From a small Canadian town, Shea Theodore is working his way to bigger things.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
The popular Seattle defenseman is developing a following as he leads the Thunderbirds (41-25-2-4) into the Western Hockey League playoffs Saturday against the Everett Silvertips (39-23-7-3). Face-off for Game 1 of the best-of-seven Western Conference series is 7:05 p.m. at the ShoWare Center.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
Theodore’s two goals from last Sunday’s regular-season finale, a 6-1 win over Tri-City, gave him 45 with the team, breaking the record held by Deron Quint (1993-1995) for most career goals by a T-Bird defenseman.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
While the 18-year-old Theodore continues to blossom for the T-Birds \u2014 so far he’s clocked 22 goals and 57 assists this season alone \u2014 he’s got an even brighter future possibly in the NHL.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
Last fall the Anaheim Ducks signed the Aldergrove, B.C., native as their first-round draft pick \u2013 26th overall choice in the NHL Draft \u2013 to a three-year-entry level contract. He will remain in the junior ranks until he finishes high school.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
He attended the Ducks training camp in 2012, a valuable experience for him.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
“Everything’s just at a higher level than you see here,” said the 6-foot-2, 180-pound Theodore. “Their job’s on the line every time they come into camp, so it was pretty cool to get to see.”<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
Getting drafted and playing for an NHL team means earning a professional salary.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
“If it’s your contract year and you’re trying to sign, it’s definitely a pivotal year,” Theodore said.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
Players who don’t sign with an NHL team often head to the American Hockey League, the 30-team development league that primarily feeds the NHL.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
Joining the T-Birds<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/p>\n Theodore grew up in rural town about five minutes from the U.S.-Canadian border and signed with the T-Birds in 2011 for a half-season. He returned to play his first full season in 2011-2012.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n The move down to Kent was a change, but Theodore most distinctly remembers the size of his audience.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n “I played my first few games as a 15-year-old, so going from playing in front of, I don’t know, probably 50 people at a Midget game up in the Fraser Valley to playing in front of probably 3,000 on an average nightly basis here … it’s pretty special,” he said.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n Theodore describes himself as an “offensive defenseman.”<\/p>\n<\/p>\n “I’m a D-man first,” he said, “but I’ll join the rush, sometimes I’ll lead the rush. You’re manning the point on the power play, you’re playing a lot of minutes.”<\/p>\n<\/p>\n He didn’t intend to adopt this style of play, he says, but it was a byproduct of circumstances.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n Playing on a small team in the 12,000-person town of Aldergrove forced Theodore to become a versatile player.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n “I grew up in a small town, so we didn’t have that many kids to pick from,” Theodore said.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n While larger cities in his area, such as Abbotsford, might attract 400 kids to try out for a 19-person team, the Aldergrove Snipers drew around 22.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n “Our team’s obviously not going to be as good, and I always had to step up going through minor hockey,” Theodore said. “So I kinda had to put a little bit of load on my back. I tried to do as much as I could growing up, and I guess that kinda just carried over and kinda made me the player that I am.”<\/p>\n<\/p>\n Theodore’s talent also has taken him around the world. He joined the Canadian under-18 championship team to play in Sochi, Russia in 2012 and followed it with playing in the U-18 championship team again in the Czech Republic in 2013. His team won gold medals both years.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n One of his toughest experiences, and the time he realized he needed to make some personal improvement, was after his under 17 championship team auditions.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n The under-17 and under-18 teams are all-star teams made up of the best young players in a country. Canada fields four teams. Theodore tried out for the under-17 team in 2011, but didn’t make the cut. He returned the next year to try out for the under-18 team and made it in, bypassing the U-17 that feeds most players to the U-18.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n With several successful seasons with the Thunderbirds behind him, as well as his work on the U-18 teams, Theodore will be a name to watch as he moves up in the ranks.<\/p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" From a small Canadian town, Shea Theodore is working his way to bigger things.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":213,"featured_media":19497,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"yst_prominent_words":[],"class_list":["post-19496","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19496"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/213"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=19496"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19496\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/19497"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=19496"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=19496"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=19496"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kentreporter.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=19496"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}