Ty Young had an affinity for both Amazing Race Canada and the Vancouver Canucks as a kid.
Young’s a 20-year-old netminding prospect for the Canucks now, and he popped up in an episode of Amazing Race Canada that aired last week, helping out host Jon Montgomery on the ice at the Abbotsford Centre.
Sporting a Abbotsford Canucks jersey and his goal pads, Young acted as referee for the breakaway challenge between the two-person teams, determining whether pucks crossed the goal line or not. The episode was shot in the spring during Abbotsford’s run to the AHL Calder Cup championship, and Young was a third-string netminder with the club at the time.
Young grew up in Lethbridge and watched Amazing Race Canada with his older brother Zach, who is two years his senior. They routinely talked about how much fun the show looked, and Young says that “seeing it now, I think it really would be a cool experience.”
He was a Canucks fan growing up in Lethbridge, too, which couldn’t have been all that easy with Calgary about a two-hour drive away. Young believes it stemmed from visiting extended family in B.C. frequently, from “driving past Rogers Arena millions of times, just looking up at it.”
He even had a Roberto Luongo replica jersey hanging in his bedroom.
“I loved Luongo and players like Alex Burrows and the Sedins. I grew up watching that team. They were my favourite,” he said. “The first NHL game I ever went to was St. Louis against Calgary in Calgary. My mom and my brother were Flames fans. After that, I was begging to see a Canucks game, so we went and watched them play in Calgary. I still had my Vancouver jersey on, because that was my team.”
Young saw game action with both Abbotsford and the ECHL’s Kalamazoo Wings last season. With Calder Cup star Artūrs Šilovs traded to the Pittsburgh Penguins earlier this month, Young is a good bet to share the net in Abbotsford with returnee Nikita Tolopilo.
All the bouncing around between teams last year also saw Young get called up to Vancouver for a single day, and he wound up taking part in a practice with the big club at Rogers Arena.
“That was definitely one of the highlights of my year,” said Young.
The 6-foot-3, 187-pound Young had a 10-9-2 record, with a 2.53 goals against average and a .926 save percentage, in 22 regular season games with Kalamazoo. In 11 games with Abbotsford, he was 8-3-0, with a 2.72 goals against average and a .904 save percentage.
Young was 44-35-7-3, with 3.36 goals against average and a .896 save percentage in 97 career regular season games in the WHL with the Prince George Cougars before turning pro this past season. He was a 2022 fifth-round draft choice by the Canucks.
He has obviously watched plenty of Luongo’s game over the years. He also tried to replicate things he’s seen from former Montreal Canadiens backstop Carey Price, with “the level of skating” and with “how calm he played.”
“Nothing ever really phased him. He was always cool, calm, collected in the net, and that’s a thing I want to be elite at as well,” Young said.
Young feels like there’s an increased expectation on him this year, and he wants to “show that I’m putting in the work and putting in the effort to continue to improve.”
“Opportunities are huge. You have to be on your game at all times,” he added. “You have to be patient, but at the same time you have to be ready whenever you get the call.”
As for the Amazing Race Canada experience, he said that Montgomery was fun to be around and seemed to enjoy the chance to play some hockey that day. Asked to pick a teammate who he could sign up to compete with, Young named his Kalamazoo netminding partner Jonathan Lemieux, explaining that “he could be pretty fun to go do that with.”
“The competitions are all real,” Young said when asked if things get edited up a bunch. “There are some things like with sound that you have to do again to make sure everything is right, but the competitions are how you see them.”
Vancouver Canucks goalie Ty Young skates back to the net after taking a break during the opening day of the NHL hockey team’s training camp, in Victoria in September 2023. Young agreed to a three-year, entry-level contract with the Vancouver Canucks.