AUGUST 15 • 2024 | 31
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names. Ultimately, it was the 
Hebruisers, Tefillin Tough Guys, 
Edmonton Mohelers and Pastrami 
Penguins that took to the ice. 
To even the playing field, Lorkis 
offered weekly classes to help 
improve the skills of players, if 
they wanted. 
“I heard from many players who 
were pretty new to hockey that 
they would never have had the 
confidence to say, ‘I’m going to 
play ice hockey on a big league,’ 
but they felt comfortable saying, 
‘I’m going to play a game and this 
is just going to be a fun time,’” 
Lorkis said. 
After 10 weeks of league play 
on Monday evenings, they hosted 
the playoffs — and the Edmonton 
Mohelers and the Pastrami 
Penguins faced each other at the 
championship. 
About 50 people, mostly family 
and friends of the players, were 
in the stands enjoying the kosher 
munchies that Partners supplied 
as they watched the Pastrami 
Penguins score their way to 
victory. 
According to Linkner, one of the 
highlights was seeing how players 
improved throughout the season.
“One guy, Zvi Hershberg, had 

never really played before,” said 
Linkner. “We were all sending 
him videos on tips and giving 
him tricks to help him score. 
On Monday, at the consolation 
game, while his whole family was 
there watching, Zvi scored for 
his first time! He was over the 
moon, waving at everyone from 
the ice. It was incredible to see his 
transition! To be honest, seeing 
that was much more important to 
me than winning the trophy!”
Just like there were no 
requirements about experience on 
the ice in order to join the league, 
there was likewise no minimum 
requirement of Jewish knowledge 
or practice in order to join — 
as is the case with all Partners 
programming.
“The entire goal of the league 
was to have a fun, low-key space 
to meet and make friends with 
other Jews, and that goal was 
met from week one,” Lorkis said. 
“Friendships formed in both a 
competitive and non-competitive 
way, beginning from that first time 
we met in the locker room.”
There was an incredible 
camaraderie; the ice seemed to 
link the players in a way that 
nothing else could.

Although it wasn’t required, 
some players did start turning up 
at the famous Partners in Torah 
Tuesday night learning program to 
study Torah with their teammates. 
“I like to joke that Avrumi and 
Noam bought in all the Orthodox 
guys and I bought in all the 
secular ones,” laughed Linkner. 
“But now I’m a lot closer to the 
Orthodox guys who I didn’t even 
know until the league! What’s nice 
is that each week there’s more guys 
from the league at the Partners 
Tuesday night learning program. 
One week, I saw one of the guys 
at Partners and said, ‘I didn’t 
know you did this!’ and he said, 
‘I didn’t know you did it either!’ 
He’d signed up the day before after 
hearing talk about it in the locker 
room.”
Lorkis, Gross and Linkner now 
laugh that they once worried about 
finding enough players.
“It turns out that here in 
Michigan, ice hockey is practically 
its own religion!” Gross joked. 
“So, we met a lot of Jews who were 
playing lots of hockey but were not 
involved in other programming.”
The league was successful 
beyond what any of them had 
dreamed and it earned rave 
reviews from everyone involved. 
“I thought we’d be using our 
community to get more hockey 
players, but it turned out we 
used hockey to get people more 
involved in the community. This 
really metastasized into something 
so much bigger than we imagined 
and we couldn’t be happier about 
it,” Linkner said. 
“We’re definitely doing it again 
next year, but none of us want 
to wait that long,” Lorkis added. 
“We’re hoping to start another 
tournament right after Labor Day. 
And we’re always looking for more 
people to join!” 

For more information, email Avrumi Lorkis at 

alorkis@gmail.com or Noam Gross at ngross@

partnersdetroit.org.

Noah Linkner 
brings the puck 
up the ice.

ROBERT BRUCE PHOTOGRAPHY

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