by Mike Doherty

The year was 1967, and against the better judgment of most of his peers, Bowling Green State University President William Jerome decided to add to campus, of all things, an ice arena. Hockey aficionado Donald Ragusa, a professor of psychology here since Jerome’s fateful decision, recalls, "The reaction was definitely negative. The faculty -- everyone -- was opposed to construction. They couldn’t conceive what value an ice arena could be in Northwest Ohio. The opposition was at least 80/20 -- probably more like 90/10." Seventeen years later, Ragusa watched his son Damon skate on a Bowling Green High School hockey team that coasted to its second state championship of the 1980’s. That same month, on March 26, Gino Cavallini ended the now-fabled, four-overtime NCAA championship game in Lake Placid, N.Y. Suddenly, windswept Bowling Green was the ice hockey capital of the United States. What happened? The transformation certainly didn't happen overnight. Don Ragusa remembers, "The first five or six years nobody in town even knew the Arena was out there." The University hockey program began Feb. 25, 1967, with a practically unnoticed 8-5 Falcon victory over Illinois-Chicago Circle; the program joined the ranks of intercollegiate varsity in 1969-70. Their high school counterparts also began as a club sport, but following a 30-4 record as a club team in 1973-74, the Bobcats also decided to grant their icers varsity status. Yet as the relatively young Ice Arena enters its third decade, the terms "Bowling Green" and "hockey" have become inseparably intertwined. Witness the flourishing youth program and the consistent championship level attained by both the high school and university teams. Finally, realize that not once, not twice, but five times, the hockey fans of Bowling Green have watched a hometown boy rise through the ranks to play hockey for the Falcons. Not coincidentally, two of those five played on the remarkable 1984 BGHS Bobcat championship club. BGHS coach Randy Sokoll, now in his sixth year, was able to field a 1984 squad that included the school’s all-time leading scorer, Tom Shirkey, who skated with the 1984-85 Falcon icers, and current Falcon Steve Dickinson, who spent his senior year breaking the national high school record for goals in a season. Dickinson found the back of the net 65 times in just 28 games. It should be no surprise, then, that the ‘Cat icers finished the year at 30-1; their only loss came, without Dickinson, to eventual Michigan state champ Ann Arbor Pioneer. Dickinson describes the championship season this way: "There was some kind of atmosphere there. We didn’t lose ever. We had six seniors, all with about 50 points or more -- I don’t think that will happen again for quite a few years, though I think it will happen again." Shirkey agrees, saying, "We were much more dominating than the other teams in the league. Randy did a really good job with us. Just look at his record as a high school coach." Sokoll’s numbers read 126-36-5, including a 20-10-2 mark with the 1986-87 Bobcat icers. This past season’s ten losses are deceiving though, as the ‘Cats rebounded from a 6-8-1 start to become Sokoll’s third "Final Four" team, only to fall in the state semifinals to eventual state champ Cleveland Heights. Sokoll, a former Michigan State Spartan captain who skated in the first ever BGSU/MSU matchup, has the best record in a long line of BGHS coaches that includes former Falcons Ted Sator (now with the Buffalo Sabres), Tom Olsen and Paul Titanic. Sokoll has done his best to maintain the strong ties between Bobcat and Falcon hockey by employing on-ice assistants such as Wayne Wilson, Wayne Collins and Eddie Powers, all three members of the 1984 Falcon national championship team. Powers is another of the hometown products who has played for Coach Jerry York’s Falcon squad after leaving the high school with a state championship trophy. The other two hometown players, Mark Mazur and Danny Brown, played for Ron Mason, York’s predecessor at the Ice Arena who is now coaching at Michigan State. After playing on the BGHS 1979-80 state champion team in his sophomore year, Powers won a starting job on the high school squad and went on to be named All-State as a senior. However, he remembers being "really unsure what I was going to do past that. I wanted to play hockey and I wanted to play [at Bowling Green], but I wasn’t sure if I was good enough. Coach York had wanted to send me up to Stratford (to play Junior B hockey), but [BG] didn’t have a third goalie that year. So they asked me to stay." The decision worked out for the best, as Falcon mentor York recalls, "Eddie did a fine job for us. He stepped in at certain times to play goalie and performed well." Shirkey says, "Eddie is a phenomenal case because he really only started one year at the high school level. Then when (Gary) Kruzich and (Wayne) Collins both were hurt, he came in and did a really standout job." Sokoll, who coached Powers in the goalie’s