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Following that old routine

Penguins all have their own pregame rituals

By Tom Venesky tvenesky@timesleader.com
Sports Reporter

An hour before fans fill the seats inside Wachovia Arena for a Wilkes-Barre/Scranton Penguins game, one spot has already been warmed up.

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The Penguins’ Ben Lovejoy can be found in the same seat before every home game at Wachovia Arena. It’s just one of the many pregame rituals followed by Penguin players.

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It’s located behind the Penguins bench, in row D, seat 12.

It’s occupant? Ben Lovejoy.

What is he doing there? And why seat 12?

“I just sit and watch the videos on the screen, zone out and get away from everything for 10 minutes,” Lovejoy said. “I sit in the same seat 12 every time because that’s the number I wore in college. I’ve been doing the same thing since college and I also do it on the road.”

Seat 12 is part of Lovejoy’s pregame routine, and every player has one.

Most pregame routines center around meals, sleep and stretching. Lovejoy and his seat 12 are a bit out of the norm, but every player strives to maintain their own routine at home and on the road.

Before every game, the basement of the Wachovia Arena is bustling with routine. The hallways are filled with players jogging, stretching, shooting pucks off walls and kicking around soccer balls.

Away from all the activity in the halls, Adam Berkhoel chooses to go about his routine in the quiet confines near a downstairs exit. The Penguins netminder stands a few feet away from the wall and bounces lacrosse balls off the concrete blocks.

Talk to Berkhoel while he is bouncing the balls and he probably won’t hear you. Walk right past him and he won’t notice. For Berkhoel, the bouncing balls are a routine that he takes seriously – one that can be beneficial to a goaltender with a quick glove.

“I’ve been doing that since college. It warms up my shoulders and really works on my eye-hand coordination,” he said. “Now that I’m getting older, it’s nice to move the shoulders around a bit.”

And then there’s Jeff Taffe, whose routine starts not in the arena hallways but in a seat at a restaurant.

“I always eat at Bob Evans every morning for breakfast, and then Olive Garden for lunch,” he said. “I started that last year.”

What’s on the menu?

“Eggs and toast in the morning, and then chicken parmesan for lunch. I usually have the same meal because I’m a pretty plain guy.”

That means most of the Penguins are plain, judging by their lunch routine. Taffe said most of his teammates choose chicken parmesan for lunch because it is a pasta, and pasta is high in energy-producing carbohydrates.

Once Taffe arrives at the rink for game day, he puts another routine in motion. That includes riding the stationary bike for eight minutes, then stretching before he gets into uniform exactly 14 minutes before warmups.

“I wait until 14 minutes so then I don’t have to sit here too long,” he said.

Lovejoy also has the same problem with sitting before a game.

After he finishes with his sitting in seat 12 routine and comes out for warm-ups, Lovejoy is usually the last player from either team to leave the ice.

It has nothing to do with superstition, he said.

“There’s a longer break between warm-ups and the first period, and I get bored just sitting in the locker room, so I stay out as long as I can to just spend more time on the ice,” Lovejoy said.

And when Lovejoy shoots the puck at the other team’s net before he leaves the ice, that has nothing to do with superstition. Actually, it’s a part of his practice.

Lovejoy said a key part of his game is icing the puck on penalty kills. When he shoots the puck down the ice at the end of warm-ups, the Penguins defenseman is honing his icing skills.

But there is a condition that comes with the practice technique.

“I’ll only shoot it if the other team is off the ice,” Lovejoy said. “And I really am practicing icing the puck. I’m not trying to score.”

Considering how active players are with their routines of running and kicking balls around before a game, it might seem as if they are exerting crucial energy that could be used during the actual game.

Not so, said Taffe. All the activity is a good way to get the heart rate going and warm up muscles that could cramp during a game.

Besides, he added, 10 minutes of light exercise is nothing compared to the high rate of energy exerted in a game.

“For me, I just like to get the body moving before you go out there and get hit,” Taffe said.

While every player’s routine involves some physical activity, Berkhoel said it’s important for a goaltender to prepare the mind along with the body.

If the Penguins offense is keeping the play at the other end of the ice most of the night, Berkhoel will spend long stretches in net without seeing a shot. Such a lull in activity could lead the mind to wander, which is usually when a soft goal is scored.

To prevent any lapses, Berkhoel begins his pregame routine the night before a game.

“That means getting proper rest and hydration, and then you go through the day doing all your steps to prepare,” he said. “Our position is so mental and it’s important to be focused and keep your mind sharp.”

For some players, routines don’t end with the opening faceoff.

Lovejoy implements a few new routines in between periods that include:

• retaping his stick

• untying his skates, “Because my feet hurt and I need to get the blood flowing.”

• And changing his undershirt, “Because it gets really sweaty.”

As further evidence that routine is different than superstition, when an uncontrollable factor interrupts the pregame schedule, Berkhoel and Taffe said they don’t worry.

“It happens sometimes if the bus is late for an away game. But it doesn’t affect me mentally,” Berkhoel said.

“This year has been a little different because I haven’t moved into my place yet, but I still stick to the same schedule,” added Taffe.

But the verdict is still out on Lovejoy, who can’t do his seat 12 routine when the Penguins play in Hershey.

“At that rink you can’t go upstairs and hop into the stands, and a lot of times their fans are already there when I normally would be sitting in that seat,” he said. “So I go and sit on our bench instead. Some games it works and some it doesn’t. We’ve had mixed results there so far.”