IRMO, S.C. — A hockey team in Lexington County is hoping for more community support.
"That's the one thing I love the most, is meeting guys from around the United States and the world. We all come together here to do something we all love: to play hockey," said Eli Reaves, a hockey player from Raleigh, North Carolina.
A new hockey team to Columbia, the Columbia Infantry, originally based in Charleston for boys ages 16 to 21, is starting their second season Monday in Irmo.
They're players from all over the world, including the Philippines, Ukraine, and other parts of the U.S.
"We try to develop good hockey players, but at the end of the day, no one's going to recruit our players if they're bad kids, right? So we try to develop them off the ice, too, help them mature," head coach Jacob Smulevitch said. "Our goal is to help them move on to where they want to be, to chase their dreams; so, as much as we try to improve their skills on the ice, too, we want them to be good people, and we try to help them do that."
They do their high school classes online and sometimes college classes from wherever they're based because they travel every week for games and stay with a host family while in the Columbia area.
Blake Hasenauer, a hockey player from Pennsylvania, said his favorite part of the experience is people.
"Honestly, the connections and the people I get to meet. I've met some great friends and great family members and, honestly, people I can call family at the end of the day," Hasenauer said.
The team is becoming more plugged into the community through fundraisers and volunteering.
"I'd love to have more people at the games; more people know who we are," hockey player Gavin Cline from Indiana said. "I'd really like to be able to get more involved in the youth hockey around here, helping coach and just develop those players."
Their home opener is at Flight Adventure Park in Irmo at 1019 Broad Stone Road on Sept. 8 at 5 p.m. and 7:45 p.m. For more information about the team and their games, visit its Facebook page.