It is unusual to see so many clubs represented on a county minor hurling panel as there are this year.
Manager Jeffrey Lynskey and his management team obviously cast their net deep and wide in January when they went fishing for the best young hurlers in the county to represent Galway at minor level for 2018.
As a result of that trawl, there are more than 20 clubs represented on this year's minor squad who take on Kilkenny this Sunday in the All-Ireland final at 1pm in Croke Park.
Annaghdown's Diarmuid Kilcommins was one such player who was reeled in, and the Claregalway College student is delighted with his first the season so far.
"We have really been enjoying the year," he says. "The training sessions have gone really well over the past few weeks and hopefully we can bring our top game to Croke Park on Sunday.
"Kilkenny are a fine team. We know that from having played them earlier in the year, but that said, we believe if we can produce our best performance, then we won't be far away."
Diarmuid's parents Tadhg and Hilary have brought him and his siblings to Galway hurling and football games all their life, and they will be proud parents when he runs onto Croke Park around 12.30pm next Sunday.
"Yeah, Mum and Dad will be rooting for us. My dad and my uncle Tomás were good footballers with Ballygar when they played, but they loved hurling too, and that passion for both has been passed on to me and I really enjoy competing in both with Annaghdown."
Leaving Cert
Kilcommins is a going into Leaving Cert next month and it another challenge to relish.
"When the hurling is over after Sunday - a good few of the panel will be going into Leaving Cert so that will be another challenge we will have to focus on.
"Thankfully we have plenty of options in Claregalway for subject choice. There is lots of GAA and other sports there too and we have lots of former county and current players teaching us, such as Cyril Donnellan, Fiontán Ó Curraoin, Lorraine Finn and Maurice Sheridan. So there is plenty of people to ask for advice on sport or college if a player needed it. I think I might do engineering or may be secondary teaching. I don't really know yet for sure."
Kilcommins speaks highly of the minor backroom team and feels the skills set is a big factor in getting to this weekend's final.
"We are very lucky to have seriously good guys like Nigel Murray, Aiden Ryan, PJ Kelly, Kenneth Burke, Gordon Crowley, and a few others working with us alongside Jeffrey [Lynskey] and that has brought us on hugely from last January when we came in first.
"We are all looking forward to the game now and we have been driving it as hard as we can over the past few weeks in training.
"It is a really competitive environment and it is as hard to make the 24 as it is to make the starting 15 which is brilliant as it drives us all on individually and collectively which is what you want.
"Everyone knows that if they are not producing the goods at training or in the games, there is another seriously good hurler only waiting to get a chance. That keeps us all on our toes. No one is taking their place for granted and that can only be good for the entire group. We are optimistic that if we produce a good performance we can achieve our target."
