February 1, 2012
Hometown heroes
UConn's Schneider, Bentley's Komm have built on foundations that saw them as friends and rivals in Williamsville, N.Y.
by Alan Lessels/Correspondent
Cole Schneider
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Bentley sophomore goalie Branden Komm, already down about giving up a goal early in the third period that let Connecticut tie a recent game at 2-2, was about to receive another small dose of bad news.
He realized that UConn sharpshooter Cole Schneider, also a sophomore, was the one who got it.
“I heard he was the one who scored and my heart kind of dropped,” Komm said. “Right after the game when I saw him, I joked and told him, ‘You’ve still got my number.’ I look forward to seeing him again. I’ll try to shut him out.”
Komm, to be sure, has nothing against Schneider. The thing is, they grew up competing against each other. Both are from Williamsville, N.Y., a town of about 5,000 just outside Buffalo, where hockey is growing.
“Actually, we were pretty much rivals all growing up,” Schneider said. “He was an All-Star goalie in our area and it was always a battle between me and him.”
They were also teammates a time or two when they were younger.
“I remember we went to a state tournament once, and his dad was the coach and Cole and I were roommates,” Komm said.
Such is the state of hockey, much like other sports, where local youth league players morph to travel team players, who grow into high school and prep school players, and then maybe play juniors, with the best moving on to college and perhaps beyond.
“The hockey world gets smaller and smaller the older you get,” Komm said. “You see the same faces a lot.”
They saw them back in the day and maybe ran into them from time to time – or even now -- at the Northtown Center in Amherst with its four rinks, or at the Hockey Outlet or Holiday Twin Rinks.
Komm and Schneider also see familiar faces when their teams play various Atlantic Hockey teams.
Williamsville is part of Amherst, N.Y., and Holy Cross goalie Thomas Tysowsky is from Amherst. Kevin Ryan from Niagara is from nearby Eden. UConn junior defenseman Tom Janosz is from Elma and Bentley freshman goalie Blake Dougherty is from East Amherst.
Waving the state of New York banner may fall to Niagara and Canisius, along with Army and RIT, when it comes to teams in Atlantic Hockey. But there are plenty of New Yorkers scattered among the rosters of other teams in the league, too.
A fair number of those come from Buffalo Sabres country, and specifically from Williamsville and Amherst.
“We play a pretty good level of hockey here,” said Pete Schneider, Cole’s father and his high school coach. “That’s partly because we’re so close in proximity to Toronto, and we’re able to go across the border and play a lot of teams in Toronto and the surrounding areas. That’s a pretty high level and it’s good for the local players to be able to do that.”
Schneider coached Cole at St. Joseph’s Collegiate Institute and is now the director of athletics at the school. He also coached his son and a number of the players from the area on various youth teams.
The presence of the Sabres and a Jr. Sabres program, along with USA Hockey, have all helped hockey in the area, Pete Schneider said.
“High school hockey has grown tremendously over the last few years,” he said. “In the last seven or eight years it’s grown drastically as more of the school districts have adopted hockey. It’s probably not comparable to prep school hockey in the Boston area, but some teams are very good.”
And they continue to send players off to junior hockey and then college.
Cole Schneider played juniors with Ryan for the Topeka RoadRunners of the North American Hockey League. Komm went the prep school route and played at Northfield-Mount Hermon in Massachusetts before moving on to Bentley.
Komm played at Williamsville North and led his team against Schneider and St. Joseph’s in the regional championships each of his last two years. St. Joe’s won them both.
“The level of play was great,” Pete Schneider said. “It’s fun to watch such high level players go against each other.”
It remains fun.
“It’s always interesting to watch those games when Cole and Branden go head to head,” he said. “It adds a little more to it.
“I fully root for UConn now,” Schneider added. “But when you can sit back and look at it objectively, you can appreciate what all the kids are doing. You’ve had the opportunity to work with them through the years and have watched the progress of some of them from the time they were 6-years-old. It’s a great feeling, and on top of it the families have stayed friends, and you run into each other at the rink and you catch up.”
Then there are the homecoming games.
Komm’s collegiate highlight so far may have been going home on the first weekend in November this season and stopping 30 shots on Friday night against Canisius, for a 2-0 win and his first career shutout.
“That was pretty special, to be able to do it in front of the hometown crowd,” Komm said. “I think there were 26 members of my family there for the game.”
That same weekend, he ran into Tysowsky -- he’s trained with him and Dougherty during the summer -- at the hotel. Holy Cross was in town to play Niagara and would win, with Tysowsky making 32 saves in the 4-3 victory.
“We were able to wish each other luck,” Komm said. “We’re all close. We don’t wish ill well upon each other. The harder everyone pushes each other, the better everyone gets.”
The 6-foot-2 Schneider and Komm both came out Williamsville and made an early impact on Atlantic Hockey. The former topped UConn in scoring last year as a freshman and was leading the Huskies (5-9-2, 4-6-1 Atlantic Hockey) again heading into their Christmas break, with 5-11-16 totals, third-best in the league.
“He’s not only got great size and skating ability that’s very good, his ability to shoot the puck is real good, too,” said UConn coach Bruce Marshall. “He’s everything we thought he would be and I think he can be even more.”
Komm missed time with an injury last season and saw limited action. But he’s made up for lost time this year this year with the Falcons (5-8-3, 5-3-2 Atlantic Hockey); at the Christmas break he led the league with a .934 save percentage and was third with a 2.24 goals-against average.
He’ll try to keep that up in the second half and, when the time comes, see what he can do with UConn and Schneider. The teams play a home-and-home series on Feb. 17 and 18.
Oh, and one other note: Schneider did get that goal past Komm back in November. But Komm stopped five other shots his hometown rival took and helped Bentley to a 4-2 win.
Allen Lessels can be reached at feedback@nyhockeyjournal.com.
