YORK, PA – The York Polar Bears were all over the ice.

Some pushed one leg in front of the other, rigid little robots just trying to stay upright. Others waved their sticks at pucks, sometimes hitting them, sometimes whiffing. A small boy melted into tears each time his father gently placed the helmet cage over his head.

All of it swirled around Rich Garrison, the leader of this most unusual hockey team. He knelt at the ice’s edge, determined to get a 9-year-old ready for practice. He summoned for an extra jersey. He pushed hockey pants and socks over the boy’s skates. He kept switching helmets to find one that fit.

Finally, Garrison called everyone together for a “shooting” drill in the middle of the rink in the York City Ice Arena. Mostly, the older kids took turns inching up to the puck and trying to push it toward a net.

To think how far they’ve come …

York City Ice Arena skating coach Lin Huber helps guide Myles Miller around the ice during one of the first York Polar Bears hockey practices on Tuesday, March 15, 2016. Myles, who is autistic, is part of the team established by Rich and Vickie Garrison of North Codorus Township for special needs children.

They range from ages 5 to 16 and play on one of the only sports teams in York County specifically for disabled children. The idea came from Garrison, 54, after he was disabled from overseas duty with the U.S. Army.

He deals with his most serious battle scars on the inside, and the hockey team seems to energize him each Monday. Certainly, it has been a vast undertaking. When the kids showed up in early March, most had never skated. Some have Down syndrome, autism and social anxiety disorder, others are partially blind or deaf.

At first, they balanced themselves on the ice by holding onto chairs or sleds made of PVC pipe or even their mentors from the York Devils’ youth program. Some cried. All of them fell down. And yet most everyone returned for the next practice and the one after that.

At home, they slept with their hockey gear and sticks by their beds and chattered about their new friends. It was as if their lives were shifting. It didn’t matter how slowly they moved or what they looked like, because they were learning a sport with others like them, and they were gaining confidence and trust.

They were part of their very first team.

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