Mound Westonka Hockey

The Mound-Westonka Hockey Association seeks to provide a community and volunteer-driven program to promote the growth and development of our players. Our Association works to promote a fun, fair, and safe environment that maximizes participation and improves players' skills while developing sportsmanship, teamwork, and self-confidence.

(ST. PAUL, MINNESOTA - January 23, 2012) -- The Minnesota Hockey Board of Directors voted unanimously at its winter board meeting to strengthen the severity of the penalty issued to players who are cited for boarding and checking-from-behind infractions.  These rule changes are being adopted on a pilot basis and will be reevaluated at the conclusion of the 2012 Minnesota Hockey season. Minnesota Hockey will continue to work with the hockey community to evaluate the effectiveness of these changes.
 
"Player safety is and always will be the highest priority of Minnesota Hockey," said Dave Margenau, President of Minnesota Hockey.  "However, as important as the rule change is, it is equally vital that the culture of hockey change to eliminate the intimidation and illegal hits.  Officials must call all illegal play and their calls must be supported by coaches, parents and players."
 
Effective Wednesday, January 25, 2012, the penalty for boarding and checking-from-behind will be a five (5) minute major penalty. This will cover all Minnesota Hockey sanctioned games played until July 31, 2012; after this time, the changes will be reviewed by the Minnesota Hockey Board of Directors.
 
Minnesota Hockey will work with its local community associations, coaches, and referees to ensure other existing rules continue to be enforced and that the rule changes will be enforced with zero tolerance. Additionally, Minnesota Hockey will continue to provide ongoing education regarding proper hockey techniques, rules and regulations. "Referees for the youth games take their role of ensuring safe and fair play seriously," said Eric Olson, Minnesota Hockey Referee in Chief. "These rule changes will be called with zero tolerance."
 
As the governing body of youth and amateur hockey in the state, Minnesota Hockey has been a national leader in creating safety initiatives for youth hockey.  In 2004 Minnesota Hockey, in collaboration with the Mayo Clinic Sports Medicine Center, introduced the Hockey Education Program (HEP).  The objective of HEP is to provide a safe and positive hockey experience by teaching hockey skills, educating parents and coaches and creating accountability through Fair Play.  Fair Play is a program that awards teams who play within the rules and respect their opponents with a league standings Fair Play point for each game, win or lose.
 
Minnesota Hockey coaches have and will continue to teach skills and techniques to ensure as safe of a playing environment as possible. Through the mandatory USA Hockey Coaching Education Program, clinics and materials provided by Minnesota Hockey, coaches are provided the training to accomplish the goal of player development.  Included in the training is a progressive approach to teaching body contact and checking. More information about these programs is available at www.usahockey.com and www.minnesotahockey.org

A big thank you to all of our 2011-12 team sponsors!  Please take some time to vist our sponsors page to see who is sponsoring and what kind of business it is.  Should the need arise, please consider using one of the MWHA sponsors.

Thank you!

Our 2012 Jamboree for Mini-Mites, Mites and U8's is scheduled for March 1st-4th. Click on the Jamboree tab to the left or the link below get all of the details. Early registration closes January 14th, 2012.

Our Jamboree has a reputation as being a ton of fun for families and players alike. 

Space is limited so register asap to guarantee your team a spot!!!!

The warming house will be open the following hours this weekend;

Friday-10:00am-9:00pm (no school)

Saturday-10:00am-9:00pm

Sunday-12:00-8:00pm

Go to the Calendar tab above and 'tag' Shirley Hills Outdoor Rink to see the schedule.  If there is NOT a practice time listed, that means the rink is open for all to enjoy.

Thank you again to the National Honor Society (NHS) students and the girls and boys hockey teams from Mound Westonka High School for volunteering their time to supervise in the warming house on Monday's, Wednesday's, Friday's, Saturday's and Sunday's.  

Please check back for future updates.

Becoming better at anything is a marathon, not a sprint. Anyone who's been around youth sports long enough knows that innate ability and the manifestation of true potential usually begin to be revealed in a child's mid to late teens; not at age eight or nine.  One of the big benefits of community-based hockey is that the A-B-C team system provides a place to play hockey for kids of different abilities at different stages of development. Too many people get hung up on the label rather than embracing the benefit of the different levels of play.

Minnesota is the last bastion of community-based hockey in the U.S.  Minnesota also had the most Division I hockey players last season, 182. Next in line was Michigan at 131, a state that has a club hockey system. While one cannot necessarily infer that Minnesota has more D-I players because the community-based system allows more late bloomers to reach their potential, one cannot rule it out either. The club hockey system tends to weed kids out at earlier and earlier ages, thereby eliminating the opportunity for potential realization in a good number of kids.

So what does this mean to you? How do you know where your child is at in potential realization? The fact is you'll never really know until you're there, so just enjoy where your child is at that moment in time. If you have an early bloomer superstar, enjoy it, it can be fun. But be ready for other players to catch up in the coming years. If your child is pretty average in the early years, embrace it and support his/her love of the game, for it is passion for the game that will be the catalyst of the late bloomer.

The article below offers a similar but different perspective on the hockey development discussion. Learn how to better support your youth athlete and have fun along the way. Playing hockey with friends doesn't stop at youth hockey -- anywhere there's ice, adult leagues and pickup games endure with players of all stripes and ages.

USA Hockey has enacted a rule change that eliminates body checking at the PeeWee level of boys hockey.  For all of the background on the subject go to the link below.