Each week, the Alaska Nanooks will be publishing blog posts from one or more newcomers from each of Alaska's 10 varsity sports teams throughout their preseason. More sports will join the blog following their first official practice.

Hockey
By #8 Jordan Muzzillo | Fr. | Defenseman | Capron, Ill.

"Hello Nanook Nation!

My name is Jordan Muzzillo and this will be my first semester attending UAF, as I am a freshman on the hockey team. As I will be the one writing these blogs, I will be keeping you up to date on the daily activities that the team is participating in, as well as informing you on everything that is happening this year! With that being said, there will also be a "meet the freshman" paragraph revealing fun facts about each individual, in addition to where they last played and grew up!

Before we get to all of that, I would like to introduce myself. I am from Capron, Illinois and am currently 21 years old. I am a defenseman on the team and could not be more excited to get things rolling! My parents' names are Deb and Joe Muzzillo. I also have one younger brother, who is currently 19 years of age. Now that you know a little about my family and myself, I will give you a fun fact about myself: I used to be in 4-H from the ages of 8-18, showing pigs at my local fair. I learned how to raise livestock while also being involved in many different community service projects.

I have only been here in Fairbanks for about a week now but we have done so many different team bonding activities to, not only get to know our community better, but also our teammates! A few highlights are a team scavenger hunt last Friday night, followed by a team softball game on Saturday afternoon. I'll start by telling you guys all about the hunt. We were split up into teams of five, each team having their own vehicle to get around town with. Our coaches then handed each team a list of miscellaneous tasks to complete. Each item on the list was for a different amount of points. An example of some things we had to accomplish for points were walking a stranger's dog, along with pump a stranger's gas for them! Each team was allotted an hour and a half to complete as many assignments as they could. Once each team arrived back at the rink, Coach Largen added up all the scores and the winners were announced. Unfortunately, my team had lost but it was a blast participating in the event and the boys had a great time! Don't worry, there will be pictures to follow so you can all see the fun we all had.

Saturday morning we had an annual softball game. Every year we split the teams up into the Americans vs. the Canadians. The Americans have won the past four years, but this time was different. The Canadians had finally squeezed out a victory and they couldn't have been more excited and proud. Ryker Leer, a senior on the team this year, has been letting the Americans know since the minute the game finished! Hey, there is always next year for revenge!

Each week I will be introducing a few freshman from my class so you can all get to know the Class of 2022 a little better. Featured in this week's blog will be forward Sam Ruffin and defenseman Chris Jandric. Sam is a 1998 birth year from Indianapolis, Indiana who recently moved up to Anchorage, Alaska this summer! Sam had played his past two seasons with the Fairbanks Ice Dogs in the NAHL. A fun fact about Sam is that he attended Culver Military Academy for two years. Ruffin will be wearing #16 this year for your Nanooks.

Chris is our other freshman who will attending the University in the fall. He is also a 1998 birth year from Prince George, British Columbia. A fun fact about Chris is that he moved to Montreal his freshman year of high school for hockey. Jandric will be wearing #29 for the team this year."

Volleyball
By #1 Zoey Keene (Fr. | S/RS | Anchorage, Alaska) & #21 Taylor Overn (Fr. | S | Portland, Ore.)

"Thirteen days ago, girls traveled from all over the country/world ready to embark on the journey of a lifetime. As girls landed in Fairbanks, they were too excited for the morning to come, knowing they were going to meet 13 of their best friends. Although the first 23 and a half hours of volleyball was during a three-day camp, good things were already brewing on the court.

We (Tay and Zo) met the first day we flew in from home and were an instant duo – the new Sarina and Em. Being the freshman on campus, we relied on our feet to get us everywhere. Walking down to the Patty Center from MBS is like a walk in the park, but coming up is more like a strenuous stroll. Like in the game of life, there are two paths, the 'risky path' and the 'safe path.' While the safe path tends to be longer, the risky path will always get you there faster. That's when we decided to speed it up even more, no longer was the risky path risky, we turned into the gutsy path! Taking a tandem bike seems like the best option… for both up and down (I'm sure we will be great friends with the hockey boys who might let us wear their gear for sketchy downhill stuff). Tandem bike donations will be greatly appreciated :). Just kidding, Coach wouldn't be too fond of that.

Kicking off the season with 'double days,' we were finally able to hit the weights this last week. Looking at our workout warm-up we laughed as we thought it would be easy. HA! Don't be deceived; those air-squats with the air-squat holds will get ya! After annihilating our lift and practices for the day, we then lined up calling first dibs on the ice bath. Despite the freshman calling it first, returners called seniority. That's when we (Tay and Zo) created the Title X: freshman discrimination. It is the most discussed topic on our team (have no fear, there's no actual discrimination on our team, we promise!).

These past 13 days have been full of hard work, many ice baths, and meals that can feed a village. We are extremely grateful and appreciative of our boosters and alumni that have taken time out of their days to make sure we are well fed after each practice. We are so juiced for our season to kick-off (definition of 'juiced' – extremely excited/pumped up; adj. – I'm juiced for those cookies) and hope you all will be there to witness greatness that is about to happen with our team. Since we committed (Tay and Zo), we have been so juiced to get here and have felt a part of the Nook family. The chemistry on this team is unreal! In all sincerity, we are so excited to get this season underway and for the Fairbanks community to come and see the Nook volleyball family roll. Tune in next week to see what's new with the Nanook volleyball team!

XOXO,
Tay & Zo"

Hockey Scavenger Hunt Photos










































































Volleyball Photos
































For more information on the Alaska Nanooks, follow @AlaskaNanooks on Twitter or like the Alaska Nanooks page on Facebook.