By Dave Kearsey
Star Sports Editor
CORNER BROOK Female hockey players playing under the umbrella of the city’s minor hockey system have reason to celebrate.
After trying for two years to get minor hockey organizers to provide them with their own dressing room for games when girls play against the boys, a new home has been built in the lower level of the Pepsi Centre.
Ashley Bromley, a 14-year-old female hockey player in Corner Brook, gave her dad Conrad Bromley a helping hand to construct a 11x8 dressing room once they got approval from the minor hockey executive and management at the Pepsi Centre. Her dad was able to get some friends of his to donate some $500 worth of supplies to carry out the project and Ashley was eager to roll up her sleeves.
To make it happen, the minor hockey executive took the space they used for equipment storage in the minor hockey room and had it turned into a dressing room for female hockey players.
Ashley had a great time helping her dad put the dressing room in place, and she is happy to see female hockey players finally have their own space to get prepared for games.
“When the girls played with the guys there was nowhere for them to get changed so they would have to go in the referee’s room,” Bromley said.
In her age group, Bromley is quick to point out that boys tend to have showers after the game so it’s not a good situation for a female player to be exposed to at all.
“You’re at the age now where I don’t think it’s very appropriate,” Bromley said.
She believes hockey will be a better experience now that they can avoid some of the frustration and headaches experienced over the years with not having their own room.
“To have a girls’ dressing room is really good because then you can just be with the other girls,” she said, noting it took her a handful of days to carry out the project.
She likes the finished project.
“It looks a lot better than it did before,” she said. “Before there was just some benches nailed together, but now it looks like a dressing room.”
Julie Power, another 14-year-old female hockey player, is pleased to finally have her own space to prepare for practices and games.
“It’s a little small, but it’s perfect for what we need,” Power said.
Power won’t miss having to prepare for games in the referee’s room and she’s happy that the decision-makers were able to see the need for it.
The new digs doesn’t have a washroom, which is a concern of players and parents alike, so players now have to travel down the hallway to one of the washrooms on the lower concourse.
The problem that exists, according to Power and Bromley, is that there is no rubber mats on the floor in the dressing room or hallway leading to the washrooms. Players have to wear skateguards or walk in street footwear to use the washroom facilites, which they feel isn’t sufficient.
“Now, I would like to at least see them put some rubber down in the dressing room and on the way to the washroom,” Bromley said.
