Tag: hockey

Coquitlam hockey star defies the odds with his NHL debut

Coquitlam’s Ben Kindel has always defied the odds, according to his mom, former soccer star Sara Maglio.

Tonight, Oct. 9, the first-round pick of the Pittsburgh Penguins in June’s NHL entry draft will make his home ice debut against the New York Islanders.

Tuesday, Kindel became the fifth-youngest player in Penguins history to make his NHL debut. The 18-year-old — who’s still more than half a year away from his 19th birthday — skated on a line with veteran superstars Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin in a 3-0 win over the New York Rangers at Madison Square Gardens.

Kindel’s 15:11 of playing time was fifth-highest of all Penguins’ players in the game, he won four of his five faceoffs, recorded one shot on net and blocked another.

Maglio, who was at the game in New York with Kindel’s dad, told Penguins’ team reporter Michelle Grechiolo her son always believed he was going to someday play in the NHL.

“Me knowing the statistics and the percentage, I never really let myself believe it,” Maglio said. “Not that I didn’t believe in him, but we’re realistic.”

Unlikely accomplishment

Making the Penguins roster right out of the Western Hockey League, where he played two seasons with the Calgary Hitmen, is an especially unlikely accomplishment for a kid who grew up in a soccer household.

Kindel’s dad, Steve, played for the Vancouver Whitecaps and the old Vancouver 86ers, as well as Canada’s national team. And his younger sister, Lacey, will play for the U-17 women’s national team that will play at the FIFA U-17 Women’s World Cup in Rabat, Morocco, from Oct. 17 to Nov. 8.

Steve Kindel told Grechiolo his son’s love for hockey was forged watching Montreal Canadiens games on TV together, as the Habs were his favourite team.

“It seems like when he was that little kid up until now, it went by in a flash,” he said.

Not his first rodeo at MSG

Tuesday’s game in New York wasn’t Ben Kindel’s first time in Madison Square Garden. He and his family toured the famous facility in 2022 during a side trip following a spring hockey tournament in Philadelphia.

“I feel like that wasn’t very long ago,” Kindel told reporters after his debut game. “I think it’s one of the best buildings in the league. The energy in there was just unbelievable, so it was just a great experience.”

Penguins coach Dan Muse was full of praise for Kindel and fellow WHL graduate, defenseman Harrison Brunicke.

“They were poised out there,” he said of the rookies. “They were in good spots. I didn’t think that there was anything too loud the wrong way. It’s a good start.”

Kindel signed a three-year entry-level contract with Pittsburgh on July 8. In his two seasons with the Hitmen, he scored 159 points in 133 games, including a franchise-record point steak that lasted 23 games. He also played five games for Canada’s gold medal-winning team at the 2025 IIHF U-18 World Championship in Texas, where he scored a goal and added six assists.

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New faces fuel optimism for Coquitlam Express anniversary season

A few more fans might have been inclined to pick up lineup sheets for the Coquitlam Express prior to the team’s BC Hockey League home opener on Saturday, Sept. 20.

Only a handful of players from the squad that finished fifth in the Coastal West division last season and then lost its first round playoff series in six games to the fourth-place Victoria Grizzlies remain.

But Express head coach Jeff Wagner said the addition of several veterans who feel they still have something to prove makes for an enthusiastic, motivated group.

“The guys that we’ve added, they kind of have a fire in their belly,” said Wagner, who’s entering his second full season as bench boss of the Express. “There’s a lot of guys in that room that really want to win.”

The lineup revamp also meant a busy training camp for captain Cooper Wilson, who’s been charged with integrating the newcomers into the Express’ systems on the ice and culture off it.

“We play a style that some of these guys have never played before,” Wagner said. “So we just talk about the details and habits they need to do in order to be successful.”

The results through the preseason were encouraging, as Coquitlam won three of its four games.

Wagner said second-year defenseman Liam Loughery appears ready to elevate his game after his promising rookie season with the Express was cut short by an injury.

