USA Hockey Adult Hockey

HUH? has played in the annual Labatt Blue/USA Hockey Pond Hockey National Championships in Eagle River, Wisconsin, for the past eight years.

Every year the team signs up for the Women’s Beginner Division.

“We’re not moving up,” team member Karen Screve said as her teammates laughed.

That’s the running joke for players on HUH?. Really, why move up if you don’t have to and you’re doing well?

HUH?, which hails from Rochester, Minnesota, has become accustomed to playing well in the round-robin tournament and qualifying for the four-team playoff. However, the team always was eliminated in the semifinals. Not this year. The women advanced to the title game, where it lost 1-0 to undefeated Wicked. HUH? finished 3-2 in the eight-team division.

Still, making the playoffs isn’t the ultimate goal for HUH?.

“As long as we have fun, we don’t care if we win or lose,” Screve said.

Make no mistake, though, the team members — who range in age from their 30s to 50s — are competitive.

“We always say we don’t care, but every time we take the ice we get halfway through the game and somebody says, ‘I really want to win,’” said lone original HUH? member Danna Adair. “Then we go, ‘All right, fine.’”

Playing in the pond hockey tournament eight of its 11 years, Adair has learned a thing or two over the years.

“To exercise all year round so you’re ready for this ice,” Adair said. “New girls, we tell them, ‘Be prepared for the lake. It’s so different than playing inside. It’s so much harder.’”

Adair and Screve — who has been to seven pond events, playing in six — implemented a strategic game plan this year. With four players on the ice at one time, HUH? went with a 1-1-2 set, using a designated goalie and defensive player and having two attackers. The team’s two reserves came in for the offensive players.

The majority of teams at the Pond Hockey Championships run with the maximum of seven players. Not HUH?.

“Having another person to sub in might be good, but as long as we don’t have team drama,” Screve said.

“Team drama is the key,” added Adair.

The women don’t have any drama with their current team. Playing in a pickup co-ed league in Rochester, they have competed together and against one another for a good decade. Camaraderie and chemistry are high on HUH?.

“If it wasn’t these girls, I don’t know if I’d come,” Adair said. “These girls are the most amazing women off the ice, too.”

Getting out on the pond and playing with her teammates is a special time for Adair. It’s three days she looks forward to every year.

“It’s just a good time to let loose and be myself and not be a mom and not be a wife and not be a sister,” Adair said. “No obligation. I can take a nap if I want to take a nap. I can drink a beer whenever I want to drink a beer. I can come down and watch hockey leisurely without a kid of mine being on the ice.”

Screve also keeps returning to Dollar Lake in Eagle River to hang out with her friends.

“The atmosphere, the fun,” Screve said. “It’s just a great weekend to get away and party and play some hockey.”

Story from Red Line Editorial, Inc.