Whalers Youth Announce Long-Term Partnership with Champions Skating Center
Bobby Ferraris Named Coaching Director, Rob Belger named Skills Director
Champions Skating Center (“Champions”), Whalers Youth Hockey and Black Bear Sports Group are pleased to announce a long-term partnership between the rink and the youth hockey club with the shared goals of growing the youth club, enhancing youth hockey offerings within the club and at the rink, and offering more development opportunities for rink and club participants. This new partnership establishes the Whalers as a long-term home club at the Champions Skating Center along with the Hartford Jr. Wolfpack AAA.
Champions and the Whalers have also named Champions Skating Center / Hartford Jr. Wolfpack AAA Hockey Director, Bobby Ferraris as Coaching Director. Coach Ferraris brings an accomplished hockey pedigree to the arena and its clubs and programming. He spent 12 years coaching NCAA Division I hockey, most recently serving as the Associate Head Coach of Mercyhurst University before relocating to New York in 2015 to serve as Head Coach of the Boys Varsity Hockey team for the Trinity-Pawling School, where he will remain the Head Coach. Coach Ferraris has established the Pride as a consistent contender in the Founders League, which is widely considered to be the premier prep school hockey league in the United States; this success included a championship in 2018. Coach Ferraris has also effectively developed his players and helped them earn college roster spots. In 2021-2022, Trinity-Pawling featured freshmen alumni on three Division I rosters and seven Division III rosters. In 2022-2023, another three Trinity-Pawling hockey alumni will be Division I freshmen at Army, Boston University, and Merrimack College. “I’m thrilled to have the Whalers join the Black Bear and Wolfpack family at the rink,” said Bobby Ferraris.
Coach Rob Belger, Assistant Hockey Director at Champions Skating Center, will serve as the Skills Director. Coach Belger played juniors for the Hartford Wolfpack before moving on to play NCAA hockey for Nichols College.
Cat Cirillo was named Director of Operations for the Whalers and will continue to oversee the administration and scheduling of the club.
Tryouts and team alignments for 2022-23 will be announced soon on the website! Go Whalers!
About Black Bear Sports Group, Inc.
Black Bear Sports Group, Inc. is a privately held company formed by Murry Gunty and Blackstreet Capital Holdings, LLC in 2015 that seeks investments in sports and entertainment facilities, teams, and youth sports events. Black Bear arenas are clean, professionally managed, and offer world-class recreational programs. Black Bear focuses on ice arenas in metropolitan areas with compelling demographics, markets with a National Hockey League club presence and arenas with existing youth hockey clubs. Black Bear not only features the ability to acquire healthy and stable arenas, but also the expertise required to turn around mismanaged or under-performing facilities. The largest owner/operator of ice rinks in the U.S., Black Bear’s footprint totals 30 facilities across the United States with 55 sheets of indoor ice, four indoor turf fields, 23 youth hockey clubs, three youth hockey leagues (Atlantic Hockey Federation, Atlantic Girls Hockey Federation and National Girls Hockey League), the nation’s largest adult hockey organization (Foundry Adult Hockey) and three Junior “A” hockey franchises with membership in the United States Hockey League, North American Hockey League and Eastern Hockey League.
