Brandon became home for Pulock

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This article was published 12/07/2020 (1884 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Ryan Pulock’s career has taken him a long way from Brandon, but a part of him will always stay in the city.

Now 25, the defenceman from Grandview patrols the blue-line for the National Hockey League’s New York Islanders after an outstanding four-year career with the Brandon Wheat Kings that stretched from 2010 to 2014.

“Obviously growing up in Grandview and then moving to Brandon to play hockey, Manitoba is home,” said Pulock, who owns a home in the Wheat City. “Brandon was home to me for four years when I was playing and it’s just the right fit. My family is close and it gives me the opportunity to train and skate all summer. It’s home.”

In Grandview, he always had access to the ice and he spent a lot of time there as a youngster. He began skating early, first hitting the ice around age two and a half or three. 

Pulock grew up in the middle of three boys, with brothers Derrick and Brock to play with and compete against. 

“It was great for all of us, whether we were at the rink shooting pucks around or playing against each other in the driveway, we spent a lot of time outside playing the game just because we all loved it so much, “ Pulock said. 

He said his father Dave and mother Tannis were an invaluable part of his ability to grow and thrive in the game. He said it took a lot of dedication, time and effort with all three boys playing. 

“We never ever missed anything,” Pulock said. “If we had to find a ride, they would make sure we got it done. They loved it just as much as we did. They both came from families that loved the game so it was just a big part of our life growing up. I’m pretty thankful that I was given that opportunity. They obviously helped me get to where I am now.”

Pulock grew up a fan of the Dauphin Kings of the Manitoba Junior Hockey League, but also had a lot of awareness about the Western Hockey League and the Wheat Kings. He even had the chance to visit the Keystone Centre to see some games.

“For me as a kid, the Dauphin Kings were a team we always followed because they were close, but the Brandon Wheat Kings were a close second,” Pulock said. “It was always a treat when we got to drive into Brandon and catch a Wheat King game. Sometimes it was when you were playing in a tournament on that weekend you got to go or sometimes I remember we would just drive in to catch a game. We always followed the Wheat Kings and it was always kind of a dream of mine to play there one day.”

By that time, one of the most noticeable features of his game had already emerged. Pulock has always enjoyed a high-end ability to shoot the puck without necessarily even focusing on it.

“It was always a big threat of mine,” Pulock said. “I think it stems back to as a kid, we spent a lot of time at the rink. If the rink was open, I wanted to be there and be on the ice. When I was at the rink, I just basically shot pucks. I wasn’t trying to make my shot better, that’s just what I enjoyed doing. I think those hours I spent were pretty big for me. 

“It’s definitely a part of my game that’s helped me grow as a player and a big part of the offensive side of my game. It can be a weapon.”

The bantam draft rolled around on April 30, 2009 for the 1994-born Pulock. He said it was a big deal for him, although the five-foot-10, 170 pound prospect wasn’t highly touted.

“I knew I had a chance to get drafted so I remember I was sitting in school in the computer room following the draft and just kind of waiting,” Pulock said. “When it finally came for me, that was pretty awesome being chosen by the Wheat Kings. That was a dream, and it worked out so well for me.”

One really big change lay ahead. Pulock, who had been a defenceman earlier in his career, had been switched to forward in bantam. His team was deep on the back end and short up front, so despite it being his draft year, he agreed to move up front.

At his first Brandon prospects camp he was still a forward, but the Wheat Kings asked him if he wanted to go to back to the blue-line, and he thought it was probably a good idea. He never played up front again.

Pulock made the club in his first opportunity, and played four regular season games before he celebrated his 16th birthday on Oct. 6, 2010.

He said Mark Schneider and Brodie Melnychuk were both a big help as he adjusted to the WHL game in his rookie season, something he admitted was a major transition early on.

“Coming in, I wasn’t really expected to make the team,” Pulock said. “I wasn’t expecting myself to make the team. I had a good camp and was given a lot of opportunity that I’m grateful for, and as the season started I was a little bit in and out of the lineup. When you’re a young guy and in and out a little bit, you’re not sure really where you fit in. I thought I was playing well when I was in so I was looking it that way.”

