Skating, sliding, crashing…all within a few minutes at a time. The pressure of playing defense and recovering and then switching immediately to play offense…sophomore Jason Day has been doing this for about nine years, playing for varsity and select teams.

Day currently plays varsity hockey for Lovejoy and North Stars. Since Melissa ISD doesn’t offer hockey, he plays for local schools who do offer the sport, and this year is his first year on a select travel team. He’s played for four years with Lovejoy and one with North Stars.

On the ice, he mainly plays center but occasionally plays right wing. In all of his regular season games he’s scored approximately 100 goals and for playoffs, 35.

Although hockey is at times a very dangerous sport, he has been hit numerous times but never something he couldn’t recover from. Also, he has no recorded injuries, but the same can’t be said about his teammates. A few months ago one of his teammates had his neck cut open from a hockey blade.

In total, seven championships have been won across the two teams in his time playing. With the newer travel team, he’s played in tournaments and championships in Detroit, Las Vegas, Houston, and Austin.