PEORIA — The Peoria Rivermen often say they go the extra mile for their fans.
The SPHL team literally did just that Thursday to make sure a small school made it to their annual Education Day Game at Carver Arena.
The Rivermen helped Rankin School in Pekin get 80 students from grades 6, 7, and 8, plus nine staff members to the 10:30 a.m. game, which drew a crowd of 9,211. That was the largest attendance for the Education Day Game, the ninth-largest crowd in Peoria’s 44-year history and sixth-largest in SPHL history.
They saw the Rivermen take on the defending champion Evansville Thunderbolts and shut them out, 2-0. But for Rankin, it almost didn’t happen.
“Here I am, in my first year on the job, and I was faced with telling these kids they couldn’t go to this game,” Rankin principal Nick Beard said before kids loaded up to head to Carver Arena. “I didn’t want to do that. They earned it, as a reward promised for academic and behavior standards, and our school has gone to the Rivermen Education Day game for years.
“But we couldn’t secure transportation. There just weren’t any buses available to us, not enough drivers, either, and we did not have the budget to arrange private transportation.”
Beard was at the game dressed in a Rivermen jersey and wearing fuzzy green “Grinch” pants, watching over the Rankin kids as they took in the action below. He is a Washington native who grew up coming to Rivermen games with his dad, Gary. He brings his own son, Noah, 12, to Rivermen games now, paying forward a love for the game.
And building that attachment is what the Education Day Game is all about.
So the Rivermen came and got them. Co-owner Bart Rogers arranged two charter buses from Green River, a company based in LaSalle-Peru that the team uses for its own travel in the SPHL.
And he paid for two-thirds of the cost.
“Anything for those kids,” Rogers said. “Katie Pogeman (Rivermen vice-president/ticketing) told me they weren’t able to get here. We started calling. We called everywhere, bus companies, limo services, anyone. My last resort was to call Green River, the company we use for our games. They agreed to work with us.”
Two charter coach buses could cost $3,000-$4,000.
Rankin School District 98 is a K-8 school with 207 students and a Pekin address. But they are isolated, not part of Pekin’s school system.
“Bart called me right away, told me he had buses for us,” Beard said. “But the cost was too much for us. We’re a small school. I went through and tried to find money, we came up with some, but only about a third of what we needed.
“I was just devastated. This game is an experience I want our kids to have. But in our situation, I had to ask one of our teachers to call the team and tell them we couldn’t come.”
The Rivermen made sure that didn’t happen. And Rankin School was there Thursday morning, in Section 119, the lower bowl spot right behind the net the Rivermen shoot at in the first and third periods.
They were among 96 schools and 9,000 students at the game. The bigger Pekin school district had 1,000 students on hand from four schools.
Some schools traveled hours just to get here. Cumberland Middle School brought kids to the game, traveling nearly two-and-a-half hours from Toledo to get to Carver Arena.
West Prairie Junior/Senior High School was on hand, traveling nearly two hours from Colchester.
“Whatever costs you can cover, do that,” Rogers said to Beard. “We will take care of the rest. Those kids earned that. We just couldn’t see them penalized and left out.
“Some of these kids might never be able to see a game otherwise. Or even ride a charter bus. We want these kids here, and we want them to fall in love with the game and the Rivermen.”
A War Room building love for the game
Rogers says putting together this Education Day Game job is a season-long, summer-long, immense effort.
Pogeman is the contact point for the schools, and one of the big steps in putting it all together is when the front office sits down to piece together where to put the schools in the arena.
“We set up a War Room,” Pogeman said. “We have to look at how many students each group has. It’s like a giant bunch of puzzle pieces. Andrew Cohen (longtime Rivermen exec) and Gavin Legett (a graduate student intern from Illinois State) are just great at that. We started first thing in the morning, sequestered ourselves, and figured it out through 6:30 p.m.”
The game has become a big deal in central Illinois.
