from Stephanie Coratti of The Ontarion,

For most Canadian hockey fans, it has become part of the sacred ritual. Alongside Ron MacLean, the explosion of many colours that is the beloved Don Cherry, and the simple yet necessary instinctual recitation of Foster Hewitt’s “Hello Canada and hockey fans in the United States and Newfoundland,” Hockey Night in Canada’s video montages have cemented their place in hockey history. A feat that anyone who knows a hockey fan would not take lightly; the tradition, the rituals, the history – a gentlemen’s club that most can’t find the door to, let alone knock. And be let in.

Tim Thompson, the man who takes hockey’s most beautiful, most gut-wrenching, and downright ugliest, setting it to a flawless soundtrack sending shivers down your spine every time, has been let in, given a beer, and the legend’s chair. A chair rightfully earned though, as Thompson has paid his fair share of dues. As it does for most, the journey began with a dream to play in the National Hockey League. Thompson took his dream to major junior, manning the blue line for the then Niagara Falls Thunder of the Ontario Hockey League.

Left undrafted, Thompson was left in search of a university to attend to get a degree and continue his playing career. Thanks to a run in with an old teammate, Todd Wetzel, who currently played for the University of Guelph and raved about it, Thompson became a Gryphon. “The more I read and heard about the school, the city and the team, the more I thought about how great it would be,” Thompson said of what he described as an easy decision. “And then I found out more about the city, the culture, how it had such a great music scene…”

A small foreshadow to what would later become a significant part of Thompson’s contribution to the world of hockey, off the ice.

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