The Friday Game - Dock builders let off a little steam on the ice

The Friday Game
Dock builders let off a little steam on the ice

by Gerry Gilmour
ggilmour@forumcomm.com

Fergus Falls, MN

When it comes to playing hockey, the gang at ShoreMaster is pretty good at building docks. Check that. They're great at building docks. Boat lifts, too. And they're not too shabby at hockey, either.

Every Friday during the noon hour, ShoreMaster employees - from top executives and engineers to assembly and shipping employees - leave their jobs at the factory and hit the ice for a spirited game of shinny.

"I didn't bring my 'A' game today," marketing manager Gary Johnson says he laces his skates in a locker room at the Fergus Falls Community Ice Arena. "I left it in the truck."

Everybody pitches in a few bucks to cover the cost of renting the ice.

Sarah Tuel is among the early arrivals. "Can I be in here?" she asks, looking around to note that she's the only woman in the room.

Sure, why not, they say. After all, she's the granddaughter of the company founder Dennis Tuel.

Not only that, she's a player. Tuel skated last year for the Gustavus Adolphus College women's hockey team in St. Peter.

Once on the ice, the players stretch, limber up and fire a few pucks around. Teams take shape based on jersey colors.

Both benches attempt to recruit Sarah. She ends up on a team with her dad, Dennis Tuel Jr., ShoreMaster's chief engineer.

The Tuel family sold ShoreMaster two years ago to Otter Tail Corp. of Fergus Falls and Fargo. ShoreMaster builds docks, lift systems, breakwaters and water recreation toys. It has 135 employees in Fergus Falls, another 125 in Camdenton, MO, and a handful at a new plant in Adelanto, CA.

The Friday game has been a tradition for five years. Otter Tail, when it took over, was not about to tell the employees they couldn't play anymore.

"Otter Tail's strategy is to buy well-run companies with growth potential, but they do not run the companies; they help them run better," ShoreMaster President Erik Ahlgren says.

"In many ways, I think we have the best of both worlds. We still have a close-knit family atmosphere in how we operate. And, we have the backing of a large, public company to help us grow."

Since no goalies showed this Friday, the nets are tipped face down. A shot hitting the small area of twine on top of the net counts as a goal. Hit the pipe, no goal.

Game on.

The game starts out fast, steel skates tearing up the ice as players huff and puff through the neutral zone.

Opponents collide, but get up and play on. No injury on the play. Bruised egos, maybe.

It's not too long before players on the ice are looking to the bench for reinforcements. How do they know when it's time to change 'em up?

"Whenever there's a heart attack, we switch," says Mike Welde, who runs the robotic welder and when he's not wielding a hockey stick.

Darrell Patterson, a dock dealer from Duluth, has a load of docks on his truck outside the rink.

"When I come to pick up a load, I make sure it's on a Friday before a boat show," he says. "The game gets the adrenaline going - helps me stay awake for the road home."

Doug Houska, market manager for Bremer Bank in Fergus Falls, is a late arrival. Playing hockey with the guys from one of the city's largest companies is good for business, he rationalizes.

He races toward the bench, calling for Johnson to take a shift. "But I just got my seat warm," Johnson protests before jumping over the dasher boards.

Ahlgren denies he tries to recruit hockey players as ShoreMaster employees. In fact, he says that if he did, he would make sure they couldn't skate as well as he can.

"I just hate these young guys who are in shape and can stickhandle," Ahlgren says.

"He's lying," says Lindsay Horgen, a ShoreMaster draftsman. "It's right on the application form: 'Can you skate?'"

Skating slows noticeably as the game wears on. It's tougher and tougher to coax replacements off the bench.

"I finally know what my problem is," says Patrick Tuel, Sarah's brother and a commercial department project manager. "I don't exercise enough."

As the clock ticks toward 1 p.m., the game intensifies again. "Last goal wins," Ahlgren shouts.

Then, true leader that he is, he orders the spares on the bench, one by one, to sneak over the boards, until the dark team has the white team outgunned nine player to five.

"When it gets to last goal, we always want the 'big line' on the ice," he says.

Still, the dark jerseys can't get the puck into the twine and the white team realizes it's been snookered. Soon its spares join the scramble.

The dark team loses the puck in its end of the ice and Sarah has the puck. She shoots and it deflects off the stick of the dark player and right in the sweet spot of the twine.

She raises her arms and stick in victory.

Game over. Back to work.