No Days Off

by Max Domi

  I tried to bring that urgency to the rink. My line mates for our first intersquad games were Martin Hanzal and Radim Vrbata, two guys from the Coyotes’ first line. When I saw my name on the whiteboard in the dressing room with Hanzal and Vrbata beside it, my first thought was, Wow, I can’t believe I get to play with these two guys. I knew it was a huge opportunity, and a great test.

  Hanzal and Vrbata could tell I was nervous. As we walked down the hallway, Hanzal gave me a little whack with his stick on the shin pads. “Relax,” he said. “Have some fun out there. Go be you.”

  I took his advice to heart, and it seemed to pay off when the coaching staff kept me around to the end of camp. I was thrilled—I was going to be playing in my first NHL games! They might have been preseason games, but I didn’t care. I was going to make my big league debut, and I couldn’t be happier. I immediately called my parents. “I’m going to be playing in my first NHL preseason game tomorrow!” I told them.

  “That’s incredible news, Max!” my mom said. “We’re so proud of you.”

  My dad was quick to tell me he would be there. I was pumped—to have him in the crowd was special to me.

  I wish I could say that the beginning of my NHL career was like something out of a Hollywood movie. Unfortunately, it wasn’t quite the movie I’d imagined

  It was September 15, 2013. We were playing the Los Angeles Kings that night. I tried to keep calm as I got ready for the game. Because of my nerves, my blood sugar had been low all day, so I was chugging apple juice before the game. I basically had a juice box glued to my hand while I got dressed, during warm-ups, all the way through the national anthem.

  The juice solved one problem—it kept my blood sugar levels up. But it created another issue. I was bloated from all the liquid in my stomach, so skating at top speed got harder each shift. And the more I pushed myself, the more upset my stomach became. There’s a lot of acid in apple juice—I didn’t have a chance.

  Partway through the second period, I got off the ice, and our head coach, Dave Tippett, tapped me on the shoulder, signaling he was double-shifting me. I jumped over the boards, and all of a sudden the nausea hit me like a brick wall. I took a deep breath and tried to swallow it down as I lined up for a face-off. One of the Kings defensemen was waiting for the puck drop when he caught my eye and asked, “Are you okay, man?” I could feel the sweat pouring off of my face—way more than there should have been.

  “I’m fine,” I managed to blurt out before tapping down my stick for the draw.

  The Kings won the face-off, and their defenseman started skating up the ice. He was my guy to cover, and I started racing after him. Then I felt my stomach bubble up. I looked to our bench, and I knew it was too far away. I’ll never make it, I thought. I immediately covered my mouth with my glove, and puked all of the juice I’d been drinking into it as I skated to the bench. There had to be a few liters of juice in my system at least. Thankfully, the Kings had turned the puck over and the play was going back toward their end. I dumped the vomit out of my glove and onto the ice, hoping nobody noticed, and hopped over the boards.

  When I sat down, I immediately started puking everywhere. My head was between my knees, and the whole time I was thinking that if this game was in Toronto, I would already be all over YouTube.

  All the coaches and all my teammates were immediately concerned. “Max, are you okay?” asked our trainer. “What’s wrong?” They thought it was something serious caused by my diabetes. I waved them off and tried to downplay it, but I was embarrassed and ashamed of what had happened.

  I made it through the rest of the game without any incident, but later one of our trainers expressed doubt about whether I would be able to withstand play in the NHL. I couldn’t blame him. I’d been able to get away with stuff like that in junior—sometimes guys could coast during a shift and still be effective if they got a lucky break. But the NHL was a whole different level. You couldn’t take a single second off. I wasn’t going to be able to coast my way through anything.

  I’d seen throughout training camp that it would take so much more than just talent to make it in the NHL: a heck of a lot more. And I knew I still had a long way to go. Physically, I was going to have to step up. But I would also have to be stronger mentally. I realized that getting even better at managing my diabetes would be the difference. Just working on hockey wasn’t going to be good enough; I needed to work on my discipline, too.

  I would have lots of time to do that. At the end of the preseason, our GM, Don Maloney, broke the news to me—I was being cut from the team that year and sent back to the OHL. I hadn’t seen it coming, but I tried to be positive.

  “You had a great camp,” Don said.

  “Thanks,” I replied.

  “You just have to get a year older and continue to get stronger,” he said.

  I thanked Don and Steve for the opportunity and promised I’d be back. But inside, I was confused and upset by Don’s answer. What did getting older have to do with anything? I just wanted someone to tell me why I wasn’t making the team, so I could go work on that.

  I liked to consider myself mature beyond my years. But my reaction to the news told a different story. I hadn’t ever experienced major failure like that before, and I didn’t handle it like an adult should. I flew back to London right away to get to the next Knights game. I was sitting in the middle seat of the plane, sporting a big black eye courtesy of a high stick from San Jose’s Scott Hannan. I was feeling so sorry for myself that, when I started to go low, I just kept wallowing in how bad I felt. I took care of my low, but I wasn’t interested in being positive or even in the exact level of my blood sugar, for that matter.

