Wonderland of Ice in Bridgeport is some 4,000 miles from the Winter Olympics in Italy, but the rink is closely tied to four people representing Team USA at the games: Tage Thompson in men’s hockey, Aerin Frankel in women’s hockey and Kristen Santos-Griswold in speedskating. <\/p>\n
Chris Drury played in prior Olympics and is back as the assistant general manager for the men’s hockey team. <\/p>\n
\u201cThey all call Wonderland home, and they’re part of our Wonderland family,\u201d said Lisa Fedick, the rink\u2019s general manager. \u201cWe could not be more excited.”<\/p>\n
Fedick and husband John Ferguson run the rink and will be in Milano Cortina to cheer them on in person. <\/p>\n
\u201cWe’re so proud,\u201d Ferguson told News 12. <\/p>\n
Each Olympian spent a significant time at the rink in their younger years. <\/p>\n
\u201cEvery day we were here for like two, three hours,\u201d recalled Rick Santos, Kristen Santos-Griswold\u2019s father. \u201cA home away from home.\u201d <\/p>\n
Santos-Griswold grew up in Fairfield. She started as a figure skater, which is documented on Wonderland’s walls, along with many athletes from the past few decades. <\/p>\n
\u201cMy little Kristen,\u201d Fedick said smiling. \u201cKristen came up through our Learn to Skate. I had the pleasure of working with her. I was not her primary figure skating coach, but I did coach her quite a bit.\u201d<\/p>\n
Santos-Griswold started dabbling in short track speed skating around age 9, according to her dad, and fell in love with it.<\/p>\n
\u201cKristen is the hardest worker I know,\u201d he told News 12.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe was always fast, but she surprised me becoming a speed skater,\u201d Ferguson added. <\/p>\n
Now, she’ll compete on the world\u2019s biggest stage\u2014a place she\u2019s been before. Santos-Griswold made her Olympic debut at Beijing in 2022 and has her eye on medals this time around. <\/p>\n
\u201cFrom the beginning, that was Kristen\u2019s goal,\u201d Santos stated. <\/p>\n
It\u2019s something Ferguson said he predicted for goalie Aerin Frankel years ago. <\/p>\n
\u201cI said to her father, I said, \u2018Peter, you have something very special. We\u2019re going to the Olympics,\u2019\u201d Ferguson recalled.<\/p>\n
Frankel, who plays professionally for the Boston Fleet, grew up in Westchester but came to Wonderland at age 10.<\/p>\n
\u201cAerin is just a woman who amazes me. She grew up always playing on the boys\u2019 team. We first met Aerin when she joined one of our Connecticut Cobras teams and traveled to Las Vegas to a tournament. She played with some of the best male hockey players in her age bracket, and she was tough as nails,\u201d Fedick explained. \u201cShe loves the work. She loves coming to the rink. She loves the practices. She loves the process, and that\u2019s why these athletes are so successful.\u201d <\/p>\n
Tage Thompson, who plays professionally for the Buffalo Sabres, is another athlete whose rise doesn’t surprise anyone at Wonderland. Tage arrived there when he was 12 after his family moved to the area for his dad to coach the Bridgeport Sound Tigers, according to Fedick.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe thing with Tage is work ethic,\u201d Fedick said. \u201cIf there was ever open ice, he would come in. It could be 6 a.m., 3 p.m., 11 p.m.\u2014he was here.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cHe had size, which you can\u2019t teach. And he had the ability and attitude,\u201d Ferguson stated.<\/p>\n
Fedic and Ferguson last went to the Olympics in 2002 to see Chris Drury on the ice. Drury grew up in Trumbull and went on to play 12 seasons in the NHL. He\u2019s currently the general manager for the New York Rangers. <\/p>\n
\u201cI feel like we kind of raised Chris,\u201d Fedick said with a laugh. \u201cHe lived about a mile from here and used to ride his bike to the rink.\u201d<\/p>\n
Fedick recalled one Christmas Eve where he was supposed to join their family.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe asked us if we would open the rink for him instead. And instead of celebrating Christmas Eve, he was here by himself practicing until about midnight,\u201d Fedick explained.<\/p>\n
Though Drury will be at the games as an executive this time, he’ll still have his Wonderland support in the audience. <\/p>\n
“To have seen these athletes as young children and watch them grow up on and off the ice and now to see them at the pinnacle of their career, it’s just almost overwhelming for us,” said Fedick.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere are no words, ” Ferguson told News 12, adding, “My predictions\u2014we go 3-0 gold medals.”<\/p>\n
Ferguson also said that no matter the outcome, he plans to hold a celebration in honor of all the Wonderland Olympians once the games are over. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Wonderland of Ice in Bridgeport is some 4,000 miles from the Winter Olympics in Italy, but the rink…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":122093,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[38],"tags":[26726,128,3180,28819,9,24,63,15559,40308,129,131,130,23717],"class_list":["post-122092","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-the-bronx","tag-bridgeport","tag-bronx","tag-hockey","tag-milan-cortina-games","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-nyc","tag-olympics","tag-team-usa","tag-the-bronx","tag-the-bronx-headlines","tag-the-bronx-news","tag-winter-olympics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/122092","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=122092"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/122092\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/122093"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=122092"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=122092"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=122092"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}