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Israel
Israeli women take ice time
New national team aims for 2010 Winter Olympic Games in Vancouver.
CARINE WARSAWSKI JERUSALEM POST
Anew breed of ice hockey players emerged in Metulla, Israel, on Thursday. Not only did they sport Stars of David on their fronts, but also ponytails on their backs. . Israel's national women's ice hockey team held its first practice last week at the Canada Centre, alongside the men's junior national team, for a special skills clinic led by Sean Skinner, an internationally acclaimed stickhandling master who came from Colorado for a week.
Alan Maislin, chairman of the Israel Ice Hockey Federation (IHF), has recruited former NHL players Steve Dubinsky and Bill Jaffe to coach the national women's team. Maislin and Sergei Matin, the Israel IHF president, also enlisted Dr. Esther Silver, who has extensive competitive hockey experience in Israel and in Canada, to help direct the program.
. Also on the front line is 19-year-old forward Lisa Horowitz and her father, Wayne Horowitz, a professor at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. The Horowitzes have been instrumental in the local women's league, which was established last year.
Despite the relatively small number of women hockey players in Israel, Skinner thinks tliat the national women's team can succeed.
"It's not about the number of players, it's about the quality of training," he said. "Russia, for example, has the least number of hockey pbyers, but has the world's strongest program."
With its first praaice out of the way, the women's team plans to make its debut at a tournament to be held at the Canada Centre from Jan. 24-26, and make its first International Ice Hockey Federation GIHF) appearance in 2007. The national women's team is in Division IV of the IIHF, alongside Iceland, New Zealand and Romania.
Silver hopes the team will pro-
Dr. Esther Silver is a member of Israel's first national women's ice hockey team, which held its first practice last Thursday at the Canada Centre m Metulla.
vide a boost for the local women's ice hockey program in the short term, by developing female coaches, trainers, on-ice officials and team managers, and down the road.
"Within two years, we hope to participate in the IIHF World Championships," she said. "Our long-term goal is to develop our Olympic team to represent Israel at the 2010 Winter Olympics."
Lisa Horowitz, who began as Israel's first female ice hockey player and hopes to be one of the women who leads the national team to those Games, sets the goals for practices. Hopefully, "we'll get to know each other's strengths and
Canadian Social Development Minister Ken Dryden (rear, centre) visits Metulla to observe the growing Israeli hockey scene.
weaknesses, what'positions eacli of us play and to work on skating and shooUng," she said. "I want to function as a team and also to help improve each individual player."
Tlie players, coaches and officials hope that the women's ice hockey program will have a positive impact on Israeli women participating in sports and point out that women's ice hockey is different than the men's version.
It is "a totally different game - it is a game of finesse and not bmte strength," explained Silver. "I believe we will be paving the way for female athletes to get involved in a sport that can showcase the unique aspects that women bring to [hockey], as well as promoting Israel and sports development in Israel... (and) that women play a major role in Israeli sports programs and also on the international stage."
Wliile the antional vramen's team is currently based in Metulla, along with all of the Israel IHF programs, there are plans to build a new ice rink in the Tel-Aviv area.
The organization hopes to move its activities to the proposed facility, where it will be better located to offer ice hockey to a larger population of cliildren and adults, wliich has increasingly taken up roller hockey. Skinner said that he believes these players can easily transfer their skills from the cement to the ice. S