“He’s mature beyond his years,” Wagner said of Loughery, who’s from Pitt Meadows. “He’ll be a guy that we’re leaning on heavily.”

Newcomers bolster defense

Bolstering the blue line corps will be BCHL newcomers Tyler Russell, who played 27 games with the Wenatchee Wild in the Western Hockey League last season, and 18-year-old James Odyniec, the younger brother of former Express forward Joseph Odyniec.

As well, Wagner said he expects Will Distad, who scored 23 points in 27 games in his final season at White Bear Lake High School in Minnesota, to have an immediate impact in his first season of junior hockey.

“Despite our veteran presence, we really like our young guys as well,” Wagner said. “It’s a really nice blend.”

Veterans lead offense

Up front, familiar names include Nate Crema, who’s back for his third season with the Express after scoring 28 points in 45 games last year, and Carson McGinley, who contributed 17 points in 25 games after starting the season with the Vernon Vipers and then the Sherwood Park Crusaders.

They’ll be supported by veteran acquisitions like Cole Bishop, who joins the Express after two seasons with the Alberni Valley Bulldogs, and Port Moody’s Luke Pfoh, who’s played for the Langley Rivermen, Cranbrook Buck and Merritt Centennials.

Christian Maro spent the previous two season with the Powell River Kings, where he scored 54 points in 80 games, while Justin Ivanusic spent time with the WHL’s Vancouver Giants and Calgary Hitmen before playing last season with Camrose and Drayton Valley in the Alberta Junior Hockey League.

One rookie forward who’s likely to attract a lot of attention is Cole Bieksa.

The 18-year-old son of beloved Vancouver Canucks’ defenseman and current Hockey Night in Canada broadcaster, Kevin Bieksa, signed with the Express last February but spent much of training camp with the WHL’s Giants. He helped lead his Fairmont Prep program in Southern California to the national final last season, scoring 73 points in 55 games.

Goalie position wide open

The departure of starting goaltender Andrew Ness for Wilfred Laurier University has left that position wide open.

Ness blossomed in the Express net after he was acquired last November from the Penticton Vees, where he’d been playing a secondary role.

Wagner said he’s hoping former Trail Smoke Eaters’ backup Ryan Parker will follow a similar developmental trajectory.

Parker won 12 of the 20 games he played last season, including one shutout, and posted a .910 save percentage.

“He was part of probably one of the best goalie tandems in the league,” said Wagner of Parker. “He’s calm and he plays the puck really well so that helps our transition game.”

Also seeking time in the crease are returnees Logan Kennedy and Mitch Pearce.

Kennedy played in three games for Coquitlam last season, losing twice and allowing 11 goals, while Pearce allowed seven goals in his two appearances.

Wagner said he’s confident both will continue to progress under Parker’s mentorship.

Wagner said despite the high turnover of players, he’s setting high expectations for this milestone season.

“We’ve created a non-negotiable standard for our players to abide by,” he said. “The guys who are willing to compete and do what it takes to win are the guys you’ll see here at the end of the year.”

Express tame Grizzlies

Three goals in the third period powered the Express past the Victoria Grizzlies, 4-3, in Saturday’s season opener for both teams.

Trailing 3-1 midway through the final frame, a power play goal by Christian Maro at 12:42 sparked the late comeback.

Nolan Dupont tied it 3:09 later, then Nolan Flynn scored the game-winner with 2:45 remaining in regulation time.

Maro added an assist to lead all Coquitlam scorers.

Justin Ivanusec scored the other goal for the Express, 4:21 into the first period.

Ryan Parker stopped 27 of the 30 shots he faced in the Express net, one of them a penalty shot by Victoria’s Max Silver.

Coquitlam fired 42 shots at Grizzlies’ goalie Carter Capton.

The Express host the Chilliwack Chiefs on Friday, Sept. 26. Game time is 7 p.m. at the Poirier Sport and Leisure Complex.

Express honours quarter-century team

As part of Coquitlam’s 25th anniversary season, the team unveiled its Quarter Century Team of distinguished alumni as voted by fans.

