New Berkshire Hockey Team Takes On The Nation's Best
 The Berkshire Braves showed they had something to prove by starting off the Battle of the Berkshires tournament with a 13-1 win over the Rutland (Vt.) Black Ice. |
Update: March 26, 2011: The Berkshire Braves won their second game of the tournament Saturday morning beating the Mohawk Little Valley Pioneers 7 - 4.
NORTH ADAMS, Mass. — The county's top hockey players are throwing the gloves down with the best teams in the country to prove that they can play at the highest level.
St. Joseph's High School senior Mike Taylor was fed up with the lack of attention the athletes in Berkshire County were getting so he gathered the best high school players and formed his own team. Now they're challenging the best teams in the nation.
"I wanted to get it going because I have a lot of buddies that are pretty good around here. Everybody's doubted us around here, saying we couldn't do it, not to put a team together. So I put it together and we played the 90th-ranked team in the nation," Taylor said Friday. "Nobody said we could do it, so we want to prove them all wrong."
Once finding interest in a local team, Taylor contacted coach Steve Kotski who took charge. The Berkshire Braves have a squirt league so he added an under-18 team and took it on the road. This weekend, he brought those top teams here.
"We're soft. We're not going to say no. We're coaches," Kotski said. "We're giving them a chance to live the dream."
The Berkshire Braves 18 and under team went to New York and beat the Saugerties(N.Y.) U-18 Midgets and then beat the Adirondac Midgets. Then, with only 11 skaters and without their best player, they took on the nationally ranked Hudson Valley Polar Bears AA. While they lost, 4-2, the game sent waves around the hockey world and earned them an invitation to compete with teams from all over the globe at the Shamrock Elite Invitational Hockey Tournament - a tourney sure to be scouted by big-name colleges.
"They're all top teams and we've been invited to it so we must have impressed somebody along the way," Kotski said. "Hopefully, we impress more right now."
It has only been two months since the team's formation, and Kotski is going after the best. He organized the first Battle in the Berkshires tournament and brought top teams to the Peter W. Foote Vietnam Veterans Memorial Rink including the nationally ranked Haverford Hawks.
"I'm 41 and I've been in hockey for a long time and this is going to be the most talent on the ice in Berkshire County in a long while," Kotski said.
The team will be up against players who are destined for professional hockey, Kotski said, and the Braves feature a few who could be right there with them. A lot of the players have the talent but not the experience of playing at this level and are still getting used to it.
"These are the most elite teams in hockey," Kotski said on Thursday. "There is such good talent here but it get sprinkled out and our leagues get watered down."
The tournament continues Saturday and Sunday. The Braves play the Mohawk Little Valley Pioneers on Saturday morning at 7 and Saugerties at 4 p.m. On Sunday, they play the Haverford Hawks at 8 a.m. The tournament's championship will be Sunday at 2 p.m.
The goal is not only to prove that there is talent out here but to build a program so that colleges and teams will start scouting Berkshire County players more. Previously, players would have to travel miles away to join a team with enough talent to be noticed.
"Our high-school teams, our best one was Wahconah this year and they went to Western Mass and lose first round. They would just smoke everyone from around here. So we took the best players from each team," Taylor said.
Berkshire Brave's player Jeremy Wich, who helped organize the team, has been traveling away to play hockey for years.
"I've had to travel for the past six years to Albany and back to play high-level hockey," Wich said. "We want to prove to everyone that we can do it and get some wins in our hometown."
Kotski said he is going to run a tough program but that comes after school work and the athletes are encouraged to play another sport as well. There are a few really good players in the county that are not on the team because Kotski told them to play baseball instead. He said he is not just trying to turn them into the best hockey players but the best the people, too.
"In order for them to play the best, they have to act like the best and that's what we ask of them," Kotski said.