It drew 8,846 last December, a record for the event. It surged well past that Thursday, breaking 9,000 for a record. The huge crowd went crazy when the Rivermen introduced a “6-7 Cam” on the video board during the second period.
Kids roared and sang a long to songs like “Let it Go” and the Bluey theme. And Beard and his Rankin group took it all in.
“My son and I went to the game last Friday,” said Beard, 39. “I saw Bart there and I told him I didn’t think we could come. Then he told me he got us buses, and said ‘You pay what you can afford. The Rivermen will pay the rest of it. We will get the kids there.’
“That was amazing. I can’t say enough about Bart Rogers and the Rivermen team. We are so grateful. The Rivermen made sure our kids got rewarded, and we can’t thank them enough.”
A defensive battle
For the second consecutive game the Rivermen played without any leadership letters on their jerseys.
It’s part of an ongoing push by head coach Jean-Guy Trudel to get a higher level of commitment from his team.
He saw them skate to a scoreless tie for nearly the first half of the game with veteran Nick Latinovich in the net for the Rivermen and Adam Manji making his pro debut in goal for Evansville.
Then Peoria earned a five-on-three power play for 44 seconds and took a 1-0 lead on a goal from Mike McChesney.
It’s all they needed, as Daniel Chartrand applied the dagger at 17:41 for 2-0 on a deflection from the doorstep.
Evansville pulled Manji for an extra attacker in the final two minutes, but Peoria and Latinovich kept them out of the net.
“The whole team was out there blocking shots, making plays, making my life easier,” Latinovich said. “I see this team starting to buy in.”
Latinovich posted his second consecutive shutout and closed the game on a scoreless shutout sequence of 125 minutes, 7 seconds over parts of three games.
“These (morning games) are a change in the routine, and the kids are in there screaming the whole time,” Latinovich said. “We try to match their energy.”
River Readings
Rivermen winger Tristan Trudel suffered an injury in the first period and did not return to the game. … The victory vaulted the Rivermen into a four-way tie for second place in the SPHL with Evansville, Roanoke and Huntsville. … The Rivermen now have three straight shutouts in the annual Education Day Game. In addition to Thursday’s 2-0 win over Evansville, Peoria shut out Evansville, 6-0, in 2024-25 and Quad City, 2-0, in 2023-24. Veteran goaltender Nick Latinovich had the shutout over Quad City as well. … The Rivermen are 5-0-1 all-time in Education Day games at Carver Arena, and have out-scored opponents 17-6. They’ve allowed more than one goal just once. … Defending champion Evansville has lost four of its last five games. … The Rivermen have a rematch at Evansville on Saturday, then head into Christmas break.
(This story was updated to add pictures, video and additional information)
Dave Eminian is the Journal Star sports columnist, and covers Bradley men’s basketball, the Rivermen and Chiefs. He writes the Cleve In The Eve sports column for pjstar.com. He can be reached at 686-3206 or deminian@pjstar.com. Follow him on X.com @icetimecleve.
PEORIA RIVERMEN
All-time largest crowds
(Regular-season and playoff games for franchise, including games while competing as Peoria Prancers and Peoria Rivermen in IHL, ECHL, AHL, SPHL. Carver Arena capacity 9,224 from 1982-84, then 8,600-8,900 from 1986-89, then 9,070 from 1990-91; 9,114 from 1992-95; 9,330 from 1996-2000, and 9,919 from 2001-2014; 9700 from 2014-present. X — indicates playoff game. Updated thru 2025-26.
Source: Peoria Journal Star archives, IHL, ECHL, AHL, SPHL, Howe Sportsdata, Dave Eminian archives.
SPHL
TOP SPHL REGULAR SEASON CROWDS
RIVERMEN EDUCATION DAY GAMES
This article originally appeared on Journal Star: Rivermen win before 9,211, step up to help tiny school see a special hockey game
Reporting by Dave Eminian, Peoria Journal Star / Journal Star
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