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Province sports writer Steve Ewen investigates what’s working and what’s not when it comes to player development among the ranks of minor hockey in B.C.
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Published Jun 21, 2024 • 9 minute read
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Ian Gallagher of the Delta Hockey Academy. Photo by NICK PROCAYLO /10105087A
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North Shore Winter Club alum Kyle Turris played 14 seasons in the NHL, but says he’s glad that he isn’t coming through the B.C. minor hockey ranks now.
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“I’m not sure I would have made it with how talented and skilled everybody is,” he said.
We’ll politely suggest Turris is being both overly modest and quotable at the same time. He is part of the youth player development game now, having recently signed on to be the director of hockey at the NSWC. And there is an argument to be made that B.C. is heading into its second-straight banner NHL Draft, coming next weekend in Las Vegas.
Boston University Terriers centre Macklin Celebrini, who played at NSWC until his family moved from North Vancouver to California when he was 12, looks like a lock to go first overall to the San Jose Sharks.
Macklin Celebrini, the expected No. 1 pick in the NHL draft to the San Jose Sharks, speaks with reporters prior to Game 2 of the Stanley Cup Final at Amerant Bank Arena in Sunrise, Florida, Monday, June 10, 2024. Photo by Stephen Whyno /AP
Fellow NSWC product and North Vancouver native Connor Bedard, who is also a centre, went No. 1 last year to the Chicago Blackhawks, becoming the first B.C. player to go in that spot since forward Ryan Nugent-Hopkins of Burnaby was the top pick by the Edmonton Oilers in 2011.
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Forward Tij Iginla of the WHL’s Kelowna Rockets is expected to be a top-10 selection next weekend. The son of Calgary Flames great Jarome Iginla, Tij was born in Kelowna and skated in multiple cities before playing his 15-year-old campaign with Rink Hockey Academy Kelowna, which is where his dad is coaching.
Centre Cayden Lindstrom, who is with the WHL’s Medicine Hat Tigers, is pegged to have his name called out in the top-10 as well. He’s from Chetwynd, and was with the Delta Hockey Academy before moving onto junior.
This year’s projected high-end picks follow the Bedard draft that also included Zach Benson (winger from Chilliwack, No. 13 overall selection to the Buffalo Sabres), Matthew Wood (winger from Nanaimo, No. 15 to the Nashville Predators), and Tanner Molendyk (defenceman from McBride, No. 24 to Nashville).
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Going into last year’s draft, B.C. had produced just two first rounders in the previous five drafts. The last B.C. draft of this kind was 2007, when New Westminster native Turris, a centre who was coming off starring that season with the BCHL’s Burnaby Express, went No. 3 overall to the Phoenix Coyotes and was joined by four more players from this province in the first round.
There is a variety of things at play here with this run of success. Maco Balkovec, who’s the executive-director of Rink Kelowna, says B.C has benefited from a “some incredible skill providers,” and mentions Jon Calvano specifically.
Hockey coach Jon Calvano with future Regina Pats star Connor Bedard. prv
Calvano heads up the Vancouver Vipers, a spring hockey program that at one point in their minor hockey days included Bedard, Benson, Wood and Molendyk, as well as Vancouver forward Andrew Cristall (who was a second-round pick of the Washington Capitals last summer) and Richmond defenceman Lukas Dragicevic (who was a second rounder of the Seattle Kraken).
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Calvano has long said that Bedard’s ferocious work ethic set a standard for that entire age group in the Lower Mainland.
Billy Coupland is a longtime NSWC coach. He has also been running skills camps for more than 20 years and has worked with both Bedard and Celebrini over the years.
Coupland’s son Ty, 17, who is coming off his rookie season with the WHL’s Swift Current Broncos, and Celebrini started together in hockey at the NSWC when they were four and five years old, respectively.
From left, NHL Top Prospects Zeev Buium, Mackiln Celebrini and Cayden Lindstrom arrive for the game between the Florida Panthers and the Edmonton Oilers in Game Two of the 2024 Stanley Cup Final at Amerant Bank Arena on June 10, 2024 in Sunrise, Florida. Photo by Bruce Bennett /Getty Images
Billy Coupland talks about Celebrini’s “hunger for the game, his love of the game,” and how he was “always evolving, always adding layers to his game.”
“I think this is a timing and mix of great players and families and coaches,” Balkovec added.
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This stint could be cyclical. It could merely be the province’s turn for a run of top talent. At the same time, it’s also impossible to ignore that there have never have been so many options in minor hockey here and opportunities are seemingly only going to continue grow.
For decades, things centred around traditional community associations like a Burnaby Minor or a Richmond Minor, along with private clubs like NSWC and Burnaby Winter Club.
In 2009, the academies, which combine school and hockey under one roof, began to take hold. There were five in the original Canadian Sport School Hockey League — including the Okanagan Hockey Academy and the Pursuit of Excellence Hockey Academy (now RINK) from B.C. — and they had eight teams over two divisions.
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The CSSHL has grown to where the 2024-25 CSSHL season will include 37 accredited academies — with nine from B.C. — and they will combine to ice 125 teams spread over eight boys and girls divisions.
The traditional community associations, private clubs and academies have since been joined by programs that have bucked national governing body Hockey Canada, like a High Performance Level (HPL) Hockey, and opted to go it alone. They have their own rules and regulations, they have to do things like purchase their own insurance since they aren’t Hockey Canada sanctioned.
Hockey Canada, in turn, has stringent rules against unsanctioned hockey. Any player, coach or official taking part in such a league after September is banned from any Hockey Canada activity for the remainder of the season. It’s been a talking point in this province since the BCHL left Hockey Canada last summer.
