TOPEKA (KSNT) – The Topeka Adult Hockey League hosted day two of a three-day, round robin playoff tournament Wednesday night.
The league’s four teams are competing for the Bob Owen Cup, named after 1960 U.S. Olympic gold medalist Bob Owen, who lived in the capital city for almost 40 years.
This is the league’s first season in five years, largely credited to the return of the Federal Prospect Hockey League’s Topeka Scarecrows. The Topeka Pilots, part of the North American Hockey League, played in Top City from 2007-2020.
“This is the first year we’ve split into two sessions,” Dave Hodges said, President of the Topeka Hockey League. “We did it because we had had no league for five years, we had no idea how many people were going to come back.”
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The league encourages skaters of all skill levels to join, with no prior playing experience required.
“This is a mixed league, there’s four different levels: A, B, C, D,” Hodges said. “Sometimes, people start the year [and] they’ve never skated before, but they get better and better as they continue.”
Hodges expects there to be six teams next season, as the interest in hockey continues to grow in Topeka. This growth has also spread to youth hockey in the city.
“The youth program I think has grown from 15 at the beginning of fall to about 100,” Hodges said. “We used to have a high school youth team, one team for the whole city, and I think we’re headed [in] that direction again.”
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