This year YHH plans to announce a player of the year at all levels we cover: U10A, U12A, Squirts, PeeWees and Bantams.  The award is named for Minnesota Hockey Legend Wiz Wyatt who starred for both Minneapolis West High School and Harvard in his playing career and went on to coach youth hockey in both Minneapolis and Edina.  To learn more about Wiz and his background click here. Different from typical player of the year awards, on ice talent and statistics are not the only criteria for this award.  Like it’s namesake, this player will be talented both on the ice, in other sports, in the classroom and will be well respected by their coaches and teammates. YHH did extensive work trying to find not only the five best players, but five great kids from all over Minnesota. And what a group of great kids we’ve uncovered, not just on the ice…but in the classroom and on the ballfields in their community as well. The SQA and U10A winners will be announced on Sunday, March 17 at Bloomington Ice Garden at the conclusion of our SQA championship of the YHH Squirtacular presented by DynaMoo (face off 2:15 pm).

Our search for the Player of the Year winners began a year ago while watching ’01 and ’02 AAA hockey teams, The Brick Tournament in Edmonton in July, followed by more AAA tournaments in the late Summer and into the Fall.  We had a list of 50 or so kids that were on rosters from Rochester, Edina, Andover, Stillwater, Rosemount, and Maple Grove. We found that every one of those kids is an outstanding player, narrowing the list to just five is very difficult. Finding great hockey players was easy, finding great all around athletes with great grades, and players that are well liked by their teammates and coaches was a little more challenging (especially when you consider the fact that these kids are usually in the spotlight for scoring so much). To find these great kids, we watched a lot of hockey…but more importantly, we talked to a lot of coaches to find out who was most deserving.  Here are those five:

Zach, a left handed slugger for the Elk River AAA baseball team last Summer.

Zach Michaelis, Center, Elk River Elks

During our search for players we first noticed Zach last Summer while skating for the MN Blades AAA club.  A gifted skater with a great shot, he got our attention right away. Zach played with The Blades team that represented Team Minnesota in The Brick Tournament in Edmonton last July. District 10, where Zach plays, was one of the toughest leagues in Squirt A hockey  featuring Zach’s team Elk River, #2 Andover, Blaine, Champlin Park, St. Francis, and Princeton. We interviewed several coaches, mostly from District 10, on who was the player they feared most when he got the puck and Zach was the hands down leader.

A multiple SKATE award winner, Zach is more proud of his high scores at school than he is the number of goals in hockey or hits in baseball. Many of his teachers say that he is a very good student, respectful, and always pays attention during class.

In addition to being a great player, Zach was also a great teammate this year. One of only 3 returning skaters to the ER Squirt A team, Coach Nate Droogsma commented on Zach’s demeanor as a leader, “Zach was a guy we relied on heavily to set the tone in practices and games for our team. Many of the other kids looked up to first because they all realize he was the most skilled player on our team, but then later because they realized he was willing to include everyone into the activities. He ran our pregame dryland exercises and helped develop a really nice attitude in our locker room.”  Droogsma went on to say, in all the years I’ve coached, there is nobody easier to coach…he looks you in the eye when you’re talking to him and when you challenge him to be better he goes out and accomplishes it…”