Coaches voted Hunter Garlent the third best playmaker in the OHL’s Eastern Conference, behind only Sam Bennett and Michael Dal Colle, last season. The 5-foot-8 centre was drafted by Guelph 10th overall in the 2011 OHL priority draft but has not been drafted by a NHL team. He had 12 goals and 18 assists in 25 games in Peterborough after the trade deadline. Garlent, 19, will be filing regular journal entries all season for sportsnet.ca.
A few weeks back my mother and two brothers sat down for a goodbye dinner and party at our home in Thorold. My little brother, Holden, was going to head to the airport and fly out west for nationals in lacrosse—a bit of a new experience for him, though he’s played at a high level for a long time. I was going to pack up my equipment and suitcases, throw them into the trunk of the 2006 Jetta that I bought from my uncle who’s a car salesman and drive two hours or so to Peterborough, trying to avoid rush hour going through Toronto. I was going to training camp. I’ve done it before.
It’s a new season and a fresh start. Not the same old. Even though I’m 19, it still feels new to me in Peterborough. This is my fourth training camp but my first with the Petes. I got a fresh start here last winter after putting in a couple of years with the Guelph Storm and not playing a lot on a strong team. A trade to Peterborough at the deadline changed things for me in a big way. I probably played more in my first game with the Petes than I had in my last three combined with the Storm. It looked like a tough situation that I was coming into—the Petes had been up and down in the first half of the season—but we had an amazing run in the first round of playoffs, going down 3-0 in the series to a really strong Kingston team, one that was a heavy favorite against us. Then we came back and won the final four games of the series, the last in their barn in overtime. If I had to name a highlight of my career, that would be up there.
Coming in at the trade deadline could have been tough and I’m sure that’s how it plays out for other players in other places. In Peterborough, management and my teammates made it as easy as possible. Like I say, though, this is my first camp with them. A lot of the guys are going into their second or third full year with the team. They know each other really well. They have a level of familiarity that I’m still catching up to. In the middle of a season, the middle of the playoffs, things happen so fast.
The day after the drive up to Peterborough, I went to the arena with my equipment. The first guy I saw was my winger, Nick Ritchie. There are 400 or so players in the league and they come from all over but it’s funny how you get to know some guys. I met Nick when we were 13 and we played on the provincial lacrosse team that won a Canadian title. We ended up playing together in under-16s and under-17s in hockey. I hadn’t seen him since the season had ended. Half an hour later it seemed like we had never gone home. It’s like that pretty well wherever you go. Everybody will know somebody. This season it’s going to be getting to know everybody well.
Another half hour later, Nick and I were catching up with other guys on the team. We were seeing everyone for the first time since the season ended back in April. Yeah, some of us were texting each other over the summer and you had some idea what other guys are doing, but you only really catch up in the room. A guy comes up to give you a hug or a handshake or make a joke and then all of a sudden it’s like you rewinding right back to where you left off.
The Petes didn’t have a lot of spots open. We lost hardly anybody from last season. A bunch of 16- and 17-year-old kids are there at the start of training camp and you know you’re going to have a few three- or four-day friends. They’re trying to make the cut and trying to figure things out. It’s never been easy. I know how it is having gone through it in Guelph, and it was tough to see them go. Some were here and gone so quick I’d have trouble coming up with the names.
When the final cut was made, the equipment manager moved everybody’s stuff into the main dressing room. My stall is between Anthony Steffano, who’s one of five guys in my psych class at Trent, and Artem Vladimirov, our Russian import who, from what I can tell, knows two words in English, yes and no. Between Stefano, a talker, and Artem, they balance each other out, I guess.
When I had packed up my bags in Thorold and said goodbye to my mom and my brothers they looked at it like I was going away from the family again. In another way, though, I was leaving one family for another.