Julia Takatsuka loves being a goalie.

For the past three years, she’s been sharing that passion with youth hockey players in Seattle.

The Seattle Kraken Youth Hockey Association brought in Takatsuka as a goalie coach, starting with its grassroots and Learn to Play classes. The intent for her was to recruit kids while making the goaltender position an option for them, too.

“Because I love being a goalie and I still play, it’s cool to share that with others that maybe haven’t found their sport or their place in the world yet,” Takatsuka said. “Now they’re finding that.”

The Kraken youth teams started about four years ago at the same time as the NHL team. Takatsuka already had three years of coaching experience when she joined the program.

The Kraken knew immediately that they wanted to build the goalie program. Takatsuka explained that it continues to evolve since starting with six teams and two full-time goalies.

Playing goalie, and having fun with it, was an experience Takatsuka brought to the table. Takatsuka began as a skater and goaltender through her middle school years before switching to goalie full time in high school.

Takatsuka, who grew up in the Seattle area and went to college at the Rochester Institute of Technology in New York, still plays goalie in a co-ed rec league and women’s league.

In the first year of the Kraken youth program, Takatsuka helped with quick-change gear for six 8U, 10U and 12U teams. Kids rotated through the gear at every practice and game.

The quick-change gear can be taken on and off within a few minutes, so if kids dislike it, they can go back to being a skater quickly. Or they can try on the gear multiple times if they love it.

The Kraken’s youth program has blossomed into 37 teams in three years.  

“Continuing to bring excitement, bring that gear, let the kids try it at practices, that’s kind of been the first touch point to get kids in and interested,” Takatsuka said. “Then we’ve also added a bunch of other ways for them to get extra training, extra goalie time. To continue that love of the position and the sport.”

Takatsuka has created an environment that she calls the “Kraken Goalie World.” The main objective is to have kids who want to play goalie “because it’s the most fun thing that they’ve ever done,” Takatsuka said.

It’s also about retaining goalies longer into their hockey careers. Takatsuka said the Kraken usually see a big drop-off in goalies after 12U. They currently carry three goalies on the 10U teams, and those players also play as skaters. It helps give those players more options and a longer period to decide if they want to be a goaltender while developing them at multiple positions.

As an example, Takatsuka noted recent 10U tryouts with two teams of 11 kids, with three goaltenders on each team.

“They can make a select team as both (a skater and a goalie), and still have that option and will get better as a hockey player versus just being a goalie or a skater in the end,” Takatsuka said. “Then they can choose later on what they want to do.”

Takatsuka has seen the challenges or reasons why kids don’t want to be a goalie. One is the perception of the position by parents, coaches or teammates that you must be a little crazy to stand in front of pucks. Or parents might say the position comes with too much pressure or too much cost.

Takatsuka and the program try to get ahead of these perceptions by starting a positive goalie culture early with new hockey families in the area.

Educating parents and coaches is important, too. Takatsuka also runs classes as a player development lead rather than just being focused on goalies. That makes it easier to get coaches’ buy-in and trust in knowing that she wants to develop hockey players rather than just goaltenders.

The financial and support pieces can be hurdles, too, but Takatsuka said she’s lucky because her association wanted a strong goalie program from day one. Therefore, equal ice time or funding aren’t major issues as it could be for other associations.

“To us, that’s just part of the cost of hockey,” Takatsuka said. “So that’s something that I don’t have to fight, and I can spend that energy putting it back into the program and making it better.”

Takatsuka also attended the inaugural USA Hockey National Goaltending Symposium this past June where she presented her thesis as part of a gold-level goaltending course. Takatsuka said the symposium was a cool experience, adding that she hadn’t been in a place with that many people who loved goaltending before.

Her presentation was met with excitement at the symposium, as she shared what the Kraken are doing for young hockey players. She’s already received some follow-up feedback from people who’ve used some of the recommendations in her presentation, modeling some of what she’s doing in the Seattle youth program.

“It’s cool to see how something we’re doing here, how it can be implemented in other associations or in different markets,” Takatsuka concluded. 

Story from Red Line Editorial, Inc.