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From crying goalie to bench boss, meet Detroit’s Jason McCrimmon

23 Wednesday Nov 2016

Posted by William Douglas in Uncategorized

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Amherst College, Cameron Burt, Detroit, Detroit Hockey Association, Jason McCrimmon, Tarasai Karega, University of Massachusetts-Boston

Jason McCrimmon wasn’t feeling it.

His mother enrolled him in a Detroit ice hockey program, but the-then three-year-old McCrimmon was hardly enthused about his visits to chilly Jack Adams Arena .

“My brothers played – I hated it,” McCrimmon told me recently. “I used to cry the whole time. It was cold, I started out as a goalie. I’m standing in one spot, I’m cold, my feet hurt.”

McCrimmon eventually got out of the net to play forward and defense. He developed into a player, and a pretty good one, too. Still, he quit the sport at 16, opting to do what teenagers like to do.

But an epiphany brought him back to frozen pond.

Motor City Hawks Head Coach/Co-Owner Jason McCrimmon working the bench during a USPHL's game.

Motor City Hawks Head Coach/Co-Owner Jason McCrimmon working the bench during a USPHL’s game.

“My father passed away when I was 18. He was the guy that if I scored two goals ‘Why didn’t you have three?’” he said. “I used to hate for him to come to the games. I had a dream when I was 20 years old. He told me to get back into the game.”

Today, the kid who used to cry in goal now barks orders from behind the bench as head coach and part owner of the Motor City Hawks of the U.S. Premier Hockey League, a Tier III junior league where players showcase their talents for college or major junior hockey programs.

McCrimmon is a double-rarity – one of the few black head coaches and team owners in hockey at any level.

He’s part of a small class that includes David L. Steward, a part owner of the National Hockey League’s St. Louis Blues; Khalil Thomas, head coach, general manager, and co-owner of the Oshawa RiverKings of the Greater Metro Junior A Hockey League in Canada; and Darren Lowe , who’s in his 22nd season as head coach of the University of Toronto’s men’s hockey team.

McCrimmon is also president and founder of  Detroit Ice Dreams, a non-profit organization that tries to increase minority participation in hockey and figure skating by lowering the main barriers to the sports – access and cost.

Flint Firebirds defenseman Jalen Smereck, Detroit native, works out with Jason McCrimmon during the summer. Smereck thinks McCrimmon is college or major junior coaching material (Photo/Aaron Bell/OHL Images).

Flint Firebirds defenseman Jalen Smereck, Detroit native, works out with Jason McCrimmon during the summer. Smereck thinks McCrimmon is college or major junior coaching material (Photo/Aaron Bell/OHL Images).

After having that dream about his tough-love hockey dad, McCrimmon contacted the coaches of the Belle Tire’s junior hockey program to ask for a tryout and a path back into the game.

That began a hockey journey that included stops at the University of Massachusetts-Boston, the Mississippi RiverKings of the old Central Hockey League, the Flint Generals of the defunct International Hockey League, and  Hela-Kieko in Finland, where McCrimmon was a high-scoring defenseman and team captain.

Detroit is known for building cars. But the Motor City is also gaining a reputation for building black successful hockey players.

McCrimmon has played with, against, or coached the likes of defenseman Cameron Burt, a former Rochester Institute of Technology star who’s currently skating for Starbulls Rosenheim in Germany and Tarasai Karega, a former Ms. Michigan hockey  award winner who went onto become one of the first black women to win an NCAA hockey title while playing for Amherst College.

“She was one of the best players to come out of the Detroit Hockey Association  – period,” McCrimmon said. “She’s very dangerous. When I played at UMass-Boston, we used to play Amherst. We came down for a two-night series against their male team and I saw her play. She was literally tearing apart the league.”

Motor City Hawks Head Coach/Co-Owner Jason McCrimmon (center) with Hawks forward Justin Session (left) and Flint Firebirds defenseman Jalen Smereck (right), an Arizona Coyotes signee.

Motor City Hawks Head Coach/Co-Owner Jason McCrimmon (center) with Hawks forward Justin Session (left) and Flint Firebirds defenseman Jalen Smereck (right), an Arizona Coyotes signee.

During hockey’s off-season, McCrimmon trains Jalen Smereck, a fellow Detroit native who’s a defenseman for the Ontario Hockey League’s  Flint Firebirds. Smereck recently signed a three-year entry level deal with the NHL’s Arizona Coyotes.

“Having grown up in Detroit, he’s pretty hard on us, making sure we’re always on top of our business and also making sure we as teenagers and young adults come back to help the young kids, teach them how we were taught,” Smereck told me recently. “I definitely think he’d be a good coach at a higher level, not only because he played at a pretty high level, but the way that he coaches, his love for the game, his care for the game. I think he can take players a long way.”

But McCrimmon isn’t thinking about going anywhere right now. There’s too much to do in Motown.

