NU Women's hockey team faces numerous problems during season

By Kyle Blaikie
Norwich Guidon Staff Writer

It was 11:30 at night and all 11 girls left on the team started at the goal line for "the penguin." One gave the ready, set, go!, and they all took off skating as fast as they could, when, all of a sudden at mid-ice, they all flopped to their stomachs and slid across the Kreitzberg Arena ice.

"It's like slip and slide on the ice," Kim Balserus, 21, a senior history major from Burlington, Vt., said. She is the captain of the Norwich women's ice hockey team that just finished its season with a 3-1-1 record during which numerous problems arose.

As they finished their fifth season, the team has had problems scheduling games and keeping members on the team due to ice times, according to team members. As a club sport, this team has found itself discouraged by this season and unsure about next year.

This season has been different than the last in many ways. One of the differences was whom the team was under as far as administration. According to Jennifer Mathewson, 21, a junior accounting major from Montpelier, Vt., the team was part of student activities under Dr. Chan Stowell, director of student activities last year. However, the president decided the team should be under the athletic director (Tony Mariano) this year.

"It was definitely better when we were under Chan," Mathewson said. "Last year, the captains used to schedule their games, but this year Mariano said we'll get everything scheduled for us, and we don't have to worry about it."

They ran into problems when many of the teams Coach Anthony Mariano tried to schedule games with moved to varsity status and did not want to play club teams like Norwich.

"We had difficulty in getting competition for them, because a lot of the teams are moving to varsity teams," Mariano said.

Mariano said the girls played about eight or ten games. He was not sure of the exact number. Balserus said the team played a total of five games. They won three of them, lost one, and one was a tie.

"We struggled a little bit to get some games for them, but the goal is to start working on their schedule early," Mariano said.

The Norwich men's hockey team's schedule for next year is almost done, and the women's team is wondering when they are going to get their schedule.

"We haven't started it, yet," Mariano said. "As soon as we get the men's schedule in place, we can start working with the women's program."

The goal for the women's team is to become a varsity team under the athletic director, and they were told the first step would be to move from student activities to the athletics.

"We were told that we would be moved under Mariano, which was the next step before becoming a varsity team."

"I have felt that women's hockey has done their time and should be considered to become a varsity sport," Stowell said. "I recommended they be under the Athletic Department and should be looked at for a becoming a varsity sport."

According to Jessica Cook, 21, a junior architecture major from Danbury, NH, the team "needs to go to varsity; that's obvious."

However, things have become "more disorganized" now that they are trying to head to varsity status, Mathewson said.

This season they didn't have "anything to work towards," she said. "This could have been a really good season for us, and it ended up being really bad, because the team really fell apart. It was like a domino effect."

Cook said the team does not need everything that the men's team has. "We don't need a big fancy locker room and weight room. We are happy with the locker room that we have," she said. "All that we want is some better ice time and more games."

The problem with the lack of games led to another problem: team members quitting.

"I have the most talented bunch of girls that I've had in 5 years," Goslant said. "I had 23 girls, and I ended with maybe 11 or 12."

"Most of the girls that we lost in the beginning of the season were gone because we didn't have games scheduled," Mathewson said. "There wasn't going to be any games to show off any skills."

Team members didn't just quit because of lack of games. Others did not like the practice times they were getting at Kreitzberg Arena.

"I understand that we don't pay any money for the ice, so we can't get the best times," Mathewson said. "Practices are late at night, and most of us have 8 a.m. classes."

With all the problems and specific circumstances, the team has been wondering whether there is a bias against the women's team.

"It certainly feels like since we are the women's team, we get overlooked quite a bit," Mathewson said.

"I think it all comes down to money," Joacha Sullivan-Strange, 21, a junior architecture major from Brabenton, FL, said. "The men make more money than we do."

"It feels that Mariano has put us on the back burner with Coach McShane's blessing," she said. "He [McShane] has made it obvious from the beginning that he does not want us here."

Mike McShane, head coach for the Norwich men's team, was unavailable for comment.

Kenny Goslant, head coach of the women's hockey team, said that Norwich is "missing the boat with women's hockey."

"It is one of the fastest growing sports, if not the fastest growing sport out there, and they [the school] do absolutely nothing to promote it or support it," Goslant said. "I don't think Norwich University is that interested in having women's hockey whatsoever."

Cook agrees with her coach about women's hockey in general becoming more popular. "I think that women's hockey in general has become really popular in the last 10 years." Cook said. "It's a different type of game."

According to Sullivan, "Coach Kenny" does not get paid for his services as the head coach. "He owns his own business, has 2 children that play hockey, and he doesn't get paid," she said.

"Gotta love Coach," Mathewson said. "He couldn't be a nicer guy"

"Kenny is why the team is still around," Cook said. "He tries to quit every year because he is such a busy person, but he keeps coming back, and we absolutely need him."

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