Spanning An Ocean For A Love Of Hockey

Glen Tang left little doubt about his main on-ice objectives during a five-night Seattle visit from Japan to play his favorite sport that still isn’t mainstream back home.

The Nikko Icebucks are a Japanese 12-Under hockey team comprised of top players from the Tokyo area, and last weekend made their second annual appearance here as guests of the Kraken and their Jr Kraken youth squads. They spent their visit learning from local coaches and partaking in a “Challenge Cup” Can/Am tournament at Olympic View Arena in Mountlake Terrace against teams from Washington, California, Oregon, and British Columbia.

For Tang, 10, the whirlwind trip offered new sights and experiences, but also a chance to test skills against the type of competition he can’t always find in his country.

“America and Canada are the best at hockey in the world,” Tan said. “And my dream is to play in the NHL.”

While the U.S. and Canada may be global hockey powerhouses, the Icebucks proved to be the best team at this particular tournament. They defeated the Oakland Bears 3-1 in the championship game last Sunday, with Tang notching a goal and an assist.

“Winning this tournament was an incredible feeling for everyone involved,” Icebucks coach Nobumase Kinugasa said. “For many of our players, this was their first experience competing internationally, and doing so in Seattle made it even more special.”

Kinugasa, a native of Kobe, Japan who once played semi-pro hockey in North Carolina and Quebec, was quick to note the trip wasn’t only about winning hockey games. The players, who were intentionally all different from those making the trip last year, had never been to Seattle before and many were in North America for the first time.

“Everybody was talking about this trip when they came back last year and a lot of the players who didn’t get to go were jealous and wanted to come,” he said. “So, that’s why we took new players.”

They not only took in some city sights but also got to learn hockey techniques different from those in Japan and capped things by taking in a Kraken game Monday against the Pittsburgh Penguins at Climate Pledge Arena.

The visit was made possible by a relationship between Kraken chief operating officer Rob Lampman and Icebucks’ COO Hiyoki Takayuki, who worked together for soccer’s FIFA global body at the men’s 2002 World Cup shared jointly between Japan and South Korea. The Icebucks used to do exchanges with the New York Islanders back when they were owned from 2001-2016 by Chinese American billionaire Charles Wang – who wanted to expand the game’s reach within Asia – and had since been looking to partner with another NHL squad.

Seeing NHL players up close was a dream for many of the Icebucks, who only get to see games back home through online videos.

Japan saw its first hockey played 100 years ago and has held a four-team national tournament since 1933 – one of the country’s oldest sporting events -- but the sport remains far less popular there than baseball and soccer. There were believed to be about 30,000 registered hockey players in Japan around the time of the 1998 Winter Olympics in Nagano, but by 2020 the number had dwindled to 18,000 – with cost and lack of available ice time cited as reasons for the declines.

The country does have men’s and women’s national teams -- the women having qualified for next month’s 2026 Olympic Winter Games in Milano Cortina. Between the Winter Olympics and the IIHF World Junior Hockey Championships played this month in Minnesota, international hockey is all the rage right now and the Icebucks visit represented a chance for much younger players to get a taste of what that’s all about.

Kinugasa only learned about hockey in Japan because his father enjoyed skating and used to take him to a nearby arena, which gave him a leg up on others in trying hockey and being good enough for North American semi-pro ranks.

That’s why he feels the early exposure to North American hockey is important for his players.

“They faced a different style of hockey, new environments and the challenge of playing away from home,” Kinugasa said. “But they supported each other and kept pushing to the end. For the players, I think the biggest takeaway was confidence. They realized they can compete at a high level outside of Japan and that their teamwork and effort truly matter.”

The players were somewhat anxious and maybe a tad intimidated heading in, knowing the North American players were bigger and played on a smaller ice surface than they are used to.

“It’s much more physical play,” Kinugasa said. “You’re running around in small spaces. So, you learn how to do that. That’s a big difference between them and us.”

Jr Kraken goalie development coordinator Julia Takasuka, who worked on-ice with the Icebucks’ netminder during their visit, said every country plays hockey somewhat differently and the visiting players certainly got a taste of that.

“And then there’s the culture,” she said. “The culture is so different between Japan and here and here and everywhere else. So, they’ll be seeing what that’s like and the similarities and differences there.”

Any disadvantages the Icebucks faced on the smaller ice proved short-lived as Ryosuke Sakai, 11, scored their first tournament goal and later added a second marker in an opening 5-3 victory over the Semiahmoo Ravens from B.C. Sakai, who finished the tourney with three goals and an assist, said he’d hoped to pick up some tips on “back checking” by watching the U.S. and Canadian teams as well as the Kraken game.

“NHL players are very fast, and they are so great at back checking,” he said. “So, I wanted to learn more about that.”

His teammate, forward Kei Hayakawa, 11, said he hoped to work on his “speed and agility” though he’s already a fast skater. Also, he’d like to get better at putting pucks to the net.

“I’m bad at shooting,” he admitted. “I need to be a little more accurate.”

Sakai started playing hockey in first grade. Hayakawa began at age 5, mostly because his older sisters also played and he was tired of getting roughed up by them.

But Hayakawa and Sakai both admit that not many of their school friends share in their passion for the sport, making them somewhat of a curiosity.

As for Tang, who closed out his team’s offense with a goal in the championship game, he loves “scoring goals” like his favorite player, Connor McDavid, and doesn’t mind school chums’ raised eyebrows at his playing a sport they don’t really understand. His mother, though, knew enough about hockey that she stepped in when he expressed an early preference for stopping pucks rather than putting them in the net.

“I wanted to play goalie, but my mother told me playing goalie is bad for your knees,” he said. “She also told me forwards can score goals, so I chose to play forward.”

One that can now impress those school pals back home by telling them he’s scored goals on two continents separated by a Pacific Ocean suddenly seeming a whole lot smaller.