“I’ve had opportunities in the last two years, probably a total of seven different colleges,” he said. “I love being here in Detroit , I’m happy what I’m doing. I want to expand the Motor City Hawks as well as expand our non-profit Ice Dreams. Whatever comes from there, if I get something big that I can’t turn down, we’ll cross that bridge when it happens.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Hockey sends Jalen Smereck from one Motown to another

05 Sunday Jul 2015

Posted by William Douglas in Uncategorized

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Cameron Burt, Detroit Hockey Association, Hockey is for Everyone, Oshawa Generals, Tarasai Karega

Jalen Smereck hopes to move from one Motor City to another.

The Detroit native has committed to the defending Memorial Cup champion Oshawa Generals this coming season. A left-shooting defenseman, Smereck was drafted by the Ontario Hockey League Generals in 2013 with the 299th overall pick.

He played for the Bloomington Thunder after that team selected him in the first round with the 18th overall pick of the 2014 United States Hockey League Phase II Draft. He scored three goals and 15 assists in 51 games for the Thunder in 2014-15. He also played two games for the Odessa Jackalopes of the North American Hockey League and tallied one assist.

“Jalen was a draft pick of ours a couple of years ago and he has continued to develop as a player over the past couple of years,” Oshawa General Manager Ron Hunt said. “Mike Kelly (the Generals’ director of hockey operations) and I watched him play for the Bloomington Thunder this past year and feel he is ready to make the jump to the OHL.”

Jalen Smereck hopes to crack the Oshawa Generals lineup in 2015-16.

Jalen Smereck hopes to crack the Oshawa Generals lineup in 2015-16.

Smereck reports to Oshawa’s training camp at Oshawa’s General Motors Centre at the end of the summer. If his makes the roster, he will move 260 miles from America’s Motor City to the self-proclaimed automotive capital of Canada.

Smereck, 18, is an alum of the Detroit Hockey Association, a program affiliated with the National Hockey League’s “Hockey is for Everyone” initiative which provides kids of all backgrounds the opportunity to learn and play hockey at little or no cost. In return, program participants must stay in school and maintain good grades.

The DHA has produced several hockey players of color who’ve gone on to play in college and professional leagues.

Tarasai Karega, one of the first black women to win an NCAA hockey championship, and Cameron Burt, a defenseman for the ECHL’s Florida Everblades and former Rochester Institute of Technology star, are among the program’s graduates.

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“Hockey is for Everyone” is managing to build good people and good hockey players

31 Wednesday Dec 2014

Posted by William Douglas in Uncategorized

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American Hockey League, Cameron Burt, ECHL, Ed Snider Youth Hockey Foundation, Gerald Coleman, Hockey is for Everyone, Tampa Bay Lightning, Tarasai Karega

Listen to National Hockey League Commissioner Gary Bettman or anyone else connected with the league’s “Hockey is for Everyone” initiative and they’ll tell you that its goal is to build good people over building good hockey players.

“As nice as it would be to have graduates of these programs actually play in college (or the pros), the fact that there are children in these programs who stay in school and go to college is more important than whether or not they’re actually still playing because to me this is about life’s lessons,” Bettman told me in 2011.

But it seems that “Hockey is for Everyone” is doing both. Designed to expose boys and girls from all backgrounds to hockey and use the sport as a tool to encourage them to thrive in school, the more than 30 programs under the “Hockey is for Everyone” umbrella are also doing a pretty decent job of producing players good enough to skate for college hockey teams at all levels – and beyond.

Detroit Hockey Association alum Cameron Burt earned a scholarship to RIT...

Detroit Hockey Association alum Cameron Burt earned a scholarship to RIT…

Over the years, several graduates of “Hockey is for Everyone” programs and its precursor NHL Diversity initiative have made it onto NCAA hockey rosters, college and university club hockey teams, minor league squads, and even to the NHL for a hot minute.

“Hockey’s been good to me,” Cameron Burt, a defenseman for the ECHL’s Florida Everblades told me recently. “It’s gotten me to places I would have never gone.”

Indeed, hockey has taken Burt a long way since the day his mother enrolled him in the Detroit Hockey Association. The instruction and nurturing the program provided helped land him a hockey scholarship at the Rochester Institute of Technology, which in turn helped him embark on a professional career that he hopes will lead to a spot in the NHL.

“It was good for me,” Burt said of his DHA experience. “I still look back at pictures of me playing in early years. It gave us an outlet to do something different. It was something that was ours right there in the city and no one could take it away from us. It was the best place for me to start.”

...which helped launch Burt's pro career. He's a defenseman for the ECHL's Florida Everblades (Photo/Al Larson).

…which helped launch Burt’s pro career. He’s a defenseman for the ECHL’s Florida Everblades (Photo/Al Larson).

Burt has two goals and 15 assists in 22 games for the Everblades this season. He tallied 43 goals and 95 assists in four seasons at Division I Rochester from 2008-09 to 2011-12. The 2009-10 season was especially sweet for Burt because RIT played in the NCAA Frozen Four tournament, held that year in hometown Detroit at Ford Field.

