Lacing ‘em Up

Hockey Is Life for BHS Student Evan Maxwell

Writer / Melissa Gibson
Photography Provided

When Evan Maxwell’s preschool soccer coach suggested he should be a hockey goalie, the idea was new to his family.

After all, ice rinks aren’t readily available in Hendricks County and the sport might be considered unique to some.

The Brownsburg resident took a year of ice-skating lessons, and by the age of 5 he was playing hockey games in Greenwood.

“I love the difficulty of the sport,” Maxwell says. “There’s always something you can improve on and I’ve always found that really fulfilling.”

Many of us are happy to simply remain upright on ice skates, but hockey requires a bit more skill.

“The skating portion itself requires keeping your balance and learning how to use the blades,” Maxwell says. “You’re going forward, backward and transitioning. Then you have stick handling, maintaining control of the puck and shooting. There are multiple types of shots you can make and each of those areas can always improve.”

Now a junior at Brownsburg High School, Maxwell competes with South Stars, a team that unites hockey athletes from Brownsburg, Avon, Center Grove, Perry County and surrounding areas.

They compete all over the state and have recently seen some massive growth and success.

“We’re a club hockey team and in my freshman year I was double rostered, playing on JV and varsity,” Maxwell says. “As a sophomore I was full-time varsity and the same with my junior year. We’re changing the culture at South Stars. When I started, the varsity team only had five wins. The next year we were half wins and half losses, and this year we won the championship.”

The last time the South Stars took home the state championship was in the late 1990s – a testament to all the hard work the athletes have put forth.

“We put in a lot of work off-season to keep everyone in top shape, and we needed to build our camaraderie and communication,” Maxwell says. “As the year went on, it was evident that we were a team that could go far this year and win the season.”

How do you become a winning hockey team?

For starters, the ‘season’ is a year-round commitment.

After a win in March, Maxwell went directly into tryouts for the spring league. Off-ice training begins this summer, and many including Maxwell will attend hockey camps to work on skills and practice in the warmer months.

“Once the summer is over, we’ll have our first fall game in late August and that goes through the end of March,” Maxwell says. “We might have a couple weeks off in June, but really it’s a year-round sport.”

Despite a sometimes-grueling schedule, Maxwell wouldn’t have it any other way.

“I think for myself and most hockey players, we’d say it’s for the love of the game,” he says. “Your best friends are the guys you play hockey with, and you want to be at your best for that guy playing next to you.”

His mom, Kimberly, says the Brownsburg Community School Corporation athletic department has always encouraged student participation in sports, even if they don’t offer a team on the school grounds.

“Evan wears a letterman jacket with a hockey letter on it, and kids often ask him about it because they didn’t realize there was a hockey team,” she says.

There isn’t a Brownsburg team per se, but anyone from Hendricks County is invited to tryout for the South Stars team.

In fact, the sport has allowed Maxwell to have a well-rounded group of friends and interests.

“It’s like having a whole different friend group,” he says. “I have one group of friends in school and another at hockey. It allows me to build a lot of relationships and meet lots of different people.”

Travel is significant in the sport, particularly for the young men in Brownsburg and Avon who participate in the program.

“We travel all over central Indiana – Fishers, Westfield, Carmel and Perry,” Maxwell says.

“We also go to Evansville, Fort Wayne, South Bend and Columbus for games,” Kimberly adds. “We’re very limited in ice rinks locally, but there’s so much more to it than hockey. The ice rink offers hockey, ice skating, public skating and sled hockey for people with a disability. It pulls people together and we often see kids at these rinks hanging out at the public skating.”

The sport might come with some reservations from parents. Hockey has long been thought of as a dangerous game.

“Evan is a very smart player,” Kimberly says. “We’ve heard that from every coach he’s had. He plays the game in its purest form, and over his whole career he’s only had two injuries. He got a mild concussion when he was 11 or 12 years old, and just recently played the state tournament with a fractured clavicle.”

With so much protective gear and safety rules in place today, hockey may be an environment where the danger has decreased and the fun has increased.

“USA Hockey oversees the leagues, and they have really been discouraging those major hits and fights we saw in the 1990s,” Kimberly says.

Though his schedule revolves around the game, Maxwell hasn’t let his grades slip.

“Evan is a National Honor Society student, an Eagle Scout, and he has a GPA of 4.3, which is a big focus for him,” Kimberly says. “He’s a super-smart, well-rounded kid and hockey is just part of what makes him him. We knew nothing about hockey at the time it was suggested and he loves it. It’s different and he’s been really driven over the years.”

Upon graduation, he hopes to continue playing in college and beyond.

“You can go into the NCAA – that’s higher-level college hockey – or there’s ACHA and Juniors,” he says. “I’m looking into the Air Force Academy and their hockey programs.”

With his interest in engineering and serving as a pilot in the Air Force, he thinks it’ll be a good fit. However, hockey will be involved in one way or another.

“I like that they don’t make you choose a major until your junior year, so it gives me time to look into a few directions,” Maxwell says. “As for hockey, I don’t think I’ll ever let the game go. Whether I’m playing competitively or just for fun, I’ll be playing either way.”

The South Stars High School Hockey Club practices at Perry Park from mid-September through March. Prior to the rink opening, practices occur in Fishers or Columbus. Visit southstarshockey.net for more information.