And they said it couldn’t be done

It’s a good thing that Gord McKenzie-Crowe did not listen to his critics.

It was back in 2006 that McKenzie-Crowe, an Ojibwe from Ontario’s Alderville First Nation, decided to put together a pair of Aboriginal youth teams to compete in some summer hockey tournaments.

He said the idea came to him after seeing his two children, son Brenton and daughter Brooke, compete in various Little NHL tournaments, an annual spring event in Ontario that feature Aboriginal squads from across the province.

“I’ve seen a lot of good (Aboriginal) players,” McKenzie-Crowe said. “But they weren’t getting the opportunity to move on to higher calibre winter teams.”

As a result he founded the Star Pathways Aboriginal Hockey Association. All of the association’s teams, which only enter spring and summer tournaments, are called Team Ontario Stingrays.

And there’s more than just two squads being iced now.
The association is planning to have 11 teams in various age groupings this season. Each club will compete in a minimum of four tournaments.

Events will be staged throughout Ontario and in Massachusetts.

McKenzie-Crowe felt allowing Aboriginal players to take part in some competitive events in the traditional off-season would help develop athletes to the point where they could be successful on winter clubs.

“Very truthfully, everyone at the beginning told us this would never work,” McKenzie-Crowe said. “They said we would get beat up. We have taken our beatings, which is inevitable when you are starting your teams from scratch and going up against elite teams.

“But our teams are all competitive now. And some of them are more than competitive; they are in the running (for the championship) for every tournament.”

Since ‘06, the organization has had its teams win a whopping 26 tournament championships. Not a shabby accomplishment since many felt McKenzie-Crowe was wasting his time even considering putting a couple of Aboriginal entries together.

In their first year the Stingrays had a pair of boys’ teams, for those born in 1995 and ‘96.

In recent years the officials with the organization started allowing a few non-Aboriginal players to suit up for the Stingrays. But more than 90 per cent of the team’s players are still Aboriginal.

“When we can fill our teams with Aboriginals we do,” McKenzie-Crowe said. “We open the doors to non-Aboriginals so our kids can have a team to play on. We’re not trying to be reverse racists. But when we have a non-Aboriginal and an Aboriginal kid trying out, the Aboriginal kid is going to get the spot.”

This year the tryouts for all of the Stingrays’ clubs will be staged over a three-day period, beginning on March 30 at the Cobourg Community Centre.

McKenzie-Crowe estimates about 300 players will participate in the tryout camp.

Each Stingrays’ club will feature 17 players. Also, each squad will sign up to five affiliate players, who, if need be, would play in a tournament if one of the team’s regular players could not participate.

McKenzie-Crowe believes about 220 of the 300 anticipated players from the Cobourg camp will end up representing the Stingrays this season.

There’s a registration fee of $125 per player to attend the tryouts.

“We don’t want to clog up our camp with a lot of kids that aren’t going to make our teams,” said McKenzie-Crowe, who will also serve as the manager of the Ontario boys’ entry at this year’s National Aboriginal Hockey Championships, which will be held in Saskatoon in May.

One of the teams the Stingrays will have this year is a girls’ entry. It will features players born in 1996 and ‘97.
The Stingrays will also have a pair of Junior A boys’ teams, featuring individuals born in 1993, ‘94 or ‘95.
The organization will also have two squads featuring players born in ‘97.

The other teams will be for players born in 1996, ‘98, ‘99, 2000, 2001 and 2002.

In previous years McKenzie-Crowe said he did most of his recruiting for the Stingrays during the annual Little NHL tournament.

But these days, because of the Stingrays’ recent successes, he’s noticed more and more people are approaching him to see if they can be part of the organization.

“When your team is successful, the phone rings the other way,” he said. “Everybody wants to be a part of that team.”

McKenzie-Crowe said some players will be making a lengthy trip just to attend the tryouts.

“Some will be flying in from Thunder Bay and Sault Ste. Marie and some other parts of northern Ontario,” he said.
Last year the Stingrays had players from 64 out of the 134 Ontario-based First Nations.

Since the Stingrays’ inception, more than 200 players who have suited up for the organization have gone on to play for a AAA or Junior A club in the winter.

“Some kids it might take them three years to make it,” McKenzie-Crowe said. “But this does help every single player, even if they don’t make it their first year.”