from Justin Bourne of Sportsnet,

At around 19 or 20 years old, I found myself invited to skate in a summer shinny game that was packed full of pros, mostly by luck (I had a personal relationship with one of the players unrelated to hockey). I first started skating there around 2002, which in Kelowna at the time meant young Canadian Olympians were well represented there, with Duncan Keith and Shea Weber and Dany Heatley and -- on the very rare occasion -- Jarome Iginla and Carey Price.

The years all blend together, as I’d skate there many years after, but needless to say the best 20 skaters between the two teams would’ve assembled a formidable NHL team at the time.

I was a measly junior A hockey player -- a pretty OK one, I should note -- but I started in that game as a junior player nonetheless. That meant being A) quite bad in that game, and B) being sadly short on the etiquette that comes with participating in those skates. I’ve written about those years before, but this time I thought I’d break it down into five simple do’s and don’ts just in case you, too, should find yourself in that situation. Cause I assure you, it’s not as simple as “Do your best.”

Oh god, don’t do your best.

That would not go over well.

What you should do is…

DO try, DO compete.

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