A homemade ice machine re-surfaces a rink at the New England Pond Hockey Festival on Saturday, Feb 4, 2017, in Rangeley. Tim McGuiness, a truck driver from Auburn, welded together a water tank and ice scraper to make the ice machine. 

Several games take place during the New England Pond Hockey Festival on Saturday, Feb 4, 2017, in Rangeley. Twenty teams with players from as far away as the Netherlands and Florida are competed.A player digs in a snowbank for a lost puck at the New England Pond Hockey Festival on Saturday, Feb 4, 2017, in Rangeley.Bill Walsh, of Franklin, Mass., and Rick Bohan, of Brunswick, Maine, go after a bouncing puck in a pond hockey game Saturday, Feb 4, 2017, in Rangeley.In keeping with one of hockey’s proudest traditions, opposing players shake hands at the end of a game at the New England Pond Hockey Festival on Saturday, Feb 4, 2017, in Rangeley.

RANGELEY (AP) — It’s clear this is not the National Hockey League when the time comes to smooth over the scratched-up ice.

The Zamboni machine is a homemade contraption featuring a water tank and welded metal that’s pulled behind a tractor. Then again, it wouldn’t be safe to bring a heavy Zamboni onto the frozen Hayley Pond in Rangeley, Maine.

All told, there were 21 teams with a half-dozen matches being played simultaneously at any given time Saturday at the Pond Hockey Festival.

Linda Sikes, event organizer, said skaters came from as far away as Georgia and California to enjoy a Norman Rockwell scene.

She said pond hockey brings skaters back to the days before hockey rinks when they first learned to glide on frozen ponds.

Members of the Gavin family sing the national anthem during the opening ceremony of the New England Pond Hockey Festival on Saturday, Feb 4, 2017, in Rangeley.