Meet The Duffers: An intergenerational hockey team with a standing reservation in Downers Grove

It’s Wednesday, it’s noon, it’s Grand Dukes, an Eastern European restaurant in Downers Grove. Which can only mean one thing. The Duffers are assembling.

“Hey, Bob!” says Jim Glynn, the “Young Guy” at 61, sitting at the bar. Bob Granato is hockey royalty, the uncle of Tony and Don Granato Jr., NHL former players and current coaches, and Cammi Granato, the first woman inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame.

Everyone has a nickname. Greg Lopatka is “the Beak” for obvious reasons if you see him in profile. Arvetis M. Dikinis is “Harvey” — you can’t expect the guys to handle “Arvetis” — and wears a Duffers jersey, which expropriates the Hamm’s Beer bear (artfully if not legally) as their mascot.

And what are the Duffers? Well, that is a long story, starting in 1970, at the new ice-skating rink opened in Downers Grove. Shortly thereafter, the future Duffers found themselves in the stands, watching their sons play hockey.

“Most of us had kids playing at the rink,” says Lopatka, 84. “The original guy, Jim Miceli — we call him ‘The King’ — he said, ‘This looks like fun. We should do this.’”

So they started playing Sundays at the rink.

They never stopped. For the next 53 years. They hang out, they play. They even take the team on the road, traveling to distant cities — they’ve taken 42 road trips over the last half-century — to play at actual NHL arenas after the pros have vacated the ice.

“We’ve had a lot of fun, thanks to the Granatos,” says Greg Zerkis. Tony Granato’s brother, Don Sr., is also a member.