Trent
Scratch Tyler Hewitt and does he not bleed red?
But these days, that red is the red of team Russia, who connected deeply with the young Tumbler Ridge resident during the recent Junior A tournament in Dawson Creek.
Tyler has been having medical issues which has sidelined him from his love of hockey. This means, explains mom Sherri-Lynn, that he wasn’t able to be on the ice when the minor hockey players were able to practice with Team Russia when they were in town last month getting ready for the Junior A tournament in Dawson Creek. “I asked Keith (Bertrand), ‘is there something we can do for Tyler to be able to meet the team?’ He said, ‘I’ll get back to you,’ and within an hour, he had called to say that mayor and council would like for Tyler to go to the dinner with the team on Monday night. And the staff they arranged for him to go into the dressing room to meet before those team pictures. Barry [Reynard] from Tourism Dawson Creek, and [Dawson Creek mayor] Dale Bumstead were at the dinner as well. And Tyler was sitting with the team, and they thought he was a little Russian in with the group. And the next day, I guess when they got together to discuss who would be Junior host for the teams, they said ‘Well, this boy from Tumbler Ridge really fit in with them. So why don’t we just keep him with the team?’ So they called me to say, they’d like him to be the junior host.”
All the teams have a junior host, but Tyler was the only one that attended every single game his team played.
For his part, Tyler describes it as “an absolutely amazing experience”.
After the dinner, Tyler spent as much time as he could with the team. “That was really fun and cool to be able to spend the time with them like that while they were in town,” he says. “And as they were leaving, I found out that I was going to get to go to all their games in Dawson Creek as well. So we spent a couple nights in Dawson to watch the games. He would even go into the dressing room before hand to hang out with the team. For one of the games, he says, he was asked to put on his playlist for the team to warm up to.
He says the language barrier wasn’t as big as he was expecting. Not only did he spend a lot of his time with the team’s interpreter, but many of the team members actually spoke English. “There was around quarter to half of the team that could speak fluent English,” says Tyler, “A lot of them played in the OHL, And when they went there they learned to speak English. But then there were some that some that still played in Russian hockey leagues and spoke full[on Russian.”
The team gave Tyler a full warm-up suit, a hockey stick, a mug, a hat, and a number of other gifts. They even signed his Raptors jersey. Tyler, in turn, gave the team a Raptor’s jersey to bring back with them to Russia. But despite all the stuff, Tyler says the best part of the experience was “just getting to spend time with them and how fun it was.”
The low moment, says Tyler, came at the end of the round robin. “There were four games and Team Russia had only won one of them,” says Tyler. “I thought they were going to be eliminated. But another team only won in a shootout and lost every game so they had less points. And I’m like, ‘okay, we’re going to the semi-finals’ and it was a little scary and stuff but then they beat the Czech team five to one and went to the Gold Medal game. But yeah, before I knew they were going to semi-finals. I was like, oh my God, no.”
During the round robin—at the very game that a pair of buses from Tumbler Ridge went to, in fact—Russia played Team Canada West to a stalemate, neither team scoring during regulation play, or during the five minute overtime period.
“Every game I stood by the bench,” says Tyler. “and for that game, it went to the shootout. And every time it goes to shoot out, one player is on the ice, while the rest of the team, links arms. And the goaltender asked if I could join in. He said ‘you’re a part of our team, so we’d like you to, you know, hold hands with all of us to be part of us right now.” Tyler is unable to come up with words to describe that moment.
But it wasn’t the best moment. After beating the Czech republic, the Russians faced down Team Canada East in the finals, another close fought game that saw both teams only scoring in the last few minutes of the third period.
Pavel Tyutnev scored for the Russians with 4:21, but the Russians got two delay of game penalties with less than two minutes in the game and team Canada was able to tie it up with 62 seconds left.
At 5:43 into the second overtime period, Shakhir Mukhamadullin scored the game winner, netting the Russians their first gold medal in their 14 years of attending the tournament. “I was really, really happy to see that,” says Tyler. “I had happy tears and was super excited they had won.
“Then the team manager asked if I wanted to go out on the ice with them, so I went out there with them, and they were all super happy and a bunch of them picked me up and started spinning me around on the ice, giving me big hugs. One of them was so happy he kissed me on the head. Another one came up to me and said ‘all this, this win, this is for you.’ And when Canada came over to shake everyone’s hands, I got to do that with them. I even got to hold the trophy after the game in the dressing room.”
Tyler says one of the things he’ll remember most is the encouragement the team gave him. “Some of them would come up after ever game and say ‘you know you will get better.’ One of them came up to me and told me that his brother had the same condition I have. He told me about how his brother was playing hockey and had to stop, but he got better and kept going. They would just come up to me after every game and say ‘you’re strong, you can do this. We believe in you.’ And there was really—it’s hard to put in words—but it was really nice. Very inspirational.”
It was in October of 2018 that Tyler had his first seizure. For a while, he suffered seizures on a daily basis, sometimes more than once a day. The proposed solution? Brain surgery. “We’ll be meeting with his neuro team on January 16 to discuss recommendations from the panel and what the next steps are,” says mom Sherri-Lynn.
She says Tyler is very proud of his community and the sports teams here. “The last time we were down at the hospital in Edmonton,” she says, “he brought along some of the packages from the coal forum and was sharing them with all the nurses down there. This just brought home what our community does and how it can come together to support a team on a world level. Team Russia felt so comfortable here.”
She says this was a profound experience for her, too. “I’m always usually next to Tyler,” she says. “This was totally him on his own experience to go and do I mean, I didn’t go down into the dressing rooms or anything. He got dropped off at the VIP section and went in. I was just in awe at how they welcomed him in and made him a part of the team.”
Even now, Tyler is still in contact with the team manager and a couple of the players.
“They want to know how he’s doing,” says mom. “How much they brought him in really lifted his spirit, with things that he’s got coming up, challenges to face. Now he’s ready. It’s built confidence and strength. Our community has always been behind our family and so much of what we do, but now it extends across the waters. It’s amazing.”
