"USA Hockey told me, 'We need someone to take over, why don't you do it,'" Caputo said. "I don't skate myself and I don't play hockey but I thought, 'OK, I'll just surround myself with people who know what they're doing and who can support me on this.' And we did."
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That year, Caputo and NYMBH held its first tryouts on Long Island - including at Northwell Health Ice Center, the official practice facility of the New York Islanders - and even in metro New York with a goal of gaining exposure and getting the word out.
"We sent out tons of emails, we gave lectures and speeches and generated lots of interest," Caputo said. "People came down that day to see what blind hockey was and what we were going to be. From that point, we just continued having practice at those rinks. We were in the city, in Suffolk [Country], in Nassau [County]. Then, we finally settled on Syosset and we've been skating about twice a month now."
Since 2017, NYMBH has been based out of Iceworks, the Islanders former practice facility located in Syosset. Twice a month the NYMBH offers ice sessions with certified youth hockey coaches and receive additional help and insight from volunteers who play at the collegiate and high school levels.
The sessions provide a safe and fun format for anyone who is visually impaired, ranging from low vision to completely blind, to get on the ice and work on everything from the fundamentals of skating to in-game competition. The players use an adaptive puck that is larger than a traditional puck, registers noise and travels across the ice at a slower speed.
While players from all over Long Island participate in these bi-monthly ice sessions, Caputo stressed the main goal of making hockey an accessible sport for everyone and creating a tight-knit community for the visually impaired. Caputo has seen firsthand how quick these connections develop, as he noted one of his sons has become close friends with two other skaters - and fellow Islanders fans - who go to different school districts on the Island.
"On the local level, my dream with my team is that nobody is excluded," Caputo said. "It doesn't matter the degree of vision loss, the skill, your age, everybody can come down. There are some stricter rules when it comes to national competitions but for me, it's not only what happens on the ice, it's what happens off the ice. This is a way for people from many different communities to get together and share their stories of vision loss."
