No more knee hockey in the hallways, or cannonball contests in the hot tub, or late night inquiries from small voices to the front desk for Prince Albert in a can.

At long last, the Fat Lady has sung her swan song at all the tournaments in all the rinks of North America, signifying the cessation of all hockey hostilities and the end of another season on the rink.

In our league, we wrap things up with a gala banquet and celebration, where skaters and their parents gorge themselves on pizza and lemonade donated by one of our faithful sponsors.

Several dedicated teams of volunteers also publish a bound collection of photos and reports of all the teams and distribute it free of charge to every skater in the league. The kids run around all night until they get every teammate�s autograph, just like a high school yearbook signing. It is a delightful tradition, and the part where all the skaters give their parents a mandatory standing ovation is OK with me too.

After the league officials thank nearly everyone in sight, and another speech or two from another sponsor or two is delivered, the rink rats squirm impatiently in their seats, waiting for the ultimate moment of the evening: Trophy Time.

Just last week, while looking for a missing hockey magazine, I wandered into my squirt-aged son�s room, and was nearly blinded by the reflections from the mini-shrine of glittering hardware parked on top of his bedroom dresser. I counted 13 hockey trophies in total, and yet my son has been playing hockey for only four seasons. At this pace, by the time he reaches bantams, he�ll need his own wing on the house.

By way of contrast, my son has also played in little league for an equal length of time and has a single trophy. While Williamsport officially frowns on the distribution of trophies, USA Hockey is more libertarian.

Rae Briggles of USA Hockey confirms that huge batches of patches are distributed throughout the country for official Playmaker, HatTrick and Shutout achievement awards, but she points out they restrict each player to a single award per season.

USA Hockey also encourages its coaches and leagues to stress the importance of teamwork over individual achievement, but trophies are an inevitable part of the equation. What rink rat doesn�t have that dream of carrying Lord Stanley�s Cup over his head for a victory lap around the rink?

And the grownups don�t exactly discourage those dreams. For example, our state�s youth hockey organization runs five separate state championship titles with five classes for each Mite, Squirt, Pee Wee and Bantam division; thus, about 450 or so skaters can legitimately claim to be state champs. I think we stole this concept from professional boxing, where there are, by my latest count, about 46 �World Heavyweight Champions.�

Clearly, the most repugnant element about our league�s trophy distribution policy is that while in terms of quantity, it is an entirely a Democratic process (EVERY skater gets a trophy); quality is another issue altogether.

For example, the �A� travel team trophy is more than two feet tall, the �B� travel team trophy is one-foot tall, etc., until at long last, the house league player gets a trophy about the size of a charm bracelet figurine.

It should be noted that every skater pays identical fees to the league.

Frankly, this process sends the wrong message to our kids. But just watch the Oscars, a Fourth of July parade, or any buffoonish gazillionaire pro sports team owner blithering over the receipt of a little hunk of metal and plastic that commemorates a winning effort and you will recognize that even as we grow older, some things never change.