First of all, my apologies to all female hockey players: I'm sorry. I used to be a sexist when it came to hockey. I preferred watching boys play over girls; watching men play over women.

However, all that changed last night. We were at the Super Rink in Blaine, Minnesota watching my 9 year old play in his fall hockey league. We had gotten there early for my son to get ready. As such, I had some time on my hands. Eklund and I had talked about me covering the US Women Hockey Olympiads as their training facility is literally in my back yard. I asked around about obtaining press credentials and left my card for someone to contact me. The staff of the Super Rink (8 sheets of ice under one roof, 4 Olympic sized and 4 NHL sized hence the name "Super Rink") advised that the Olympic hopefuls would be scrimmaging one another at 7 pm. My son's game ended at 6:50 pm. As such, I told my 38 week pregnant wife that she could go home after our son's game to rest, but that I would take the rest of the crew including my son with a disability and his PCA over to watch the women warm up. So off we marched to Rink 6 and the warm-ups were already in progress.

Holding my only daughter, watching these talented athletes warm up, I was profoundly struck at the enormity of it all. Think about it. How far girls'/women's hockey has come. My brothers played with a girl who was probably better than the rest of the boys, including two boys who got drafted. She went on to play in the first women's semi-professional hockey league in Minnesota back in the early 1980's (the Minnesota Checkers). She did this at about the time when she could have challenged to play on the high school varsity team. She choose not to upset the apple cart. She was a remarkable athlete and eventually represented her country (the US) at the summer Olympics in Atlanta in track and field events. Back then, there was not yet a women's Olympic hockey team, otherwise she most likely would have participated in both the summer and winter Olympics. I would guess alot of the women trying out for next year's team started like this girl did, by playing with the boys. After all, hockey was solely a boy's sport in Minnesota. That, however, changed and girls are playing hockey together with the boys in the mite/initiation programs and then when the boys go the squirt level, the girls have their own uni-sex levels sorted by age brackets much the same way soccer leagues work.

Last night, it finally dawned on me. Men/boys, who used to dominate the hockey discussion, are now having to make room for women/girls who are signing up at an impressive rate more and more each year to take to the ice to participate in the coolest game on earth, hockey. For some men/boys, it is probably hard to do. For others, it may be easy, but they continue to blow it off as something inferior to what they prefer. To me, having grown up in a family of all boys and, myself, having 4 boys myself, I probably would not be at the place I am now in my mind as women's hockey is concerned were it not for my only daughter who's presence in my arms last night at the tender age of 21 months had one of the most profound impacts on me in a long time as we watched the Olympic hopefuls warm up for their "shot" at the big time. For the women, there are no pro's, no WNBA. They have "semi-pro" leagues, they have college hockey at every level, but for many the Olympics are the peak. I believe for the men that the Olympics may be the peak, but for many the NHL and the Stanley Cup is the preference.

Finally, last night I thought to myself that the women on the ice would absolutely school most of us who visit this blog, with few exceptions. I laced the skates up in my youth and wasn't very good at it. But I tried. I competed. I experienced highs and lows. Success and failure. And in the end, that's what it is all about, or so I thought. Perhaps we as a society are pushing through the prejudices that exist from men towards women and from boys towards girls through mediums like hockey. Perhaps seeing the giant steps girls and women have taken in the sport of hockey alone is but a micro-cosim of what is happening in society. For me, that is true. I used to cringe at the song "Anything You Can Do, I Can Do Better" as a child. However, the two women most near and dear to my heart, my mom and my wife, are incredibly talented individuals who both do many things far better than I could ever dream. Just the act of giving birth to a human life makes my insides tremble in extreme pain and discomfort. My daughter, when she came along, rocked my world. She took our "boy house" and turned it on it's ear permanently. Recently, my ever-cocky 9 year old was challenged by my former hockey playing daughter in-law to a one-on-one match this winter. Now that should be fun! As my wife and I expect our sixth child, as much as I love my boys, I have made no bones about the fact that I hope to be blessed with another daughter. Truth be told, I wanted a girl so much that I found out early on in the pregnancy what we were having, but my wife didn't want to know. I simply didn't want one negative vibe the day my child was born and thought it would be best to deal with any negative feelings prior to it's arrival. As we await this child's arrival, at least as the game of hockey is concerned, it simply doesn't matter any more. Boy or girl, they will still be able to play the game I love best.

Having watched last night's warm-up while holding my daughter gave me great solace that not only can my daughter be a huge hockey fan when she grows up, but that she also can take to the ice (just like the boys) and rise to whatever heights her ability will take her (just like the boys) and hopefully one day, if good enough, play in a professional women's hockey league and/or compete for a spot on an Olympic roster. You may be laughing, but my sister in-law played women's professional/semi-pro football in California and Florida.

As a society, we have come a long ways. We still have a long ways to go (as evidenced by the ice girl photo for this blog), but we are on our way. The U.S. Women's Olympic hockey team is but one piece of evidence in how far we, as a society, have come. Last night, I watched hockey players warm up and could have cared less if they were boys or girls; men or women. They were hockey players, end of story. Come this February, I will now be avidly watching all of the hockey players compete in the Olympic Ice Hockey Tournament and not this time turn a blind eye towards one group merely because of their sex.

Hopefully Team USA allows me cover their training up until that point as a member of the press.

Note: I wasn't able to watch the scrimmage as my precious daughter and son with a disability had simply been at the hockey arena too long and were starting to melt down so I missed the scrimmage.

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