senior year of high school, relates, "I was glad to see him get the chance because he’d paid his dues out there facing shots in practice. He played a real role in the national championship.' Powers’ brief mid-season stint as the Falcons’ starting goalie included a key win at Western Michigan, and as Sokoll speculates, "Had they not won that game, they might not have gotten a [NCAA Tournament] bid. Who knows? Eddie’s got a championship ring, and he really earned it." Shirkey and Dickinson, like Powers, helped win a hockey championship for the high school and later joined their fellow "townie" in the ranks of the Falcon varsity. Yet they took different roads in accomplishing what York calls "a great, great thing. There’s an awful lot of roadblocks standing in the way of making our club in any year at all." The Falcon coach explains, "Where we are in Division I -- generally and for the foreseeable future one of the top teams -- makes it even more significant that (they came) out of this community to make our team." Tom Shirkey started skating at age six and playing hockey at eight. He went through every possible level in the Bowling Green Youth Hockey Association (BGYHA) save the Atom division (ages 5-6), by playing Mites (7-9), Squirt (10-11), Peewee (12 -13) and Bantam (14-15) before joining the high school varsity his sophomore year. Shirkey spent most of those years playing with the youth leagues’ "travel teams," which he says are "like All-Star teams" -- these teams were generally successful, travelling as far as Indianapolis and Detroit. "For a 10-year-old," recalls Shirkey, "that’s a pretty long trip to play hockey." Nonetheless, he says, "Coming through the system in Bowling Green was a definite advantage, because we’d basically have the same players together for a number of years. My squirt team when I was 10 made up at least half of the high school team when I was 18." One of the "other half" of that high school team was Dickinson, who chose a different route from Mites to the high school. After skating his first two years with the BGYHA, he left to play with Toledo community teams for six years before returning to the high school for his final two years of eligibility. "My first year in Toledo," he recalls, "I deserved to make the team, but I was practically the worst player in the league." He credits the higher level of competition in the Glass City for his rapid improvement. In his final year of youth play, Dickinson scored a remarkable 72 goals. He admits that he needed time to adjust to joining a high school team that had been skating together for years but obviously the transition worked well enough, as he and Shirkey in their two years together on the Bobcats combined for 190 goals and another 190 assists. Yet, after high school the linemates took diverging paths once again in continuing their hockey careers. Shirkey made what he calls "a Grand Canyon leap" from the high school team right onto the Falcon squad while Dickinson followed graduation with a year in Stratford, Ontario playing Junior B hockey. Coincidentally, one of his Stratford teammates was current Falcon teammate Nelson Emerson, 1987 Central Collegiate Hockey Association freshman of the year. Shirkey, like Powers, made the high school-to-college transition immediately but, unlike the goalie, never even thought about a year in Canada. He explains, "I really didn’t have any plans to play college hockey after high school, but coming out my senior year, Coach York called me up and told me to try out. Once you get offered a tryout, you’re certainly not going to turn it down!" Sokoll, for one, was not surprised by his former Most Valuable Player’s ability to make the jump, as he describes Shirkey as "the hardest working kid I’ve ever had ... really a pleasure to coach. The consummate team player." Though Dickinson’s route to the Falcon team set him back a year in school (he is now a sophomore to Shirkey’s junior status), he has enjoyed a level of success surpassing that of his old linemate. York is clearly optimistic about Dickinson’s future with the university team, as he says, "He’s going to be the best by far of all the players to have come through here (from Bowling Green). He’s really shown some rapid improvement. The coaching staff, myself in particular, is really impressed with the strides he’s shown. I think he’ll be a factor on this team in the next couple of years." Dickinson’s chance to contribute came a little earlier than he expected and in a way that no one who knew him as a scoring machine in high school would have predicted. The longtime forward found himself on the ice in this March’s NCAA playoff series against Harvard in the unlikely position of defenseman. He skated on Bowling Green power plays, in what may be a preview of his role for next year’s icers. How much difference did the year in Stratford make for Dickinson? He explains, "in high school I could basically do what I wanted on the ice, and I went to juniors and played with