Forward:

  • Kyle Turris
  • Mark Soares
  • Tyler McNeely
  • Alex Kerfoot
  • Corey Mackin
  • David Jones
  • Tyler Kopf
  • Brett Hemingway
  • Massimo Rizzo
  • Brandon Yip
  • Andrew Ladd
  • Ryan Tattle

Defense:

  • Brad Hunt
  • Keith Seabrook
  • Matthew Campbell
  • Marc Biega
  • Noah De la Durantaye
  • Alan Mazur

Goal:

  • Clay Stevenson
  • Mark Dekanich
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‘He was our warrior’: Port Moody hockey player loses cancer battle

A Port Moody hockey player has lost his battle with brain cancer.

Wade MacLeod died Sunday, Sept. 13. He was 38 years old.

In a post on social media, Karly MacLeod said her husband died “in a room filled with love, surrounded by family.”

Wade MacLeod first fell ill in 2013 after collapsing while playing his second pro season for the Springfield Falcons in the American Hockey League.

Golf ball sized tumour

Doctors subsequently removed a non-cancerous tumour the size of a golf ball from the left side of his brain.

After months of extensive physical and speech therapy, MacLeod was able to resume his playing career with the AHL’s Toronto Marlies and several ECHL teams.

MacLeod, who played his minor hockey in Port Moody as well as the Coquitlam U18 Chiefs and Port Coquitlam Buckaroos before scoring 146 points in 101 games for the Merritt Centennials in the BC Hockey League, then headed to Germany.

Coming off a 61-point season for the second division Rosenheim Star Bulls, MacLeod collapsed again while preparing to return for another season in Germany.

This time doctors diagnosed a cancerous glioblastoma.

MacLeod worked to get back on the ice. In the spring of 2016 he signed with the Allen Americans. He scored 13 points in 13 games, good enough to secure a contract for the following season with Lowen Frankfurt.

MacLeod played 49 games plus another seven in the playoffs for the Lions. He scored 49 points.

Another setback

But in September, 2018, MacLeod was felled again.

Doctors removed a Grade 3 glioblastoma tumour and prescribed several rounds of chemotherapy.

The setback cost MacLeod three seasons of hockey. But it didn’t diminish his desire to play again.

“I said from the very beginning that cancer wasn’t going to be the reason I retire from professional hockey,” MacLeod said.

Working out with trainer Kai Heinonen and skating at Coquitlam’s Planet Ice with veteran NHLer Brad Hunt helped MacLeod get back into what he called the best shape of his life. In September, 2021, he and his family — that now included two young daughters — packed up for Manchester, England to play for the Storm of Great Britain’s Elite Ice Hockey League.

MARIO BARTEL PHOTO
Port Moody’s Wade MacLeod worked his way back into shape after a third setback from brain cancer.

‘Never give up on your dreams’

“The biggest thing is never give up on your dreams and always stay positive,” MacLeod said.

But after scoring just one point in seven games in Manchester, MacLeod signed with Narvik Eagles in Norway.

In June, 2023, MacLeod announced his hockey career had come to an end.

“I gave all my life to hockey and now it is time to turn the page,” he wrote on Facebook.

Months later, MacLeod underwent a fifth brain surgery. Doctors upgraded his glioblastoma to Grade 4 — the most serious and aggressive form of the disease.

Working with a medical team at Port Moody Integrated Health, MacLeod pursued alternate treatments like hyperthermia, drug and dietary therapy, as well as radiation.

“He was our warrior,” Karly MacLeod said. “Despite any obstacle he had to overcome, he faced it head-on with so much determination and never stopped smiling along the way.”

Indelible mark

MacLeod also left an indelible mark along his hockey journey.

The Manchester Storm posted a message about MacLeod’s passing on social media, “He was a true warrior, and his spirit will forever be a part of the Storm family.”

“We are heartbroken,” said Loewen Frankfurt.

