From the Dog House to 'the Greatest Team Ever'Mar. 17, 2009
Junior Ryan Crapser learned an invaluable lesson Chasers team with Trinity College hockey mentors
Trinity College hockey players, juniors Joe Hanson and Ryan Crapser, are used to cold weather. After all, they play a sport on ice. But early last season, when the pair got in some hot water with their coach, David Cataruzolo, they were dealing with territory much warmer than they’re accustomed to.
“Coach was not too pleased with us,” Crapser recounted about the day he and Hanson got called into the coach’s office after ruffling a few feathers on campus. “He told us that he wanted us to be doing some community service.”
The players, feeling a little shaken up, did not take their penance lightly and immediately began a quest for a community service project that would accommodate their capabilities. That’s when Rich Petitt, manager of Trinity’s Williams Rink at the Koeppel Community Sports Center, helped find a perfect one, looking no further than the sport they know and love – ice hockey. The two jumped at the offer to help coach the Connecticut Chasers every Sunday at the rink. But what started off as nothing more than a chance for the pair to get out of their coach’s doghouse, turned into something that ended up having, what Hanson described as, “an unbelievable effect” on their lives.
This was not your ordinary coaching assignment. The Connecticut Chasers hockey team is a collection of 13 individuals that have some distinct characteristics: besides sharing enthusiasm for the sport of hockey, these players all have serious developmental disabilities, such as Down syndrome, autism, fragile x, and other serious chromosomal and neurological disorders. But when they’re on the ice, none of that gets in the way.
“I love playing hockey and spending time with the guys,” said Ryan Paggioli, one of four players on the original roster that dates back to 1996. “The Connecticut Chasers is the greatest team ever.”
Crapser and Hansen, who have played competitive hockey since they were 5 years old and began pond skating even earlier, would agree with Paggioli. That’s why they continue to volunteer with the team more than a year later (“It’s no longer an obligation,” Hanson says). And that’s why teammates, Chris Oeting, who became heavily involved this season, Naoto Hamashima, and Derek Sandberg have followed suit, not because they had to, but because they wanted to.
“This is an amazing group of guys we have the opportunity to spend time with,” Hanson said. “It’s something we look forward to every Sunday, when we can come and play hockey with these guys who remind us what it’s all about; that it’s just a game, that it’s supposed to be fun.”
Head coach Gil Perez, a Simsbury resident, has been with the team for nine years now for that very same reason.
“There is nothing better than seeing the smiles on [the players] faces when they complete a pass or score a goal” he said. “Nothing.”
Back in 1999, Perez, 36, a former hockey player and three-sport athlete at Simsbury High School, was approached by Debra McAlenney, President of the Connecticut Down Syndrome Congress and his former pre-school teacher, about coaching the Chasers. He agreed, telling McAlenney’s son, Ben, a player on the team, “Your mother used to be my teacher, now I’m going to be yours.”
Perez says the players “like to have fun and hoot and holler,” but when it comes down to learning the essentials of the game, they are attentive and interested in learning. And watching them play, you would believe that they have been listening.
“He had issues with balance when he was twelve,” McAlenney said as she watched her 25-year-old son skate along the ice, pushing his puck through a group of defenders. “Now he can skate backward.”
Kathy Dilozir says her son, John, 12, is an avid hockey fan, and has always followed the Boston Bruins very closely. His passion for the game was always fervent and sincere, but, she said, she never thought that he would one day be on the rink himself. Now, because of this team, Sundays have become his favorite day of the week.
“After two times out on the ice, he was skating on his own,” she said with a tone of disbelief. “I never would have imagined that he would be able to play. [The coaches and the Trinity players] are fabulous with them.”
The coaching has had a clear impact on the Chasers, as confirmed by these expressions of amazement. But more important than the effective coaching is the strong and genuine friendships that have developed, evident from the very first moment one witnesses their interaction.
“They’re all my best friends,” Paggioli said.
“It’s like a family,” Crapser added. “We get as much joy, we get more joy, being out there with them than they do with us.”
McAlenney sees first-hand how the relationship has helped her son and all the players on the team, more than just in their hockey skills.
“I’m so grateful to the coaches and players at Trinity,” McAlenney said. “They have helped [the players] so much with their self-confidence.”
The companionship is undeniable, and that’s why three Chasers were in attendance for Trinity’s final regular season hockey game against Castleton State, to root on their friends at the same rink they had spent so much time together. And that’s why the trio was invited back to the locker room after the game to hang out with the Trinity team, which presented the three players with hockey sticks, Gatorade and tape.
“They could not have been happier,” McAlenney added about the experience. “They were thrilled.”
Though the team took a tough 3-2 loss that night, their second loss in as many nights, Coach Cataruzolo acknowledged the importance of the Chasers’ presence in healing a team that was not at its highest emotional peak.
“We were coming off two losses, but those players came into the locker room and brought light and perspective,” he said. “They were excited about being around the players and it was really nice to see the way our guys responded. It was very special.”
No coach likes hearing negative things about their players, as Cataruzolo did last fall. But in this case, it is safe to assume that everything was worth it. He remembers the fateful day when he called Crapser and Hanson into his office to reprimand them for what he called, “boys being boys.”
“I thought it was important for them to get involved in something that would benefit others,” he said. “What’s been exciting about it for me has been watching them take something that started off as a project, and turn it into a passion. I couldn’t be more proud.”
Do Cataruzolo and the Trinity players expect their program to stay connected with the Chasers in upcoming seasons? “Definitely,” say Crapser and Hanson. “[The Chasers have] grown with the program,” Cataruzolo added, “It’s been a really great thing for our guys.”
The Chasers, equipped with uniforms and gear, took the ice at Williams Rink last Sunday, one in which the Trinity players were able to shoot some puck with their friends one final time this season. But the afternoon didn’t end when they took their skates off. Crapser and Hansen, members of the Psi Upsilon fraternity, had the team and their family members back to the fraternity house for a pizza party to celebrate a brotherhood that formed as naturally as ice melts in a territory much warmer than it’s used to.
“To the greatest team ever!” toasted Paggioli. Everyone in the room held their soda cans high in agreement. “To the greatest team ever.”
Link to online story
For a photo gallery of the Connecticut Chasers on the ice and at the pizza party with their friends from the Trinity hockey team,
visit:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/30966584@N03/sets/72157614426862394/
