SALT LAKE CITY -- Alex Kerfoot and the Utah Mammoth hosted a Girls’ Hockey Day at the Utah Olympic Oval on Wednesday, as Kerfoot and the club continued their efforts to grow the game of hockey in the state of Utah.
More than 200 girls attended the event, which featured sessions ranging from trying hockey for the first time to more advanced skills clinics for girls already playing the sport.
The Girls’ Hockey Day is a part of the club’s inaugural "Mammoth Week," with the club holding fanfests and clinics all across the state.
“I think that you've seen all the initiatives that the team's been doing this whole week, and for us to just help out and be involved in any way we can has been nice,” Kerfoot said. “We spent a good chunk of the time here in Salt Lake this summer, so to be able to do something like this and kind of build on some of the girls hockey stuff that the team and we have been doing has been nice, and it's great to see the turnout.”
The 30-year-old center was Utah's nominee for the King Clancy Memorial Trophy last season for his involvement in the community, specifically growing the sport for girls in the state.
During the team's inaugural season, Kerfoot and his wife Marissa donated tickets to home games to young female hockey players and invited them down to the bench for warmups along with time to chat before games.
That involvement led the Kerfoots and the Mammoth to want to do more for the community.
“You can only have so many girls out to games and so to be able to get on the ice with them and do a day like this, it allowed us to reach more people,” Kerfoot said. “And ultimately, there's lots of different communities that we'd like to be involved in and that the team is involved in, but specifically doing this stuff with the girls is special too.”
Helping Kerfoot at the clinics were decorated U.S. Olympian Hilary Knight and Mellissa Channell-Watkins of the Professional Women’s Hockey League.
“It's just so fun just having a young face out there,” said Knight, who won gold with the U.S in the 2018 PyeongChang Olympics, as well as 10 gold medals in the IIHF World Championships. “You remember kind of when you were that age and how important these moments were and just learning small skills or just the in-between and sharing a smile is just so important ... It was fun to interact with all the young girls that you know are one day going to fill our shoes and we'll see play at the professional level or the Olympic level.”
“To have someone like Alex be dedicated to the work in the community and developing girls and women's hockey is just so outstanding. I can't say enough about it. So I'm really excited to be here and be a part of it.”
Kerfoot said the experience was exciting for him as well.
“For me to be out here is cool and be a Mammoth player for them to see," he said, "but these girls are really looking up and aspiring to be a Hilary Knight or the other PWHL players who are here and who they see. So to have someone like her, be on the ice firsthand with them, I think makes it extra special and really thankful that she was able to come out and support this.”
As for the Kerfoot family, time will tell if his own daughter Carrera, who was born in July 2024, will follow in her dad’s footsteps and take to the ice.
“We'll definitely expose her to sports and hockey in general,” he said. “We’ll allow her to do whatever she wants to do, we're not going to push anything on it.”
