On an icy road

The Purdue University web site has this to say about its club sports program:

The Club Sports Program offers a unique blend of team and individual sports with intercollegiate opportunities for club members. Each club receives professional guidance, facility usage, and some financial support. Club members help with their own expenses through payment of individual semester and/or annual dues, fund-raising projects, and special assessments.

These are kids who participate out of their love of the sport. But misfortune hit the Purdue men's ice hockey club squad yesterday on a road in Indiana. The program reports:

A member of the Purdue University Ice Hockey Club team died and seven of his teammates were injured Saturday afternoon (Dec. 1) when the van in which they were riding rolled over after sliding on ice-slickened Ind. 25, five miles north of Wingate, Ind.

The accident occurred at about 3:45 p.m. as the 20 team members, two coaches and a manager were traveling to the David S. Palmer Arena in Danville, Ill., for a scheduled 5 p.m. game against Holy Cross College of South Bend, Ind.

The Purdue Exponent -- the student newspaper -- reports that the student killed in the accident is defenseman Andrew Jackson, of Chanhassen, MN. It might not get the attention of the larger programs of their sister schools in the Big Ten, such as Minnesota, Wisconsin, Michigan, or Michigan State, but in its own right it is a successful program -- winners of nine of their first 11 games this year -- and this morning we thought we'd remember these kids and their fans for their loss and their love of the sport.