In a statement on its website, the ECHL said, “its member teams mourn the loss and express their condolences to the family and friends of former ECHL player Wade MacLeod.”

The Northeastern University Huskies, where MacLeod scored 137 points in four seasons, said he “left a lasting mark on the program both on and off the ice.”

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On frozen pond

In the midst of a late-summer heat wave, it’s time for some cooling images.

I shot these photos in January, 2024. We’d had several days of very cold days and nights, and I’d been monitoring the ice forming on a local lake in anticipation someone would eventually skate on it.

On a clear, crisp Sunday afternoon, my patience was rewarded.

We don’t get the opportunity to skate on frozen lakes and ponds very often in this part of the world, so it’s very special when it does happen.

My only regret: I didn’t bring my own skates.

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This Coquitlam Express player is having a career season. You’d never know he has a chronic disease

This story first appeared in the Tri-City News on March 16, 2023

If you happen to spy Coquitlam Express forward Mateo Dixon checking his phone on the players bench during a game, he’s not calling his family back in Toronto about his latest goal, or texting his buddies.

He’s checking the level of his blood sugars.

Dixon has Type 1 diabetes.

Diagnosed when he was 13 years old, Dixon says he hasn’t let the autoimmune disease hold him back from attaining his athletic goals.

In fact, having Type 1 may have even accelerated his development as a hockey player.

Now 20 and in his final season of junior hockey, Dixon is having a career year, scoring 45 points in 49 games.

Not that his journey through the sport has been easy.

When your pancreas is working as it should, you don’t think about it.

Constant calculations

The elongated gland that sits in your upper abdomen tucked behind your stomach magically produces the enzymes that help you digest food and the hormones that keep the amount of sugars in your blood on an even keel.

But when your pancreas suddenly stops functioning, you can’t not think about it.

While the days of restrictive diets for people living with diabetes are long gone, every time Dixon eats or reaches for a bottle of energy drink after a shift on the ice, he has to make a mental calculation about the amount of carbohydrates he’s ingesting.

He also has to check his blood sugar levels with an app on his phone that’s connected to a sensor plugged into his body, then determine the dose of insulin a small pump he wears 24/7 injects into his body to offset that sugar boost.

It’s not always an exact science.

Exercise, stress, anxiety and excitement can throw even the most precise calculation out of whack.

Overshoot your insulin dose and your blood sugars can drop, sapping you of energy, depleting your ability to focus or make quick decisions.

Underestimate, and your soaring blood sugars can make you nauseous and tired, and bring on a pounding headache.

Neither outcome is ideal for a high-performance athlete who has to be at the top of their game and ready at any moment to jump on the ice.

Dixon said his disease has brought on no shortage of aggravations.

“It can be so random” he said. “So many micro things can affect it.”

‘A sense of responsibility’

But, Dixon added, living with Type 1 has also put him more in tune with his body.

He said he’s hyper-aware of everything he eats and drinks and the importance of maintaining a healthy lifestyle to better manage his blood sugars.

Dixon’s off-ice training regimen doesn’t just get him ready for the rigours of the hockey season, it also helps smooth out the effects of the highs and lows he’ll inevitably endure.

Express coach Patrick Sexton said Dixon’s maturity is beyond his years.

“He has a sense of responsibility,” he said. “He knows exactly how he’s feeling and how to address the situation.”

Sexton said he’d played with teammates who have Type 1, like Luke Kunin, now a defenceman for the NHL’s San Jose Sharks.

But this is his first experience coaching a young athlete with the disease.

He said it’s important to maintain open lines of communication so he can understand why Dixon might not be able to immediately take a shift because he’s dealing with a low, or why he’s looking at his phone and wolfing down a candy bar on the bench instead of manning the power play on the ice.

“My job is to support him,” Sexton said.

Invisible disease

Dixon said one of biggest challenges of diabetes is its invisibility.

The advent of technology, like the small insulin pump that plugs directly into his abdomen or thigh and the digital glucose monitor that connects by Bluetooth to his smartphone, has eliminated the very public displays of pricking his finger to draw a drop of blood to dab on a test strip plugged into a handheld meter or injecting a dose of insulin with a hypodermic needle.

