Sweet Home Alabama: How Nic Dowd's Huntsville Roots Helped Him Thrive As A Hockey Player & Human Being

Sammi SilberOct 29, 2025

ARLINGTON, V.A. — For Nic Dowd, Alabama has come to mean everything.

It's not just where he grew up, but where his career began to take shape. Though his dad was a doctor and his mom was a nurse, Dowd was always meant to play sports.

And what better place to grow up than Huntsville, the "Hockey Capital of the South?"

"We had a really great community... my whole childhood was really centered around sports," Dowd said.

Dowd was also the kind of kid who would try anything. He loved soccer and baseball, but hated swimming, to the point where he faked an injury so that he'd never have to get back in the pool.

Ultimately, though, his older brothers played hockey, and as the story usually goes, he followed suit, wanting to go wherever his role models did.

"Those are probably some of my best memories," Dowd smiled, reflecting on mini sticks and backyard hockey with his family.

It doesn't snow a lot in Alabama, so instead of an outdoor rink, Dowd's dad laid down a 10x15 foot concrete slab in the backyard for his kids to play the sport when they weren't at travel hockey. The three boys all skated out, so more often than not, it was Dowd's dad in the net.

Looking at the state of Alabama, it's not necessarily the first place that comes to mind when one thinks of hockey. However, Dowd stands by the fact that Huntsville's hockey scene is by no means under the radar, and is perhaps one of the best places to develop down south.

"I'm not quite sure how it'd match up against the Midwest and Northeast places like that, but saying there's a lot of people down there that care highly about the game of hockey, and they're happy to teach what they know," Dowd said, adding, "Hockey's on people's radars down there, and they enjoy watching it."

Dowd grew up playing travel hockey through the Huntsville Hockey Association and watching the University of Alabama — Huntsville Chargers, and when he was 14, Huntsville built its first AAA program, Total Package Hockey, where Dowd was on the program's first-ever team.

After that, he moved to Indiana to play for Culver Military Academy Prep, and then St. Louis and Indiana to play in the NAHL and USHL before committing to St. Cloud State University, where he'd cross paths with Charlie Lindgren and former teammate Nick Jensen.

Not only did Huntsville teach Dowd how to play hockey, but how to be a better person, values he still carries to this day that rub off on his teammates.

"He's a phenomenal human being. As they saying goes... if I had to pick one guy in the room to look after my daughter, it'd be him. Just a really good person, great teammates, works extremely hard every day. Such a good dad, such a good friend," Tom Wilson said, adding, "I think there's hockey players and there's human beings, and I think for him, it's kind of the same guy. He is who he is."

Looking back, Dowd cherishes his Huntsville roots, and has also enjoyed seeing the scene grow over time, with the Huntsville Havoc establishing in 2004 and more resources being available to youth players in the area.

"It was always good when I grew up," Dowd said, adding, "We have a lot of transplants from Canada that come down and play at Alabama-Huntsville, and a lot of them stick around and are part of the coaching staff and stuff. We have nice facilities down there, they're building them out now, actually making them bigger. It was a really, really good community growing up."

At the end of the day, it was always hockey for Dowd, one of three players all-time to hail from Alabama. And while he has Huntsville to thank, he also stressed just how important the role his parents played for him.

"I was fortunate that my mom and dad took me around everywhere being a parent. Now I understand how difficult that is," Dowd said. "Especially mom and dad, both working jobs, careers that were challenging jobs and required a lot of effort and raise kids, and they made a lot of time to get us to practice, get us the games on the weekends, spent a lot of money for us to travel, stay in hotels, fly. I was really fortunate I even got that opportunity."