Practice Summary - 10/24/26

After a one-week reprieve from an early morning practice, the Dare Devils were back at their normal 9am time slot this morning. The early wake-up call didn’t seem to affect the players, who all had an extra jump in their skating legs today.

Unfortunately, Head Coach Myles and lead Assistant Coach Steve Toledo had a scheduling conflict due to their other coaching responsibilities. Management was concerned that a short-handed staff would be in trouble without Coach Myles, but the junior coaches came out in droves (shoutout coaches Carmine, Alex, Sarp and Asher) and senior Coaches Eric Zlotnick, Joe Keegan, Doug Katz and Ray Law stepped up, as usual.

Practice started with a learn-to-skate session, and our newer players continue to show significant progression in their skating and hockey skills. Thanks to such great coaching representation, every skater got individualized instruction. Victoria Garay, Ethan Basta, Bodhi Pilavakis, Jordan Rosen, Shepherd Slootmaker, Daniel Weissman, Nirav Wagle and Grant Wnek were all flying around the ice and rifling shots at our goalies.

Speaking of goalies, we’re developing an embarrassment of riches between the pipes. Three netminders laced up today: veteran superstar Matty Brighton, rising rookie Mark Papadopoulos and newcomer Elliott Silverman. All three put on an impressive showing blocking shots.

After learn-to-skate, Coach Eric took the reins as ad interim head coach and led the players through a gauntlet of new drills, thanks to his dusty old notebook. He started with power-skating and added some new components to the typical edge work. For instance, he added a hop at the end of the swizzles. The players were up for the challenge and all put in excellent skating displays.

Next, Coach Eric studied his notebook, split the ice into three zones and gave the assistant coaches explicit instructions for each drill. These were all new, multi-step drills, so he made sure the right coaches were at each station. Captain Ryan Griffin also did a great job demonstrating each drill and showing the players how to complete them properly. The stations covered passing, edge work, breakouts and shooting.

Thank you coaches and thank you players. Today was a great practice. We hope to see everyone at the 15th Annual Bruce Giger Memorial Golf Outing on Monday!