This evening, 29 locals will hit the ice at George’s Pond at Hirsch Coliseum with the hopes of earning a spot on the roster for Shreveport’s 2022-23 junior varsity hockey team.

Yes, local high school hockey not only exists, but it’s growing.

Shreveport’s varsity squad just completed its third season. The 2022-23 campaign will be the sophomore season for the JV unit.

“The amount of local kids who want to be hockey players is phenomenal,” Scott Muscutt, general manager of the Shreveport Mudbugs, a member of the North American Hockey League (the only USA Hockey-sanctioned Tier II Junior league in the nation), said. “The list of people responsible for that is endless. It’s truly remarkable.”

Shreveport’s high school hockey program, also dubbed the Mudbugs, is the only prep team in the area and includes players from several area schools. The team travels to Dallas every other week to play doubleheaders in the AT&T Metroplex High School Hockey League.

The growth of this non-traditional sport is impressive, and it’s something Michael Pabst knows all about.

Hockey was first introduced to the area in 1997 with the Shreveport Mudbugs of the Western Professional Hockey League. Around that time, the idea to make lacrosse a local high school sport was born.

Like the problem “youth” hockey faces now, one team was developed back then for those interested in high school lacrosse in the area. And they had to travel to Texas to find games.

“It was all Karl Mitchell,” Pabst said.

Mitchell, an Air Force transplant and former college lacrosse player, started a pickup league by holding practices at Shreveport’s A.C. Steere Park. Eventually, youngsters took notice and asked Mitchell if he’d coach them should they get enough kids for a high school squad.

A church team (St. Paul’s) turned into a team at Loyola College Prep. In the early 2000s, Caddo Magnet had enough players to form its own team, and so did Byrd.

Mitchell, the godfather of Louisiana lacrosse, coached until his untimely death at the age of 48 in 2013. Pabst served as an assistant under Mitchell before taking the Yellow Jackets’ job.

“I hadn’t held a stick in 20 years, but I knew how to yell at teenagers,” said Pabst, a product of Massachusetts who helped organize local youth lacrosse and eventually founded the sport’s premier youth organization in the area, Red River Lacrosse.

Pabst now coaches the Renegades, the home for high school lacrosse athletes who do not attend a school with its own team. The Renegades and other area prep teams are members of the Louisiana High School Lacrosse League. They are no longer forced to travel to Texas to find games.

Pabst says the key for the growth of lacrosse was the recruitment of middle schoolers, something the Mudbugs have done in the past.

Hockey’s growth in the area has endured speedbumps. In fact, it almost never began. With the arrival of professional hockey in the late ’90s, there was an idea to get kids involved in the sport, but there were tempered expectations and naysayers.

“We didn’t even have enough confidence in our ability to put kids on the ice,” said Muscutt, the first player ever signed to play professional hockey in Shreveport. “People said, ‘Roller hockey is as good as it’s going to get.’ We questioned that and said, ‘Why is that as good as it’s going to get?’”

The Junior Mudbugs program eventually hit the ice at the CenturyTel Center (now the Brookshire Grocery Arena) in Bossier City. Today, there are hundreds of members of the Junior Mudbugs.

One Junior Mudbugs graduate, Brayden Cook, has made his way to the NAHL’s Springfield Junior Blues.

Jason Campbell, a former Mudbugs player and assistant coach, now coaches the Mudbugs NAHL squad. He was instrumental in getting high school hockey rolling.

“It does George Cloutier proud,” Campbell said.

Cloutier was a local goaltender whose life ended at age 12. His name graces the playing surface at the Hirsch Coliseum – the only sheet of ice in the area.

“His family and their love for the game had a supreme effect on Musky and myself and our community,” Campbell said.

Even at a young age, Cloutier believed hockey could bring a portion of the community together. He was right.

“I never would have projected the success high school hockey has brought, but it’s been phenomenal,” Muscutt said. “And now these kids are going on to play college hockey. That would never happen without high school hockey.”

