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Join us in supporting our passion for ice sports and make a lasting impact on our team’s success!
Ice hockey is one of the fastest growing sports in the South and specifically in Florida. While ice hockey was previously a sport of cold weather states, more kids are playing ice hockey in Florida than ever before! Consequently, leagues are growing and giving athletes the opportunity to develop their skills and compete at all levels. At the high school level, there are limited leagues in Florida – most notably one in the Orlando area, one in the South Florida area and the largest in the Tampa Bay area. Unfortunately, ice hockey is not yet sanctioned with the Florida High School Athletic Association (FHSAA). The consequence of this is that it is not supported by traditional school district funding,
Because of the lack of affiliation with FHSAA, community organizations are critical to help run and sponsor both leagues and individual teams. In the Tampa Bay area, the community hockey development department of the Tampa Bay Lightning operates the Lightning High School Hockey League (LHSHL). The LHSHL exists primarily to increase participation in ice hockey among Florida high school students.
In the current 2024-25 season, the LHSHL has 21 Varsity teams in 4 divisions and 16 JV teams. Sarasota entered the league as a JV- only team in the 2023-2024 season. The LHSHL, looking to expand and grow, tapped Sarasota as an ideal location to develop a new program. With support from our community partners, the Sarasota Ice Rays JV team had enormous success in its inaugural season, going 18-2-1 and winning the league championship! However, last year was only the beginning! Now, in just our second season in 2024-2025, we will field both a JV (combined with kids from the Palmetto catchment area) and a Varsity team! We are so excited about this growth and the future is bright for our thriving program and for younger kids in Sarasota County that play ice hockey!
This season we have 43 athletes who will compete for the Sarasota Ice Rays JV and Varsity teams. We will continue to call Ellenton Ice Arena our home rink. The season will run from September and hopefully into the middle of February if we make the playoffs again! The Varsity group has 20 regular season games, and the JV group has 18. Both JV and Varsity seasons will culminate with a league championship tournament (and a state championship tournament for Varsity – the winner of which qualifies for Nationals).
As we expand, the need for the continued support of the community is critical to our mission. We have many steps we need to complete to attain success in continuing to grow both the JV and Varsity programs and to be sustainable. While the Tampa Bay Lightning provide support as far as logistics, planning and some funding, individual programs such as ours require significant community support to achieve our goals.
We are very grateful for your consideration of becoming a Sarasota Ice Rays sponsor and supporter.
We are a 501(c)3 organization so any support you do provide is tax deductible. Any donations are much appreciated in that such donations will allow us to pay operational expenses as we incur them. Donations also help fund meaningful extras for the players such as an end of season banquet and playoff t-shirts, among others.
Stay in touch for our latest news and updates on tryouts and events.