It's all in the name, really.
When the Central Illinois Girls Hockey Association formed in 2016, naming its forthcoming teams "Revolution" made sense back then: Doug Kent, the association's president, remembers regional options for girls hockey as limited.
But when the idea of starting all-girls hockey teams was initially pitched seven years ago, Kent also remembers some pushback.
"There were a lot of people that didn't think girls should be playing hockey, in 2016, on their own teams. They thought they should play with boys — they didn't think they would develop well, that boys would push them and that boys are better," Kent said. "We had to drive through all of that and recognize that there are people like that, but we didn't let them stop us."
Seven years later, there are now nearly 70 girls of all ages playing on Revolution teams. There are also seven youth hockey organizations across central Illinois that are affiliated with the Central Illinois Girls Hockey Association.
Kent said it took almost all of that time to get the buy-in necessary to validate the program.
"It took about seven years to get enough turnover in the organizations for them to start to truly buy-in. We were patiently waiting for people to recognize that girls should also play hockey and be able to play on their own teams," Kent said. Now, "when you say things like, 'Well it's Peoria's Revolution' or 'It's Springfield's Revolution,' — it truly is now because all seven of those organizations have bought in."
Affiliates for Revolution span the region, pulling team members from areas like Pekin, Danville and Champaign-Urbana among others. They're also affiliated with the Northern Illinois Hockey League, the second-largest youth hockey league in the U.S. and largest in the Midwest.
Kent said an emphasis has been not on pulling girls away from other youth hockey organizations entirely, but giving them a chance to be on a team with their peers.
And while the interest in girls' hockey has certainly spiked locally, it appears part of a national trend as well. National organization USA Hockey reports participation in girls hockey teams has shot up 65% over the past 15 seasons.
There's not an exact explanation for the increase, but when asked, Kent indicated the sport's visibility might be one reason for the uptick.
"When the Blackhawks win cups, more girls play hockey. When the St. Louis Blues win a Stanley Cup, more girls play hockey," he said. "You can look at the metrics when (teams) win a cup: There's massive amounts of girls and boys that join and play hockey."
'That's something I could do'
Seeing the sport played in real life is, really, how Annie Herman, now a club hockey player at Illinois State University, became the player she is today.
Herman said she came to the sport almost by accident: Her dad received tickets to a Bloomington Thunder game from his workplace.
"None of us wanted to go because we had no interest in hockey. It was never in our family," she said. "I remember I saw one player and I saw how passionate he was for the sport ... I was like, 'I want to be that guy.'"
A few months later, her family put her in skating lessons.
"They didn't really think it would stick. They kind of thought I would give it up. It did stick, thankfully, and I've played ever since," Herman said.
Herman, now a freshman at ISU, began playing hockey before the Revolution team was founded in 2016, but she did eventually join that team as well. She's seen firsthand as a player — and now as a coach to that team — the growth girls hockey has had locally.
"There's so many of them. Seeing where these girls are are at at 8, 9 and 10 years old compared to where we were at 11 and 12 is just insane," she said. "It's all because our coach was like, 'Well I saw you girls and how I could have made you better earlier.' We didn't have that opportunity because we had only just started."
In the seven years since it was started, Revolution has sent at least one team member to play at the college varsity level.
Others, like Herman, have stayed in the area and kept up the sport through club offerings at ISU or the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign.
Herman said she'd love to see ice hockey's presence — for both the women's and men's club team — level up in the coming years.
"There's NCAA, which is the best of the best and then you have ACHA (American Collegiate Hockey Association) which is a little less than that. And then you have what we are, which is club and it's quite literally just a club — it's for fun," she said. "I would love to see us hit ACHA. I think it's entirely possible — we're just only in our second year."
'I think we could continue to grow — and never stop growing'
And while the Revolution team has been growing for some time, Kent said that organization would love to see additional growth as the team continues onward.
"Our sweet spot would probably be having a competitive travel team and then maybe a house select team — the girls that don't really want to travel outside of the general area in central Illinois but also want to play on girls hockey teams," he said. "Two teams at each age level where one travels outside, maybe to Chicago and other states, and one that stays locally and plays."
Even better, he said, would be all-girls teams based in Peoria, Champaign, Springfield or wherever else a rink is based. Right now, Kent said there are families driving from as far as two hours away just to have girls on the all-girls teams.
Both Kent and Herman said the significance of having an all-girls team extends beyond the sport itself.
"I think there's a lot more friendship because sometimes boys hockey doesn't really accept girls hockey. If you're one of two girls playing on a boys team, you have a separate locker room and you really only hang out with the guys on the ice," Herman said. "Getting to talk about the games and stuff before practices or after in the locker room is huge."
Kent said the all-girls teams offer some soft-skills building that mixed teams do not.
"Leadership skills, being able to be a leader amongst your peers — a lot of times females on a youth team don't get to be a leader, in fact they don't really get to participate in a lot of the activities because there is only one (of them)," he said.
Kent acknowledged that money can be a barrier to getting into the sport, especially in an area where hockey isn't a sport offered or seen in local school systems.
To offset the financial barrier, Kent said the club's membership rate is "a fraction" of "a lot of the clubs in the area" and several thousand dollars in financial assistance is given out each year. The minimum goal is $3,000, he said, but some years have seen that figure reach around $6,000.
Coaches, staff and the board of directors of the Central Illinois Girls' Hockey Association are also unpaid.
"There is nothing more satisfying than telling a family that wouldn't have expected to be able to (participate) that they get to do that," he said.
The word of mouth from things like that, he said, have carried the team's growth.
Local support, too, can also go a long way, Herman said, adding that the ISU women's club team makes efforts to support the men's club team as well.
"Growing, I think, hockey at ISU is important — not just women's hockey. We are in the middle of Illinois. We're not in a popular hockey town. So growing it at all helps increase all of our chances," she said.