  I made it back in time for the game against Guelph, but I carried my foul mood with me—I got suspended in the first period for throwing an elbow to the head of Brock McGinn. McGinn later admitted to me that he sold the elbow to make it look worse than it was. Not that it mattered—that elbow I threw was a really dirty hockey play, and I deserved to be suspended.

  You’d think that a moment like that would be a wake-up call. It should have been, but I didn’t care after I got the news. My attitude was, I’m too good for this league—I felt like it was a waste of time to be back with the Knights. I was bitter and petty, constantly playing the blame game. I remember watching Coyotes games and thinking that I should be there. But, with time, I was able to see that I did have a lot to learn and a long way to go.

  In December 2013, Team Canada announced its roster for the World Juniors. The same way that I’d expected I would make the Coyotes, I assumed I had a good chance of making Team Canada. I mistook the few NHL preseason games I’d played for invaluable experience, and I was naïve enough to think that I had cemented a spot on Team Canada. I was so caught up in thinking that I should be in the NHL that I’d lost track of what was important—trying to get better on a day-by-day basis in London and earn a spot on Team Canada.

  The day of the announcement, I had a weird feeling in the pit of my stomach. A voice in the back of my head kept repeating, I didn’t make this team. I couldn’t explain it. I had never had a defeated thought like that before in my life, and I’d never been cut from a team before the Coyotes. But I couldn’t get that voice out of my head.

  I was at the rink getting ready for a Knights practice when I got the call from Scott Salmon at Hockey Canada. He was kind, but he got right to the point—I wouldn’t be playing for Team Canada that year.

  My brain shut off when I heard that. I thanked him for the opportunity and wished him luck. After we hung up, I went through practice, and then I went to work out with my trainer.

  I was in the gym for my warm-up, trying to act like what had just happened didn’t matter. I felt very emotional, but I tried to downplay what a big deal it was for me. Everything felt out of my power. I felt so shitty, like I couldn’t do anything to make a difference. What was the point in pushing so hard if I kept failing? It was easily the biggest sense of disappointment I had ever felt
in my hockey career.

  After the news was made public, I checked out who was on the roster. Bo had made it, and I was so happy for him. And another one of our teammates, Josh Anderson, would be going, too, which was fantastic. I was excited for both of them, and I wanted them to win. But knowing that I wouldn’t get to be there beside them just doubled my disappointment.

  The first person I called was my dad. I broke the news to him.

  “Don’t worry about it,” he said. “Focus on winning another championship with the Knights. That’s all you can control at this point.”

  The rest of my family called, along with my agent, Pat Brisson, and other friends. I tried to listen to the comforting words that everyone shared, but none of it made me feel any better.

  But then I got a call from Mark Hunter, the general manager of the Knights. He told me he thought I should be at the tournament, but that we would make the best of the situation, and that we would do something special in London.

  Mark’s words struck a chord. After our call, I looked at myself in the mirror, knowing that I had to change my ways. It was time to collect myself and grow up—I had no one to blame but myself. If I was going to succeed or fail, it was all up to me and my play on the ice. The ball was in my court; it always had been.

  Something clicked, and I went on a tear over the rest of the season—I ended up with thirty-four goals and ninety-three points in sixty-one games that year. More important, I didn’t have any more diabetic incidents that affected my play throughout that time. As summer approached, I felt stronger and more assured every single day. I knew what I could do if I kept my body healthy and my mind in the right place.

  I didn’t know if all of that would be good enough to play in the NHL the next season. But at least I was one step closer to my dream. After everything that had happened that year, that was a start.

  7 WILLPOWER IS A SUPERPOWER

  I went back to Coyotes training camp for the second time in September 2014. What a difference a year made. At my first NHL training camp the previous year, I had been in awe of everything that was going on. My anxiety had been through the roof, and the practices had been like nothing I’d ever experienced.

  When I showed up for my second camp, I didn’t have quite the same deer-stuck-in-the-headlights feeling. I had traveled with the guys on the team, I had practiced with the boys, and I knew the coaches a little bit better. In some small way, I felt like I belonged a bit more than I had the first time around. It was a refreshing feeling.

  My second year was still a challenge, but not even close to what I had gone through during my first camp. I did everything I could to make things easier on myself, too. Our first trip that camp, I sat down and made myself a checklist of what I needed to pack. Some of the items were no-brainers—toothbrush, deodorant, clothes. But others were things that no other player would pack—gluten-free snacks, insulin, test strips, batteries for my glucose meter. The guys on the team teased me for overpacking, but I found the exercise calmed me down. I knew I was prepared and that I had everything I could possibly need on the road if something went wrong.

  The preparation seemed to help, as I played really well throughout camp and felt I was making an impact during our preseason games. I had put the previous year behind me. I really felt that I could have played in the NHL that year. But the Coyotes felt differently—they sent me back to London a second time, even earlier into camp than they had the year before.

  The day that I was packing up to leave, our general manager, Don Maloney, came by to wish good luck to me and the other guys leaving camp.

