Community, a love for growing the game and a pinch of luck. That’s how Vineyarder Nick Kent’s career as a professional hockey player and a youth development coach with the Tampa Bay Lightning was been shaped.
“Even from day one, hockey, for me, has been right place, right time,” he said.
Born and raised on the Island, Mr. Kent has trotted the globe to play hockey and now lives in Florida, but he still comes back every summer to teach the game he loves to Island kids.
The first few times he laced up his skates when he was about six though, he hated it. His dad was a goalie and brought him on the ice for the first time at a YMCA camp. It took bribes from his father — one lap around the rink for one movie rental — until he was hooked.
Mr. Kent played every position as a kid and played professional hockey in several countries. — Jeanna Shepard
“Growing up here, you play with the majority of the same kids your entire life, which is something you don’t really see elsewhere,” he said. “That was just an awesome experience, because [during] senior night, I had known everybody from day one. And the chemistry you build on the ice...you know where someone’s going to be without even looking for them.”
Throughout his youth, Mr. Kent played all over the ice in every position but found his home in the net as a goalie.
“I’ve had games where I’ve stolen a game, but then I’ve also had games that we’ve lost because of me,” he said. “So riding that wave of not getting up too high and not going down too low...it’s a fun feeling for me.”
It’s rare for a player to play forward, defense and goalie. To the high school boys’ hockey coach Matt Mincone, it’s a part of who Mr. Kent is.
“He is the only player in my years of coaching that has played every position,” Mr. Mincone said. “It shows his unique ability to want to try and to fit a needed role on a team and to be part of a team.”
After graduating high school, Mr. Kent decided to continue his hockey career in junior divisions, playing with teams in North Carolina, New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Canada and Sweden. Moving between different goal posts was a rewarding challenge.
“It’s part of the business,” he said. “But now looking back, I uprooted my life so many different times just to go play for a different team in the same league with the same group of people. It was wild. But I wouldn’t change anything. I’d do it again 100 times if I could.”
The pandemic halted his playing career, and he came back on Island from Sweden right when the world was shutting down.
Mr. Kent’s current job offer came by chance. He moved to Tampa with a high school friend in the fall of 2021 and decided to sign up for a local Labor Day tournament, playing with strangers. One of those strangers had connections with the Tampa Bay Lightning community and hockey development department. A 20-minute interview later, he had the job.
“I was on the ice three days later in my Lightning tracksuit and Lightning gloves going, what just happened?” he said with a laugh.
Mr. Kent comes back to the Vineyard in the summer to teach Islanders. — Jeanna Shepard
In Tampa, Mr. Kent wears many hats. He primarily works with the girls program, from learn to skate up to recreational leagues. He also works with the kids and adult sled hockey teams, an experience that he cherishes greatly.
“It doesn’t matter how much traffic there is getting to the rink and how stressful it is racing there for practice,” he said. “You get there and the kids are all smiles. You’ll never hear anything negative from any of them. They’re all excited to be on the ice every minute of it. And it’s a blast.”
Kelley Steadman, current girls hockey development coordinator with the Tampa Bay Lightning and former national team player, has seen Mr. Kent’s growth as a coach.
“Over the last three years, he’s really put himself in a position where most of us are really comfortable letting him run with things when we aren’t there,” she said. ”I think that’s just a testament to him and how hard he works and the type of person he is.”
Mr. Kent comes back to his hometown in the summer to organize various summer programs and leagues, bringing what he’s learned in Tampa back to the Island.
“Especially in the summertime, the way I look at it is you have to let kids be kids,” he said. “A lot of the development just comes from the repetition of playing in games. Let the kids do their [skill] camps during the day, and then at night [for games], they’re gonna want to have fun with their friends. Because when I was a kid, that’s all I wanted to do.”
For Mr. Mincone, he will always feel like Mr. Kent’s coach, but he respects and appreciates what Mr. Kent brings back home.
“Coming back here and filling the role that was needed to run the high school league in the summer and run the camp and being the goalie technician and being good at it... he’s passionate about everything he does,” Mr. Mincone said. “He’s taken it to a different level to keep dreaming the dream even if the mold of the dream has changed.”
Climbing up the ranks in the sunshine state and the NHL is the immediate goal, but next summer, he wants to bring something new to the Vineyard.
“I’d like to bring a camp here exclusively for girls and have a couple of the Professional Women’s Hockey League players come down and have them coach,” he said. “Having them be able to be coached by some of the best women’s players in the country...I think that would go a really long way with the development of the girls’ programs here. Trying to piece that together is definitely top of my radar.”
He hopes that his unique journey continues inspiring young players on the Island.
“To know now that there are alternate routes, and to be able to share that with this next generation of kids [is exciting],” he said.“ A coach cutting you from a team doesn’t have to be the end of your story. If you keep pushing, you’ll find your spot. Especially as a hockey player, you just need to find a team. They don’t have to be the best team, they don’t have to be the worst team, but you just have to find a home and go from there.”
