Outside, the cool darkness of night shrouds the world. The lights of Minneapolis twinkle in the sky, distant to the north. Ahead, the smooth ribbon of asphalt bends gently up and to the left, bringing us over the Mississippi. I glance down at my watch; the dials indicate 8:35 p.m. It’s December 1^st, and I can feel the cold of winter radiating through the glass window.

Mutak is driving the RX300 toward Golden Valley, and I am the passenger. The destination?
Breck Ice Arena.

At the arena, we unload our equipment from the SUV’s cavernous cargo hold. A short walk in the brisk air leads us to the building’s interior. It is a nice, new arena, perhaps the nicest high school arena I’ve seen. Breck, a private school, is known for having good ice hockey teams, and their facility reflects their hockey pride.

I settle into one of the dressing rooms and change into my hockey gear. It’s not an instant process — numerous straps, laces, and buckles must be tightened, tied, and locked, all in a certain, meticulous order. My 45 pounds of goalie gear feels quite heavy when packed in its bag. However, once I don it, the weight seems far less.

All of the padding brings with it a feeling of invincibility. Pucks? Falls? Out-of-control skaters? Ha! I laugh at such feeble impacts. I’m biased, but I think I look and feel badass. Similar to my golf strategy, I figure that I should at least look the part if I lack the skill.

I pick up my stick, check to make sure I have everything, and walk out of the dressing room and over to the ice.

It is bright white. No spectators are in the stands, but that’s not really surprising; after all, this session is nothing more than a practice.

I step onto the rink. As I start skating around the perimeter, I’m surprised by the ease with which I move. I guess I was expecting skating to be considerably harder with all of the padding, particularly the leg pads, than without. I notice two primary differences: I can’t do crossovers, and the pads and low cowling prevent me from making extreme blade angles relative to the ice. It’s certainly different than when I was playing pick-up roller hockey in 2003 as a normal player.

The skill level of my classmates is better than I expected yet exhibits a wide range of variance. Some have obviously played ice hockey, while others are struggling to skate forward. The other goalie in the class seems to be a novice, perhaps at the same skill level as myself.

We goalies skate through some warm-up drills with the rest of the players before breaking off into our own small group. Our goalie coach starts us off with the basics of goaltending. We cover goaltender skating (how often do forwards need to shuffle side-to-side?), the stance (keep your arms ahead of your body!), and basic positioning (it’s all about the angles!). Of course, the primary purpose of a goalie is to make saves, so we delve into the essentials of glove saves and stick saves. Yes, there are many more types, most notably involving the blocker and leg pads, but there’s only so much that can be covered in a limited amount of time.

With time running short, the instructors decide to let the players shoot some pucks and the goalies save some pucks. The group splits into its two subgroups; green is on one end of the arena, and red (me among them) is on the other. The drill is similar to the one you see prior to many high school and college games: the players line up in two lines on either side of the goal. A player from one line skates out to the blue line, receives a puck passed from the player in the other line, and then shoots the puck at the goal.

I make some saves and let some in, but fortunately the saves are in the majority. Much as should be expected, none of the saves hurt. A puck flies at my head and strikes my mask. I notice the impact only because of the noise. Mutak’s turn comes up in the line. He shoots… and I stop it. Huzzah!

Time expires, and we all skate off the ice and return to the dressing rooms.

I’m exhausted, happy, and thankfully not too sweaty (yay for high-tech fabrics!). This goaltending thing is harder than it looks!

I meticulously solve the packing puzzle that is my gear bag. I toss the bag in the SUV, and we drive off.

Playing goalie is hard work, but I truly enjoy it. I look forward to my first game and first official save.