That can make it hard for his teammates and coaches to immediately recognize why he might be a little off his game, or why he has to cut short a workout.

So, he takes care to bring them into his world as best he can to build an understanding of his disease and the challenges it can present.

“I look at it as a growth opportunity,” Dixon said of living and competing with Type 1. “It’s not limiting at all. It can literally be the opposite.”

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A Coquitlam hockey player is about to take his career in an unexpected direction

This story first appeared in the Tri-City News on March, 8, 2023

Mark Ledlin has spent a lifetime getting ready for the biggest opportunity to advance his musical aspirations by banging and crashing opponents on the ice.

The 25-year-old graduate of Dr. Charles Best Secondary School in Coquitlam just wrapped his eighth season of playing professional hockey in Germany — the past two with the Rostock Piranhas in the second division German Oberliga.

But without a contract for next season, Ledlin is focusing his attention on developing a music career that received a big boost three years ago when he appeared on the German version of the reality show, The Voice.

And he could be poised for a breakout with the release of his first EP this summer and an opportunity to compete as one of eight semi-finalists in SiriusXM radio’s fifth annual Top of the Country competition.

On March 30, Ledlin will head into a studio to record an acoustic version of an original song he’s written and composed.

The songs and videos of all eight semi-finalists from across Canada are then posted online for fans to vote for their favourite.

The winner receives $25,000, as well as industry mentorship and a song writing trip to Nashville.

Ledlin said playing hockey in front of thousands of fans has steeled him for the pressure of being on top of his singing game in the recording studio.

It’s also given him the confidence and self-awareness to find his voice.

“I’ve had moments on the ice where I’ve screwed up and there’s 4,000 people watching,” Ledlin said. “I can be myself on the ice and on stage, but nobody tries to fight you on stage.”

ROSTOCK PIRANHAS
Mark Ledlin, of the Rostock Piranhas, pursues an opponent in a recent game against EG Diez-Limburg in the second division German Oberliga.

Ledlin said music has always been a part of his life: His dad, Fred, who also played pro hockey for 13 seasons in Germany, is an accomplished guitarist himself.

Mark Ledlin said he learned to play watching YouTube videos then started posting videos of his own music from his apartment during the early months of the COVID-19 pandemic as he awaited hockey to resume.

That led to Ledlin’s appearance on The Voice. And while he didn’t advance, he impressed the judges enough to earn an invitation to the show’s “Comeback Stage.”

Ledlin said until now, music has mostly been a way to fill the time between practices and games. As the end of his hockey career comes within sight, he’s drawing from his experiences as a professional athlete to fuel his creativity.

Ledlin said his blue-collar existence toiling year to year for contracts in hockey’s outskirts, far from the bright lights and big arenas of the NHL or even the German first division, brought him to country music’s soulful sounds.

“I’ve had to learn how to do everything myself since I was 17,” he said. “I put that into the music. Every song I write comes from the heart.”

Ledlin said his teammates have been supportive of his musical journey.

“Some of my biggest fans are the guys I play with,” he said. “They’re always asking me to play songs for them.”

But as Ledlin prepares to pull off his skates and elbow pads and put on a flannel shirt and cowboy boots, he’s feeling like an underdog all over again.

And that’s not necessarily a bad place for an athlete to be.

“I’ve been a pro since I was 17,” he said. “I’m going to make some noise in the music world. That’s my destiny, that’s my drive. If it’s hockey or music, I find a way to get to the end.”

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Coquitlam player signs with the Pittsburgh Penguins

A Coquitlam hockey player with a soccer pedigree is now a Pittsburgh Penguin.

Ben Kindel signed a three-year entry-level contract with the NHL team on Tuesday, July 8, after the Penguins selected the 18-year-old forward 11th overall in June’s 2025 Entry Draft.

