Is it all relative?

[Hockeyguy_27]

How many of you grew up playing hockey and remember that one kid who was way better than everyone as a mite or squirt? The kid who was destined to be a college or pro player. Did he make it?

I'm doing an unscientific survey. I'll post my answers after I read yours.

[MoreCowBell]

Marty Sertich, Mr. Hockey and Hobey Baker winner was an awsome Mite and squirt player.

[wbl92]

Played with Brian Bonin since clinic, all the way through high school. He was always head and shoulders above everyone else we ever played. He was better than most kids 2-3 years older since he started.

[My_Kid_Loves_Hockey]

Played with Brian Bonin since clinic, all the way through high school. He was always head and shoulders above everyone else we ever played. He was better than most kids 2-3 years older since he started.

Ditto for Trent Klatt....Brooklyn Park, playing Peewee A at squirt age I believe

[O-townClown]

How many of you grew up playing hockey and remember that one kid who was way better than everyone as a mite or squirt? The kid who was destined to be a college or pro player. Did he make it?

I'm doing an unscientific survey. I'll post my answers after I read yours.

Heat, I did this earlier this year. The simple fact is that the kids that were sensational Squirts usually went on to be great players.

David Latta was the best player at the Edina Holiday Tournament when I was a first-year Squirt playing Gold and friends were on the West travel team. From Thunder Bay. Lo and behold he was drafted next to Tom Chorske in the 1st Round.

My year it was Scott Bloom. Best kid I ever played against in Squirts. He was Metro POY (shared with Jim Carroll) and had a very productive senior year at the U. Oh, and he won two state HS titles. Don't need to tell you how big of a deal that is.

Some kids I played with didn't hit bigtime. Glen Lang and Bill Peterson were kids I played against as Pee Wees and with on an all-star team. Peterson's highlight was playing on Columbia Heights as a freshman in the Miracle game and Lang was a D3 star at UW-Superior if I recall. Would have thought these kids were can't miss WCHA players at age 12.

The best kid on my Squirt team had an unbelievably productive WCHA career at Denver. He moved up to Varsity and you played with him in HS.

Summary: yeah, usually these kids that were head and shoulders above the rest as Squirts went on to do well. Not always, but often.

My experience at least.

[slasher]

Hockeyguy- I think that's a YES!

[Tenoverpar]

I grew up with a kid named Chris Tshup in New Jersey. The kid was amazing when we played as kids, just unbelievable hands and ice savvy.
Didn't score so many goals but was an assist machine. He left town when we were in HS to go play prep school in New England, he ended up getting drafted in high school by Calgary in the same draft as Jagr, just 4 rounds later. He went to Notre Dame and played four years and then tooled around in smaller leagues but didn't make the show. To this day I look back and can't figure out how he even got as far as he did. I know he worked extremely hard on tooling his body to endure the beating that it took. Hockey took him from a small seashore town to a prep school education to Notre Dame and eventually to success through hockey connections. Great, where did that kid come from story.

[sorno82]

I would recommend that those that are interested should read the book Blades of Glory by Rosengren. It chronicles the end of an era at Bloomington Jefferson where a bunch of kids grew up together and had an up and down senior season. It talks about kids like Tom Gilbert who is now in the NHL (but still struggled to get a chance after high school), and others who had all the promise in the world end up as beer league stars. There was a kid who played squirt C his first year, and others who were stars from the beginnning. They talk briefly about Peter Mueller who was a dominant Peewee, and how he may have been recruited to play. Eric Johnson is not mentioned, but I believe he was a Squirt B his first year.

Glen Lang, who was mentioned earlier, is still an outstanding hockey player. He got caught in a numbers game at Duluth, and switched to Superior. In the summer leagues of the early - mid 90s, he was clearly on par with many of the D1 and NHL players in the league, but sometimes you need someone who will stick with you and let you stumble a bit and give you a chance to make it.

[bigpoppababy]

The kids I grew up with, their was a bunch of them that would have made huge marks in College or possibly the pro's. Unfortunately, they were arrested following the state tourney for breaking into a small hockey shop in Eagan/Burnsville in the late 80's/early 90's. There was a few of them that had full rides to D1 schools, but lost their shot.

In my opinion, it was much easier back 15-20 years ago to shine then it is now. A lot more avenues to promote strong players today with the age of internet and email.

[hockeyparent11]

It can be looked from both ends-How many D1 players were great as kids. My guess is that most, but not nearly all, were good at a young age.

Or you can look at it the other way: Of kids who are great squirts, how many go on to be D1 players. This percentage is far smaller, because there are so few D1 spots. Here is some math to explain why:

Right now, Minnesota has about 150 squirt A teams, or 2250 A Squirt players. Each year, about 50 Minnesota kids go off to play D1 hockey. If you take the top 10% of squirts, you get 225 players. This is only the best 1.5 players on each team. This is not the whole first line and not the bothof the starting D-pair. It includes no one on the second or third lines. It is only the best player on most teams, the best two players on some.

Of these best players, there is only room for about 1 in 5 at D1. So, it is inevitable that 80% or more of the very best squirts will never play D1. There is simply no room. And this is before adjusting for the late bloomers and the clutzy squirt who grows into a huge young man.

Enjoy it as you go!

[gilmour]

hockeyparent11, good job on the math except for one thing - you math assumes that every player on a SQA team is a 2nd year squirt...in other words, you have to reduce the 2250 players by the number of first year players...so let's say that 30% are first year players...that leaves 1575 players eligible for your calculation per year...taking your 10% of the players leaves 158 players so one out of every 3 of the 90th percentile (158 players divided by 50 open spots) will play D1...for the sake of simplicity, the final math says that if you identified the top 158 players and put them in groups of ten you would be able to pick one kid from each of the 15 groups.

Whatever - can't believe I wasted 5 minutes typing this...