BOWLING GREEN — When Alex Barber returns to Columbus, there is a telltale sign times have changed in his hometown.
Barber, a junior forward on Bowling Green's hockey team, was born a year before the Columbus Blue Jackets played their first season, but he was still a rarity as a youth hockey player. Though he came from a hockey family and was on skates well before his second birthday, Barber said he didn't realize until his school years how few of his classmates played hockey.
But now, as the Jackets ready for the start of their 21st season, Barber said he can't help but notice the classic sign someone is likely headed to or from a rink: the travel hockey sticker on the back windshield.