While hockey faces limitations that don’t exist in lacrosse — one being limited playing surfaces — one thing local high school hockey can offer is the ability to wear the Mudbugs logo.

Today, those kids will compete for a shot to wear the same logo as the Mudbugs they watch at The George on weekends. The same colors as the players who’ve won two national championships in the past four years.

“I’m glad it opens up their heart and makes me even happier when I see it opens up their eyes and they realize there is a responsibility when you wear the logo,” Muscutt said. “‘What is my sportsmanship like? How to I treat my teammates. How do I walk into the rink? What clothes am I wearing? How do I walk out of the rink? How do I speak to officials?’

“I hope it comes with the culture that it represents for every person who wore it, no matter the level.”

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By DOUG IRELAND, Journal Sports

Nobody cheers for 11 men whose performance is pivotal to the outcome of this weekend’s NCAA Final Four.

Their highest compliment is not being noticed during, and after, they go up and down the court with young men who are at most, half their age.

They’re in uniform, with their jersey design a timeless standard: black and white vertical stripes.

How did they get there? For over a decade, Shreveporter Tynes Hildebrand helped choose the best officials to work the NCAA Tournament, culminating with the Final Four assignments (a trio of three-man crews, plus two alternates). One of this weekend’s referees, Keith Kimble of Arlington, Texas was calling college games around Louisiana on a regular basis not too long ago.

The Final Four picks emerged from 104 whistle-wearers who, over a seven-month stretch, survived scrutiny by a group of evaluators and conference coordinators. Some of the best refs didn’t work the first weekend, held out on purpose. They entered the assignment pool for the Sweet 16, along with the top graders from the first and second rounds.

How did Hildebrand and his colleagues evaluate them?

“Did he get the call right? Did he make the wrong call? Or was there no call when there should have been one? We totaled the numbers and the officials with the highest percentages moved forward,” said Hildebrand, who has lived in Shreveport with wife Julia for the past several years.

“No calls and missed calls are negatives. About nine out of 10 calls during the season, and in the tournament, the top officials get it right.”

Until retiring following the 2014 Final Four, Hildebrand was one of four NCAA regional officiating observers.

Since then, he actually gets to watch the games.

“I don’t think I ever enjoyed the games. You never watch the game. You’re watching the trail (official), the center, and the lead, and we had about 75 criteria that we looked at: their positioning, signaling, decorum, on and on,” Hildebrand said.

“These days, I enjoy watching the tournament like everybody else.”

The 91-year-old played basketball for H. Lee Prather at Northwestern State from 1950-54, then became a teacher and coach. He got the head coaching post at Northwestern in 1964 and kept it for 16 seasons, infamous for his outbursts with officials but respected around the country for his basketball knowledge. He helped head coach Henry Iba and colleagues including Bob Knight pick the 1972 USA Olympic Team. He and John Wooden developed a friendship.

The Final Four, even after his coaching days ended, became an annual reunion of coaching colleagues – until it turned into a work assignment when he began grading officials in 1997, and especially once he was tabbed one of four regional observers when that system was created in 2006.

Traveling far and wide throughout the season, from hallowed venues like Allen Fieldhouse at Kansas to mostly-empty gyms in remote locations, was quite an experience. There often was time for him and his frequent travel partner, Julia, to see sights, even visit friends and family. That wasn’t the case in March.

Once the initial pool of 104 referees was chosen, with Hildebrand working from his longtime home in Natchitoches, he headed north.

Through the four opening round games in Dayton, and the first two rounds, the evaluation team included conference coordinators and observers gathered in a command center at NCAA headquarters in Indianapolis. Every official in every game got rated either “highly recommend, recommend, do not recommend.” Officiating director John Adams took input from his regional coordinators and made assignments for the second weekend, and the Final Four.

In the Sweet 16, Hildebrand and the other regional observers went to regional sites, grading from a prime courtside seat during the games.

“Sitting next to Verne Lundquist and Bill Raferty, getting to know them, that was a joy for a country boy from Florien,” he said.