Kindel’s dad, Steve, is a former Canadian national soccer team player who also played eight seasons with the Vancouver Whitecaps and two seasons with the old Vancouver 86ers of the A-League.

Kindel’s mother is Sara Maglio, who played for the women’s Whitecaps from 2001-05 and made four appearances with Canada’s national women’s team, including at the 1999 FIFA women’s World Cup.

His younger sister, Lacey, is an accomplished soccer player with the Vancouver Rise FC’s academy program. She also represented Canada at a qualifying tournament for the FIFA U-17 World Cup that will be played in Morocco Oct. 17-Nov. 8.

Ben Kindel, a right winger, spent the past two seasons with the Calgary Hitmen in the Western Hockey League where he amassed 159 points in 133 games, including a franchise-record 23-game point streak that spanned more than two months from Nov.8 to Jan. 12.

Not to be outdone on the international stage by the rest of his family, Kindel also played five games for Canada’s gold medal-winning team at the 2025 IIHF U-18 World Championship in Texas in the spring. He scored a goal and added six assists.

“You see the hockey sense, you see the playmaking ability,” said Pittsburgh’s director of player development, Tom Kotsopoulos, of Kindel’s performance at the team’s recent development camp. “I think he’s a kid who’s willing to put in the work, and he knows what he has to do.”

Kindel said he’s excited to be part of a team that’s built around veteran superstar Sydney Crosby.

“Obviously, they have a player such as Sidney Crosby and a lot of other great players that have been here for a long time,” he said of the Penguins’ longtime captain. “But I think like looking up to a guy like Sid for his passion for the game, his loyalty to the Penguins, and his hockey sense and the way he plays the game the right way.”

Kindel told Penguins’ team reporter Michelle Crechiolo while he grew up in a soccer household, his dad was a big hockey fan and he fell in love with the game as soon as he started playing.

Still, Kindel added, he gleaned valuable lessons from his parents’ soccer passion.

“Do everything 100 per cent, no matter what you’re doing, Then, play with passion every time you step out on the field or the rink.”

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Port Moody player plucked in first round of PWHL draft

Port Moody hockey fans won’t have to travel far to see one of the city’s own make her debut in the Professional Women’s Hockey League.

Jenna Buglioni, who was also a top field hockey player when she attended Gleneagle Secondary School in Coquitlam, was selected eighth overall by the new Seattle team in the league’s 2025 entry draft.

That’s seven places higher than the Hockey News’ assessment of top prospects last February.

Buglioni, who scored 164 points in 167 games during her five seasons at Ohio State University, said she’s looking forward to the next step in her hockey career.

“I’m so excited to see the fans rockin’ it at Climate Pledge Arena,” Buglioni said on Instagram, adding she “can’t wait to get to work in November.”

Buglioni was actually eligible to be selected in the PWHL’s 2024 entry draft, but she opted instead to play a fifth season at Ohio State while earning a Master’s degree in sport management.

Buglioni said the additional season would also better prepare her for the rigours of turning pro.

“I have gotten that extra time to work on skills and get more game experience,” she said.

Buglioni won two conference and two national championships at Ohio State, although her final season ended in heartbreak when the Buckeyes were defeated in overtime by the University of Wisconsin Badgers in the NCAA Frozen Four championship final on March 30.

“We were so close to getting that outcome we wanted and it almost felt stripped away,” Buglioni said of the result that came after the Badgers tied the game on a penalty shot with less than 19 seconds left in the third period.

Individually, Buglioni set school records for career and single-season game-winning goals and she tied the program’s record for career short-handed goals.

Buglioni was also the Buckeyes’ captain in her final season and she even sang the national anthem prior to her final regular season game at Ohio State.

Seattle joins Vancouver as the PWHL’s first expansion teams. Neither has yet to announce a nickname.

Vancouver selected veteran Finnish national team forward Michelle Karvinen seventh overall in the entry draft, which took place in Ottawa.

The PWHL is expected to release its schedule later in the summer.

