Coming in to my senior year of hockey, it was another year of a new coach. Every year of my high school career, I had a different coach. This year, it was announced that Coach Valimont would be our coach.

Coach Valimont was known around Arrowhead Hockey for being a great coach. He coached for many years at Arrowhead, but he ended up retiring in 2010. He was the winningest coach at Arrowhead and lead Arrowhead to a state championship.

Coming into the year, I didn't know what to expect. Coming off a horrendous previous year, with a record of 8 wins and 17 losses, we knew we needed a change.

The first time I met with coach was right after tryouts. He started off by saying that we needed to change the culture of our program. After this meeting I knew he was going to be a great coach.

Coach started practice by saying “Enthusiasm is the electricity of life!” He then told us to reply by saying “how do you get it?” He stated, “Act enthusiastic until it become a habit!” We then cheered and started practice enthusiastically. This became our pre practice ritual, except a different player would do it each day. We began having so much fun with this that as we were saying it, that Coach made us do a little dance as we said it. Even if we were having a bad day, it sparked positive energy and a successful practice.

As we got to know Coach Valimont, it was apparent how great of a coach he was. He was a great motivator and got us ready for games and practices. His words were like a fire starter, igniting the team to get going whether it was making a joke, pushing us to work harder, or getting on us for not doing something. He made us work harder than we ever had before by doing conditioning (exercise as coach called it) each day at the end of practice and dryland every day after practice. It was tough work, but it ended up paying off during the games.

This was apparent in the middle of the season when we had an 11-1 record and on a 9 game win streak. It was one of the best starts in Arrowhead hockey history. Our team ended up going 17-7... a huge improvement from the previous year. We ended up getting to the third round of playoffs before being eliminated. It was a great year led by an inspiring coach. However Coach Valimont was not only just a great coach, but also a great mentor.

Coach Valimont always helped shape us to be better people in and out of the classroom. He pushed us to succeed in the classroom by constantly asking about our grades, and pushing us to improve our grades. He made us better people outside of the classroom by teaching us his four rules: 1. Always say please and thank you. 2. Do what you say you're going to do. 3. Finish what you started. 4. Always be on time. Our team strived to do this and I will continue to do so.

Coach Valimont was a terrific coach along with a great mentor. He has taught me many lessons that I will carry with me into my adulthood.