Joe Buss, co-captain of St John’s hockey team, tells John’s Chronicle about his involvement in the St John’s Hockey Team, one of the highlights of his time at Durham, and advises on how others can get involved.
Before I came to St John’s I had always enjoyed playing hockey at school, but being a part of the team over my three years here has been one of the highlights of my time in Durham. I remember signing up straight away at the freshers fair and I found that playing was not only a great way to meet fellow first years, but also a chance to become friends with those in the years above.
In my first year we had a great season, despite going out of the floodlit cup on penalty flicks we finished fourth in the top division which was a brilliant achievement. We lost many key players that summer but managed to go one better in my second year by finishing third. Being in the race for the title right until the final couple of games was pretty remarkable for a college the size of John’s.
This year we’ve not had it easy as a club. As a result of the university teams only picking a handful of freshers from this cohort, the college leagues are full of very good players. However, this has only motivated us more to maintain our premiership status and punch above our weight as one of the smaller colleges.
Since we returned to Durham after Christmas, the team has been performing exceptionally well. It has been an honour for me to captain such a great group, whose effort and commitment is probably the best I’ve experienced for John’s Hockey.
Although we may not be the biggest club, our socials have always been well attended, even by those who don’t play hockey themselves. At the end of my first year, I remember our end of season bar crawl being a particular highlight, with both men’s and women’s players of all year’s getting involved. Hopefully, in summer term, we can be more active with socials as this term we have a lot of games to play in amongst summatives.
We are a very welcoming club, always open to new members of whatever ability. In fact, it has been great to see that this year we’ve had a couple of third years get involved in hockey for the first time since they played at school. This Epiphany term we train on Tuesday evenings from 9-10 on the hockey pitches at Maiden Castle. We still have some crucial matches to play this term to push up the league as far as possible, and in summer term we will have the Festival of Sport which is always a fun day with a mixed team.
Of course, John’s-Chad’s Day is also on the agenda and this year is shaping up to be great game with Chad’s having a much stronger team than previous years. If you’ve played a bit of hockey before or have never picked up a stick but want to give it a go, I would strongly recommend joining the Facebook group and coming down to training!
- Joe notes that he and his co-captain, Bryce Furlong, would welcome messages from students who have questions about getting involved.
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