I deal with a lot of teams every day in my job as a family adviser and as the publisher of The Junior Hockey News. Sometimes those dealings revolve around players, sometimes its team advertising, and sometimes its about a story.
Yesterday was the first experience I have had in dealing with the Minnesota Owls of the Minnesota Junior Hockey League as a Family Adviser.
I have a client on the Owls team who has been a key player for them this year and all of last season. A great young man, and a player who has a dream of playing NCAA hockey next year.
Many teams would not want to have a player like this leave their organization, and often times these situations can become tension filled. This was not one of those cases.
When I spoke to Owls’ General Manager Ryan Huck about promoting my client to a Tier II team, the first thing he said was; “We would never hold a player back from advancing himself”.
These are words I don’t always hear from Tier III teams who may be seeing their best player pack his bags.
A few hours later, Ryan Huck was filling out an outright release form! Thats right, no compensation required from the Tier II team calling the player up. This is a very rare thing, and it is something the Owls are committed to doing.
“The game is about developing the player and moving them on.” Said Huck. “Their success is our success, it’s a two-way street.”
Who would have thought, a Tier III team committed to the player and not the team bank account. Refreshing.
Joseph Kolodziej – Publisher