a bunch of kids who were equal to me or better. Up there, if you don’t cover your man, it’s your mistake -- you’re responsible. There’s a lot more hitting, and everyone’s moving a lot quicker. I learned a whole new system. I never had to check in high school -- all I wanted was the puck.. In juniors, I learned to check and to get in the corners." Shirkey is aware of his former teammate’s improvement, as he notes, "Playing juniors helped Steve a lot. He’s more team-oriented, and he has a better understanding of the game." Further, Shirkey admits that he lacked some of Dickinson’s advantages: "The competition in [Ohio's high school leagues] is weak at best. There’s really no comparison with the guys from juniors who are not only probably more talented, but they’ve been playing against top-notch competition. Some are now even pros." Sokoll, a former member of the Detroit Red Wings organization, agrees that Dickinson’s choice was probably for the best. "Very frankly," Sokoll says, "I don’t think that Ohio high school hockey is the best developmental grounds for the prospective collegiate player. For someone that really aspires to play Division I, the avenue to go is to play on a top-level junior team in Detroit or Canada. That’s a viable option for players." Tim Hack, a member of the Falcons’ 1984 championship season, who still resides in Bowling Green, agrees. "The high school here only plays half of its games against quality competition. The other half ... well, it’s fun to win like that, but they had to call some games after the second period. You’re not learning anything." For Hack, a Saskatchewan native, things were different. "From the time I was 14," the former Falcon wing recalls, "I did nothing but hockey from September to the end of March. The year I was 17, I missed being on the ice four days, and that includes Christmas and Thanksgiving." While Shirkey acknowledged the importance of academics in his high school and collegiate careers, Hack says he grew up in Canada learning a different emphasis. "When I played juniors," he says, "that was the most important thing in my life. Don’t get me wrong; I mean I wanted to do well in school, but it was all travel, play, practice. I’d miss six weeks of school; it was almost like a job." Hack, nonetheless, left the University with an accounting degree stamped summa cum laude. While the development that takes place in high school and juniors is important, the most crucial learning stages are the earlier ones. The Bowling Green Youth Hockey Association that produced Shirkey, Powers and, to a lesser extent, Dickinson is still going strong. Jack Mynatt, a University professor of psychology, is currently coaching his son Ian’s Mites team. He explains the phenomenal popularity of youth hockey in this area of Ohio: "They’ve kept a clear focus on their goals, which is to let the kids have fun. Everybody gets to play the same amount. In the house leagues (as opposed to travel teams), they don’t even keep league standings." He is quick to add that everyone keeps track of their team’s standings anyway, just before Ian exclaims, "We’re in first place this year!" The elder Mynatt is pleased that in the house league he coaches in, "They’ve focused the program so the average kid can go get something out of playing. Kids can just go out there and run into each other and have a pretty good time." However, even on the "All-Star" travel teams, the stress is not on winning. Hack who currently coaches the Squirt travel squad says, "We work on fundamentals and team play. We emphasize that and then hope they can do it in a game." Hack also plays down the supposed talent difference between the Detroit Adre AA league in which his BG team plays and the Canadian leagues he grew up playing in. "The players in the Adre league are as good or better competition at 10 or 11 as I played at that age," he says. While the former Falcon suggests that Bowling Green hockey may be turning into something of an "extension of hockey in Detroit," his team is comprised mostly of BG natives. Hack says, "The team I have here reminds me of the teams I played on (at that age) -- a couple of good kids, a couple of weaker players." He bemoans the fact that his team often plays stronger clubs. He adds though, "This is their first exposure to that league, and they’re a step behind. In a couple of years, they’ll play those same kids in Detroit even." Powers believes that the major reason Bowling Green-based teams are rising to a level competitive with what York calls "hockey hotbeds," such as Detroit, is the fact that the program is starting to perpetuate itself, particularly in the area of coaching. Powers points out, "A lot of people like myself, Tom, Steve and Tim Hack are all coaching now. These are people that are a lot more knowledgeable about the game. Most of our coaches were just parents. They didn’t know that much about hockey. I can see us developing better players now because of the knowledgeable coaches that we