City High’s Henry Ingersoll has ice dreams

IOWA CITY — At the age of 4, Iowa City High freshman Henry Ingersoll, inspired by friends, decided to try hockey.

This was not a sport traditionally played within his family.

Ingersoll didn’t love the idea of playing hockey at first. It took time.

“At first I didn’t like it because I was very young and it was very challenging for me,” he said.

He initially found other sports more interesting and intriguing than hockey.

“I come from a basketball family, my dad played college basketball so naturally that was the first sport that I played,” Ingersoll said. “It was just so different from basketball, I didn’t know what to think of it yet.”

After a few years, Ingersoll tried hockey again and it seemed to come much more naturally for him.

“When I tried it again, I was older and bigger, and around that time I was starting to fall out of love with basketball,” he said.

Ingersoll plays on the RoughRiders high school club hockey team in Cedar Rapids. Throughout this season, he has been fighting for his spot on varsity as a freshman.

“This year I’m focusing on making the roster and helping out the team, but next year will be about leading the team,” Ingersoll said.

He has played in 11 of 29 varsity games and has one assist. In 29 JV games, he has five goals and three assists. Although RoughRiders are 6-22 at the varsity level and 4-23 in the JV season, but Ingersoll thinks there is potential.

“I think that the team and I have had a solid start to the season, but I’m definitely not at my full potential,” he said early in the season. “We have faced the best teams in the league so far and kept every game within a goal, both JV and varsity are close to being winning teams.”

Looking forward, Ingersoll’s goals for his hockey career are making state all four years of high school and, after high school, playing for a junior or semipro hockey team.