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Hockey helps Port Moody teen bounce back from fire tragedy

This story first appeared in the Tri-City News on Feb. 28, 2021

There may be no “I” in team, but a Port Moody teen is learning there’s a whole lot of support and love, especially when the chips are down.

Dec. 13, Hailey Kress and her family were displaced from their Glenayre home in the middle of the night by a fire that destroyed their garage and deck, heavily damaged an adjoining bedroom and inflicted lots of smoke and water on the rest of the structure including the basement.

That’s where Kress, 13, stored her hockey equipment.

Nobody — including the family dog — was hurt in the 3:15 a.m. blaze. But the emotional toll of that night has been especially difficult on Hailey, said her mom, Monica.

As the family moved in with relatives, then to an Airbnb, and finally to a rental home on the opposite side of Burrard Inlet, Hailey struggled in class at Banting middle school. She said she’d have panic attacks, feeling frozen and overwhelmed by the enormity of that night’s events and the impact it was having on her routines and sense of security.

“It was important to get back to normal,” said Monica. “We needed to somehow concentrate on something other than the fire, get her mind off the negative.”

Hockey is Hailey’s other.

The day after the fire, Monica received an email from Heather Fox, the president of the Tri-City Predators female hockey association where Hailey has been playing for three years, reassuring her that efforts were already in motion to ensure her daughter could keep playing.

Back on the ice

Two weeks later, Hailey was back on the ice. All of her equipment was brand new, courtesy of The Hockey Shop, in Surrey. Her new Predators bag, socks, pants and even hockey tape were donated by Rocket Rod’s at Planet Ice in Coquitlam.

n a season that’s been all about disruption because of public health restrictions to temper transmission of the coronavirus that causes COVID-19, Hailey said practising with her teammates made her feel normal, that everything was going to be OK.

“It was really fun to be with my friends again,” she said. “It made me forget about everything for an hour.”

Hailey, who’s also played baseball, jiu jitsu and acro-gymnastics, started playing hockey after a sleepover at a cousin’s house meant she also had to attend that cousin’s game the next day.

She said she liked what she saw.

“It looked super fun,” she said, adding she especially enjoyed hockey’s aggressive nature.

Monica said she was initially taken aback when Hailey expressed an interest in playing hockey herself. But the positive benefits of being part of a team and forming new relationships outweighed the downsides of the sport’s expense and sitting on cold arena benches.

“It makes for a really well-rounded kid,” she said.

Values camaraderie

Hailey said she enjoys the challenge and responsibility of playing defence, including learning how to skate backwards. But she most values the camaraderie of her teammates and coaches.

“It’s like always having people around you who care about you,” Hailey said.

That care was delivered even before Hailey returned to the ice, as her teammates put together a package for her family of food and personal items like blankets and skin care products.

Monica Kress said she’s been overwhelmed by the outpouring of support from Hailey’s team and the Predators’ hockey community.

“You always think you pay a lot of money for these sports, you think you’re just a number to them,” she said. “But it’s such a good group of kids and parents.”

Hailey said the experience has given her an appreciation for the importance of having sport and teammates in her life. It’s also made her more determined to keep getting better at her game.

“Everything that they’ve done makes me want to try harder to show I’m grateful.”

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He’s one of the greatest villains in Canadian sports history. But this Coquitlam historian has a new take

This story first appeared in the Tri-City News on April 2, 2023

A Coquitlam historian is shining a new light on one of the greatest villains in Canadian sports lore.

Cedric Bolz, who graduated from Centennial Secondary School and is now the head of the history department at Douglas College, has published an alternate view of the famous 1972 Canada–Russia hockey Summit Series as it was seen through the eyes of Josef Kompalla, one of its referees.

Kompalla and fellow West German Franz Baader were among eight officials that also included four Americans, a Swede and a Czech, who were assigned to work the historic eight-game showdown between hockey’s two greatest superpowers at the time.

But Canadians old enough to remember the grainy live TV pictures from Moscow’s Luzhniki Ice Palace beamed into their living rooms and even classrooms that September 51 years ago likely recall Kompalla as Public Enemy No. 1.

