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Campus Convos: Tyler Irvine

By Craig Peterson, 11/14/17, 7:30PM EST

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"There were times I told my parents, ‘I don’t think I can do this anymore.’"

In our Campus Conversations, we sit down one-on-one with some of our alumni playing Division-I NCAA hockey. They offer candid comments and insight into the world of hockey after high school, including life in juniors and the process of getting to the next level. Check out their first-hand accounts of triumphs and successes as well as struggles and failures along their journey to playing college hockey.

This week, we feature Livonia Stevenson alum and current Merrimack College forward, Tyler Irvine.

Like a badge of honor, Irvine prefaced the conversation by saying he had never played a day of Triple-A hockey. He played two seasons of varsity hockey for Livonia Stevenson, earning Second-Team All-State honors as a junior and First-Team honors as a senior. In 57 career MI-HS games, Irvine scored 46 goals and 130 points, playing a pivotal role in Stevenson’s first ever Division-II state championship run in 2013.

A long road, but successful junior career, Irvine went to the NAHL after his senior season to play for the Topeka Roadrunners. After scoring 17 goals and 34 points in 57 games with Topeka in 2014-15, Irvine made the jump to the USHL the following season. There, he played 26 games with Cedar Rapids before being traded to the Muskegon Lumberjacks mid-season. He finished the year with five goals and 15 points in 26 games with Muskegon and made his college commitment to Merrimack College in Hockey East.

As a freshman in 2016-17, Irvine played in all but one game for the Warriors, scoring six goals and 10 points. He earned Hockey East Rookie of the Week honors twice last season and recorded the game-winning goal in Merrimack’s first win of the 2017-18 season against Massachusetts. His sophomore season with the Warriors marks the first time since high school that he has played for the same team in consecutive seasons.

This Week’s Campus Convo with Tyler Irvine:

Hub: Going from high school to juniors and juniors to college, how do you explain your journey?

TI: “It’s like coach [Dave] Mitchell always says, it’s a process. If you put in the work, if you try your hardest, the scouts will find you, it doesn’t matter what league you’re in. They found me and Dom [Lutz], they found a bunch of other kids. Its how hard you are willing to work, your work ethic; you control your own destiny.”

Hub: ‘Control your own destiny’...How were you able to control your own destiny then? What did you do specifically to set yourself apart?

TI: “Freshman year, I got cut from the high school team. Sophomore year, I wanted to play high school and didn’t make it. I started working out and lifting as hard as I could every day; stuff that no one sees. Then I finally made the team my junior year...You let that fuel you. You keep working out when no one’s watching. You do the little things, stay after practice, last one off the ice and first one going on.”

Hub: What one piece of advice would you give players new to junior hockey?

TI: “One major thing with junior hockey that some kids don’t realize is that you can take one online course. So each semester I was out playing junior hockey -- everyone wants to ‘chase the dream’ and play D-I hockey -- it’s scary to take three years off from getting your life started in college. It’s like you’re gambling, you don’t know what’s gonna happen. So with my two years off, every semester I was out I took one online course so that when I did go in my freshman year, I was 17 credits ahead of the normal freshmen. That’s a really big thing that kids don’t realize, you can take one course each semester and it will really help you going in.

“Then let’s say it doesn’t work out and you could say ‘well, I’m playing juniors but I didn’t get that scholarship.’ Well now I have this to fall back on and can go to school now. It’s not as bad as if I was just out completely.”

Hub: Did that risk or uncertainty ever make you hesitate or want to quit ‘chasing the dream’?

TI: “Seeing all the stories and texts from your buddies back home going to school and you’re out in Topeka, Kansas, playing hockey? Yea, I questioned ‘did I make the right move?’ But I’ll tell you in the end, when you get that D-I commit and scholarship to help you out, it’s well worth it.”

Hub: You were traded in the USHL from Cedar Rapids to Muskegon, what was that experience like?

TI: “Junior hockey is a business. So they’re gonna do what’s best for their team. When I got traded, I was kind of expecting it because it was near the deadline and some kids are like ‘oh my God, no I got traded!’ but it ended up being the best thing that ever happened to me.”

Hub: It seems like every goal you’ve set for yourself, you’ve achieved thus far. So now that you’re at the college level, what do you set your sights on now?

TI: “Well when I was in high school, my goal was to get one step further. I got to the NA. Then a year after that I wanted to go one more step. I got to the USHL. After that, I said, ‘c’mon, let’s get that commitment. Let’s go to college.’ I went to the NCAA. So I mean, what’s the next step after here? I don’t know… we’ll see."

Hub: To be able to continually set goals and achieve them time and again is not easy to do. Has there ever been a time where you set out to do something and failed or struggled to do something you had your sights set on?

TI: “Yea, all the time. In Cedar Rapids, I was scratched multiple games. I was injured, I sprained my ankle. Trying to come back from that injury, I just couldn’t get in the lineup. There were times I told my parents, ‘Mom, Dad, I don’t think I can do this anymore.’

I was able to push through it and started playing in Muskegon [after the trade] and everything worked out.”