Hockey may be Canada’s national winter sport, but for Westlock RCMP Const. Dave Wilejto, it’s more than just a game.
Since arriving in Westlock about two years ago, Wilejto has kept up his involvement in the sport, devoting time when he can spare it to helping coach the Midget Warriors and Initiation teams.
Wilejto spent 19 years of his life playing hockey at levels ranging from minor hockey in his hometown of Burn’s Lake B.C, through Junior ‘A’ hockey in communities around B.C., and on to the professional minor leagues in the southern United States.
“I suppose if I had a background in arts, that’s where I’d be involved,” he said. “I just felt like I could contribute there. That’s why I stayed with hockey. Aside from family, that is probably one of the things I owe the most in my life to.”
Working with the two ends of the minor hockey spectrum has resulted in Wilejto adopting a different mentality depending on which kids are on the ice in front of him.
With the Initiation kids, he said it’s all about keeping them entertained and excited about the sport. Yet, there’s also a lot of teaching that goes on, teaching that yields noticeable results as the season progresses.
It’s important, he added, not to forget where the kids started on day one when they’re zipping around the ice at midseason.
“Being out with them every day, you kind of forget that until you step back and think about it,” he said.
On the other hand, the Midgets are more about working on improving their overall game through little fixes to get that extra edge.
Even though the physical aspect of the game is important to being a successful hockey player, Wilejto said a lot of the work he puts in has to do with making the kids mentally tougher.
Building that mental toughness could also go a long way towards setting the kids up to be strong members of society when their playing days are over.
“The goal there is to make them all better hockey players and hopefully in the long run better people too,” he said.
Wilejto hopes to share the lessons he’s learned with the players, so they can understand just how valuable their minor hockey experience can be.
“You learn things you can carry on through life,” he said, citing teamwork and morals as two of the biggest skills he picked up. “I’m a firm believer that team sports, and hockey specifically, … are a great building block for a lot of life skills that you can use later on.”
His desire to share what hockey can do to a person isn’t just a bit of altruism — it’s also deeply personal, as his four-year-old son Blake is currently just starting his hockey career at the Initiation level.
“I kind of want to expose him to the same things I was exposed to,” Wilejto said.
As far as looking back on his pro career, Wilejto said it was a fun experience he won’t soon forget.
“It was a fun lifestyle for a guy in his early 20s, there’s no question about that,” he said.
Even though it was a fun lifestyle, he said it was a bit nerve wracking at times.
“The minor pro leagues are a little bit cut throat,” he said. “Sometimes you don’t know whether you’ve got a job the next week or not.”
While the southern U.S. is not a hockey hotbed, the region was starting to learn and embrace the sport in the late 1990s and early 2000s when Wilejto played there. That mutual feeling each other out had an impact on the players’ and fans’ experiences.
“They were just starting to figure hockey out, so it was a learning experience for both the fans and the players being exposed to that down there,” he said.
With what he figures will be about 20 years of involvement in hockey still to go as Blake advances through minor hockey, Wilejto is eager to keep his finger on the pulse of a sport he loves.
“I’m a kid at heart anyway,” he said. “I’m not a fan of the new NHL, but the sport of hockey is always going to be the sport of hockey, it’s always been my first love as far as any kind of extra curricular activity would go.”
