A Lifetime of Competition: Teachers find an escape through sports
Written by: Keaghan Dunn-Rhodes
It’s Monday night at Big Bear Ice Arena in Lowry. The dusty clock on the wall reads 9:30 as the players lace up their boots. Many teachers are at home grading papers, but not Mr. Hoffer. For him, 9:30 means game time. Never mind that he will probably get home at midnight, or that he has to teach 6 classes tomorrow. Playing ice hockey with some of his best friends on this cold night is worth it.
“I started to play ice hockey when I was about ten, and played on through high school,” Mr. Hoffer says with a grin. “But then I stopped playing for about twenty years. When I discovered that some of my friends had started to play in an adult league, I thought that I could definitely start to play again too.”
Ever since taking up the sport that he loved throughout his early life once again, Hoffer has become a regular at Big Bear. He plays every Monday in an adult league for his team, the Oblio’s, as a defender.
“The guys on my team are all from different walks of life. Some are surgeons, some are dentists, some are investment bankers, and several of the guys on the team are teachers,” remarks Hoffer. “It’s really an interesting mix.”
Mr. Hoffer isn’t the only East teacher who cultivates a love for sports outside of school. Ms. Topf, a literature teacher, is an avid tennis player on the side. Like Mr. Hoffer, Ms. Topf played competitively through high school. However, she hadn’t picked up a racket since then when she was approached with an offer to be an assistant coach for East’s tennis team. Soon after, Topf was offered a spot as doubles partner to none other than Ms. Wagner, cementing her spot within the tennis culture between the teachers at East.
“After not playing for such a long time, the combination of coming back to coach and then playing with Mrs. Wagner made me love the game again,” says Topf.
Though both Ms. Topf and Mr. Hoffer spent up to twenty years away from their respective sports before picking them up again, their abilities never diminished. Mr. Hoffer’s hockey team regularly advances to the finals of the Big Bear Ice Arena adult league. Ms. Topf competes in USTA regulated tournaments from March to October, and is consistently ranked as one of the top four seeds.
After playing sports for the majority of their lives, one would think that Ms. Topf and Mr. Hoffer may have replaced their fierce competitiveness with a simple love for the sport that persists if either winning or losing. Think again.
“I don’t like to lose,” says Ms. Topf with a fiendish smile. “Part of the problem is I am competitive by nature, so tennis is just a really good outlet for me.”
Ms. Topf’s words ring true for Mr. Hoffer as well.
“I enjoy going out on the ice for the love of the game, but at some point the desire to win overrules me and I find myself competing for every loose puck,” states Hoffer.
No matter how they fare, though, the two teacher’s love for their sports remains. Topf describes tennis as a “life sport,” one that she can play at any age.
“You can always come back to it, and it always comes back to you,” remarks Topf. “I really hope to be one of those 80 year old ladies out there teaching the kids how to do it someday. I think it’s a sport you can always play.”
