(let’s pretend you only live like an hour away from ann arbor)

it’s your first ever UMich game (which is against ohio state) and you’ve been dreaming of this for so long. and now, your dream has come true. you’re excited to see the arena and the team play, but you’re also super excited to see someone in particular. sophomore dakoda rhéaume-mullen. it’s a few hours til the game and you wanted to leave early to have time to eat, park, maybe walk around, and go to warm ups. so you get in your car and make your way to ann arbor, your nerves going overdrive. after you eat and finally drive into ann arbor, everything actually starts to hit you. the questions, the excitement, the worry, all of it. but you power through it as you find parking. you check the time and it’s almost 6 so you walk down the street and up to yost arena. you take pictures as you walk, to save the memories. you walk up to the doors and they metal detect you and scan your ticket. once that’s done, you walk in and gaze around in complete shock. but you were prepared. you had your plan for after the game to try and meet as many players as you could, especially dakoda as soon as you walk down to the ice, you look around and take more pictures while waiting for the players to come out for warm ups, one of your favorite parts about going to games. after only a few minutes of waiting, the players start piling out onto the ice, handling the pucks with ease. you took multiple videos and pictures to capture the moment but kept your eye out for dakoda. you took pictures and videos of everything but mostly dakoda. even a couple of them showed him looking at you, which made you so happy. but then something happened that took you by surprise. dakoda gave you a puck!! and you didn’t even have getting a puck on your mind, or have a sign, all you were trying to do was at least get him to notice you or wave. and even better, you got it on video! he smiles as he flips the puck over the glass to you, which you caught with a HUGE grin, internally screaming and crying on the inside. then after warmups were done, you went to go find your seat, which was still fairly close to the ice. you sit down and wait til the game starts once the game is over, which they won, you make your way upstairs to wait by the locker room (yes you can do that) hoping you could meet some players and get dakoda to sign the puck he gave you. so you wait, and lo and behold, you were able to get pictures with luca fantilli, nick moldenhauer, will horcoff, tyler duke, garrett schifsky, and a few others, probably since they won so they were happy. most important of all, you met dakoda, got a picture, and he signed your puck. you guys had a small conversation before he had to get going. but before he left, he asked to see the puck again and said he ‘forgot to write something on it’ which definitely confused you but you gave the puck and marker back to him. he wrote something quickly before telling you bye and leaving. you leave the arena in complete excitement and shock, heading back to your car and back home once you get home, you immediately looked at the puck to see what else dakoda had written on there. you saw the signature but turned the puck around to some more writing. it said, ‘message me on instagram, make sure to tell me it’s you’ on the back. your eyes damn near pop out of their sockets. so, you do as told and go to his instagram and message him along with a picture of the puck