12/17/98

Steve: Rob, this is your first interview with the Bucs and so we would like to know just a little bit about your background. Tell us about where you were born, where you call home, and a little bit about your family.

Rob: I was born in Hayward, Wisconsin. That is where I call home. I have a sister and my two parents, and they are both teachers. My dad is a teacher at the high school, and my mom is an elementary teacher. My sister is attending The University of Wisconsin at Madison where she is a freshman. We have two dogs.

Steve: Is Hayward a big city, small city? Where is it at in Wisconsin?

Rob: It is about 2,000 people. The school district is about 10,000. It’s about an hour south of Superior/Duluth. It’s up in the middle of nowhere pretty much.

Steve: How did you get started in hockey? Is hockey big in that area?

Rob: I lived on a lake until I was 12 years old. My dad would shovel a rink every year, and since I was about five, we would go out there. When I was six I started in the youth program in town. From then on I played just about every day after school, either in the rink in town or out on the lake.

Steve: Does Hayward have a good youth hockey program?

Rob: Yeah.

Steve: Tell me a little bit about the teams you’ve played for. I know you started young, and then tell me how you progressed through and how you actually ended up with the Bucs.

Rob: I worked all the way through the Hayward youth program. Freshman year I made the high school team, and I played four years for the high school team, last year being my senior year. The Bucs saw me play in the Chicago Showcase Tournament. Wisconsin had a team in it made up of all seniors from the state. We had to go through a big try out thing to get to that. So that is where the Bucs saw me. It was just a coincidence that I ended up coming here pretty much. I had a good try out and ended up making it.

Steve: A lot of guys will go off like to the Soo Hawks or other teams rather than play high school hockey. You stuck all four years with the high school. Were you planning on going to the USHL or did you know what you were going to do?

Rob: Yeah. Actually, I tried out in between the summer after my junior year, before my senior year, I tried out in Waterloo just to go to the try out. I wasn’t planning on staying there if I made it or not. My dad was going to make me come back and go to high school, just because of better classes and stuff. I wouldn’t have to screw around with going to school down there and everything. I didn’t make the team so I didn’t have to worry about that anyway. I finished hockey in Hayward and decided I was going to try to play junior hockey. If that wouldn’t have worked out, then I would have gone to a local Division III school - River Falls or Eau Claire or something like that.

Steve: And obviously it did work out well. Did you know when you were in the try out camp that you were doing well? How does that work? Do you know you are doing well? You just don’t know?

Rob: I had no clue until the very end, I mean I was right on the edge. It wasn’t clear that I made the team, so it was tough.

Steve: When you were in the try out camp, could you tell it was going to be a good team at that point?

Rob: Yeah, it was a really competitive try out camp.

Steve: In what way?

Rob: Yeah, it was just faster and almost everyone at the try out here was good. Where like at the Waterloo try out, there were a lot of good players and then it dropped off drastically. At the Waterloo try out, you could tell who the veterans were. They were awful confident with the puck and everything. The same thing here; you could tell who had played a year of juniors before. But this was just a lot more competitive.

Steve: Talk to me about this season. It has been an unbelievable season for the Bucs. Why are the Bucs so successful, do you think, this year?

Rob: I think it all starts with all the returning players that they have, all the veterans that have been through all this once or twice already and went all the way last year. I think that is where it all starts. I mean, next year it is going to be tough coming back with five, maybe six, returning players instead of half the team like we have this year. I think that is where the whole winning streak and having the good record and being able to come back and win games. I think that all starts with a bunch of guys who are experienced and have done it before.

Steve: Do you see your skills developing in the league because you are forced to play with the best?

Rob: Definitely. Playing with the best team in the league every day in practice and in the games, I get better. I mean, it makes you have to get better. When you play against better players and with better players, you are going to get better.

Steve: What are your plans for the future? Do you have any dreams or hopes?

Rob: I hope to get a scholarship somewhere. I mean, partial at least. If things don’t work out that way, then I will probably go to a school near home and plan on playing on their hockey team. I would like to play hockey in college. If things don’t work out, then I’ll go to school and start with the education.

Steve: What are some of your goals that are not hockey? What would you like to do in the future?

Rob: I have no clue what I want to do for a career. But I know that I don’t want to live in a big city. I think that living here in Des Moines for these past three and a half months is really showing me that. I can’t stand driving around in the traffic.

Steve: What are your hobbies? What do you like to do?

Rob: I love to fish and hunt and golf. That is what we do all summer and fall, so that is what I like to do.

Steve: Everybody wants to know about nicknames. Do you have a nickname?

Rob: Novs or Novie.

Steve: Great. Well, Rob, thank you for visiting with us. Is there anything else that you would like the fans to know that they may not know about you?

Rob: Nothing that I can say in print!

Steve: Okay. Thanks a lot.

Rob: All right.