Despite roots in a basketball-crazy region, this Amerk stars on the ice

Mason Jobst, who is enjoying the best season of his star-crossed professional hockey career for the Rochester Amerks, grew up in the heart of Indiana, one of the hotbeds for basketball in the United States.

The statewide love for the game is unparalleled, and rarely can you drive around any block in the town of Speedway, where Jobst was raised just outside Indianapolis, and not see kids playing hoops on their driveways or on the playground.

You just wouldn’t have seen Jobst out there hooping because while he admits that he grew up a fan of Bobby Knight’s Indiana Hoosiers, basketball was never his game, not after his aunt bought him a plastic hockey stick and ball before he had even turned two years old.

“There’s only one or two kids in my entire town who played hockey growing up,” said Jobst before the Amerks start another critical three-games-in-three-nights weekend Friday by hosting Hershey at Blue Cross Arena. “It was definitely a unique route that I took.”

From Indianapolis to Rochester, Jobst has had to overcome several obstacles, the very least of which was becoming a hockey player in a basketball-crazy region.

As an undersized player, the 5-foot-8 Jobst spent four years with Muskegon in the U.S. Hockey League, much of that time interrupted by three shoulder surgeries. “It was a pretty dark time in my life,” he said. “Hockey had been taken away from me for so long. It really sucked.”

When it came time to play college hockey, having grown up in Big Ten country, that’s where Jobst pursued opportunity, but his injuries had seriously decreased his exposure for college hockey recruiters. Penn State told him he could walk on, but he stayed patient and was able to grab some scholarship money from Ohio State.

“I always loved Big Ten sports just because growing up in Indiana you’re surrounded by it,” he said. “And then once they created (the Big Ten hockey conference in 2013) I knew that that was where I wanted to play and Ohio State was the first school that really gave me the opportunity.”

Like basketball in Indiana, football at Ohio State cast a long shadow over hockey, but Jobst didn’t care. “Obviously, hockey is not a top program there but there’s so many unique opportunities and the resources and everything are incredible,” he said.

As a Buckeye, Jobst became a two-time All-American, a Hobey Baker finalist, and he helped rejuvenate a flagging program that had been mired in mediocrity with just one NCAA tournament berth since 2006. He led Ohio State to the Frozen Four in 2018, and in 2019 it was Jobst’s double overtime goal that defeated arch-rival Michigan for the Big Ten regular-season championship.

“That was a pretty cool experience,” Jobst said. “The rivalry is super intense, even in hockey; it’s not just football. For it to go to overtime and me win it, that’s a goal that was one of my favorites I have in my career for sure.”

Jobst began his pro career in the New York Islanders system and played parts of two seasons in the AHL for Bridgeport, and after a trade to the New Jersey Devils he played briefly for Binghamton before coming to Rochester as a free agent last year.

“I had some history with him,” Amerks coach Seth Appert said. “I tried to recruit him when I was (head coach at RPI). I’ve seen him play since he’s been 16, 17 years old. He became a Hobey Baker finalist caliber player at Ohio State, really drove their program to new heights of success that that program hadn’t seen.”

However, Jobst struggled to get ice time with the Amerks either because of injury or being a scratch and he played in only 26 games, scoring four goals and 13 points. Needing depth on defense, the Amerks dealt Jobst to the San Jose Barracuda at the 2022 trade deadline in exchange for Mark Alt.

“It was really hard,” Jobst recalled. “I loved the guys here last year so much, we were a really close group and that was the most exciting time of year. It’s kind of like this year where every point mattered, every game mattered. The first three years of my pro career had all been COVID related - no playoffs or kind of like fake playoffs - so it was the first time where it was real meaningful hockey again and I was really excited to compete and try to win the championship.”

Instead, he finished the year with the last-place Barracuda and missed out on the Amerks exciting run to the AHL Eastern Conference semifinals.

“I got traded to San Jose which was at the time in last place so that was one of the hardest parts,” the 29-year-old said. “The ramp up and everything here, you could feel the energy in the town, the city was buzzing and the games were starting to get packed and then it got flipped upside down so that was hard.”

Still, there were no hard feelings and when it came time to sign with a club as a free agent, Jobst did so with Rochester.

“I just think it speaks to his character that he wanted to come back here,” Appert said. “He felt that this was a place that he enjoyed being, where he felt that we believed in him as a person and a hockey player.”

This year started slowly, but in the last few weeks Jobst has taken full advantage of his opportunities and he has 13 goals and 30 points in 49 games. Tuesday, he scored a shootout goal but it wasn’t enough as the Amerks lost 3-2 to Syracuse.

“He’s playing excellent right now,” Appert said. “He’s getting an opportunity to play first line, second line center and he’s showing what we believe existed in him. This is probably his first real runway of 20, 30, 40 games that he’s had the opportunity to be a go-to guy in the AHL. He’s showing that he is climbing up the ladder to be a high end American League player.”

This year, Jobst stayed put as the NHL trade deadline came and went, and now the focus is on securing a playoff berth in the way too close for comfort North Division.

“I’ve always believed that I can have success at this level,” Jobst said. “It’s just been with the injuries and being in and out of the lineup and not being able to play my position and get settled, it just wasn’t really clicking. Once I knew that I could get settled in one spot, learn the systems, play my position, that I would start having success and I think that’s what you’re starting to see this year.”

Sal Maiorana can be reached at maiorana@gannett.com. Follow him on Twitter @salmaiorana.To subscribe to Sal's newsletter, Bills Blast, which will come out every Friday during the offseason, please follow this link: https://profile.democratandchronicle.com/newsletters/bills-blast

This article originally appeared on Rochester Democrat and Chronicle: Mason Jobst stands out as an Amerk hockey player, despite Indiana roots