About 173 miles separate Estero, Fla., home of Burt’s Everblades, and Orlando, Fla., the new home of Tarasai Karega, yet the distance in the Sunshine State can’t melt the ties that bind the two hockey players.

Like Burt, Karega got her hockey start with the Detroit Hockey Association, where the the two developed a friendship. Like Burt, hockey provided a collegiate path for Karega.

She attended Amherst College in Massachusetts, where she was a standout for the NCAA Division III Lord Jeffs. She was named first team New England Small College Athletic Conference in 2006-07 as a sophomore and notched 61 goals and 51 assists in 110 games during her collegiate career while maintaining a 3.34 grade-point average.

Detroit Hockey Association grad Tarasai Karega, right, earned an NCAA title with Amherst College.

Detroit Hockey Association grad Tarasai Karega, right, earned an NCAA title with Amherst College.

In the 2008-09 season Karega became one of the first black women to win an NCAA hockey title when the Lord Jeffs won the Division III crown.

After college, Karega moved to Philadelphia where she served as hockey operations coordinator for the Ed Snider Youth Hockey Foundation, a “Hockey is for Everyone” affiliate created by the founder of the Philadelphia Flyers.

Today, she’s a  premium guest services representative for the National Basketball Association’s Orlando Magic. She still keeps up with hockey, attending ECHL Orlando Solar Bears games.

Gerald Coleman’s NHL career was fleeting – 43 minutes over two games in goal for the Tampa Bay Lightning in 2005-06 – but significant nonetheless. He was the first NHL Diversity alum to play in the league.

Gerald Coleman played less than an hour over 2 NHL games but his time in goal was historic.

Gerald Coleman played less than an hour over 2 NHL games but his time in goal was historic.

Coleman played in the program in Evanston, Ill., as a teenager while also playing for a AA travel team. Playing AA hockey was more challenging, Coleman said, but the NHL Diversity program provided him with a comfort zone from those who questioned why a 6-foot- five-inch black kid would want to play a predominantly white sport like hockey.

“I felt at home when I was with that group,” Coleman told me recently. “When I was playing with my travel team, I had racial slurs hurled against me from parents, from the kids. They always looked down upon me because I was different from everyone else.”

Coleman’s skill caught the attention of the London Knights of the Ontario Hockey League. After three seasons in net for the major junior hockey team, the Lightning took Coleman in the seventh round with the 224th pick in the 2003 NHL Draft.

Coleman’s NHL stat line is scant – two games, 43 minutes, two goals against, 2.77 goals-against average, .882 save percentage – but he enjoyed a lengthy minor league hockey career. He spent nine seasons stopping pucks for 10 ECHL and American Hockey League teams.

“Even though I didn’t make it in the NHL, at least I made it a lot farther than I could have done in my life,” Coleman said.

Chronic hip problems forced Coleman to retire in August at the age of 29, but his career ended on a high note. He helped guide the Alaska Aces to ECHL’s Kelly Cup. Coleman’s hip pain helped inspire his post-playing career path – to become a physical therapist.

NHL Diversity alum Gerald Coleman finished his hockey career on top - winning the ECHL Kelly Cup in 2013-14.

NHL Diversity alum Gerald Coleman finished his hockey career on top – winning the ECHL Kelly Cup in 2013-14.

“I’m going to start going to school in January and I’m working at a rehab facility in Chicago. Over the last three years with my injuries, I was in  rehab for six months every  summer. I know the ins and outs of it. I know it could lead me back to hockey, if not coaching.”

Coleman, Karega, and Burt say they keep tabs on their old hockey programs and are proud to see “Hockey is for Everyone” alums continuing their progress educationally while keeping their passion for playing the game.

Elmira College hockey player and Fort Dupont alum Donnie Shaw III, left, helps out  at his old rink.

Elmira College hockey player and Fort Dupont alum Donnie Shaw III, left, helps out at his old rink.

Four of Karega’s former charges from Snider Hockey are playing for college teams this season: Elizabeth and Kimberly Feeney on the University of Pennsylvania’s American Collegiate Hockey Association Division III club team; Alivia Bates at NCAA Division III Plymouth State University in New Hampshire; and Saidie Lopez on New Jersey’s Rowan University women’s hockey club.

Sixteen other Snider Hockey alums tried out for college club hockey teams at local Temple University, Drexel University and West Chester University.

Malik Garvin,  a forward who got his hockey start with New York’s Ice Hockey in Harlem, is enjoying his first season playing for Division III Western New England University in Massachusetts.

Devan Abercrombie, a former member of Washington’s Fort Dupont Hockey Club, is a freshman forward for St. Joseph University’s club hockey team in Philadelphia.

He’s attending St. Joe’s on a full four-year ride as a 2014 NHL/Thurgood Marshall College Fund scholarship recipient. The scholarship is awarded annually to academically-eligible “Hockey is for Everyone” participants.

Donnie Shaw III, another Fort Dupont alum and a 2013 NHL/Thurgood Marshall College Fund scholarship recipient, is a sophomore at Elmira College in New York and plays for the Soaring Eagles NCAA Division III junior varsity team.

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