Joey Payeur
A notion that sprung from a potato chip bag will see Ron MacKinnon feasting on the coaching knowledge of one of Canada’s legendary junior hockey bench bosses.
The Fort Frances resident was one of 18 minor hockey coaches selected to attend the Old Dutch Coaching Academy, which is being run by former longtime Ottawa 67’s head coach Brian Kilrea during the 2014 Memorial Cup in London from May 23-26.
MacKinnon, who coached the Fort Frances Atom ‘AA’ Canadians this past season and also coaches girls’ hockey here, was picked as part of a contest Old Dutch ran to celebrate hockey parents and coaches throughout the country—and he didn’t even know he was a contender.
“When I got the message on my laptop, I wasn’t even aware I had been entered,” laughed MacKinnon.
“I’m pretty jacked up about it,” he added. “I’m also pretty humbled by it.
“I can’t take all the credit,” MacKinnon stressed. “I had some very good assistant coaches in Mike Mann, Mike Webb, Chris Dittaro, and Jon Cooper and a good manager in Tim Spence.
“You can’t do it alone,” he noted. “Unfortunately, there’s only one plane ticket.”
MacKinnon was nominated for the contest through an essay written by Devlin resident Stephanie Cousineau, whose son, Ashton, was on the Canadians.
“We had just finished a tournament in Thunder Bay and I saw on a chip bag Ashton had about this contest,” she explained.
“I thought, well, there’s nothing else to do on a four-hour ride home,” she reasoned.
“So I wrote out the essay on my phone and by the time we got back home, I was finished and just sent it right in.”
Cousineau said there were plenty of reasons in her mind to enter MacKinnon into the contest.
“At the start of the year in the first meeting he had with the parents, he really stressed the importance of the fact the kids would be representing the community on and off the ice,” she recalled.
“He pushed the idea on the kids that it was important to respect parents and coaches,” she added.
“He made it clear it wasn’t just about winning.”
Cousineau also commended MacKinnon on his dedication to the game, and said his attendance at the coaching academy only can benefit local minor hockey players down the road.
“I think it can only help our community with the wisdom he will be bringing back,” she remarked.
“I thank Stephanie and Ed Cousineau very much, and I heard even Ashton helped with the submission,” said MacKinnon.
The local coach, one of only five chosen from Ontario and the only one not within 100 km of the Greater Toronto Area, will be learning at the feet of a giant of the profession in Kilrea, who won two Memorial Cups with the 67’s.
He also was named the OHL’s coach-of-the-year five times while racking up 1,193 wins in 29 seasons at the helm.
And if one of Kilrea’s closest friends in the game happens to stop by—a certain Donald S. Cherry—that will brighten MacKinnon’s day even more.
“Cherry usually goes to the Memorial Cup when he can,” a hopeful MacKinnon said about the former Boston Bruins’ coach and national broadcasting icon famous for his “Coach’s Corner” segments on Hockey Night in Canada.
“It would be a dream for me to meet him.”
