What started as an idea between a group of five incoming first-years has grown into a major sports team at Drake University in just four years.
On Feb. 21, Drake Club Hockey held its Senior Night, where four seniors were honored. One of those seniors, Paxton Reading, was a founding member of the group as a first-year and former president of the club.
“[We] all kind of had the same idea. So our parents were talking on Facebook a little bit, and we basically all got together one day and [were] like, all right, we could try to start this,” Reading said.
The process wasn’t a walk in the park. According to Reading, there was a lot of “heavy lifting” involved, including getting registered with the league, getting jerseys, sparking interest and obtaining funding.
“Our biggest thing was outreach. It’s tough when you start a new club and you’ve got to try to get to people,” Reading said. “We went to the fairs and the different things where the student organizations would help hold stuff. But we still have people and even professors that don’t know about our organization.”
In the first year, the team also had no official funding.
“Sophomore year, we started to get a little bit [of funding]. We didn’t get official funding from the school until my junior year,” Reading said.
It was Reading’s sophomore year that the team also was able to bring on a head coach: Henry Widen, a Drake graduate student who served one year as head coach before stepping down and being replaced by Todd Henderson.
“[Henderson] should be getting paid starting next year. That’s something we’ve worked out with Drake, is getting the coaching staff paid,” Reading said.
With the bigger budget the team is receiving, Reading said they plan to use a lot of the money for marketing and outreach.
“I’m trying to grow the club. I want us to move up to a D2 or D1 team within the next five to 10 years,” said Dylan Fischer, next year’s president of the hockey club.
The team is currently ranked D3 in the American Collegiate Hockey Association. Fischer said that, in moving up to at least D2, Drake would be given the opportunity to play teams like Iowa State and the University of Minnesota.
In order to move up a division, the team would need to grow in size and get approval from the ACHA.
Fischer’s magic number is 15. He wants to grow the team from its current 11 to 15, which would involve recruiting eight new players since four of the current ones are graduating.
“We’ve been going to high school tournaments all over Iowa, Illinois and the big one up in Minnesota to scout and meet with players, try and convince them to come to Drake,” Fischer said.
According to Reading, the team is expecting around 10 new players in the coming year solely from high school outreach — exceeding Fischer’s initial goal.
“Shout out [Fischer] for that; he was the former recruitment chair. He’s done a lot of great work. It really helped going to the Minnesota State Hockey Tournament, a massive hockey event in Minnesota,” Reading said.
Looking forward, Reading is proud of how much the team has grown in such a short amount of time. He said the team is in good hands with Fischer and all the new guys.
“I’m a little nervous because I don’t have any power anymore. But I think it’s a great base that we’ve built. I trust the guys taking over and I trust the people around the organization. So I only think it’s going to grow,” Reading said. “It will be so cool to come back in five or so years and see how much it’s grown, knowing we helped build this. I think that will be really cool to look back on.”
