How does a 57-year-old from the small town of Ayr, Ontario wind up as a first time CHL head coach with the Swift Current Broncos?
It has been a long and interesting journey for Dean DeSilva.
"I've been involved in hockey my entire life," DeSilva said. "I've been skating since I was two years old. I've been playing since I was six years old. But I've never worked a day in hockey because if you love what you do it's not work.
"That journey has been tough. I'm probably somebody that doesn't look back enough and reflect on things on some of the accomplishments. As soon as that season is over, I'm already preparing for the next season. What I've learned over the last couple of years in the WHL is to take that time and really reflect back and appreciate the small victories."
DeSilva's hockey journey started as a player. He played parts of five seasons in the Mid-Western Junior Hockey League with a Waterloo Siskins team he would go on to later coach.
He put up 283 points over 159 games with the Siskins. That included a 51-goal season in 1988-89.
His coaching career started over two decades ago.
"I started minor hockey U14 AAA," DeSilva said. "Did Tier 2 in Ontario for eight years, three years as an assistant, five years as head coach."
He returned to the Siskins as a coach leading them to a 43-7-1-0 record as he was named GOJHL Coach of the Year in 2009-10.
In 2011-12 he moved to the Elmira Sugar Kings and guided them to a 40-9-0-2 record.
His teams had a 154-83-7-11 record over five seasons in the GOJHL.
"All those lower ranks (I was) still working a full-time job," DeSilva said. "Working 40-50 hours a week and then being at the rink, putting in just as much time. That was always the running joke in the family was that I put in as many hours at the rink as I did for my full-time job."
DeSilva then served as head coach of the Kitchener Jr. Rangers U16 AAA team for 7 seasons. He led them to the OHL Cup five times and helped develop 28 players picked in the OHL Priority Draft.
He was also an assistant coach for Team Canada at the 2011 Three Nations Cup and the 2016 Youth Olympics. He then served as an assistant for Team Ontario at the 2019 Canada Winter Games.
The veteran coach was also tasked with the job as the Kitchener Minor Hockey Association Director of Development.
"I revamped and rewrote their entire development program from learn to skate to U18 AAA," DeSilva said. "I was a coach mentor and worked with all the coaches at various levels."
He took on coaching on a full-time basis in 2019-20 moving west to join Michael Dyck's staff with the Vancouver Giants.
After returning home to Ontario during COVID, DeSilva found his spot with the Everett Silvertips. There he worked for three seasons under current Bowling Green NCAA Head Coach Dennis Williams and one season with veteran WHL Head Coach Steve Hamilton.
"My time in the WHL I worked a lot with the forwards and a lot of the power play," DeSilva said. "So as far as development for goal scoring, power play, things like that, I've got experience with that. When I was head coach at the junior level back in Ontario, our teams are setting record for least goals against. We're going to focus on the play without the puck and then move forward from there. Goal scoring is very, very hard to come by in this league, so obviously that is the skill that we've got to develop... We're going to preach patience as part of our development and just keep moving forward day by day. We want to be better than we were yesterday. Each day we want to be better."
The Silvertips twice won the U.S. Division during his stint and had the best regular season record in the WHL last season. DeSilver also helped them twice achieve single season team records for most goal scored.
He has taken some time to evaluate the current roster and incoming players for the Broncos. That doesn't mean he's pre-judging where players will fit.
"I want to see how they develop, " DeSIlva said. "Every player is going to come in and say I'm a leader. I want to see how their actions show that. This year these guys are coming in they've got a clean slate. I've watched them on video. I've talked to a few of them, but I want to see what they do live and on the ice. Let their actions speak for them. There's not going to be any prejudgments.
"That's something that I take pride is building relations with the players. I hold them accountable. I'm hard on them, but it's a game. Hockey is still a game, and you know the office things are just as important."
As someone from a small town whose family home is in a rural community, he knows building relationships in Swift Current is also important.
"We live about 10 minutes out of a town of 2500 people," DeSilva noted. "Small town, agriculture area, everybody knows everybody. You take the good and the bad, and when people want to stop and talk to you, it's because they're passionate. You'd be more concerned if they don't want to stop and talk to you because then they're not following the team. I think it's very, very important that we are part of the community. If our fans want to be passionate, that's better because that helps bring players in when they see the passion the fans have and the love for hockey.
The journey west got DeSilva to this point. A journey that wouldn't have been possible without a family across the country that supported that risk.
"I wouldn't have been able to do this without the support of my family," he added. "Moving across the country for the last six years has been tough and not everybody would agree with it. Not everybody would understand it. But the people that are helping make those decisions are very, very supportive. The journey could not be made without them."
DeSilva will now head back to Ontario for a month before returning for the team's hockey school and season preparation in August. The Broncos expect to name the rest of their hockey operations staff in the coming weeks.