  “Don,” I said as we shook hands, “last year I was told I had to get a year older and a year stronger. I did that. Can I ask, then, why I’m going back to London?”

  Don smiled. “Another year of getting stronger won’t hurt,” he said. “I’ve seen young players in the past be thrown into the pros too early—it’s not usually a good thing for them. When you come into the league, I want you to stay in the league.”

  I appreciated Don’s insight, even if I didn’t fully agree. But there was one difference that year, compared to the year before. Our head coach, Dave Tippett, pulled me aside just before I left.

  “You can take being sent down however you want,” he told me. “But if you want to be in the NHL next year, you can’t afford to feel bad for yourself. You can’t afford to mope around and think you’re too good for the OHL. The window to make this team is small for everyone. We see you as being a big piece of this team. My challenge to you is to treat every day in London this year as if you’re in the NHL. Practice habits, eating right, preparation. Do it all like a pro, and become a leader.”

  I’ve always been competitive, so if someone gives me a challenge, I take it. Dave Tippett gave me a challenge for that last year in London, and I embraced it.

  Because of that, I had a much better attitude heading back to the OHL that year. I didn’t see junior as punishment for not making the Coyotes roster; instead, I took it as an opportunity. I was determined to dominate junior hockey right away, so as soon as I got back I went right to work. I wanted to prove to everyone—my teammates, the Coyotes coaches, the Team Canada management—that I could be the mature player they wanted me to be. I hadn’t forgotten being cut from the Team Canada World Junior team the year before. The tournament was going to be held jointly in Montreal and Toronto that year, and I wanted to be on the ice for it.

  I played the best hockey of my life in the first few months after the Coyotes camp. I started to incorporate the lessons I’d learned and observed at the NHL camps into my game. Even just the few brief weeks I’d spent around NHL players had given me an appreciation for the finer points of the game. One of the most important takeaways that had hit home during my second camp was that scoring on an NHL goalie is a hell of a lot harder than it is in the OHL.

  In junior, you can beat goalies from the top of the circle with a well-placed shot. But the best players in the world have a hard time beating even an average goalie in the NHL with the same shot. NHL goalies have sound positioning, they’re big, and their equipment doesn’t leave many holes. And most fans don’t realize how fast NHL goalies are. In the NHL, you know that you’re probably not going to beat the goalie with the first shot, and you’re probably not even going to beat him on the second shot, either, because he can move so quickly to reposition himself after the rebound—Jonathan Quick in Los Angeles is the best at it; he will battle right to the end. Most of the time in the NHL, you’re going to have to get a third chance to score.

  Of course, all that time you’re trying to score on second and third chances, the other team’s defensemen are doing whatever they have to do to clear the front of the net. Guys block shots in the OHL, but not as often as they do in the NHL. Getting a shot through is probably the hardest part of trying to score goals in the NHL. There are very few players in the NHL who can walk off the half wall and beat a goalie clean. So I was excited to learn how to score goals in new ways.

  Armed with that knowledge, I had a ton of confidence for my final year of junior hockey. And it paid off. A couple of weeks after I got back to London, we had a game in Kitchener. Not only did we win that night, but I had a couple of goals and two assists. I could feel things clicking on the ice in a way that I never had before.

  There was a great energy to the team that year. Mitch Marner had joined the Knights the year before, and even at that young age, his skills were unreal. He was a natural leader, and there wasn’t anything he couldn’t do with the puck. Watching guys like Mitch and Christian Dvorak develop their game and seeing the passion they brought motivated me to work that much harder. And they were just two of the many players from the Knights who would go on to break into the NHL during that period. It was a special time, and I wanted to make the most of it.

  At the same time that I was starting to learn ways to score more effectively, my understanding and control of my diabetes was also getting better. For me, when I’m low, it can take up to f
ifteen minutes after I eat or drink something until my blood sugar levels are back to normal. I’d known that for a while, but still, those fifteen minutes could feel like an eternity as my body processed the sugar in my system. Mentally, I could push myself through some of the lows, but I finally accepted that it was essential that my body be in the same state as my mind. As frustrating as it might be at times, I understood that I had to let my body catch up to my mind if I was going to perform at my best.

  Before that year, when I went low in a hockey game, I would be in a foul mood for the full fifteen minutes as I waited for my blood sugar to come back up. It would affect how I acted on the bench and how I performed on the ice. My teammates must have hated it. But as my willpower got stronger and stronger throughout the season, I learned how to control my own actions and reactions. The moment I saw someone about to give me some Gatorade or some juice, even if I physically felt like garbage, I accepted their help, and then I could walk myself through the next few minutes, visualizing what would happen and telling myself that everything would be all right. Before I knew it, my blood sugar would bounce back up, and I would be ready to roll again. It seemed I had finally come to a point in my life where I was prepared and responsible.

  Late into my final season with the Knights, our team was about to head on a road trip. Like I did before every road trip, I lay down for a nap for a few hours before the bus left. Shortly before I had to be at the rink, Gail called upstairs to me, telling me it was time to get ready. A few minutes later, she yelled up to say it was almost time to go.