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New technology to be utilized at Prospects Tournament

By CHRIS DOBROWOLSKI

cdobrowolski@record-eagle.com

TRAVERSE CITY — Seven of the eight teams taking part in the upcoming NHL Prospects Tournament will be utilizing cutting edge technology as a test run when the tournament begins on Friday at Centre ICE Arena.

Bill Boll of Quantum Pro Hockey and a staff of three others were at the arena for about 14 hours on Wednesday installing sensors for RFID technology into the boards at the arena, with the sensors that are spaced three feet apart allowing teams to track on-ice time, number of shifts and average time of shift for the tournament.

“The sensor will pick up when you’re on the ice and when you cross or exit the ice, it stops calculating time on the ice,” said Anne Reeves, director of Detroit Red Wings events in Traverse City. “Then it’s automatically calculated into a system they can monitor from wherever on computers.”

Thus far, the technology has only been used in Europe and in the AHL, but is now being looked at by the NHL as a potential analysis system. Players wear a sticker the size of a Band-Aid on their shin pad to track their ice time. Pro Hockey Vision has teamed with a Kuru Digital — a company out of Finland — to bring the software to

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RFID sensors installed in the Centre ICE boards for this week’s NHL Prospects Tournament will track player time on ice.

Record-Eagle/Chris Dobrowolski

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the tournament, which runs through Tuesday at Centre ICE.

“We smacked it together over the past nine months or so, tested it out, it worked well, upgraded more of what the NHL wanted and now we’re implementing the system here for the Traverse City camp,” said Boll, the CEO of Quantum Pro Hockey. “(The data) is instantaneous and 100 percent accurate.”

NHL teams have been reluctant to try the new technology, but they’re warming up to the idea as they’ve seen what it can do.

“They’re already using it in Europe right now,” said Boll. “So I took a little video off my cell phone camera to show some NHL teams. Most of them said, ‘it can’t be.’ We said, ‘it is, call these teams in Sweden or Finland.’ That’s where we got the approval from the Red Wings to come here. The day of reckoning will come Friday, but it will work.”

Red Wings general manager Ken Holland was the first to confirm interest in using the test, with others soon following. The St. Louis Blues are the only ones who elected to not be involved.

“It’s very, very exciting for us,” said Reeves. “I don’t think our area has ever been a part of something so big. If it’s accepted it could impact globally, starting with the NHL and beyond that.”

Quantum Pro Hockey collects over 400 different metrics, such as shots, hits and hits taken, but the icetime metric is the only one that’s automated.

Boll said he guesses that it could be in every NHL arena within two years if this weekend’s test goes as expected. Some NHL teams which are not participating in the Prospects Tournament are flying representatives in to see the technology up close, according to Boll.

This week’s test could be the tip of the iceberg for Quantum Pro Hockey, which has been granted patents for physiology metrics that could be revolutionary, measuring things like impacts of hits, where hits are taken on the body, acceleration and deceleration of players delivering and absorbing hits, and potentially, concussion monitoring.

“If a player is skating up the ice with the puck, and he gets hit, we’re going to be able to tell how hard the skater who hit him skated, how far he skated, where the impact was, if it crossed his baseline as far as traumatic brain injury or concussion, whiplash. Right now we’re working on the design of the chip,” said Boll.

Other professional organizations have expressed interest in using out the company’s technology, including Major League Baseball, the NBA and equestrian events. NASCAR and Formula One racing also have approached the company. For now, the focus is on this week’s Prospects Tournament.

“This is the first piece of our puzzle,” said Boll.

“I don’t think our area has ever been a part of something so big. If it’s accepted it could impact globally, starting with the NHL and beyond that.”

Anne Reeves, director of Detroit Red Wings events in Traverse City.

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