A couple of weeks into the season, the team suffered some injuries and Pulock found himself in the lineup every night. His confidence skyrocketed as a result.

But there was no doubt he was playing at a different level.

“That step from midget to the Western Hockey League is a big step from playing against 14- and 15-year-olds,” Pulock said. “All of a sudden you’re 16 and playing against 20-year-olds. It challenges you. It forces you to get better and mature as a player otherwise you’re not really going to fit in there. It’s a very quality league. There are lot of top-end NHL hockey players who have come from the Western Hockey League, so it produces a lot of elite players. It’s a league that helps you mature on the ice but also off the ice being part of the community, going to school and doing all those little things that it teaches you.”

While Pulock would have been considered fairly shy by junior hockey standards, he lucked out in one big way when he was able to stay with his aunt and uncle, Myles and Bonnie Hubbard. That went a long way as he made the off-ice transition.

“I’m pretty quiet but it wasn’t that bad for me,” Pulock said. “I was pretty fortunate to move to Brandon, make the team at 16 — I was 15 when the season started — but I was able to billet with my aunt and uncle, which really helped. My uncle is a teacher at Crocus Plains where we go to school so he would drive me to school in the morning and I would catch a ride to practice because I was too young to get my licence yet.

“I think those transitions of living with family and being close to home really helped me. It probably would have been a big challenge for me if I was somewhere else.”

He also had to adjust to people knowing who he was. Pulock might not have been the chattiest player on the team but he embraced the role as a public figure.

“It’s a pretty tight-knit community, and the Wheat Kings are obviously a big part of that community,” Pulock said. “It was very special for me to get that opportunity to play there, just because of being closer (to home) and having family there and that small-town kind of vibe that it gives off … I think there are a lot of kids who look up to the Wheat Kings so it’s quite an honour to be part of the organization. To have that spotlight a little bit is pretty cool as a young kid.”

Another big part of being a Wheat King is knowing that you’re going to have one of the most gruelling travel schedules in the league. While a lot of time is spent on the bus, Pulock said it can help.

“It can be a grind for sure but those are some of the best memories you always think of,” Pulock said. “You remember some of those long bus rides when you’re stuck on that bus for 20-some hours with the guys. You find a way to have some fun and joke around. There are a lot of great memories and great friendships made while you’re travelling and while you’re on that bus.”

His game grew and grew, culminating in him being selected by the Islanders with the 15th overall pick in the first round of the 2013 NHL entry draft.

A measure of the high esteem he was held in can be found in another area as well.

Pulock was the last player to serve as team captain for two years in a row in the the 2012-13 and 2013-14 seasons. It’s something he considers very meaningful.

“It was a tremendous honour,” Pulock said. “Playing there and playing for a couple of great captains in Shayne Wiebe and Mark Stone, and getting the opportunity be a captain at 18 was a huge honour for me and something I’m very grateful for.”

The team’s head coach, general manager and owner, Kelly McCrimmon was also a key part of shaping his experience. Pulock lost his younger brother Brock in a car accident in 2010, while McCrimmon’s older brother Brad died in a plane crash in Russia in 2011. 

As a result, the pair shared a heartbreaking bond. 

“It’s been pretty huge,” Pulock said of McCrimmon’s influence. “Off the ice, he helped me a lot. We both went through similar tragedies so that was a big help for me. And on the ice, he was hard but he had respect for his players and he wanted to get the most out of each and every single guy. I think that really helped me turn into a professional hockey player. The way the Wheat Kings organization is run from the top down is very professional and I think it really prepares you for what it’s going to take.”

Pulock’s WHL career came to end in Game 5 in the second round of the 2014 playoffs when Brandon fell 5-1 to the host Edmonton Oil Kings.

In 261 career regular season games, Pulock recorded 64 goals, 146 assists, 64 penalty minutes and a plus-minus of plus-24. He added 15 more points in 24 playoff games.

 

See ‘Pulock’ — Page B2

The defenceman soon joined the American Hockey League’s Bridgeport Sound Tigers and began his professional hockey career, but it was a profoundly bittersweet time.

