Adam Papin/MDN Declan Farmer, of the U.S. National Sled Hockey Team, wears a jersey designed by Ken Oda, of Minot, during the team’s 4-1 victory over Team Canada on Friday, March 15, 2024.

Ken Oda brought hockey cards to school at Our Lady of the Wayside, in suburban Chicago. The second grader would slide the cards under a sheet of paper and carefully trace the outline of the hockey player.

Then, the youngster dreamed up uniforms for all his favorite hockey teams. The Chicago Blackhawks got new uniforms. So did the San Jose Sharks, who were just entering the league as an expansion team.

Just before Christmas, his teacher finally had enough of him not paying attention and sent him to the principal’s office. Soon, he found himself in after school detention for doodling in class when he should have been paying attention to his studies.

Little did a young Oda know that when he grew up he would get to design hockey jerseys for the U.S. National Sled Hockey Team, and the team would wear them while playing its rivals from Canada.

That’s exactly what happened on Friday night, when the men’s team wore his design when they defeated Team Canada 4-1 at the Maysa Arena.

Oda serves as the general manager for the Minot Minotauros, a North American Hockey League (NAHL) team in town. In the role, Oda has designed nearly every jersey the team has worn over the last decade.

“I started working for a hockey team and got to start actually designing jerseys,” said Oda. “Pretty much anything that the ‘Tauros have worn since 2012, I’ve designed.”

That includes all the regular season jerseys, specialty and cause jerseys that the team wears to raise money for local non-profits through game-worn jersey auctions.

“To go from second grade, getting in trouble for it, to now, when it’s one of the ways I make my living is pretty cool.”

One of the organizations that Oda has designed specialty Minotauros jerseys for in the past is Prairie Grit, and when it was looking for ways to make the inaugural Border Battle more profitable, it looked at doing a jersey auction following the games.

Oda designed jerseys for both the U.S. national team and for Team Canada, but ultimately just the Americans chose to wear them. Oda dug into the history of USA Hockey and the uniforms and logos different teams have used over the years.

“I came across a blue eagle logo which was used in the 1940s,” said Oda. ” I really liked that logo, but they used it on a white jersey back then.”

That’s where Oda broke with tradition, choosing red for the jerseys. He knew that the blue logo wouldn’t work on a blue jersey because of how blue it would be.

“As I was digging into the history of USA Hockey, I couldn’t find any red jerseys dating back to the first teams in the early 1900s,” said Oda. “I couldn’t find any history of the United States wearing red, so I decided to have some fun with it that way.”

According to Oda, the use of red by rivals from the Soviet Union and Canada may have played a part in the color not being used by USA Hockey. Whatever the reason, Oda felt that for a one off event, it would be a cool thing to do.

Once the jerseys were designed, Thor Nelson, who spearheaded the efforts to bring the national teams to Minot, presented the jerseys to the U.S. National Team, who jumped at the opportunity to wear them.

“He asked them and they said, ‘Yeah, we’ll do whatever we can to support the cause [Prairie Grit],’ So it wasn’t really a hard negotiation. They were all for it.”

Following Friday’s game, the jerseys were auctioned off, with proceeds going to support Prairie Grit. While a final amount hasn’t been determined yet, Oda estimates the auction raised between $5-$6,000 for the organization.

“To see the U.S. National Team wearing the jerseys I designed, it definitely was a full circle moment for me this weekend,” said Oda. “It just shows how far you can go if you chase something you’re passionate about.”