Last April, video surfaced of Buffalo Sabres centre Ryan O’Reilly roller blading around the Harbor Center in Buffalo as he signed autographs for Sabres fans.
The Sabres sometime practice at the Harbor Center, and threw their gear on inside the KeyBank Arena before making the short trip over to their practice facility.
Over in the Olympics in South Korea, ice surfaces aren’t as common as they are here in North America. With such a condensed Olympic schedule and limited practice times with limited rinks, some teams are forced to dress inside a dressing room at one venue before boarding a bus to practice on another sheet of ice close by.
Such was the case for the Canadian Women’s Olympic Hockey team, who were forced to get dressed in one venue before boarding a team bus. Goaltenders don’t have the convenience of putting on their skates as one of the last pieces equipment like players do, because their skates have to be properly connected to the boot of the pads. That meant that goaltenders Shannon Szabados, Genevieve Lacasse and Ann-Renee Desbiens had to do what O’Reilly did and slip into a pair of roller skate guards.
Szabados even got to mix in a quick chat with Ben Scrivens, the likely starter for the men's team that was finishing up their first practice at the Winter Games.
While we mostly see skate guard with kids who prefer to get dressed at home, it’s pretty funny to see these athletes have some fun with it all and revert back to their minor hockey days when skate guards where a regular thing.
