Michel's Jr. Trappers Blog - Behind closed doors

Jr. Trappers forward Michel Gamache is going to be giving us an up close and personal look at the North Bay Jr. A Trappers in his new blog. Michel will be sharing his stories with us weekly here on BayToday.ca. Enjoy it!

I’d like to start off by thanking those who have taken the time to write me a few words in the past couple weeks. I really appreciate the advice and the support. Now this week’s subject comes as requested by a fellow reader.

In hockey, Jr. A hockey especially, a lot happens inside the dressing room. Whether it be lounging with the guys, bonding as a team, or discussing plays, there is always something happening.

Before a practice, the coach doesn’t usually say much; we are just expected to be ready to practice. But the odd times, he will come in and say a couple words, either of encouragement, or sometimes to discuss an earlier matter.

The dressing room talk before a practice is pretty varied. Stuff from last night, the game before, work, school, job, NHL, girlfriends, and anything else that happens to pop into a conversation.

Before a game, the atmosphere in the room is very different from that of a practice. It is a lot calmer and focused. You can initially tell that everyone is getting prepared mentally for the game ahead of us. Although there is music blaring from the speakers, there always seems to be a kind of calmness roaming around the air.

Before the warm up, we have team meetings. Most of the time they are separated into these categories: forwards, defenseman, power play, penalty kill, and even sometimes meetings for each individual line.

Since we have a break between our warm up and the actual first period, the speech before it is usually about warming up. “Warm up your hands. Warm up your feet. Warm up your goalie.”

When we come back into the dressing room, after the warm up, everybody is geared up and excited to play. Coaches come in and review strategies studied during the previous practices. About 2 minutes before we head on the ice, they come back and give the final words before the game. The speech is followed by the calling of the starting line up followed with a loud roar, and everybody is up and heading out the dressing room and on to the ice.

Ready-set-go, it’s game time!

Next week I will be home for the holidays, I hope to find the chance to write something for then. If not, then I will be back in 2 weeks. Happy holidays everyone!

Michel.