Lucas Punkari
After a strong showing at the USHL combine in Chicago in early August, local goalie Mark Loveday had a set goal in mind of making the U16 squad when he returned to the campus of Shattuck-St. Mary’s in Faribault, Mn.
And when the roster for the U16 Sabres was announced on Sept. 18 following a week of tryouts, the 15-year-old’s name was right there.
“I was really pumped up that I made the team as all of the hard work that I did during the summer paid off,” Loveday enthused.
“I was also glad that I beat out my main competition [Eric Schierhorn from Alaska] for the spot, as I know he wanted to do better than me as I beat him out for the Tier I [Bantam] spot last year,” he noted.
“Once I found out that I made the team, it felt like a big burden and a huge weight was lifted off of me with all of that stress gone,” Loveday added.
Making the U16 squad was Loveday’s number-one goal due to the fact the team has a chance to play at the national tournament at the end of the season, which will be taking place in Buffalo at the end of March.
“The two top teams that guys want to make here at Shattuck are the U16 and the Prep teams as they are always the nationally-contending teams there,” Loveday explained.
“Obviously, I would have liked to have made the Prep squad this year, but that’s more of a team for the junior and senior guys that are here while the U16 team is more for the younger guys to help them build their game and work their way up.
“It was a more realistic goal to make the U16 team, and it ended up happening for me.”
Joined on the team by 12 of his teammates from last year’s Tier I Bantam squad, along with players Loveday was familiar with from the Shattuck-St. Mary’s campus, the Sabres already have gotten off to a quick start with a 6-1 record going into this weekend’s HPHL Showcase tournament in Ann Arbor, Mich.
“So far as a team we’ve been playing really well,” Loveday noted.
“Our schedule, though, is going to be really hard this year, and it’s not going to be those blowout-type games that we had last year,” he stressed.
“The coaches [Christian Bragnalo and Brad Cohen] specifically scheduled us to be up against the best teams all of the time so that we are better prepared for the nationals.
“And so that we are also used to the situations that you may run into when you are playing those top teams,” he added.
As for his own play, Loveday is pleased with his 3-1 record thus far, which came after a pair of road wins against the Thunder Bay Kings to start the season before splitting a pair of games last weekend versus the visiting Colorado Thunderbirds.
“I felt really good in those first two games in Thunder Bay, and I thought for our very first weekend of the season that the team played great,” Loveday recalled.
“When we went against Colorado, though, we found out right away that they were a lot bigger, faster, and stronger than the other two teams we faced so far [Thunder Bay and the Minnesota Blades], and I don’t think we were really ready for that,” he admitted.
“I played in the first game on Friday and the shots were something around 40-20 for Colorado, but I basically bailed my team out and we were able to get a 3-2 win.
“Then in my next start on Sunday, the game went the other way around for us as we outworked them but we ended up losing 6-4 as they capitalized on our turnovers.”
As the season progresses, Loveday is looking to continue to make improvements to his game as he wants to achieve his main goal of capturing a national title at Shattuck, especially after the Tier I Bantam Sabres lost in the quarter-finals of last year’s USA Hockey championships.
“Not being able to win it all last year made me really hungry to do it this year,” Loveday remarked.
“I just want to get better to help my team have a shot to win that tournament, and that is basically my biggest goal right now.
“I’m just trying hard and competing in practice all of the time and doing what I can to get better, and that includes putting in the extra hours after school and on the weekends to work out,” he noted.
“It’s really all about training hard once again, just like I did this summer before I went to the USHL combine.”
