Singh hopes Floorball becomes an Olympic sport someday.
AB Wire
SAN FRANCISCO: An Indian American teenager, Brij Singh, of Los Altos, California, who loves hockey, has played for the United States floorball under-19 national team in the World Floorball Championships.
Four years ago, Singh didn’t even know floorball existed, which may become an Olympic sport someday. But once he did, the Los Altos resident proved to be a quick study, reported the Los Altos Town Crier.
After playing the sport for only three years, Singh made the U.S. under-19 national team that competed in the World Floorball Championships last spring.
Although it’s not a high-profile sport in the U.S., floorball has been around for a while. It originated in Sweden in the 1970s and soon spread throughout Europe. Similar to hockey, floorball requires five field players and a goalie per side. Games are played over three 20-minute periods.
Singh learned about floorball while attending Bellarmine College Preparatory, the Crier reported.
“I was in the middle of my freshman year and I was watching an ice hockey video in the middle of class when my friends and I found this weird Swedish hockey game called floorball,” he said.
Immediately interested in the sport, Singh and his friends soon launched a floorball club at Bellarmine.
“It was one of the first clubs of its kind in the entire country,” he said.
In three years, the club grew from approximately five friends to 65 members in Singh’s senior year. When Singh discovered there was a World Floorball Championships – this year held April 29 through May 3 in Helsingborg, Sweden – he set his sights on making the U.S. team, the Crier reported.
“I heard about this (event) and I immediately wanted to be a part of it,” he said, “and I knew that I had the skills to get there.”
So Singh proceeded to train with the top floorball leagues in the area – including those in Menlo Park and San Jose – for two hours three times a week. He then sent a video of his floorball highlights to the U.S. coaching staff, which soon contacted him about joining the squad.
This year’s U.S. team differed from those in years past, according to Singh. Instead of relying heavily on players originally from Europe, the team featured several athletes who grew up playing the game in the U.S. The roster included teens from several states and a variety of sports backgrounds, including ice hockey and field hockey.
“We had high expectations going into the tournament,” Singh said, “but a major disadvantage was that we had all met 100 hours before our first game.”
While the team did not perform as well as they had hoped – losing all three of their games – the experience was “unforgettable,” Singh said.
After lopsided losses to Denmark and Hungary, Team USA put up a fight against Canada before falling to its northern rival 16-10.Singh intends to keep playing floorball as he enters college in the fall. He wants to form a floorball club at the University of Michigan – just as he did at Bellarmine.
Singh noted that floorball is an extremely cost-effective sport that could easily replace hockey in schools. And it’s a joy to play.