Heading into the 2023-24 season, the Adirondack Thunder will have a few new faces on their team, and one of them is 25-year-old forward Andy Willis who started playing hockey at the age of three. The Missouri native had success right off the bat as he won three State Championships in High School and Willis talked about he was a rare case, “Ya, it was great. St. Louis High School hockey isn’t necessarily the biggest hockey market, but we still have some good teams here, and I was a rare case where I stayed all four years and played high school hockey, a lot of guys leave early to go play junior hockey early, and I wanted to stay and graduate from the high school I was going to, and we had really good teams and were able to win three state championships while I was there”.
Once he graduated high school, Willis would go to the University of St.Thomas but would transfer to Lindenwood University half way through his freshman year. During his two and a half years at Lindenwood they would go from ACHA team to a Divison I team, and in their first season Willis served as the team captain, “Ya, it was good, obviously we were playing ACHA the first two years I was there, it was a pretty big jump, but the last year we were a club team we started bringing in some Divi,son I games, and obviously we made the transition and brought in a lot of new guys, and we made the jump, and I think we did a really good job to get our foot in the door and compete at the highest level and being able to stick around for th.e ; obviouslys amazing” Willis said
The six-foot winger would make the jump to the ECHL after he senior year at Lindenwood as he would join the Fort Wayne Komets for 10 games at the end of the season where he put up a goal and five assists for six points, and Willis talked about how the experience will help him heading into next season, “Ya, I think it was important obviously I got to get a little taste of what pro hockey is like and the style of play in the East Coast legoing to and I think that’s gonna benefit me a lot going into this year, to be able to get a full year under my belt, the experiegoing to had last year is gonna help me out a lot and it was just super important to see what that jump was like going from college to the pro level.
When asked about what he’s most excited for about next season and joining the Thunder, the answer seems to be in line with what I hear from everyone else when asked that question, “I’ve heard nothing but great things about the atmosphere, and apparently, playing up there is really cool; I’ve heard nothing but great things about the guys and coach Mac, and I’m excited to get up there.” said Willis.
