A Canadian Goalie Hockey Dad in Taiwan

A Canadian hockey dad in Taiwan.

I have been living in Taiwan since 2002. I’m married and have 3 children, Victor, Amy, and Zachary. My two boys both play hockey, goalie position. When I first came to Taiwan hockey was the furthest thing from my mind. But when my wife wanted my oldest son to learn how to in-line skate at the local school, he was 5 at the time, I saw a group of children learning in-line hockey. I told her that that is what I want him to learn how to play. I approached the coach of the hockey team, the Golden Dragons, Peter Deng, and our hockey career had started. It wasn’t long after that when the coach asked Victor to play the goalie position. Even being Canadian I didn’t know anything about that position. So I did a lot of research and found some training guides. I started practicing with the team to help coach my son in the goalie position. I was then later asked to play for the old-timer team, as a forward.

The Golden Dragon team started to do well in the league and in the tournaments. My son was noticed by another team, the Taipei Tigers, and Geoff LeCren asked if Victor would like to play goalie for his ice surface team for an upcoming tournament. And we agreed.

So Victor, age 7, was doing ice practices and in-line practices at least 3 times a week by now with games on the weekends.

Geoff LeCren then wanted Victor to play in an older age group, so as not to interfere with the Golden Dragon team and also join the Taipei Tigers in-line hockey program.

Now Victor was playing on 3 teams and practicing 4-5 times a week on ice and in-line with lots of games on the weekends, and tournaments. I was doing a lot of driving. And investing in goalie gear in Taiwan is a bit expensive.

By now my second son had started to learn how to play hockey as well with Taipei Tigers. Victor had almost completely switched over to Taipei Tigers and Taipei Typhoon by this point but still promised to play for Golden Dragon’s men’s team at 11 years old. His new coach was Cullen Revel.

At twelve he played for the youth national team in Beijing China at the very first CCM Invitational tournament. They won the championship in a shoot-out against a team from Toronto. He made 3 great saves. He took the Best Goalie award and got to meet NHL player Johnny Oduya.

He played in the Hong Kong 5’s with a Taipei Selects team and took 2nd place and Best Goalie in a very entertaining championship game that went to overtime against the Hong Kong Selects.

By 14 years old, Victor was trying out for the U18 National team. He played in a men’s tournament in Hong Kong and his team, mostly 16 year olds, he was the youngest player there at 14, and they took 4th place. He had gained experience playing against much older and better players from Kuwait, and Japan. 

Victor has continued to play for Taipei Typhoon and being selected for special teams to play in summer tournaments in Hong Kong and Thailand. He has won numerous other best goalie awards in those tournaments. 

He is currently playing and training with the U18, U20 and men’s national teams under a Canadian coach, Ryan Lang, an exceptional Canadian Jr A player. Victor had been doing 3 or 4 practices per week and games on the weekend. He has also been playing in a men’s 4 on 4 league called The Taipei Original 6 until Covid-19 shut it all down in May 2021.

During a winter holiday back in 2019 I decided to take Victor to visit his grandparents in Canada and get him a little Canadian hockey experience. We did a lot of hockey in the three weeks we were there. We had 4 sessions at The Zone with a certified goalie coach, a lot of drop in shinny hockey at the local ice-rink, and my uncle was running a men’s beer league on Friday nights that we went and played at. But Victor’s greatest experience was when he went to have a Day at Victus Academy in Kitchener. He did classes and strength and conditioning and an ice session. He was amazed. Better still Victus Academy called my parents home and asked if Victor could come back for another ice session as the coaches wanted to take another look at him. That made me feel so proud. So we did!

I have always had the idea in the back of my head to send Victor to Canada to do his high school years, but I couldn’t let him go. Then Covid-19 hit and Taiwan was pretty much Covid free and Victor was able to continue to practice and play hockey here. Covid did shut down the two opportunities for Victor to play for Taiwan, Chinese-Taipei U18, in the IIHF tournament in Turkey in 2020 and 2021. We are hopeful for 2022.

What I want to do is send Victor to Canada this year to Victus Academy in Kitchener. They had over 10 of their senior students get drafted into the OHL. However the tuition is well out of my range as an ESL English teacher.

Tuition at Victus Academy is $25,000 CAN a year. Plus he must play on a AA or AAA team which will further cost $3,000 plus a huge commitment from his grandparents in the way of driving.

I have done the best I can with him here in Taiwan. I am asking you for help and support to help Victor fulfill his dream of playing professional hockey.

Sincerely,

Greg Graff

A Canadian hockey dad in Taiwan.

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