Scott Radley: Hamilton’s Ryan Kuwabara takes over behind the bench of the Niagara IceDogs
The life of a minor pro hockey player isn't easy. Particularly if your career takes you overseas.
For months every year you're away from home and sometimes your family.
If you become a coach once you've hung up the skates, things don't become a whole lot easier.
Just ask Ryan Kuwabara.
After playing junior in Ottawa, it was off to West Virginia, New Brunswick, Japan, Ireland and Korea for the Hamilton native.
Every winter from 1992 to 2009, he was someplace else in the world chasing the dream.
When he stepped behind the bench, he got a bit of respite running teams in Stoney Creek and Ancaster before leaving for Saginaw, Flint and West Virginia.
On the road again. Always taking short-term leases on apartments because, well, ya never know in this racket.
You have to really grind away," he says. You have to sacrifice a lot."
He did it - they all do it - because he has hopes of climbing the coaching ladder. And he's had success. Still, it was rough.
He has a wife and four daughters who live here. Seeing them only once a month or so - when he makes a trip back or they come to him - is hard. Regardless, he's worked at his craft for the better part of the past decade because he's wanted the opportunity not just to climb the ranks but to get a crack at being a head coach somewhere significant.
It's a little Darwinian but he'd keep his ear on the railway track to hear about teams that let their coach go or teams looking for a change. When he did, he'd reach out and let them know he was out there and available.
How many times?
I don't know," he laughs. There would be too many to count."
He spoke to teams in the Ontario Hockey League, the ECHL, even the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League despite his French being just so-so. That's always fixable, he thought. Nothing happened.
He found consistent work as an assistant coach or even associate coach. But those head coaching gigs proved elusive.
But you never know when something in the past might lead to a chance in the future. A few years ago when he was coaching the Junior B Ancaster Avalanche - a team in which he had an ownership stake - he got to know the owner of the Brantford 99ers. So when that guy bought the Niagara IceDogs in the summer, Kuwabara reached out.
I definitely have some interest," he said at that time.
Nothing happened. They chatted but there was no interview or anything. So the guy they call Kuwie went to West Virginia to work as an assistant with the Wheeling Nailers in the ECHL.
Meanwhile, back in Niagara, things weren't going so well.
The team was flailing. In fact, it was in last place in the Ontario Hockey League and in the midst of a one-win-in-10-games stretch three weeks ago when the coach who'd been hired in the summer was fired. A few days later, Kuwabara's phone rang.
His moment had arrived.
The start of his head coaching career, admittedly, hasn't followed the Hollywood manual. He lost his first game to Hamilton, his second to London and his third to Sudbury in a 13-2 disaster (there's a reason the team's in last place). When your side has won just six of its 24 games, it's going to take time to get things turned around.
That's OK. Not only is the 50-year-old finally getting his chance to be a head coach in the OHL, but he's able to do it close enough to home to live in his own house with his family. It's so new, he admits it's a little weird being around all these girls in the middle of hockey season. No complaints, though.
I am just so fortunate," he says.
He really is. His situation is pretty unique.
Of course, just a couple days after he was hired, his wife had to fly out with some friends for a long-scheduled getaway in Mexico. Meaning right when he finally managed to make it home in-season to bring all the family together, Melisa was off on a road trip of her own.
Yup," he says. Too funny."
Scott Radley is a Hamilton-based columnist at The Spectator. Reach him via email: sradley@thespec.com