August 3, 1983
BY GARY BLOCKUS
Call Sports Writer
The dog days of August are upon us once again, and there is only one sure way to beat the heat and humidity. Ice.
Except, that is, if you’re one of the 18 boys selected to the Region II hockey team set to compete in the Keystone Games next weekend at Penn State. For those boys, ice is a Pavlovian bell for sweat and hard work.
The Region II team, which is comprised of what is considered Northeastern Pennsylvania, has been hard at work since July 23, practicing twice a week at the Allentown Ice Palace off Hanover Avenue.
Hockey in the summer? “They love it,” coach Dave Cole extolled of the boys in his charge. “They wanted to practice all summer long, but that wasn’t very practical.”
For practical purposes, the team will play an exhibition game 8 p.m. tomorrow against Coltans
Junior of the Lehigh Valley Summer Hockey League at the Ice Palace. That’s an adult team. The Region II team in question is strictly for boys 16-and-under, and no graduated high school seniors are allowed.
“We hope to give the people a good demonstration of hockey,” Cole added, who is no stranger to the frozen puck himself. Cole is better known as the bantam team coach for the Lehigh Valley Comets. The 40-year-old has played the game since his youth in Ellwood City in the western part of the state.
Three members of the Lehigh Valley Comets organization qualified for the team at tryouts in March: Tom Domin of Wescosville, Doug Paxson of Center Valley, and Linc Treadwell of Bethlehem. Two boys from the Wilkes-Barre area, one from just inside the New York border, and 12 from the Harrisburg-Hershey area also qualified for the team. Included, respectively, are Jack O’Donnell, Mark McLaughlin, Bob Miettunen, Mark Pirritano, Dave Ernst, Chip Bliss, Jim Hamarn, Brian Kreider, Dave Fahnestock, Scott Pollack, Bill Savage,
Brian Talley, Jim Illingsworth, Larry Cockrell, and Mark Hake.
Does the season, summer rather than winter, affect the boys? “Most of these boys have several years experience,” Cole continued, “at least six. They play in summer leagues, or go to one or two week summer camps.”
“I’d say they were in very good shape; it just takes practice to get your timing down.” Practice is one thing the boys don’t get enough of, mostly because it is cost-prohibitive. “It costs $80 an hour for ice time, and the boys paid $40 each for practice and practice games. They also had to buy their own jerseys for the Keystone Games, as well as meal tickets while at Penn State, which ran them an additional $75.”
The pain, the money, and the sacrifice are just one portion of advancing to the second annual Keystone Games. Pride is another.
For the public, the witnesses of these summer games, the pleasure of sitting in an air conditioned ice hockey arena should be of special significance … relief from August’s sweltering heat.
The Original (Lehigh Valley, Pennsylvania)
