WHERE ARE THEY NOW — Laluk’s WHL days add up to future success

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Scott Laluk never imagined he would have a chance to enjoy what would prove to be one of the most formative experiences of his life.

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Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 08/01/2018 (2271 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Scott Laluk never imagined he would have a chance to enjoy what would prove to be one of the most formative experiences of his life.

Laluk, now 42, played three seasons with his hometown Brandon Wheat Kings from 1992 to 1995, and was a part of what would prove to be one of the most important deals in team history.

“The character development that I got from being around people like (general manager) Kelly (McCrimmon) and (head coach) Bobby (Lowes) and (assistant coach) Johnny (Mark Johnston) and my team, sets me apart today from people because I feel that they’ve given me the skills to be better at what I do every day,” Laluk said. “You can’t teach culture. You can’t teach work ethic like they do. I don’t know what the formula is, but the environment in that Wheat King dressing room is second to none.

Submitted
Former Brandon Wheat King defenceman Scott Laluk poses with his wife Jennifer and sons Benjamin, 5, and Zachary, 8. The Brandonite played with the Wheat Kings for three seasons from 1992-95.
Submitted Former Brandon Wheat King defenceman Scott Laluk poses with his wife Jennifer and sons Benjamin, 5, and Zachary, 8. The Brandonite played with the Wheat Kings for three seasons from 1992-95.

“If you’re a dad or mom and your son gets drafted to the Brandon Wheat Kings, you should be ecstatic because you know that you’re going to get the best for your child. I really feel strongly about that.”

He had similar luck growing up.

Laluk said his parents Harvey and Barbara, who still live in Brandon, were instrumental in getting their six children into activities when he was young.

Scott started skating at age five, going through the CanSkate and power-skating programs, and followed his older brother Craig into hockey, playing with the Oilers at the Valleyview Community Centre at age seven.

While he had success on the ice as he went through the minor hockey system, he never dreamed that one day he could be a Wheat King.

“They were gods when I was a kid,” he said. “The idea of playing there was never in the back of my mind. I was just playing because I loved playing and loved playing with my buddies. I don’t know that it was ever really a goal of mine.”

He played his first year in the Manitoba AAA Midget Hockey League with the Wheat Kings as a 15-year-old — which was then major bantam — and also as a 16-year-old.

In his two seasons with the midgets, the team won the regular season championship both years, losing in the final in the 1991-92 season to the Winnipeg Hawks. Coincidentally, the Tom Skinner-coached team is thinking about getting back together and putting an entry into an upcoming tournament in Grand Forks, N.D.

“We just had a really special group of guys who bonded together, and fell short at the end, which was a shame,” Laluk said. “We had one of the best midget teams certainly in the province that year and we should have taken a shot at the Air Canada Cup that year.”

Meanwhile, another part of his hockey path had been charted.

Laluk remembers a visit by Johnston to tell him that he had been listed by the Wheat Kings as a minor bantam. When Johnston asked Laluk what he thought, the youngster was flabbergasted.

“I didn’t even think this was on the table,” Laluk recalled. “It kind of blew me away. I remember him leaving and my dad and I giving each other a big hug, going ‘What just happened?’ We grew up going to these games and watching these guys who were so great, and to think that was going to be part of your life was just an amazing experience.”

Laluk would start his WHL career as a 17-year-old in the 1992-93 season; the team would make the largest turnaround in Canadian Hockey League history, from 28 points the year previous to 90 points. He would join a blue-line that featured Wade Redden, Aris Brimanis, Ryan Smith, Craig Geekie, Dwayne Gylywoychuk and Jeff Staples.

His first concern was finishing Grade 12 at Vincent Massey with university entrance-level courses, something that was arranged for him.

“I just felt really cared for and really accommodated for,” Laluk said. “Kelly was fine with me finishing up at Massey whereas most of the guys go to Crocus. It was just a good time. I was so excited. I felt really privileged the whole time, with the guys I met who have become great friends over the years. Life takes us on our own paths but whenever you get a chance to see them, it’s always great to see those guys.”

Laluk played in 42 games that season, earning three assists, but said he carried a sense of wonderment that entire year.

“It was almost surreal to think that this dressing room that I’ve been in before is now my dressing room and these are my guys and I’m part of this journey,” Laluk said.

Led by Marty Murray, Bobby House, Mike Maneluk, Trevor Robins and a host of others, the Wheat Kings went 43-25-4, to finish second in the East Division. Though they would be ousted in the first round of the playoffs by a veteran Medicine Hat Tigers team that had underperformed during the regular season, a corner had been turned by the franchise. Brandon has missed the playoffs twice since that season.

