Uncle Teddy
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THAT WAS THEN ...
Swapping blades for cleats in Scarborough
Soccer has rapidly displaced minor-league hockey as the community's sport of choice. Gone are the glory days of shinny, wrist shots, power lessons - and dreams of making the NHL, reports Peter Cheney
PETER CHENEY
December 27, 2008
When Canada's world junior hockey team took to the ice yesterday, the Toronto area was well represented - by nearly a third of the roster. There were players from Maple, Oakville and King City. Woodbridge, too. But there were no players from Scarborough.
Comedian Mike Myers's street-hockey skits may have made Scarborough a famous hockey town, but that reality has been replaced with a new one. In Scarborough, hockey is rapidly becoming the game of the past.
"It's what we grew up with, but the new kids aren't playing it," says Colleen McInroy, whose 15-year-old son plays with the Scarborough Young Bruins. "They're playing other sports. It's sad."
Ms. McInroy reflected on the fate of the game at Scarborough Gardens Arena, a facility that opened its doors in 1967. Then, Scarborough was home to one of the busiest minor-hockey associations in Canada, with 10,000 registered players.
Things have changed since then. The Gardens, on Birchmount just off Kingston Road, used to be packed. Now, the stands are nearly empty most nights, and few of the young players that take to the ice are locals. The once-thriving Scarborough Hockey Association has followed a trajectory that could be compared to that of the North American car industry. Over the past two decades, the number of players has fallen nearly 75 per cent, from 10,000 to about 2,800.
"It's hard to watch," SHA president John Kelloway says. "This is not happy situation."
The decline of hockey in Scarborough is the result of a sweeping demographic and economic change that has altered the face of the community - and the fate of Canada's national game. In the 1950s and 60s, Scarborough was a WASP bastion where homes echoed to the voice of Foster Hewitt and bedroom walls were papered with Bobby Orr and Dave Keon posters.
That has rapidly given way to a new, multi-ethnic reality that includes everything from Tamils to Tanzanians to Armenians. From 1961 to 1970, new immigrants made up just 6 per cent of Scarborough's population. By the 1980s, that figure had more than doubled, to 14 per cent. And, according to the 2006 Statistics Canada census, the number is now more than 34 per cent.
Scarborough's fastest-growing new cultural group is South Asian, which has more than tripled since 1996. They have brought with them a new sporting universe, where the heroes are not Sidney Crosby and Wayne Gretzky, but soccer icon David Beckham and cricket superstar Imran Khan.
Soccer has rapidly displaced hockey as Scarborough's sport of choice. There are about 11,000 players registered. The Scarborough Soccer Association has nearly 8,000, and an estimated 3,000 belong to other organizations, including Tamil and Chinese leagues.
The signs of soccer's ascent are easy to find.
Clairlea, once a hockey arena, was converted to an indoor two-pad soccer pitch, now called the Scarborough Soccer Centre, in 1992. The soccer centre, just off Warden Avenue, is part of a trend - 18 years ago, there were just two indoor soccer fields in the GTA. Now, there are more than 30.
"This is a highly ethnic community," says John DeBenedictis, owner of a soccer store called JMT Metrosport. "They're going to pick soccer because that's what they grew up with."
His thesis was borne out at the Metro Sports Centre indoor pitch, a disused factory off Birchmount that has been lined with Astroturf. At a night soccer practice recently, there were hundreds of young boys and girls on hand. Among them was the nine-year-old son of Errol Viegas, a technical systems manager who immigrated to Canada after a childhood in Tanzania, where soccer was the only game in town. "Everyone played," Mr. Viegas says. "To me, soccer is the No. 1 game in the world. I love it."
On the bleacher behind him was soccer dad Tom Hendry, raised in Scotland, and a soccer fanatic. Next to him was John Allen, a 51-year-old playwright who grew up playing hockey in the Great Toronto Hockey League, but chose soccer for his nine-year-old son.
