NEW YORK— When John Tonelli talked, Jeff Pozzuto listened.

The 2003 Butler graduate and former Golden Tornado hockey player recently signed a professional contract with the Hudson Valley Bears as a result.

The Bears play in the four-team Eastern Professional Hockey League, along with the Jersey Rockhoppers, Brooklyn Aces and Danbury Madhatters.

The league hopes to expand and become a feeder system for the East Coast Hockey League, which is affiliated with the NHL.

Pozzuto, 24, played for Butler his freshman and sophomore years before moving on to the Amateur Penguins. He was captain of an Amateur Penguins team that won a national tournament.

A defenseman in high school, he played forward for Niagara University's American College Hockey Associationteam for four years.

"I went to Niagara for their hospitality management program,"Pozzuto said. "They just happened to have a hockey team, so I played."

Niagara has an NCAADivision Ihockey team and an ACHA team. Pozzuto could have played for either, but opted for the ACHA.

"It was more relaxed, more laid-back,"he said. "I was there to go to school."

Upon graduation in December of 2007, Pozzuto moved to New York City and now serves as a hotel manager there. He hooked up with a hockey skating group, where he met Tonelli, a former four-time Stanley Cup champion with the New York Islanders.

"There are eight million people in New York, but not very many good skaters,"Pozzuto said. "The good skaters found each other. They skate around and play together and a few former NHLguys are in that group.

"There's former AHL, Division I players. ... Tonelli asked me where I played and when I told him, he couldn't believe I didn't play higher than club hockey.

"He told me, 'Man, you can play. You just have to get in better shape,'"Pozzuto added. "That kinda opened my eyes."

While Pozzuto took his college hockey seriously, scoring a number of goals his first two years at Niagara, "I didn't take it that seriously," he said.

That's all changed now.

The original Hudson Valley Bears started out 1-14 and folded. A former AHLplayer and a member of Pozzuto's skating group bought the franchise, restarted the team and asked Pozzuto to give it a try.

"What's nice about it is that most of our players have 9 to 5 jobs, so we practice and play at night,"Pozzuto said. "I can concentrate on my hotel career and play professional hockey at the same time.

"I plan on moving up. I'm taking (hockey) very seriously."