“We took a team that couldn’t find a way to win to a team that always found a way to win,” Laluk said. “It was so exciting to be part of that. It was a fun time to be a Wheat King. It’s almost felt like a transition year.”

Laluk marvels at the culture that the franchise developed.

He said the organization managed to develop a closeness and an accountability at the same time.

“It was just everything,” Laluk said. “Dilly (Rick Dillabough) and Lyn (Shannon) and everybody who was in the front office, there was a great family feel to it but there was a still a culture to it that this is semi-professional hockey but we still care for each other. It was just a great environment to be in. Bobby (Lowes), what a coach to have when I came in, and what a person, and to have Johnny there the whole time, I felt really lucky. I always had someone to go to. I loved my experience there.”

Laluk was a puck-moving defenceman who skated well. He was never a front-line guy on those star-studded teams, but instead was a strong contributor who took advantage of everything he was given.

File
Brandon Wheat Kings defenceman Scott Laluk during the 1993-94 WHL season.
File Brandon Wheat Kings defenceman Scott Laluk during the 1993-94 WHL season.

In his second season, he scored twice and added 18 assists in 68 games, with seven more points in 14 playoff games, and in his final season as a Wheat King in 1994-95, he scored four goals and added 19 assists in 60 games.

A move that the Wheat Kings made in January 1995 to shore up their offence would affect Laluk, although it was months before he would know it. Rising star Mike Leclerc and Alexandre Vasilevskii were acquired by Brandon from the Prince George Cougars for defenceman Ian Walterson, winger Chris Low and future considerations.

Brandon lost to the Kamloops Blazers in the league final, and since the WHL champions were the Memorial Cup host that year, the Wheat Kings earned a berth as well. Laluk would score on future National Hockey League star Jose Theodore in a Brandon victory during the round robin.

He said he vividly remembers every game they played in Kamloops.

After the season ended with a 2-1 loss to the Detroit Junior Red Wings in the Memorial Cup semifinal, Laluk and forward Colin Cloutier soon learned that they were the futures in the deal and were headed to Prince George.

“It was a bit tough,” Laluk said. “P.G. at the time wasn’t the strongest team and we continued not to have a great team that year. It was especially hard to go knowing the Wheat Kings had such a great team coming back again. The hardest moment of that year was going into Brandon with our team knowing that you’re playing a great team and losing. It was a long bus ride to Regina or wherever we played next because that was home and it was hard not to be there.

“But I had a ton of great experiences out in Prince George.”

Laluk made the most of the opportunity, scoring 12 goals and adding 22 assists in his 67-game overage season in 1995-96 as Leclerc led his former Brandon teammates to a league title.

Laluk joined the University of Manitoba Bisons in the 1996-97 season, and would spend four years there. The Wheat Kings had given him a head start by paying for two university courses per term, and he went to Brandon University with his close friend, goalie Byron Penstock.

Prince George did the same, so by the time Laluk left the WHL he had a year-and-a-half of university courses completed.

At the U of M, he completed a four-year Commerce degree.

Laluk worked with PricewaterhouseCoopers for 12 years, moving to the Cayman Islands in 2003, where he met his Saskatchewan-born wife Jennifer and the couple had their first son Zachary, now 8.

The family returned to Canada in 2011 and settled in Calgary before their second son Benjamin, 5, was born.

Laluk joined MNP, saying their values align with his own, and has worked for the once Brandon-based firm ever since.

Like many former Wheat Kings who had left the arena behind them, Laluk returned to the rink when Zachary, who now plays in the novice age division, started in the game. Benjamin is now in TimBits, so he spends plenty of time at the rink, although both also love to ski. They’re also in taekwondo and taking piano and hiphop lessons.

“They really want everything and I feel really happy that I can give that to them and let them choose what they want at some point in their life,” Laluk said.

Laluk calls his Wheat King years a special time in his life that’s impossible to get back, adding he still has his jackets, jerseys and hockey cards. He ran into McCrimmon a few years ago at Clear Lake and was surprised at how warmly his former general manager greeted him, saying it proves that once you’re a Wheat King, you’re always a Wheat King.

“It gave me a great sense of pride to be able to play for the Wheat Kings in front of my friends and family,” Laluk said. “I wasn’t the best Wheat King when I played but I did the best that I could. I was proud to be part of the development of a program that is now world class. There are few to no programs that are as good as what Brandon has put out for two decades. I’m proud to be part of that and I think Brandon should be proud to have it.”

» pbergson@brandonsun.com

» Twitter: @PerryBergson

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