Love of hockey leads Sandy family to help develop youth players

It started with figure skating lessons for their oldest daughter, but that’s not how Danny and Beth Ingram of Sandy were drawn to their passion today–youth ice hockey. It led to the couple’s creation of the Salt Lake Effect Hockey Club, which is benefitting hundreds of young people energized by a sport boasted by the fact that Salt Lake City now has its own National Hockey League team.

“We wanted to introduce both of our daughters to figure skating, starting with our oldest daughter Klyne,” Danny said looking back more than a decade ago. “She started skating, but she eventually decided to try other things such as gymnastics. Our second daughter Millie was also in a Learn to Skate program in San Antonio where we were living, and the ice rink was divided for skating on one side and hockey on the other. She spent all of her time captivated by hockey on the other side, started pointing and getting really excited. She was 3 years old.”

Needless to say, hockey became her sport.

The Ingrams, named this month’s Community Heroes for the City Journals, moved to Salt Lake City in 2015, not long after their son Clark was born, and both he and Millie are entrenched in ice hockey. Today, Millie plays as a goalie U14 Utah Lady Grizzlies traveling team, and recently competed in a tournament in Sun Valley, Idaho. Clark is part of the Utah Junior Grizzlies. Both are very dedicated to their sport, as are their parents.

The more their kids got involved, the more they sensed there was a need to change the playing field, or the ice so to speak, regarding some youth hockey programs.

“We started the Effect last March,” Danny said. “We wanted to help all the players with the desire for an equal chance to play, and to focus efforts on character building and shaping them into leaders, using hockey as that platform. And we identified some of the barriers to the kids really getting the investment that they need.”

The first one was the price of the sport.

“It shouldn't be who your mom and dad are or how much money they make,” Beth said. “That's a barrier for a kid playing a game that they want to play. And so we wanted to remove that as an obstacle. Understand that hockey is a very expensive sport, with ice time and equipment and everything else.”

To that end, the Ingrams have invested their time and literally hundreds of thousands of dollars of their own money and started Effect. But cost wasn’t the only issue they had with existing programs.

“We kind of looked at some of the stuff that USA Hockey is doing as a monopoly, and it's really discouraging competition and impeding innovation, and there's a lot of dialog and debate. So Beth and I decided we wanted to work together, show the example of what can be, embrace stewardship and give back. Everybody was talking and change wasn't happening, and we felt that we should go, walk the walk, put our money where our mouth was, create experiences for the kids, lead by example. And the change needed was from outside because of the entrenchment that select people have; the influence, the control that change isn't going to come naturally.”

“Our mission is to transform great athletes into better people,” Beth said. “We’re guided by the platinum rule that you treat others the way we would like to be treated. We focus on the youth athlete with three goals for our program—increase experience, improve skills and inspire passion. I think parents are sometimes a contributing factor to kids not understanding reality, and they're high maintenance and entitled. We want to help parents to see that there's no entitlement. Help associations and organizations realize positive change.”

The Salt Lake Effect is having two tryout sessions in March, on the 9th and 16th (see sidebar), and the Ingrams are investing in 220 skaters fighting for 10 teams with roster spots. They are paying for everything involved in this sport–the ice time, the coaching, the uniforms for both practice and travel, and all the tournament entry fees for the season coming up. Parents will only be responsible for paying their own travel expenses. Independent evaluators, including some former NHL players and prestigious coaches, will be at the tryouts. No teams are set in stone, and players will be chosen solely on their merits on ice. No parent will have control over those selections.

Still in its first full year of operation, Salt Lake Effect will continue to expand into younger age groups, eventually for players ages 5 and above all the way to age 18.

“We think ultimately, in the program, we will have between 500 to 600 kids that make teams that will get the game of hockey largely given to them free, and to make it less of a burden for parents,” Danny said. “We want to teach them life skills and invest in their hockey development, but also the development of their character and shaping them into future leaders. So that's the dream for us.”

Find out more at saltlakeeffect.org.