Inside the NHL's push to recruit Latino hockey fans and grow the game
LOS ANGELES — In the summer, when the temperature in Phoenix's north valley climbs well above 100 degrees, the heat would rise like a vapor cloud from the asphalt parking lot that hugged Ozzie Ice's two mini rinks.
"You're trying to keep an ice cube frozen in the oven," said Sean Whyte, a former Kings winger and hockey director at Ozzie Ice before the rinks were melted for good and the space converted into a rock-climbing gym.
Whyte grew up in Canada, where kids played hockey on frozen ponds. The desert, on the other hand, was more conducive to growing cactus than it was to nurturing NHL scoring champions.
At least that's what Whyte thought until the day a wide-eyed half-Mexican third-grader everyone called Papi skated in.
"He used to hang out at my rink all day, pretty much every day," Whyte said, recalling time he spent with Auston Matthews. "All he wanted to do is get on the ice."
These days Matthews, the top pick in the 2016 NHL draft, gets most of his ice time in Toronto, where the seven-time All-Star has won rookie of the year and most valuable player with the Maple Leafs. This season the All-Star Game MVP leads the league with 49
