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Lah Paw finally got his goal.
The first-year hockey player crashed into the net after a rebound, fought through two defenders and buried the puck past the goalie on Feb. 11 to give the Starwhals a 3-1 lead over their opponents in Hudson, Wisconsin. His teammates rushed, forced Paw, and cheered so hard they almost forgot to do the traditional fly-by, where scorers skate past the bench for high points.
Paw, 14, is a left fielder for the Starwhals, a youth girls’ team based out of Langford Recreation Center in St. Paul’s Como area. His first season playing hockey is going well. He is becoming a faster, more confident skater, learning the basics of the game and making new friends. But he really wanted this goal.
After the Starwhals game at the end of January, under the lights at the outdoor rink in Langford, he shrugged off his pads on the bench and it wasn’t cold in a Levi’s T-shirt. He’s improved a lot in his first season on the ice and said he’s determined to score by the end of it.
When he accomplished his goal, when his teammates finally let him skate back to the bench, he had a huge smile, according to Starwhals coach Clayton Howatt.
“I like the company of people in hockey,” he said.
Minnesota, commonly known as the State of Hockey, has the largest youth and high school hockey program in the country. But the sport remains heavily white, even as Minnesota becomes more diverse. According to Minnesota Hockey, 86 percent of players under the age of 8 are white. Today, 34 percent of the state’s children ages 5 to 9 are youth of color, according to the nonprofit demographer Minnesota Compass.
Star whales are different. Six of the team’s 12 players are people of color with Native American, Somali, Filipino and Chinese backgrounds. Then there’s Paw, believed to be the first Karen American girl player to be registered as a member of USA Hockey, the game’s governing body.
The team has a lot of new skaters and may not win a game this year, although Tatsu’s goal helped secure their first tie. But that doesn’t seem to bother them. Before the outdoor game on the home field, with light snow falling, the girls enthusiastically howled the team’s “Who are we? Star whales!” pregame detention.
Make a bridge over the gap
Chy Nou Lee learned to skate as a child when the Ramsey County Sheriff’s Office Youth Plus program came to her St. Paul neighborhood and offered a hockey clinic. Today, Lee is a Ramsey County crime prevention specialist and runs the Youth Plus program, which provides equipment and instruction in several sports. It has 50 kids in its hockey program. It’s a way to build relationships between youth and law enforcement at a time when trust needs to be built, Lee said.
“Our philosophy is to get the kids involved,” Lee said.
The program is popular, he said, and there is a waiting list because of equipment shortages. This year, the group engaged members of St. Paul’s Karen community, resulting in a few boys and one girl, Paw, signing up for youth teams.
The paw quickly got on the ice, Lee said.
“He was like a rock star there,” she said.
She continues to support his hockey adventure and often takes him to practices and games. He cheered Paws and his teammates on in the cold during their outdoor game and drove him home afterward.
Raised by Hmong refugee parents, Lee understands what it’s like when immigrant households try to break into traditional American business. He credits Howatt with helping Paw and other similar players participate.
Howatt grew up in St. Paul in the 1980s and played youth hockey at the Langford Recreation Center before playing in high school and college. When he was a kid, every recreation center in St. Paul had its own team.
But over time, demographics changed in St. Paul, and recreation center teams dwindled. A few years later, high school teams began to combine to maintain rosters, Howatt said.
But he saw no need for the bill, and was frustrated that neighborhood families couldn’t be included.
“There is no shortage of children. The kids are black and brown now and the hockey community is saying, ‘They don’t want to play,'” Howatt said.
“There is no shortage of children. The kids are now black and brown and the hockey community is saying, “They don’t want to play.”
Clayton Howatt, youth hockey coach
As a coach for ten years, Howatt has tried to get neighbors involved in the sport, regardless of their background. Parents usually don’t care what their kids do as long as they’re safe and having fun, he said.
The team has equipment and scholarships for familiesand price should never be a barrier to participation, Howatt said.
Increasing participation
But there are still challenges for players aspiring to the urban core. Youth hockey in Minnesota is divided into 13 districts. Four youth associations located in Minneapolis and St. Paul make up District 1. The Starwhals are a co-op team made up of girls from north and northeast Minneapolis and St. Paul, part of a concentration that has occurred in inner cities to keep the rosters viable. Rural areas and inner cities often have a harder time getting youth teams on the ice than large suburban areas, Howatt said.
Minneapolis and St. Paul were once the core of the State of Hockey, regularly producing Division 1 players, professionals and Olympians. Today, Minneapolis has one boys’ and one girls’ hockey team among all public high schools. St. Paul has one girls team for all schools and two boys teams in the district.
There are several efforts across the state to encourage kids from different backgrounds to get on the ice. One is Hockey Is For Me, a program launched by the Minnesota Wild in 2021 that will be adopted by the entire National Hockey League.
Wild director of community relations and hockey partnerships Wayne Petersen said the goal is to make hockey welcoming to kids of color and the LGBTQ community.
“We have more kids playing hockey in Minnesota than any other state, and it’s not even close, but the majority of players in the state are white,” Petersen said.
“We have more kids playing hockey in Minnesota than any other state, and it’s not even close, but the majority of players in the state are white.”
Wayne Petersen, Director of Community Relations for the Minnesota Wild
The Wild network works with community partners to try to recruit families with children of color who may want to try hockey, Petersen said. Registered kids begin with four learn-to-skate sessions at Wild’s Tria Training Center in St. Paul. If they want to continue, they can attend four more learn-to-play sessions held at 20 rinks across the metro, where they will be taught more about the basics of the game.
The program is free, includes all necessary equipment, and provides grants of up to $500 to families who wish to enroll in youth hockey to cover registration fees. Lessons learning to skate are organized at the end of summer and lessons in September, so that children who like the game can sign up for the winter season.
“We want it to be sustainable so they can continue to play through their high school years,” Petersen said.
“This is my favorite team”
Getting young players to stay in the sport at the high school level is a challenge for city organizations, Howatt said.
If a child does not start playing until the age of 12 or 13, there is a probability that he will continue with the sport in the long term. But signing up one child in the community can inspire others to join, and if an older sibling plays, brothers and sisters are more likely to follow, Howatt said.
This year’s Starwhals team is Howatt’s favorite in his decade of coaching youth hockey. The girls have different backgrounds and interests, but they have come together as a team and formed close friendships, Howatt said.
“They are incredibly supportive of each other,” she said.
The team has struggled on the ice, but with so many first-timers, that’s no surprise. Howatt has three goals for his players from a hockey skills perspective. He wants them all to be able to lift a shot wrist off the ice, skate backward with a crossover technique, and do a mohawk turn—a change of direction between skating forward and backward. By January, all the girls had three skills down.
But the biggest goal is to create good moments and memories for the players. The view at Langford Park during the Starwhals’ outdoor game against the Minneapolis Storm in late January was like the inside of a snow globe brought to life.
The parents cleared the field of snow before the game. Howatt reminded the girls that the puck would move slower outside.
The girls dug a sinker along snow-covered boards to a makeshift bench and worked up and down the ice for 60 minutes, giving 100 percent effort. They didn’t score and lost, but they seemed happy and cheered for each other the whole time.
The season is coming to an end, and the playoffs begin in mid-February. There is still time for Starwhals to win and Lah Paw to score more goals.
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