As a teenage player, Joseph Santalucia understands that hockey is more than a fun game.
The ice may be almost the same at every stop, and the boards as unforgiving in each rink, but the game remains a powerful draw. From when he was a young kid growing up in Burnaby, the dream of playing pro hockey took him and his imagination to far away places.
Now the sport has led him to another stop, where hockey means hope, resilience and a respite from a tragedy that touched a nation.
Santalucia is heading to Humboldt, Sask., after the Saskatchewan Junior Hockey League club acquired his rights from the Dryden Ice Dogs this week.
“I’m going (to Humboldt). I talked to the GM, and they said they see me as a top-four (defenceman),” said Santalucia. “They see me playing (the) penalty kill a lot and hopefully put me out on the powerplay. They say I’ll play, so that will be pretty good.”
He showed plenty of promise in his first junior A season, after two years with his hometown junior B Grandview Steelers. As a rookie in northern Ontario’s Superior International Hockey League, Santalucia established himself with one of the circuit’s top franchises, as it went on a roll and won both the league and playoff titles.
Having endured his first season away from home, the five-foot-eight blueliner is now one of many newcomers expected to help restart a proud but damaged hockey club, after the Broncos’ bus was involved in a collision with a semi truck last spring, where 16 players and team members were killed.
“I didn’t know any of those guys, but it hit me pretty hard,” he said of the April 6 crash. “With hockey, we all go on buses,
it’s supposed to be a fun time and joking around on the bus. When I found out about (the crash) it just hit me, it was like ‘Oh, wow.’
“It was sad, an awful thing. Hopefully when I get to Humboldt we will play for those players and hopefully make them proud. Make the town proud.”
Playing hockey has been a driving force for the Notre Dame Regional Secondary school grad, from his early days at the Burnaby Winter Club – including one season with Burnaby Minor Hockey – as well as junior tryouts in the B.C. Hockey League.
Toiling two years in Grandview, Santalucia decided to seek his junior A chances out-of-province, first with the Alberta league’s Olds Grizzlys, then to Dryden. Over 39 games with the Ice Dogs, the left-shooting defender contributed two goals and 10 assists, plus three in a successful playoff drive.
Dryden advanced to the Ontario provincial championship final, where the Wellington Dukes prevailed and advanced to the Royal Bank Cup – where they lost 4-2 to Chilliwack in the final.
“(The Ontario final) was honestly pretty intense. The atmosphere in the whole (Dryden) arena was packed, and I couldn’t hear anything because it was so loud. It was just a great experience to be a part of,” he recalled.
The transition to the junior A game went smoothly, but there was a learning curve, he noted.
“The speed of the game was at a lot of the adjustment. Obviously getting stronger and stuff because the guys in junior A are a lot stronger and faster and just more aware of the game,” said Santalucia. “The hockey was good. There was maybe a little more, I wouldn’t say dirty, but a little grittier. A few more hacks and whacks on the back of the legs and stuff.”
Probably the toughest part was learning to live away from home for the first time.
“I got homesick really quick. It was my first year away from home so it was hard to adjust, but it was OK. I’m doing my own laundry and stuff.”
At the Ice Dogs’ season-ending banquet, Santalucia shared the Most Improved Player award with forward Ted Davis.
And while he requested a trade to be closer to home, he had no idea where his request would take him, and was surprised when he got the news.
“It was a request to be traded, but I didn’t know Humboldt was going to trade for me. I have a player advisor and he was talking, saying there were a few teams interested. Humboldt wasn’t one of those (teams) at first, then I woke up to a tweet saying I got traded to Humboldt. It was like, ‘Oh, wow.’”
A starting running back and defensive back with Notre Dame during their march to the 2017 B.C. Subway Bowl final, Santalucia expects camp, which opens in a month, to be another chance to show what he can do. Considering how some people look at his diminutive stature and set their expectations low, he’s eager to demonstrate that he is more than just a small defenceman.
“My whole life I’ve always been told I shouldn’t really be playing hockey because of my size. I just tell them, ‘No I’m going to play. I don’t really care what you say about it.’ I’ve now gone this far so,” he said.
To make the Broncos and have a chance to pull on what is now an iconic green-and-gold jersey, is the next step.
“Honestly, I got goosebumps thinking about it the other day. It’s going to be a cool experience and I’m really excited for it, to be honest.”