"To me, hockey represents the worst part of our culture," Mr. Allen says. "I had enough of it. I got sick of the Omega Man hockey dads. You'd see them in the hockey jackets, smoking outside the rink, waiting for the Porsche they're going to get when their kid signs with the NHL."
Cultural change is not the only obstacle that hockey faces. There is also the matter of rising costs. Marty Cairns, a chartered accountant who has coached in the GTHL, says the average annual cost of a season in the Double-A division, including team fees, equipment and travel, runs from $5,000 to more than $8,000. Triple-A can cost twice that.
"I don't know how people do it," Mr. Cairns says as he watches his 16-year-old son, Ryan, play at Scarborough Gardens Arena. "Not everyone has enough money for this."
The cost of hockey is a problem that afflicts the entire GTA. And it all comes down to real estate. Land in the Toronto area is some of the most expensive in the country, and virtually all of it is spoken for. There are only 52 arenas in the GTA, and it has been more than two decades since a new one was built. Ice time costs more than anywhere else in Canada - some private arenas charge nearly $300 an hour.
For many new Canadians, the cost of hockey makes the sport a non-starter.
Alex Oprea grew up itching to play Canada's national sport, only to be frozen out by its economics. So he played soccer instead. "My parents couldn't afford hockey," he says. "I wish I could have played, but I didn't. That was our life."
Mr. Oprea, now a 28-year-old teacher, came to Canada as a child from Albania. Both his parents were engineers, but their credentials weren't recognized, limiting the family's income. Their story was typical of Scarborough in the 1980s and 1990s. "Everyone I knew was like us," Mr. Oprea says.
For Scarborough hockey, the results have been cataclysmic. In the past two years alone, three hockey house leagues have folded because of falling enrolment. One of them was the Scarborough Young Leafs, which dated to the 1940s.
"A lot of history is going down the tubes," Mr. Kelloway says. "But it's hard to stop what's happening. There are a lot of things going against us."
THAT WAS THEN ...
Swapping blades for cleats in Scarborough
Soccer has rapidly displaced minor-league hockey as the community's sport of choice. Gone are the glory days of shinny, wrist shots, power lessons - and dreams of making the NHL, reports Peter Cheney
PETER CHENEY
December 27, 2008
When Canada's world junior hockey team took to the ice yesterday, the Toronto area was well represented - by nearly a third of the roster. There were players from Maple, Oakville and King City. Woodbridge, too. But there were no players from Scarborough.
Comedian Mike Myers's street-hockey skits may have made Scarborough a famous hockey town, but that reality has been replaced with a new one. In Scarborough, hockey is rapidly becoming the game of the past.
"It's what we grew up with, but the new kids aren't playing it," says Colleen McInroy, whose 15-year-old son plays with the Scarborough Young Bruins. "They're playing other sports. It's sad."
Ms. McInroy reflected on the fate of the game at Scarborough Gardens Arena, a facility that opened its doors in 1967. Then, Scarborough was home to one of the busiest minor-hockey associations in Canada, with 10,000 registered players.
Things have changed since then. The Gardens, on Birchmount just off Kingston Road, used to be packed. Now, the stands are nearly empty most nights, and few of the young players that take to the ice are locals. The once-thriving Scarborough Hockey Association has followed a trajectory that could be compared to that of the North American car industry. Over the past two decades, the number of players has fallen nearly 75 per cent, from 10,000 to about 2,800.
"It's hard to watch," SHA president John Kelloway says. "This is not happy situation."
The decline of hockey in Scarborough is the result of a sweeping demographic and economic change that has altered the face of the community - and the fate of Canada's national game. In the 1950s and 60s, Scarborough was a WASP bastion where homes echoed to the voice of Foster Hewitt and bedroom walls were papered with Bobby Orr and Dave Keon posters.