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HPL plays at private facilities like Planet Ice Delta and Planet Ice Coquitlam as their base rinks and according to their web site had 700 players registered this past season after starting out with 74 in their inaugural 2017-18 campaign.
Kids’ hockey has become big business. All of minor sports has. What it’s done is force everyone in the space to try to do more and offer a better product. You can look at a NSWC adding a Turris. You can look at Rink bringing on an Iginla, a Hockey Hall of Famer.
Iginla grew up in St. Albert, Alta., and praised his minor hockey coaches and his experience, but admits that things are “definitely different,” now.
RHA Kelowna Joe Iginla and dad, head coach Jerome Iginla during there game against the Burlington Eagles at the Seven Chiefs Sportsplex on Day 2 of the Circle K Classic in Calgary on Thursday, December 28, 2023. Photo by Darren Makowichuk /DARREN MAKOWICHUK/Postmedia
“In these programs, you learn a lot more about being an athlete,” continued Iginla, 47, who coaches Rink’s Under-15 Prep boys team. “When I was younger, you used to order VHS tapes to watch your favourite people. You used to watch highlights. You didn’t get a chance to learn about nutrition and sports psychology and training. It’s come a long way.”
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Turris added: “I see kids on the ice five or six days a week almost year round. There’s dedication, commitment and work ethic from these kids from such a young age. It amazes me that they don’t burn out. At the same time, it’s why they are more talented and more skilled than I was when I was growing up.”
The introduction of the academies and unsanctioned leagues has led to traditional minor hockey associations trying to do more to keep up. White Rock’s Semiahmoo Minor, for instance, has Shane Kuss and Matt Erhart heading as their hockey development leads. They’re both former head coaches of the BCHL’s Surrey Eagles.
Other minor associations are doing similar things.
“They’ve meant so much to our association in terms of creating a program,” Semiahmoo Minor president Jared Harman explained of Kuss and Erhart. “One of the things they said when they first came on is that they wanted Semiahmoo to be known for a certain style of play. Whether it’s at the house level or the rep level, they’re communicating with coaches and the players to make sure they have the skills and the tools they need.”
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Delta Hockey Academy president Ian Gallagher maintains that “competition in the marketplace is good,” and it’s “never going to go away.” He also says that traditional minor hockey associations are vital, adding “that the communities, with great volunteers, do a great job.”
Delta Hockey Academy president Ian Gallagher Photo by NICK PROCAYLO /10105087A
“We need to help them,” he continued. “We have to be cognizant that the volunteer group associations are very important. We need to protect them.
“In the same respect, with associations that aren’t meeting a customer’s needs, there needs to be a question about mobility. Just because I live in a certain area, do I have to play for that association? Hockey is one of the last sports to be territorial in this way. Open boundaries needs to be something that’s explored. There will be winners and losers in this regard. We need to find a way to make as many winners as possible, through the sharing of information and coaching clinics and anything else it takes to keep growing the game. That’s inherit on the people.”
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Larry Hayes has similar thoughts on the stakeholders connecting and find cohesion. He is the executive administrator of Burnaby Minor and has been with the association for decades; he was manager of bantam and midget teams in the 1980s that featured Hockey Hall of Famer Joe Sakic.
“There needs to be dialogue and agreement about how all of the various hockey programs, both sanctioned and non-sanctioned, can work together,” Hayes said. “There is a lot of work to do. Many established minor hockey programs are feeling threatened. It would be much better for athletes and families if everyone works together and concentrates on the things that they can do best, whether that be elite programming, recreational, etc.”
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All this striving to offer more and the competition to land players has increased cost across the board. It’s hard to see hockey getting cheaper anytime soon.
A season at an academy can easily run $25,000. Throw in sessions with a skills coach or trainer, which has started to become the norm, too, and there’s another $15,000 in a year, and that’s easily a conservative estimate of a year’s hockey expenses.
“It’s ironic that I’m saying this but all this kind of stuff has led to the sport being so expensive,” Coupland said.
Harman added: “Anybody who tells you that hockey isn’t expensive isn’t being honest with you.”
Harman also wonders about the stressors that the financial and family time commitments are putting on players.
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“It’s not just hockey. I think all sports have turned into full-year events,” he said. “I think it creates pressure on these kids to accomplish things that, no matter how hard they are work or how good they are, have the odds still stacked against them. I hate to sound like the old guy, but when we were young you played hockey four or five months a year and you played baseball two months and it wasn’t the only thing that defined you. I worry that the pressure that’s put on these kids can define them too much.”
NSWC COO and general manager TC Carling has a take on this. He’s a former Vancouver Canucks executive, and he was with the club when they brought on Rick Celebrini to be their director for rehabilitation. He’s the dad of Macklin, 18, and Aiden Celebrini, 19, a defenceman the Canucks picked in the sixth round of last year’s NHL Draft.
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Handout photo of the sports-crazy Celebrini family of Vancouver (now in California). Macklin (left, age four) and Aiden (six) were best friends from the get-go as North Shore Winter Club members. Macklin Celebrini, 18, will be the fist overall NHL pick on June 28 in Vegas and Aiden Celebrini, 19, was drafted by the Canucks last year. prv
Macklin and Aiden were eight and nine at the time, and Carling says how Rick dealt with the boys and their sports was a good guide for him. His daughter Elsa, 12, is a soccer player.
“I was the watching the progression of these boys through Rick and It was so clear it that this is what they wanted,” Carling said. “The work ethic and the desire to do this was coming from the boys. When I see this as a father, I realize that my job in this is to just keep giving my daughter opportunities.
“It has to come from the child. They have to want to do it.”
sewen@postmedia.com
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