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The third edition of this competition asked university and college students province-wide to come up with bold, practical ideas to address real world challenges facing hockey today. The final pitch day took place on March 25 where the teams presented to industry experts in the NHL, NHLPA and SAP.

The hockey innovation competition this year was held in Ottawa. Although UW did not win, their hard work and drive should not be overlooked.

UW’s team, called RinkNext, was made up of fourth year statistics student Roy Luo, fourth year computer science student Max Tan, fourth year computer engineering student Carl Wang, and third year rec and sports business student Joey Zhang. Their idea is a scalable, Rink-as-a-Platform model that retrofits community arenas with heat recovery, multi-use conversation kits, and digital management to cut energy costs and expand year-round access.

A core goal for this team was to make the rink inclusive to everyone and they went on to work together to figure out how they would be able to do that.

Zhang came up with the idea of joining the hockey innovation competition. This idea stemmed from his experience as a junior hockey player. “I loved going to the rink. It was fun and I got to hang out with the guys and play ping pong. It wasn’t always about hockey,” he said. He brought the idea to his three friends, Luo, Tan, and Wang. He told them he wanted the rink to be inclusive to everyone and insisted they come up with an idea.

Reflecting on the event and their presentation, Luo shared, “We did the best we could, so I’m very glad we were able to have fun and collaborate on such a meaningful project.” The team also showed massive appreciation for the opportunity to meet and talk with other professionals and executives in the hockey industry.

“We all have high work loads, and the fact that we were able to manage it and overcome that was a very impressive feature we were able to push through,” Wang stated. The team agreed that the event was a good networking opportunity.

When asked how the process of preparing and competing in this competition was and how competitive it was, Tan said, “It was wildly competitive. First we had to make a slideshow talking about our ideas and then do a presentation in the semi finals.” He also stated that it was quite the experience to compete with all six teams that came in from all across Ontario.

The most memorable moments of the event for the four friends wasn’t anything revolving around them, but the chance to meet with the other teams and see what other ideas they came up with. “It’s pretty nice to see everyone approach the same problem from a very multifaceted and variety of perspectives,” Luo said.

The team showed hope for the ideas that were in the competition to get implemented in some way in the near future, believing that many of the concepts presented had real potential to improve the hockey experience and make rinks more accessible, efficient, and inclusive for communities across the region. The choice of implementing these ideas is solely the NHL’s, “The competition is to present an idea that wins either innovation or implementability, which one is more feasible and it’s more for the NHL to gather ideas,” Wang stated.

The winners were announced on March 27: The Guelph team won the Changemaker Award, St. Clair College and Queen’s University won the Innovator Award. For winning, the team members received scholarship grants, a VIP NHL ticket experience, and networking opportunities with the NHL, SAP, Ottawa Senators and participating colleges and universities.