Pauls hopes US sled hockey team continues Milan gold rush in Paralympics
“That was my first experience kind of the first time being away from home, being away from Mom and Dad,” Pauls mentioned. “That was undoubtedly bizarre. I used to be a brilliant shy child, I did not actually speak a complete lot. And then the following 12 months I got here again, and my coach sort of checked out me after one of many video games, and was like, ‘Man, while you got here right here final 12 months, you have been one of many worst gamers on the market, and now, like, you are among the best.’ That was the sort of second the place I used to be like, ‘All proper, possibly I’ve a future in this.’”
Kevin McKee, who’s one in all Pauls’ greatest pals and has gained three Paralympic gold medals, met him on the US improvement camp and mentioned he might additionally inform immediately he was meant for giant issues.
“He’s a couple of years younger than me, but even at that time you could tell that he just had the drive and the willpower to do whatever it took to get there,” McKee mentioned. “At that time, a young kid, just energy, just wanting to go. That was kind of his role when he first made the national team was on the third line, just give energy for the team at the time, and I think he was perfect for it.”
Sled hockey was invented at a rehab heart in Stockholm, Sweden, in the early Nineteen Sixties. It was launched on the 1994 Paralympics in Lillehammer, Norway, and has been there ever since. Players are in sleds that sit on high of two hockey skate blades and use two sticks, which have steel picks on the butt finish, to assist propel themselves.
And like in the lads’s and ladies’s ice hockey tournaments on the 2026 Olympics, there can be loads of motion and hitting in the Paralympics — with one massive distinction.
“When the men and women get hit into the boards, the glass moves. The boards don’t,” Pauls mentioned. “We’re not tall sufficient to get hit into the glass, so the hits are fierce. And, I imply, it is so quick, it is a lot quicker in individual. I’ve by no means seen anyone come out of a stay sled hockey recreation and been like, ‘Eh, that was OK.’ Everybody’s all the time enthralled with it.”
Pauls acquired his first style of worldwide sled hockey on the 2009 World Championships in Ostrava, Czech Republic. At age 16, he was the youngest member of the gold medal successful team. The subsequent 12 months, he made his first look in the Paralympic Games, successful the primary of 4 straight gold medals for the United States, repeating the feat in 2014 (Sochi), 2018 (PyeongChang), and 2022 (Beijing). He was captain of the team in 2018 and 2022 and can be captain once more in Milan.
“He’s just matured and became such a great leader for our team,” McKee mentioned. “To me, he’s the best captain we’ve ever had.”
The longest-tenured US nationwide sled team participant in his seventeenth season, Pauls has represented his nation in the World Championships 10 instances (seven gold medals) and performed in 15 Para Hockey Cups (11 first-place finishes).
And now he’s going for an additional Olympic gold, making an attempt to observe up what the US women and men did in Milan.
