The growth of Disabled Hockey in Minnesota has been quite significant the past few years. Several Minnesotans have been able to play hockey because of the efforts of the many volunteers that make Special, Sled, and Stand-up Amputee hockey happen. In spite of everyone’s efforts, there are still many people that could benefit (or know someone that could benefit) from playing Disabled Hockey that aren’t aware of it’s existence.
To help increase awareness for Disabled Hockey, the first ever Disabled Hockey Night with the Minnesota Wild will occur on Thursday, September 24th when the Wild host the St. Louis Blues in a preseason game. Highlights include:
- Disabled Hockey participants and families will sell game programs before the game and will share in the proceeds of the program sales.
- Luke Schmitz, veteran of the war in Iraq and member of the Minnesota Sled team, will skate the State of Hockey flag to center ice as the Wild and Blues take the ice.
- One representative each from Special, Sled, and Stand-Up Amputee will all say Let’s Play Hockey” together to start the game.
- First intermission – 12 Special /Stand Up Amputee players will play a 3 minute game on the ice. While this is occurring a promotional disabled hockey video will air on the scoreboard. Immediately after the Special Hockey game, Section 108 will make a ceremonial check presentation to Special Hockey. Section 108 is a collection of Wild season ticket holders that sit in section 108 – each year they host a golf tournament and donate proceeds to Special Hockey.
- Second intermission – 10 Sled players will play a 3 minute game on the ice. The same video will play on the scoreboard during the game.
- Concourse booth – Disabled Hockey will have a booth set up in the concourse during the game. The booth will be staffed by Disabled Hockey players/families and will feature the National Championship trophy won by the Minnesota Sled team.
- Public Address announcements – Multiple times during the game, the Wild announcer will read Disabled Hockey promotional announcements and direct people to the concourse booth or minnesotahockey.org if they want to learn more.
- Other exposure includes: disabled hockey story on wild.com, radio interviews during the broadcast, etc.
- The Wild will be donating several tickets for the participants. They will also be offering a discounted ticket offer for the others that want to attend with a portion of that money donated back to Disabled Hockey.
The exact ticket offer will emailed soon. When you receive it, please forward this offer on to as many people as possible. It would be great to have a large turnout of Minnesota Hockey supporters showing their support for the Disabled Hockey players!
