This was written by Brighton hockey mom Alicia Sikkenga Urbain
Last weekend marked the last day of high school hockey for my son Drew and really for our family. Drew is a senior at Detroit Catholic Central and a forward on the hockey team.
It ended like it was supposed to end, on the last day of the season, in the last game of the state high school hockey championships, with Catholic Central being crowned Division 1 state champions. To make it slightly more poetic, it was over Brighton, where we live, where Drew was zoned to go to high school, where he went to school up through eighth grade, where he had friends and former teammates.
In the spring of 2019, I wrote a blog about Drew’s travel hockey days coming to an end. I wrote:
“And many will go on to play against each other over the next four years, too. My hope is that they leave it all on the ice, play hard, work hard, and hug after the game.”
This played out in the first game of the season when CC played Hartland, on the NHL rink at USA Arena. Drew’s former teammate who is one of his best friends plays at Hartland (the defending Division 2 state champs who, this past season, moved to Division 1). CC took the win, but the two hugged in the handshake line at the end. Drew went on to play other teammates and other friends over the season, and they all ended with at least a handshake and some with hugs.
There was another part to the story brewing on the West side of the state. As the regular season came to an end, Drew’s cousin Tyler Sikkenga, who is 11 days younger, was wrapping up his season, too. Tyler is a senior at East Grand Rapids, which is in Division 3.
The two played each other for the last time in the fall MDHL League, we saw Tyler play a regular season game back in December, and our hopes were fading that his team would make it to USA Arena for the state championship. We were hoping to see Drew’s team in Division 1 and Tyler’s team in Division 3.
Drew and Tyler through the years:
Tyler was out for the first two games of regionals, but his team pulled together and won both. His team, East Grand Rapids, upset Grand Rapids Catholic to win regionals. They went on to pull out a win over the Bay Area Reps in the quarterfinals in yet another upset to make it to USA Arena.
The Sikkenga hockey blood was flowing strong as CC also made it through their regionals and quarterfinals. EGR was going to have to play one of the best teams in the state, Houghton, which everyone had picked to clean up in Division 3. In the first tilt of the day at USA Arena on Friday, EGR came from behind in the semifinal game, with Tyler scoring the game-tying goal with just seconds left in regulation and then assisting on the game-winner in overtime.
A few hours later, CC won its semifinal game too. In the East Grand Rapids final, Tyler scored EGR’s only two goals, but they fell short by a goal in the final seconds of that game. The cousins who started life together, both of whom wore No. 14 this season, got to finish their hockey careers on the same day at the same location with a lot of Sikkengas there to cheer them on!
Meanwhile in the final game of 2023 state finals, CC beat Brighton 3-0, and the final hug of the handshake line was for another Rebel from the early years, one who meant a lot to our family, and one whose dad (who also meant a great deal to us) passed away just weeks prior. This hockey mom was prepared to be emotional with all the lasts, but the last hug is what started the tears.
The CC team went on to sing “Mary Alma Mater” as they did after every win of the season. I have grown fond of that song over the last four years and hearing it the way the team sings it after games for the last time was also hard (but I have it recorded so I can go back and listen anytime I want).
A line in that song says, “May valiant Blue and peerless White teach us to be men of Mary, Alma Mater.” The hugs in the handshake line, I think, have shown that they are now men and they know that they are competitors on the ice, they are still brothers off the ice.
As Drew stepped off the ice for the last time in a CC jersey, I knew the boys learned the Goodness, Discipline and Knowledge both on the ice and off. I am sad for this chapter to end, but I am looking forward to seeing how these men of Mary Alma Mater and the Rebel boys grow into their own.
Their futures are bright, and I hope that when they play with and against each other eventually in men’s league hockey they still follow it up with a hug in the handshake line.
P.S. A few days after the state-championship games, they announced the All-State teams. Both Tyler and Drew got All State First Team in their respective divisions.
Alicia Urbain is a Brighton resident.
