Jonny Brodzinski spent seven years of his childhood working for his father, Mike Brodzinski, at his hockey store, Hockey Zone, in Minnesota.
It was eventually renamed Hockey Central until its father was purchased by Pure Hockey just before the COVID-19 pandemic, and a young Brodzinski sharpened skates there.
They have been running the “Brodzinski shooting school” for many years.
The store was going to get rid of an old Bauer workout station with artificial boards and artificial ice until Mike decided to give it to Jonny, who thought his two young daughters – Lucy and Olivia – would love it.
Mike told Jonny that he had a surplus of kids who also wanted to learn how to shoot, but not enough time to do it all himself.
“It snowballed from there,” Brodzinski told The Post Sunday after practice in Tarrytown. “I went from having 5 to 10 kids to, by the end of the summer, 35 to 36 kids. It was great. It’s so much fun. I just teach the kids what I know, just the little things that can help them even at a young age, teach them the little techniques that will help them later – if they learn the right way now.
“Just seeing their transformation from the first session to the last, the smile it gives them is awesome. »
Thus began the Greenwich, Connecticut chapter of the Brodzinski Shooting School – Garage Edition.
From girls entering their first year of college to a 5-year-old boy, Brodzinski taught hockey to all ages and genders from his own home this summer.
His father gave him plenty of advice for the camp, during which players shot 300 to 500 pucks a day and worked on their strength.
Her eldest daughter, Lucy, set up her little lawn chair next to the rest of the parents and watched.
She then got in her Zamboni toy and cleaned the fake ice after each session.
Although he has a decent sized garage, the size of the area was one of the biggest obstacles for Coach Brodzinski.
“Eventually when I’m done playing hockey, that’s my goal,” Brodzinski said. “Just to buy a little land, build a big pole barn and run my own shooting school and hockey camps.”
That should still be a long way off as Brodzinski enters his 10th season of professional hockey, arguably at the peak of his career.
Coming off a season in which he played a career-high 57 NHL games, recording six goals and 13 assists, Brodzinski is days away from making the Rangers’ roster out of training camp for the first time since joining the organization in 2020-21. .
“It’s something I knew I could do this whole time,” Brodzinski said. “Having that opportunity to be more of an everyday player than just being plugged in when guys get hurt was awesome. It kind of sucked since my last year in LA, getting injured that year and then falling back on the totem pole and having to come back.
“It was great. Especially playing on the power play again and getting those touches. It was great.
The Blueshirts have long relied on Brodzinski as a depth piece, but as the team’s injury luck has dissipated, the 31-year-old’s value within the organization has increased.
With Jimmy Vesey sidelined week-to-week due to a lower-body injury, the left winger’s spot on the fourth line is up for grabs.
Brodzinski has been the favorite for the position, in addition to skating on the second power play unit, while rookie Adam Edstrom has also been part of the conversation.
Brodzinski arrives at training camp every year with the expectation that he will have to earn his spot, approaching each day like he has nothing to lose and like it could be his last in the NHL.
Having to prove himself over and over again has worked well for him, but Brodzinski can’t help but look back when attributing how he got here.
This is what shaped his dreams for the future.
“It’s been a very long road,” he said. “I owe a lot of that to when I first came out of college, to Mike Stothers in Los Angeles, to all that management, to Dean Lombardi, they were really big on development. I think those first three years were the most important of my hockey career. Coming out of college, I wasn’t the best defensive player, but my defensive mindset was just very smooth. I think they just ingrained toughness and being difficult to play against into my game. It was huge. After that, going to San Jose for that year, I was just a right winger that year in San Jose, I was in the American League. We had three centers injured, so I ended up going to center, played the rest of the year at center and from there I was a wing/center and I could kind of play n’ no matter what position.
“It takes a long road to get to where I am and a lot of hard work and things like that, but it takes a lot of really good coaching and opportunities, that’s the most important thing. Otherwise, you really won’t get anywhere in hockey.
