Dressed For The Ice Dance Sisters Still Strap Up The Skates, But With Rec Hockey In Mind

To borrow a line from a Garth Brooks song, “Her favorite dress is her favorite blue jeans.”

That’s what led two sisters to play hockey.

Kim Mitchell and Debbie Johnson were practically born wearing figure skates.

But when a difference in opinion arose over what kind of costume Mitchell would wear, at the tender age of 11, she had a change of heart.

“When it came time to put on the dresses in competition, Kim split,” Johnson said.

Mitchell laughed, proudly displaying a grin, no doubt seen a time or two as a child.

“They told me to get rid of the blue jeans and spit out the bubble gum and I said no thanks,” she explained.

Johnson followed suit a year later.

“When Kim switched over (to hockey), I decided to give it a try,” Johnson said. “Kim, my mom, my brother - the whole family was skating together. It was the thing to do.”

Actually, as much as Mitchell hates to admit it, a yearning for hockey began a couple years earlier.

At Snoops Saloon, a favorite after-game stop to talk hockey, she fondly recalled the days when she would follow her father to hockey practice on the pond at Manito Park.

Reluctantly, and with a lot of encouragement from her sister, she recounted for the handful of teammates that had assembled an incident that occurred early one winter morning.

“I was chasing a puck and couldn’t stop,” Mitchell said, her cheeks turning a rosy red.

She had gotten a little too close to the edge and fell through the ice.

A low chorus of snickers, led by her sister, began to swell.

“That wasn’t funny,” Mitchell continued, the laughter still greatly outweighing the sympathy. “I thought I was going to die.”

She didn’t, obviously, but was sold on hockey.

Mitchell and Johnson have been wreaking havoc on opponents since, most recently in the Adult Men’s Recreation Hockey League.

The league is divided into four leagues, classes A (veterans) through D (“rookie”).

After competing in the C League last year, the sisters have dropped to the D League to play on Monday nights with the Spokane Devils, the first all-women’s entry in the men’s league.

Their teammates are glad they did.

“They play awesome together,” Brandi Van Horn said. “They always know where each other is going to be.”

On this particular Monday night, Mitchell and Johnson skated as center and winger on a 2-on-1 breakaway.

Mitchell started the play with a pass to Johnson, who returned the favor to a wide-open Mitchell.

With a quick and easy flick of the wrist, Mitchell’s shot beat the goaltender - but not the post - and bounced harmlessly to the corner.

Both threw their heads back in disgust, no doubt grinning a little inside. That very play is often the source of some good-natured competition.

“She’ll be going down on a 2-on-1 and she will pass instead of shooting,” Mitchell said. “The first thing she says when she comes off the ice is `I’m sorry,’ because she knows I’m going to yell at her.”

It was Johnson’s turn to laugh.

“She likes me to shoot more, but I like to pass to her,” Johnson said. “She has a better shot than I do. Whether you score or make the assist, a point’s a point.”

And on that night, she was right to pass.

“Great pass,” Kim said. “I should have had it.”

All kidding aside, the two work easily together.

“We compare a lot of each other to the other one,” Mitchell said. “If one does something, expect the other to do it.”

Oh, by the way, the name of that song is “Two of a Kind.” Fitting, isn’t it?