The year 2012 will be remembered for a vast array of accomplishments and some disappointments. This report highlights some of the most memorable. Please enjoy this step back into 2012, and know that 2013 will be even better for the sport as we progress on an upward trajectory for hockey in North America.
Olympic Celebration The excitement surrounding qualification for the London Olympic Games was really brought to a full-fever pitch during the Olympic Celebration staged at the Virginia Beach Convention Center in June. An audience of well over 3,000 Olympic supporters gathered for an evening of entertainment celebrating the 2012 U.S. Olympic Women's Field Hockey Team. It was a gala and really personified the importance of attaining qualification to the Olympic Games, the absolute pinnacle of sport.
Olympic Games The London based Olympic Games started in late July and continued into the first week of August. Hockey was featured throughout the entire seventeen day run of the Olympic Games. Globally, 12 teams from each gender qualified representing a broad range of nations. The competition was startlingly tough and the venue was one of the best on the Olympic programme. From the financial perspective of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) as it reviewed the sport, the stadium sold out for each session, and tickets for hockey were legitimately difficult to obtain. The IOC ranked the sport as highly popular in GB and a huge financial
success…plus the competition was compelling. The
unfortunate side of the equation was that Team USA did not meet expectations and finished twelfth. Upon the conclusion of the Games, USA Field Hockey hired a third party consultant to provide an objective view of the High Performance program. The outcome provided for a transition with many new people coming into the USA Field Hockey High Performance Department at the beginning of 2013 with new strategies in place for the upcoming quad leading to Rio 2016.
Analysis and then Modification of High Performance Team Dr. Peter Davis, Ph.D., was selected to lead the USA Field Hockey High Performance Review. Dr. Davis was formerly an employee of Australia Rugby, the Australian Institute of Sport, Director of the United States Olympic Committee’s Sports Science Department, and, as a consultant, has assessed many Olympic programs globally from Europe, the Middle East, and North America. After the Beijing Olympic Games, Dr. Davis provided an assessment of New Zealand’s hockey teams after a 12th place finish. In London, the Black Sticks improved to a fourth place finish. Within Dr. Davis's report for USA Field Hockey, a number of recommendations have been implemented, and a new women’s high performance team is now in place. Other strategies are being followed, and a Home of Hockey was found.
Home of Hockey A major element of our 2020 strategy was to develop a Home of Hockey. A Home of Hockey is loosely defined as a place that has sport specificity dedicated to hockey; a place to train the senior teams plus provide services to athletes in the pipeline; and a place to host competitions, clinics, and other appropriate events revolving around the sport. Over the years, a number of sites were explored. Those sites included the ESPN Wide World of
2012-13 USA FIELD HOCKEY ANNUAL REPORT
Sports Complex near Orlando, and a site near Camden, New Jersey. All the sites we looked over had great positive aspects, but the site upon where we have landed has fulfilled the majority of the needs of hockey. First and foremost, we have a community in Lancaster, PA. that has embraced the sport and the teams, and will take ownership of our Olympic team. They are and will continue to be family. The size of Lancaster County (~500,000) is just the right size community to embrace an Olympic sport. If we were to choose a larger metropolis, we would get lost in the maze. The facility itself will, in the end, be a facility with indoor developed capacity of over 1,000,000 square feet….and that does not take into account the fields and pitches found outside of the building. That will make it the largest multi-sport facility in the world. Lancaster is in the heart of the field hockey hotbed. Housing and training our team in Lancaster will provide for greater team access to friends and family as well as educational and career opportunities. The Lancaster facility will offer year round training with both a water based pitch located outside and another under a dome. And, finally, we will offer the finest in medical service through our relationship with the Orthopedic Associates of Lancaster (OAL), and sports science through a collaborative with OAL and The Nook. A never ending array of experts in sports science will be available through a variety of universities such as the Human Performance Department at Penn State University. Experts will include strength and conditioning specialists, nutritionists, physiologists, psychologists, and bio- mechanists. That is quite an array of scientists and they will be devoted to the improvement of all levels of athletes. The Nook is a marvelous new element to this sport’s progression, and it will be open for hockey business on or around mid- August, 2013.
Emphasis on Men’s Development and
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