Finnish Floorball Gaining Momentum in Dallas
Floorball is the second most popular ball game in Finland, and every Finn has played floorball at least in gym classes. In the U.S. the sport is not that well-known yet. However, in some areas, such as in Dallas, there are many active players and teams. A group of people in Dallas has played floorball already over 15 years, and the popularity of the sport is increasing continuously around the U.S.
Floorball resembles ice hockey or ball hockey, but it's played indoors without ice, with a plastic ball and floorball sticks. Floorball is said to be a much safer sport than ice hockey, since the rules don't allow players to take a body contact or a high stick. Floorball was originally developed in Sweden.
A group of mainly Finnish expatriates and later on a growing group of Americans in Dallas have played floorball since the beginning of the 2000s. At first, they played in a small tennis court throughout the year, no matter if it was 100F hot during the summers, or windy and cold during the winters. Luckily the team got a regular time and a place for practices in a sports hall in 2006. Today, the team has played in the same sports hall for already ten years.
Jukka Kotti is one of the best persons to explain the increased popularity of floorball in the Dallas area. He has been coaching a junior team since 2008 twice a week, and has played with his friends since the tennis court days.
"Floorball has been an extremely popular game among Finns all the time. With dedication and hard work (so called Finnish "sisu"), we have managed to assign new players to the game and many of them have become valuable members in development and coaching. New players are keen to learn the rules and play the game - anyone can play floorball. I hear so often from the parents how their kids cannot wait to play floorball the next time, and many of them bring their friends to try and join the sport.”
The true starting point in Kotti’s team’s history was a game against the Austin Floorball Club in 2007. The game itself was an easy win for the Dallas team since they had played much longer. The teams started to cooperate closely after the match. Today the Austin team has one USA Championship title, and the Dallas team holds two 3rd places. Hard work pays off! A new Texas team started also in Houston a few years ago. If you don't have enough teams to play with, you need to create your own opponents, as the Dallas team did.
Today the Dallas team has many more opposing teams to play with under the North Texas Floorball Association (NTFA), which was established two years ago. There are altogether eight teams playing in the North Texas Floorball league in two different levels. In the beginning of every season, some of the recreational level players move up to the Elite level as their skills grow. Due to long distances within the Dallas-Fort Worth metropolitan area, NTFA is developing local teams and even leagues to allow more players to join competitive games.
In 2014, NTFA and the team Bohemians from the Czech Republic started cooperating together, and two of the Bohemians’ coaches travelled to Dallas to hold a floorball camp for the local players. NTFA is planning to send junior players to the Czech Republic to play with advance level players there.
“A friendship and cooperation model with another, more experienced floorball team is a very important way to develop our Texas floorball,” says Kotti.
The Dallas team started to cooperate also with the Dallas Stars – Fitness Stars Foundation approximately 3-4 years ago. Dallas Stars has a Community Outreach program which aims to teach a healthy life style for children. There are 350 schools involved in the program, and over 200,000 children have played floorball as one of the sports they try out during the program. Hopefully many of the children will keep on playing floorball even after the trial!