Even those who’ve only experienced the series second hand through subsequent memoirs and documentary films have come to vilify Kompalla, said Bolz.

Authors and filmmakers have perpetuated the narrative that the amateur referee was out of his depth arbitrating games between hockey’s greatest professional players and the mighty Soviets.

Or worse, they surmised, he was a complicit East German.

Until now.

Historical oversight

Bolz’s book, The September He Remembers, flips Kompalla’s story and his role in the Summit Series on its head.

It is, Bolz said, “the first step in correcting a major historical oversight and adding a new chapter in the Summit Series’ growing, mutable legacy.”

Bolz said he first heard of Kompalla through his stepfather, who’d played professional hockey in Germany for several years before moving his family to Canada.

The veteran referee officiated more than 2,000 games including several world championships.

He was revered in Europe and even earned a place in the International Ice Hockey Federation’s (IIHF) Hall of Fame.

But in Canadian hockey lore, Kompalla is a reviled figure who seemed determined to derail the NHLers from affirming their superiority on the ice over the Soviet Union.

J.P. Parise physically attacked him after he’d been assessed a penalty.

He bore the wrath of a frustrated Alan Eagleson who threatened to pull the Canadian players from Game 8 when Kompalla drew the refereeing assignment for the decisive match and then threw chairs on the ice after Parise was penalized.

He was chased down hallways by players and team officials incensed by some of the calls he’d made.

Even after the series was decided, Kompalla was harassed by Canadian players on a flight to Prague for an exhibition game against the Czech national team.

A quiet life of retirement

When Bolz heard Kompalla was still alive and living a quiet life of retirement in Krefeld, Germany, he reached out, determined to reconcile the conflicting images of a pivotal character in hockey’s greatest drama who seemed to have been left behind by its history.

“I’m a historian,” Bolz said. “My job is to document voices and this was a voice.”

SUBMITTED PHOTO Douglas Collage history instructor Cedric Bolz (right) visits with German referee Josef Kompalla while working on a book about his role in the 1972 Summit Series. Behind them is a photo of Kompalla being attacked by Canada’s J.P. Parise after he was called for a penalty.

Over the course of three years of phone interviews and personal visits, Bolz constructed a picture of a modest man who still loves hockey but can’t understand how he’d become one of the sport’s most notorious characters.

“It was always baffling to him,” Bolz said.

Road blocks

Along the way, Bolz ran into road block after road block in his efforts to gain an understanding of how Kompalla had become so despised.

Players still alive like Red Berenson and Wayne Cashman wouldn’t talk to him.

Even Ken Dryden, the Hall of Fame goaltender renowned for his thoughtful ruminations about the sport and the author of two memoirs about the series, wouldn’t return his calls.

“A narrative had been crafted,” Bolz said. “Legend continues to trump the way things actually were.”

Bolz believes Kompalla was collateral damage, a convenient foil, in a hockey drama that was supposed to be a friendly cultural exchange in the spirit of detente that had started to warm the Cold War in the early 1970s, but quickly devolved into an athletic expression of the great divide that still existed between East and West when the Canadian NHLers realized their opponents wouldn’t be the pushovers as some observers had billed them.

Time is running out

Kompalla is now 87 and Bolz is all too aware time is running out to set the record straight and reform the referee’s legacy.

He hopes his book, academically annotated and cross-referenced through multiple sources, will help facilitate that.

Some who’ve helped shape the story of the Super Series over the past 51 years have taken notice and made overtures to correct the historical record, like the popular misconception that Kompalla was from East Germany when in fact he’d fled communist rule in Poland and settled in Germany’s democratic West.

As for the aging referee who continues to travel the German countryside to attend hockey games as a spectator, Bolz said he still holds out hope his contribution to the series will be recognized in a more positive light.

“He’s always wondered why he’s never been invited to any of the series’ anniversaries,” Bolz said of Kompalla. “It’s important to see him get some sort of closure.”

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