It feels like it’s been an eternity since the Greenfield hockey team won the state championship last March.
The Green Wave defeated Lunenburg for the 3A State Title — the first ever in program history — but just two days after the victory, the world came to halt. Greenfield was one of the only schools to actually win a state championship during the 2019-20 winter season, as many other tournaments were still ongoing when the pandemic shut everything down.
Having a high school hockey season this time around was up in the air for a while, but the Greenfield School Committee passed a motion to approve competitions, as long as state guidelines haven’t changed for athletic competition by the end of January. The Wave took to the ice at Collins-Moylan Arena Monday for the first time as a team since that victory over Lunenburg, and they’re scheduled to play their first game Jan. 30 against Chicopee.
“We’re very excited,” Greenfield head coach Adam Bouchard said. “Every coach and student athlete is excited for the opportunity to play. We were lucky to play in the tournament last year, then the world got shut down on us two days later.”
There won’t be any postseason tournaments this season, so Greenfield won’t have a chance to repeat this season. Still, the Wave are just happy to be able to take the ice, particularly with the entire team taking part.
Every local school that’s in the program’s co-op is currently back, meaning students from Athol, Franklin Tech, Frontier, Mahar, Mohawk Trail, Pioneer and Turners Falls are all allowed to practice with the team, though some players are waiting for their respective school boards to vote whether they’ll be allowed to participate in games.
“Getting the whole program back together means a whole lot more than just playing hockey,” Bouchard said. “We’re one big Green Wave hockey family, so if some of us couldn’t play it would have been difficult to participate without some of our family.”
Greenfield has been practicing in person all week, preparing to play its first game on Jan. 30. So far everything has gone well, and confidence remains high that a season will happen.
“The practices have been split up because of the number of kids you can have on the ice at one time,” Greenfield athletic director Mike Kuchieski said. “Everything has been going smoothly. We’ve told the kids if we do things safely, we’ll be having a season. Hockey is one of the sports we can do safely, it’s been being played around here since August, so I think it’s one that can go.”
A series of modifications have been put in to make the season as safe as possible. One of the more noticeable gameplay changes will come during faceoffs. Players lined up opposite each other in the circle must be six feet apart and face in the direction of the faceoff location.
Scrums against the boards this season won’t be the same as years past, as only one offensive player and one defensive player are permitted in any scrum along the edges. A third participant in any scrum, from either team, will cause an immediate whistle and stoppage of play.
Players must wear masks at all times, whether on the ice or on the bench, and a slew of other changes to the pregame and bench areas have been made. Most Greenfield players have already played under the same protocols with their club teams since youth leagues began playing again in August. The hope is that the transition won’t be as difficult, and that players have already adjusted to the new way of playing.
“The kids know the modifications,” Kuchieski said. “They’ve already bought in and they’ve been doing them for a while now. I’m not worried.”