She's Got It Iced

Blue and yellow jerseys swarm over the ice at the West Warwick Civic Center as youthful hockey players warm up for their Saturday morning “mites” game. In a nearby locker room, the referee takes a few minutes between games before re-lacing her skates and heading back onto the ice. She positions the players, drops the puck, and play explodes.

It’s a typical weekend for these pint-sized skaters, many of whom have been on the ice from the time they could stand. Ranging from 6 to 9 years old, they’re amazingly nimble, although at this age, it’s typically a game of collision offset by lots of padding. What isn’t typical is the referee, Alisa Izzo, 12, of Johnston, R.I., (pop. 28,195) one of the youngest hockey referees in the country.

“It looked like fun,” says Alisa of her decision to don the black and white stripes. “I also liked refereeing because I got to know the rules better and what to do and what not to do.” Alisa, an honor roll student, also plays on two hockey teams.

In her second year as a referee for Rhode Island USA Hockey, Alisa has the equanimity of someone older, much more seasoned. In her short career, she’s been tested time and again—breaking up a fight between two 14-year-old players or unflinchingly enduring the profanities of a coach before her older brother, Carl, also a referee, ejected him.

“That was my first game, and I wasn’t really positive on all the rules,” she recalls. “I made some wrong calls and missed some offsides.”

“She does a good job,” says Robert Maguire, seminar instructor for USA Hockey in Rhode Island. “She’s still in the learning stage, but she’s made a lot of progress.”

Alisa first strapped on figure skates at age 4 but swapped them for hockey blades two years later “because she’s always wanted to keep up with her brother,” says Lisa Izzo, her mother.

Apart from that first game, in which she was mistakenly paired with older players, Alisa referees the “mites”—players younger than she. But before she could pin the bold red, white, and blue USA Hockey patch to her referee’s jersey, Alisa had to complete an all-day training seminar and then pass a 50-question test. Training and testing are required annually before referees are awarded each year’s patch. And there is a perk that goes along with all that work—Alisa is compensated $10-$15 a game.

“I never would have thought back in 1966 when I was playing hockey that I’d have a daughter who was playing and refereeing,” says her father, Carl Izzo, who notes that hockey has been off-limits to women until recent years.

How far this poised youngster takes her hockey career may depend on the state of women’s hockey by the time she leaves college. Olympians such as Rhode Islander Sara DeCosta, who was among those competing at the Salt Lake City winter games, have proved there’s a place for female hockey players at the highest levels. DeCosta won a silver medal at Salt Lake as goalie for the U.S. women’s hockey team, and a gold in 1998.

“One of Alisa’s biggest moments was when Sara let Alisa wear her gold medal at hockey camp and told her, ‘Someday you’ll be doing this,’” Carl Izzo says.

Whether professional hockey is in her future, Alisa has already made her mark, Maguire says. “She absolutely is a role model for other girls.”

Gayle Goddard-Taylor is a regular contributor to American Profile.

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