Short-Sited Sport : Recreation: Roller hockey is all the rage, but facilities where kids can practice and play games are scarce because of fears of liability.
The Nordiques and the Panthers were on the run.
First they were booted from a shopping mall parking lot in West Hills. Then they got kicked out of an elementary school. All because neighbors complained that the roller hockey teams made too much noise when the pucks hit the boards, or when their skates clattered across the asphalt, or when exuberant parents shouted too loudly.
Eventually, after they were chased outside the Los Angeles city limits, the players, between the ages of 8 and 13, found a Calabasas elementary school where they could hold practice games.
The saga of the Nordiques and the Panthers, two teams from the West Valley Roller Hockey League, is not unusual. Roller hockey is the new youth sport rage in Southern California, with many kids setting aside baseballs and basketballs and creating hockey hotbeds in communities from Los Angeles to Orange County.
But as the sport’s popularity continues to grow, so has the number of school districts or businesses banning the activity because they don’t want to be held liable if players get hurt--even though most, if not all, organized leagues have insurance. The Los Angeles Unified School District is among those that have prohibited the sport on its campuses.
“We don’t have rinks at our schools. We don’t have designed areas that are safe to play,” said Jim Sugahara, head of outdoor recreation programs for the giant district.
“The grounds have a lot of cracks and children may run into basketball poles,” he said. “It’s not conducive to roller-skating or roller-blading. It’s just not designed for that purpose.”
But parents and coaches who have seen children abandon Little League and other established sports to play roller hockey disagree.
“That’s just excuses,” said Steve Shepp, a coach for the Nordiques in the San Fernando Valley.
“They don’t need much other than a blacktop,” he said, adding that all players in his league are required to wear proper equipment and all the games are supervised.
But fear of lawsuits has prompted schools and businesses--essentially those with big parking lots--to put a damper on the activity.
“Our security people on weekends have chased some kids and young adults off of our school sites,” said Brad Lantz, student services director for the Tustin Unified School District in Orange County.
Growing pains are being felt throughout the region as pint-size Wayne Gretzkys pour out of neighborhood cul-de-sac pickup games, looking for organized teams and a place to play.
The Nordiques and Panthers have missed about three weeks of practice since the season began in late March after they twice lost their playing privileges when neighbors and school officials complained of noise, heavy traffic and the destruction to property.
“Once or twice a puck went through a school window. However, they did replace them,” said Ilene Meyers, principal of Lockhurst Drive Elementary School in Woodland Hills. After a six-month tryout, she decided not to allow the West Valley Roller Hockey League to practice on her playgrounds.
“It just didn’t work out,” said Meyers. “Our school is in a residential neighborhood. It was difficult for people living there.”
Coaches called more churches and private businesses with big parking lots, but the answer was always no because of the same concerns, said Pete Hogenson, the Panthers’ coach.
“We couldn’t hold practice for about two weeks because we didn’t have a practice site,” said Hogenson, whose 8-year-old son, Jake, plays on the team. “We didn’t want to take these kids to go and practice at somebody’s abandoned parking lot without permission.”
Finally, Chaparral Elementary School in Calabasas agreed to allow the teams to practice twice a week for a total of three hours. Players and coaches couldn’t be happier, even though they had to call off practice one Thursday when the school held its PTA meeting on the same day. However, there were no complaints.
“It’s nice to have one practice. Two is a luxury,” said Hogenson. “If we have to make concessions to be good tenants we will.”
Some hockey teams have gone to extremes to find a place to practice. In Orange County, some teams--which have few other places to go--secretly play on school campuses on weekends and in the early hours before school starts.
In Saddleback Valley recently, as the sun rose over a black asphalt parking lot near a schoolyard, hyperkinetic kids donned their skates and began practicing their slap shots.
Their coaches kept one eye on the players, and the other eye peeled for the security guard or principal who might appear and immediately banish them all from the schoolyard.
Side by Side Rinks in Huntington Beach is one of the few places in Southern California for young roller hockey players. League play goes on 23 hours a day, seven days a week. Players show up at 1 a.m. for the final set of league games.
At 4 a.m., the rink shuts down. An hour later, the next day of roller hockey begins. Rink management says they could fill three other roller facilities with the demand for new roller hockey leagues.
But the search for less formal practice sites has posed a minor law enforcement problem, as police officers encounter weekend hockey games on school property and force the players to clear out.
“The police come out and tell us to leave, the principals come out and tell us to leave; I think it’s really stupid,” said Brian Fletcher, 17, who plays for a junior team in Mission Viejo. For Fletcher, “roller hockey is the best sport in the world. You get going so fast, you get so much speed, it’s kind of a rush. Then when you score a goal, you get really pumped.”
The popularity of youth roller hockey was made possible by two events, enthusiasts agree: The successful marketing of in-line skates--a series of wheels set in a single line between the heel and toe--and the celebrity of Los Angeles Kings’ hockey superstar Gretzky.
“Its popularity has just mushroomed, it’s being played in the streets everywhere,” said Alan Trudell, spokesman for the Garden Grove Unified School District.
While the problem largely centers on schools, some cities are also concerned enough about liability to take a hard line.
Trudell said his 9-year-old son and his friends have been shooed away from parks by city employees in Anaheim Hills. “It’s really overpowering my son’s desire to play football or baseball,” Trudell said. “He loves to play roller hockey.”
John Black, who managed Roller Hockey International’s Los Angeles Blades franchise last year, also organizes youth roller hockey tournaments throughout Southern California and has seen the phenomenal growth of the game.
“You can see the gleam in a kid’s eyes when they talk hockey,” said Black. “The word you hear over and over is addictive. This sport has really taken root, and it’s definitely here to stay.”
Black and other roller hockey organizers say the only thing holding the game back is lack of proper facilities.
“We have organized baseball, basketball and soccer. Why can’t we have organized roller hockey?” said Hogenson, the Panthers’ coach. “I’d like to see it be a part of city parks and recreation programs.”
Players will go anywhere they can find a smooth surface. Enclosed tennis courts are attractive, and enclosed garage structures will do in a pinch.
But with schools conveniently located in most neighborhoods, most roller hockey players usually wind up on the schoolyard. A better way needs to be found, everyone agrees, but progress toward developing roller hockey facilities has been slow.
Scott Accongio, who runs the six-team Golden West Roller Hockey League in Anaheim, said he’s talked to several Orange County cities and school districts about building rinks--and always gets the same answer.
“They say they don’t want noise in parks, they say liability is the issue,” Accongio said. “But insurance isn’t that hard to get. I’m willing to come in, build the park, get the kids in off the street. It’s been frustrating.”
But there are also encouraging signs for roller hockey enthusiasts.
In Santa Ana, the city converted an underutilized tennis court for roller hockey play. Garden Grove and Anaheim found places that could be used for roller hockey and hired outside contractors to operate leagues for adults and children. The Los Alamitos School District is working on a similar proposal.
The problem of finding a place to play, though increasingly common, is not new. George Williams, 34, owner of the Reseda Roller Hockey League, recalls that even before the era of in-line skates--when he and his buddies growing up in Burbank wore sneakers to play hockey--the sport was not a big hit with authority figures.
“We’ve been kicked out of every schoolyard, every tennis court and every supermarket parking lot,” Williams said. “We knew every cop in Burbank by name.”
Chau Lam is a Times staff writer. Frank Messina is a special correspondent.
