Photo: Todd Pederson
19-year-old Thomas Stewart has been named Captain of the Winnipeg Freeze for the upcoming 2024-25 season.
“It’s obviously a huge honour”, Stewart explained. “I’m coming up on my third year in the organization. Talking to (Head Coach) Jay (Pylypuik) over the summer, we debriefed here and there. Probably back in August, he brought it up and dropped the idea on me and I quickly said yes. It’s a great honour to be the captain of the Freeze and I want to lead the team this year.”
Stewart says his leadership style is going to be aided by someone in particular who had a big impact on him. “I look to a guy like Tyler Parr. He’s currently playing with the Saskatoon Blades (WHL). I remember back in our bantam year at RHA, he had a presence, he could control the room, he had a lot of authority. He was a good guy, good in the room and good player. That’s a guy I want to take after. Being there for everyone, pushing everyone, being hard on everyone during practice and games, as well as the gym. I want to be there for everyone and someone the younger guys can look up to.”
Coming into the year, Stewart knows it will be a young group but at 19 years old, he also recognizes what he does now can help be the foundation for the franchise going forward. “We’ve been a pretty young group the last couple of years. I was in the leadership group last year, but this year is different being the captain. Having the younger group and a lot of new faces, a big part of things is getting them comfortable. Showing them what junior hockey is like is very important. At the end of the day, remember that we’re playing hockey, a game we love, we enjoy playing. We want to make it a good experience while pushing the franchise to being a playoff contender.”
In his mind, Stewart has some intangibles he wants to start instilling right away like competitiveness, feisty, effort, and heart. “It’s a mindset going into every practice, every day, every game. We can play with these teams, we can beat these teams. So, getting into that head space and continuing to push every single day. We want to have an attitude, we want to compete and we’re going to keep building that every single day. We want to build expectations every single year.”
“We have guys in the WHL and it’s that stuff that gets me and other guys excited. It’s a goal to promote guys from this team to the next levels of hockey. For now, it’s about taking it a day at a time and continuing to push forward.”
Looking back at that day in August when he was told he’d be captain, Stewart says there was one particular person he had to call first. “My dad. He’s been the one pushing me in my hockey career. He’s always kept up with everything, pushing me to get better every day. I look up to him and I was proud to tell him I was chosen as captain.”
The Winnipeg Freeze open the regular season on the road against the Niverville Nighthawks on September 20th. Their home opener is September 27th against the Selkirk Steelers.