The rink where my son plays roller hockey is really quite an
eyesore. Wayne Gretzky built the place back in the nineties—a collection of
three full-sized rinks under a massive metal roof—but Gretz sold it a few years
ago to new owners whose enthusiasm for selling pricey hockey gear and stale
pretzels stands in stark contrast to their apathy about the place’s upkeep. The
heavy doors that separate the player benches from the playing surface are so
badly rusted that getting them open at the end of a shift is a virtual
impossibility.

Observations like these are the byproduct of acting as an
assistant coach. This is our family’s first season in hockey, and although we
take our hockey pretty seriously at Evans World Headquarters, we’ve learned
more about the game than we ever could have imagined. Coming from baseball,
where assistant coaches are tasked with teaching the players the nuances of the
game, I’ve been shocked by how little there is to contribute on the bench. My
primary role until Saturday had been to stand next to the aforementioned rusty
door and attempt to muscle it open when tired players come off of the powder
blue playing surface.

I was tying my son’s skates Saturday afternoon when the
father of the redheaded twin boys on our team walked over to me and said,
“Coach John is sick today. You’re our man. Good luck.”

Ten minutes into the game we were down 4-1. Our opponent,
the Bruins, looked efficient, fast, well-coached. There was nothing fluke or
lucky about their goals. They were just better than us. Much to my displeasure,
the situation required that I actually do some coaching. I called the team over
during the first intermission and just started blabbing.

“Guys, we’re better than this. We’ve already beaten this
team twice this season, and there’s no reason why we can’t come back and beat
them again. But you’ve got to want to win. We’re not going to score on slap
shots from 50 feet away. If you get the puck with some open space in front of
you, go to the net. If you see someone else open, get him the puck. If we want
to beat these guys, we have to work harder. We have to want it more than then
do. OK?”

[crickets]

“How about this?” I said, grasping at the air. “For every
goal we score, I will spend one dollar on the team at the snack bar.”

“YEAHHH!”

(OK, so maybe I’m no Vince Lombardi, but then again, Vince
wasn’t coaching nine-year-olds.)

Forty-five seconds into the second period, we scored.

Two minutes later, my son scored the first goal of his
hockey career—a brisk little slap shot that zipped right over the goalie’s left
leg pad and made the perfect sound (PING!) as it hit the red post at the base
of the goal.

The floodgates only opened wider from there. Our designated
puck hog, a spoiled little rich kid who wouldn’t know how to pass the puck if
his trust fund depended on it, scored six goals.

We won, 10-5.

I gleefully spent ten bucks on slushies in the snack bar
after the game, and on the way home from the game my son called every friend
and relative he’s ever had to tell them he scored a goal.

Bribery works, people. Give it a try.