That has rapidly given way to a new, multi-ethnic reality that includes everything from Tamils to Tanzanians to Armenians. From 1961 to 1970, new immigrants made up just 6 per cent of Scarborough's population. By the 1980s, that figure had more than doubled, to 14 per cent. And, according to the 2006 Statistics Canada census, the number is now more than 34 per cent.
Scarborough's fastest-growing new cultural group is South Asian, which has more than tripled since 1996. They have brought with them a new sporting universe, where the heroes are not Sidney Crosby and Wayne Gretzky, but soccer icon David Beckham and cricket superstar Imran Khan.
Soccer has rapidly displaced hockey as Scarborough's sport of choice. There are about 11,000 players registered. The Scarborough Soccer Association has nearly 8,000, and an estimated 3,000 belong to other organizations, including Tamil and Chinese leagues.
The signs of soccer's ascent are easy to find.
Clairlea, once a hockey arena, was converted to an indoor two-pad soccer pitch, now called the Scarborough Soccer Centre, in 1992. The soccer centre, just off Warden Avenue, is part of a trend - 18 years ago, there were just two indoor soccer fields in the GTA. Now, there are more than 30.
"This is a highly ethnic community," says John DeBenedictis, owner of a soccer store called JMT Metrosport. "They're going to pick soccer because that's what they grew up with."
His thesis was borne out at the Metro Sports Centre indoor pitch, a disused factory off Birchmount that has been lined with Astroturf. At a night soccer practice recently, there were hundreds of young boys and girls on hand. Among them was the nine-year-old son of Errol Viegas, a technical systems manager who immigrated to Canada after a childhood in Tanzania, where soccer was the only game in town. "Everyone played," Mr. Viegas says. "To me, soccer is the No. 1 game in the world. I love it."
On the bleacher behind him was soccer dad Tom Hendry, raised in Scotland, and a soccer fanatic. Next to him was John Allen, a 51-year-old playwright who grew up playing hockey in the Great Toronto Hockey League, but chose soccer for his nine-year-old son.
"To me, hockey represents the worst part of our culture," Mr. Allen says. "I had enough of it. I got sick of the Omega Man hockey dads. You'd see them in the hockey jackets, smoking outside the rink, waiting for the Porsche they're going to get when their kid signs with the NHL."
Cultural change is not the only obstacle that hockey faces. There is also the matter of rising costs. Marty Cairns, a chartered accountant who has coached in the GTHL, says the average annual cost of a season in the Double-A division, including team fees, equipment and travel, runs from $5,000 to more than $8,000. Triple-A can cost twice that.
"I don't know how people do it," Mr. Cairns says as he watches his 16-year-old son, Ryan, play at Scarborough Gardens Arena. "Not everyone has enough money for this."
The cost of hockey is a problem that afflicts the entire GTA. And it all comes down to real estate. Land in the Toronto area is some of the most expensive in the country, and virtually all of it is spoken for. There are only 52 arenas in the GTA, and it has been more than two decades since a new one was built. Ice time costs more than anywhere else in Canada - some private arenas charge nearly $300 an hour.
For many new Canadians, the cost of hockey makes the sport a non-starter.
Alex Oprea grew up itching to play Canada's national sport, only to be frozen out by its economics. So he played soccer instead. "My parents couldn't afford hockey," he says. "I wish I could have played, but I didn't. That was our life."
Mr. Oprea, now a 28-year-old teacher, came to Canada as a child from Albania. Both his parents were engineers, but their credentials weren't recognized, limiting the family's income. Their story was typical of Scarborough in the 1980s and 1990s. "Everyone I knew was like us," Mr. Oprea says.
For Scarborough hockey, the results have been cataclysmic. In the past two years alone, three hockey house leagues have folded because of falling enrolment. One of them was the Scarborough Young Leafs, which dated to the 1940s.
"A lot of history is going down the tubes," Mr. Kelloway says. "But it's hard to stop what's happening. There are a lot of things going against us."