The observers got game videos, retreated to hotels and graded again that night to compare to the on-site ratings.

“My grades didn’t change much,” said Hildebrand, a 2014 Louisiana Sports Hall of Fame inductee.

Now just a fan with a very unique perspective, Hildebrand said officiating in this March Madness hasn’t been as bad as many believe.

“The kids now are staying in the weight rooms, and are stronger and faster. The post play is a wrestling match, and that’s unfortunate,” he said. “The officiating has generally been really good. Some of it, average, I’ll put it that way.

“There’s more missed traveling than ever before, and double dribbling. It’s a hard game to officiate. But the fellows we’ll see this weekend, they’re just dadgum good officials.”

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Cinderella isn’t coming to New Orleans. Instead, we get a Final Four of bluebloods.

Who among us thought St. Peter’s could overcome North Carolina, even an eighth-seeded bunch of Tar Heels, after dispatching Kentucky, and Purdue (no disrespect to the Murray State Racers, but a super season isn’t admission to the Sky Lounge)?

Who among us HOPED St. Peter’s could do it ONE MORE TIME?

St. Peter’s, undergraduate enrollment of 2,600, shouted “why not US?” to every Division I basketball program not in a Power 5 conference, and to some that are in that number. Washington State? Vanderbilt? Colorado? I could go on, but you get the idea. Most of the 358 D-I basketball teams are not anywhere near the top of the food chain.

The 2022 Final Four teams have millions of lifelong fans who have only seen their favorite teams play on TV. Nothing wrong with that. But there’s a lot to be said for the George Masons, Butlers, and yes, the Gonzagas of the college hoops world (the Zags seem omnipresent in the top 10 now, but they didn’t make a Final Four until five years ago) crashing the Big Dance’s smallest gathering, its conclusion: four regional champions, three games, one winner.

How sweet it would have been to have St. Peter’s in the Crescent City. A school whose campus takes up all of two blocks in Jersey City. A program that uses trash can lids mid-practice to catch dripping rainwater in its home gym. The other teams have five-star recruits. The Peacocks didn’t have five stars AMONG their recruits.

When Mike McConathy led Northwestern State on its first steps into March Madness in 2001, it was just two years earlier that Gonzaga had made its initial run to the Elite Eight and was considered a Cinderella. When the Demons came home, there was a decent amount of dreamy speculation whether NSU could follow that same trail.

Didn’t happen. Doesn’t but once every forever. Ask folks at UT Arlington. The Mavs soared to the 2017 NIT quarterfinals, ending with 27 wins and a Dallas Morning News headline that seemed reasonable: “UTA comes up short in bid for NIT semifinals, but appears long on promise for the future.”

Didn’t happen. Hubris overdose. A year later, after 21 more wins, a new athletic director canned coach Scott Cross – not only a UTA grad, but an Academic All-American guard for the Mavs – and said the program was headed on Gonzaga’s path to prominence. Heard anything from UTA since? Except for two coaching changes?

Point is, don’t look for St. Peter’s to be back next year – in March Madness, let alone the Elite Eight.

The Peacocks didn’t edge over .500 this year until Jan. 18 after topping Canisius 65-57 in a Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference battle. They hadn’t won more than two straight until they got hot at the right time, reeling off 10 wins until Sunday’s meltdown. So Cinderella was 12-11, then found its footing and eventually, a glass slipper.

The St. Peter’s run was fueled by gallons of guts, complete buy-in among the Peacock flock, no small amount of pluck, and feathery jump shots that seemed magnetized to the inside of the rim. Good players, playing great – but not a future NBA Draft pick on the roster. A coach who knew his team and knew no fear.

It was a joy to watch. In the 318 AC, doubtful anyone had a direct tie to St. Peter’s, but we all developed a connection.

“Why not US?” That question is being asked by Bulldogs, Demons, Warhawks, (Grambling) Tigers and many, many more. Every March, we’ll now all have a little more hope, thanks to Peacocks who ruffled some feathers, spread their wings and soared.

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