“That’s tough,” Pulock said. “Obviously that and retirement when you’re officially done your hockey career. For me, it was tough because of what I was leaving behind in Brandon. The goal would have been to win a championship but we never really came close but I think the time I was there was pretty good rebuilding years coming off the Memorial Cup and helping the team get prepared to go deep and win a championship shortly after I left. It was tough leaving the friendships and everyone in the organization, your teammates. Your whole life is going to change a little bit when you do move on and play pro.”

He said part of the move from junior to pro is the fact that a player no longer has billets and has to look after themselves, and also that they’ll be a lot farther from home.

Pulock followed the Wheat Kings very closely the next season, even watching games when he could because they were all his friends. He was very proud of the 2015-16 team after they won the WHL championship, but played down the impact he had on the guys who formed the core of that squad.

“It was pretty special to watch,” Pulock said.

After spending the 2014-15 season with Bridgeport, Pulock played 15 games with the Islanders during the 2015-16 campaign, making his NHL debut on Feb. 28, 2016 against the Edmonton Oilers.

He played just one game with the Islanders in the 2016-17 season.

“I was definitely up and down a little bit throughout my years,” Pulock said. “The first time or two I accepted it. It was what it was. I was young and I was developing, I wasn’t ready to be an NHLer. When I did get up and play quite a few games and then play in the playoffs, and then be sent back down again, it was definitely frustrating to me. That’s all kind of part of the business too, and you can’t sit back and be upset about it and complain. 

“You have to go down and put in the work and continue to get better and improve your game and prove to people that you belong at that next level. I think I was able to do that fairly well.”

Pulock earned a full-time job in the 2017-18 season, and has spent the last three years with the big club. In 234 career games, he has recorded 31 goals, 77 assists, 55 penalty minutes and a plus-27 rating.

This season, the six-foot-two, 217-pound Pulock was leading all Islanders defencemen with 35 points and an average of 22 minutes 24 seconds of ice time per game until play came to a sudden halt due to the COVID-19 pandemic. 

In the dressing room, the players knew about the situation in Europe but didn’t think about it a lot. When the NBA halted its season on March 11, it suddenly opened a lot of eyes.

“A lot of guys realized that if they were shutting down, we probably weren’t too far behind,” Pulock said. “I think it was the next day there was a shutdown for us. It’s been a crazy, crazy world in the last few months, not just in the sports world but in everything. It’s something you never really thought would happen.”

The team flew home from Calgary, where they were preparing to meet the Flames, and spent a few days in New York before Pulock returned to Manitoba for a 14-day quarantine, where he joined his girlfriend Paige Friesen and their three rescue dogs in Brandon. 

He’s back in New York again now, however, because the Islanders’ two-week mini training camp opens today in New York. 

He certainly doesn’t take his NHL life for granted.

“Every city we play in, it’s just the opportunity to travel around and do what I love,” Pulock said. “It’s pretty special. As a kid, you always dream of playing in the NHL. You’re playing road hockey and it’s your NHL at the time. You never really think it’s actually to happen but always in school when people asked what you’re going to be when you grow up, I said I was going to be a hockey player. You don’t think it’s going to happen but that’s your dream. Now to actually be doing it is pretty special.”

In normal summers, Pulock is a common sight at Wheat Kings hockey camps, helping to put youngsters through their paces. 

It’s important to him to lend a hand, and pay back what he sees as a debt to the organization that made his NHL dream possible.

“With everything the organization gave me as a player, the opportunity and just helping me to get to where I am now, I think I owe them by giving back in any way I can,” Pulock said. “Just giving to the community that was behind us when I was a player there is pretty special. I spend my summers in Brandon, I train there, I skate there in the summers. When there are Wheat Kings camps going on, I’m always willing to give back a little bit. When I was a young kid, if there was an NHL player in the area I would always try to get on the ice with them. 

“I just try to give back that way a little bit and do what I can to help kids develop. Hopefully they can make it to the NHL one day as well.”

 

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