have." Hack agrees, saying, "I give the Bowling Green parents a lot of credit for trying and for spending time with their kids, but a lot of them never played the game. They don’t know the purposes of the drills, and if a parent can’t quite do it right, it’s tough to show a kid." Of course, many parents such as Mynatt are still active with the BGYHA, and Sokoll recognizes the importance of the "hockey parent" factor to the program. "The parents might start as fans, then get involved. When parents are interested, the kids are interested," he concludes. The original interest, though, is most often sparked by the incredible success of the much more visible University team. Sokoll knows this and explains, "The fact that we’ve got a college team right here that is very successful maintains a high level of interest. The kids here in Bowling Green can come see college hockey at its finest and then aspire to play." Powers adds, "There’s so much that Bowling Green hockey has to offer. It’s appealing to kids. When they see the Falcons, they say, 'Mom, I want a pair of skates. I want to go out and do that stuff.'" And Coach Mynatt sees a social network revolving around hockey for the youth of the town. "You’ve got all these kids -- all of Ian’s buddies -- where the really big thing to do, even at Ian’s age, is to watch hockey games over at the University," he says. The idea of role models persists even at the high school level. Current BGHS sophomore Justin O’Connor -- who Sokoll compares favorably to a young Shirkey -- relates to looking up to Falcons like Iain Duncan and Paul Ysebaert, and also to Dickinson and Shirkey who not long ago wore the same red and white BGHS jerseys Justin and his teammates now do. Of the admiration, Dickinson says "That’s a great honor to have, when you have any kind of player look up to you." He admits, "I check in the papers to see how they [the BGHS team] are doing." While the high school players look up to their Falcon counterparts, the role model idea carries to still another level. Sokoll explains, "There’s only one high school in Bowling Green so we’re still covered by the paper, and like the college team, we’re generally successful. Kids in the sixth, seventh and eighth grades are aiming to one day play high school hockey." Ian Mynatt for one proclaims, "I think it’d be great to play hockey in high school!" Current ‘Cat icers can certainly relate to the youth looking up to them. O’Connor, for instance, watched his brothers play, while teammate Andrew Moore, a senior forward, remembers, "Ever since I’ve been little, it’s been a dream of mine to play on the high school hockey team and win a state championship." Not just to play -- but to win. Perhaps therein lies the secret behind the remarkable popularity of hockey in the community of Bowling Green. Ragusa remembers when being a hockey fan was the exception rather than the rule. "In the first few years, the stands at (Falcon) games were half empty. But as the stands filled, local people got turned on to hockey, and it grew from there because it’s a winner. It’s unique, and it’s something we became good at on all levels. Young Moore adds, "We’re watching some of the best hockey in the country here. It’s pretty much a hockey town." The BG native who has experienced the most individual and team success at all levels of hockey is Dickinson. He has played on no less than five state championship teams at five different levels, including the 1984 BGHS championship, and this year added a CCHA regular season trophy to his collection. In fact, the only level of hockey in which Dickinson did not win a championship was with his first Mites team in the BGYHA, where his coach, coincidentally, was Don Ragusa. Powers’ hockey memories go back even further, and again, the presence of skating parents was a key element. "My father was always out at the Ice Arena and my mother was a figure skater," he recalls. "They’d take me out there when I was a baby, age two or three. I started skating when I was four years old and playing hockey at the age of five." Hack understands the parental viewpoint, saying, "Hey, if I had a kid and I was getting involved with watching hockey, I’d want him to start playing too." The senior Mynatt thinks the youth hockey program is anxious to keep the parental connections strong. "In Ian’s first few years, I did little things. They try to get the parents involved as much as they can. When you sign your kid up, they pass this paper out asking what you’re willing to do. This sounds kind of hokey, but I wanted to put something back into the program." The program is perpetuating itself as both parents and former players remain anxious to contribute. The main impetus, again, is success. Mynatt admits his interest is sparked by winning: "I don’t think there’s another university in the state which has been as successful at a sport. Year in, year out, we’re ranked in the top five. Not even Ohio State football can say that." Another BG "hockey parent," Rick