SISEC
Thirteen feet.
Doesn’t sound like much, but in the game of hockey it’s a world of difference.
And those worlds collide in Cochrane at the Swiss International Sports and Education Centre, where international players aged 15-17 are honing their hockey skills in a North American hockey environment.
Five of those players are bringing a Russian-style game with them. It’s a game played on an ice surface 13 feet wider than the average 85-foot wide North American rink. The SISEC Russians, and the team’s other non-North American players, are now playing on a surface approximately 2,700-square-feet smaller than the rinks they left back home.
And with the smaller ice surface comes a very different style of play compared to the games played in the larger rinks.
“Different because of the physical game,” said 16-year-old SISEC forward Georgy Ostapchuk, who hails from Krasnoznamensk, just outside Moscow. “A lot of hits.”
Ostapchuk has been adapting to the smaller ice surface this season along with his fellow Russians.
“Very good hockey. Hard contact, high speed,” said 16-year-old forward Danis Farvazetdinov of Moscow. “I like it. It’s good.”
The generous international ice surface breeds a more virtuoso, individual-style of play than the pass, move, and hit system so prevalent in the North American game.
“They have the skills. Their one-on-one game is great. And they see the open ice well and attack well,” SISEC coach Topher Plonka said. “In Russia, they let them wheel it up the ice.”
But it’s Plonka’s job to introduce these athletes to the more acute confines of the North American rink and the style of play that succeeds on it.
“The biggest adjustment for them is the smaller rink. It forces you to be more physical. Their time and space is gone,” Plonka observed. “Here, they’ve got to be able to move the puck and react quicker and take hits. It was a big wake-up call for them, the physical part of the game.”
Still, he doesn’t want to coach the individual skills out of his Russian stars.
“I don’t want to hold them back. But I also want to limit them from trying to dangle through everybody.”
He appears to have struck a balance in that regard, as the team is 14-3 with one overtime loss in Canadian Sport School Hockey League play, and has won eight games, tied six more and lost 11 in Northern Alberta Midget AA Hockey League play.
Givi Shepotko, who played in the highly-regarded Moscow Dynamo program, is showing great success here, even if he’s not sold on this style of hockey.
“I think where I played, it’s better than here, basically,” said the 16-year-old Muscovite, who has 30 goals and 18 assists in 33 games. “Where I played in Moscow; very technical players. Very smart.”
Of course, the larger ice surface has something to do with it.
“More room to be creative,” he offered, while adding he’s enjoying his time with SISEC.
Fellow Muscovite Arseny Ivanov has a different take on the North American game.
“I like the smaller ice,” the 15-year-old forward said. “Better than the big ice in Russia. It’s good play.”
Goalie Mikhailo (Mike) Rudenko of Kherson, Ukraine, is in his second year with SISEC and has become very comfortable on the smaller ice. After all, the size of the net doesn’t change.
“I’m used to it. It’s faster,” he said of the pace of play here. “Canada has more team players. It’s more like a unit. Canada has the system that is better than trying to play yourself. It’s not the players who are winning, the team is winning. If the team is playing well, you’re winning.
“We’re winning a lot.”
And, big ice or small, that’s the one fundamental element in competitive hockey everywhere: When you’re winning, it’s all good.
No comments:
Post a Comment