Longtime local high school hockey coaching legend Marty Roos is hoping to earn his 500th career victory this Wednesday night when his Notre Dame High School of Fairfield skaters face Immaculate of Danbury at the Milford Ice Pavilion. Thirty-three years ago this month, however, Roos was coaching his son, Perry, at Fairfield Prep.On the other side of town, meanwhile, Arnie Larsen skippered the Andrew Warde High School hockey team, captained by his son, Andy. The father and son combinations at both Fairfield high schools made headlines in a feature story in the January 18, 1976 edition of the Bridgeport Post.
"I ride back and forth to the games in my own car," the elder Roos, a Prep coaching legend, was quoted as saying in the article. His son, Perry, the Jesuits' captain in 1975-76, said, "It's definitely added pressure with my father as the coach."
"I think I would play better under a different coach than my father," said Crimson Eagles' hockey captain Andy Larsen, pictured first from the left in the front row below. "He would prefer me not coaching him," answered Arnie, his Dad and the founder of the Warde hockey program.
The article states that while their fathers do the coaching from behind the bench, Perry Roos and Andy Larsen do the skating on the ice. It's been that way for both players ever since they decided to lace up their skates.
"I guess you could say I followed in my father's footsteps," admitted Andy, the team's leading scorer. "He plays tennis, too, and so do I." And the younger Larsen played it well, considering he won the Connecticut High School singles championship in the Spring of 1975.
Both players, Andy and Perry, played in the Bridgeport Youth Hockey program in their younger days when, again, their fathers were their coaches.
"He's really pushed me and contributed a great deal to my success," acknowledged Perry about his father, who coached his 50th victory against North Branford in the 1975-76 season. "But it's definitely added pressure with your father as the coach. I remember one game my freshman year against Ludlowe, I made two mistakes which cost us two goals and we lost the game and didn't make the state tournament because of it. I felt really bad and thought about calling it quits that night. But I got over it."
Larsen, however, saw things from the other side of the fence. "I have problems with my father as coach," said Warde's 1975 soccer most valuable player. "I can only do so much. Things just don't work with him as the coach. I want to do things by myself, and when I tell him I want to try something different on the ice, he always yells to me that he's the coach.
"Now and then the pressure would be taken off if I was playing under a different coach," the younger Larsen continued. "But I'm pretty used to it by now."
It's not easy from behind the bench, either. Both coaches have to avoid any signs of favoritism, yet their sons are the team leaders and the ones their teammates are going to look to when the going gets tough.
"He's the acknowledged leader," Arnie said about his son. "The kids voted for him as captain. He's played a lot of hockey, and it comes natural to him. I don't bring the game home with me, and I try to do better next time.
"I tell him (Andy) something that he should do and he'll absorb it. He'll pick it up," Arnie added. "Still, we think differently on a lot of things in a game. For instance, he's a center and he has to play out away from the corners ready for a break. Yet, he'll go in the corners a lot and dig the puck out himself even though I tell him not to. I know, though, that he would rather not have me coaching him."
Both Andy at Warde and Perry at Prep performed brilliantly during their scholastic careers. Perry scored his 100th point on December 27, 1975, in a 17-1 romp over Lee High School of New Haven. Overall, he had 44 goals and 67 assists by mid-January of 1976. While Andy hadn't reached the 100-point plateau as of yet, he had tallied 57 goals for the Crimson Eagles.
Please take a look at my special five-part series on the early days of the Andrew Warde High School hockey program. It is linked here.
Paul
Please sign the AWHS Guest Book.
Visit the Andrew Warde High School Gift Shop.
Watch the AWHS 1976 vintage "film".
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