Barker currently watches his son, Rick, Jr., play for the Blue Streaks Mites house league team, and he glows about the BGYHA. "I can’t say any bad things about the youth program. The kids learn responsibility. It’s good exercise, and it’s good for them physically and mentally," the senior Barker says. He is more than willing to credit much of the success to the fact that "there are a lot of caring parents in this community." This claim is backed by Powers’ emphatic, "I’d match this town and its community support against any other hockey town in the country." Rick, Jr., meanwhile says, "Hockey is very challenging. It’s hard because you’re on skates and you’re trying to shoot this puck which is so little, but it gives you a good workout." Besides a good workout, there is another important reason hockey is popular with the youth of Bowling Green. As York describes, "The youth have become involved in hockey here because of the age in which organized hockey starts is like six years old. There’s no other activity that can keep young kids involved in a sport -- at least in this area -- that doesn’t start until later on." The Falcon, coach adds, "My own son is seven and wants to play a sport and get involved, but he has to wait for basketball or soccer, and there’s no Pop Warner football here at all." Interestingly, Brendan York is following in his father’s footsteps of contributing to the legacy of successful Bowling Green hockey. The younger York was a member of the Bowling Green Peewee Travel hockey team that won the Ohio state AA championship last month by defeating Dayton, 5-3. Even when other options become available, many youths stay with hockey. Bobcat senior Moore echoes Shirkey’s words about skating together for years, gesturing to teammates O’Connor and John Bartlett and exclaiming, "God, I’ve been playing with these guys all my life!" And O’Connor remembers, "A lot of players on our team played basketball, too, but when we had to make a choice, everybody chose hockey." Another major factor in the choice is the ice time available to BG natives that is not an option to players as close as Toledo. Shirkey explains, "With the University having such a nice facility and so much available ice time, there was a definite benefit for us. In high school, we practiced every day, and many teams in Toledo only get one or two days a week in two-hour blocks." Nonetheless, Hack believes that if Bowling Green hockey is to continue its remarkable progress of the last 20 years, then the ice time now available to the youth leagues is not enough. In his hometown, his youth teams benefited from six hours of ice time per week on their home ice. Here, his squirt team struggles to find practice time in the Ice Arena’s busy schedule, and he believes, "Kids just aren’t going to get as much out of a practice at six or seven in the morning," a common time for his team to have. Dickinson says, "The best thing about coming to high school was getting on the ice every day." However, the Bobcat varsity skate only 45 minutes daily, far less than players of similar age levels receive in Canada or other American "hockey hotbeds" like Boston or Minneapolis. Is there a solution to this increasing problem of demand for ice time? Hack thinks so. "This town really needs another facility, even if it’s just a barn with ice," he says. York concurs, noting the true isolation of the Ice Arena. "You move 20 miles east or west of here, and there’s no hockey at all. If you get off the wrong exit on I-75 and go to Clyde or somewhere, it’s all basketball." Nonetheless, he’s not expecting immediate expansion, explaining, "I think we’ll just stay where we are. Will there be rinks in [nearby small towns] Fremont or Napoleon? I don’t see that." Dickinson, though, seems more inclined to agree with Hack, saying "More kids are getting involved in youth hockey. If they’d build another facility, even more people might get interested. People don’t really want to practice at six in the morning." Maybe President Jerome knew something back in 1967 that the 90% of faculty opposing him could not foresee. Somehow, the Ice Arena has not only become a focal point of the University, but also for all of Bowling Green. Now the first generation of Bowling Green hockey players -- the Dickinsons, Powers’ and Shirkeys -- can actually talk about needing a second facility. Whether another rink in Bowling Green is a realistic goal is immaterial. Bowling Green hockey will continue to prosper as long as the Ian Mynatts and Brendan Yorks of the BGYHA continue to dream of winning a state championship for Bowling Green High School and the Justin O’Connors at the high school continue to strive to someday wear the orange and brown of the Falcons. As Powers concludes, "There’s no replacement for winning. That’s when people want to play on your team. When people think of Bowling Green, they think of hockey." The system is set in an ever-strengthening cycle of self-perpetuation. © 1987, Michael E. Doherty, Jr.