AMHERST, N.S. — Terry Rhindress is gaining more experience in international hockey.
A year after being an assistant coach with the silver medal-winning team at the world university games in Russia, the Amherst native and Riverview, N.B. resident is again working with Team Canada for its university sports Under-22 women’s hockey team.
“It’s an amazing opportunity because you get to work with the best of the best and you get to rub shoulders with some of best hockey minds who have coached at the national level for a long time,” Rhindress said. “It’s an opportunity to develop the players, but it’s also an opportunity to pick up some things I can use with my program.”
Rhindress leaves Wednesday for Calgary for the summer training camp and showcase that will be a step in putting together the team that will represent Canada at the 2021 university games in Switzerland.
There will be three professional development days before players begin arriving Aug. 1 and hit the ice Aug. 2 following some Hockey Canada testing the day before.
“There will be six games in seven days after that Hockey Canada will have an opportunity to invite some of those players to the main camp,” Rhindress said. “The main camp goes the week after the showcase. They stay there and compete for the next week.”
The head coach of the Mount Allison University women’s hockey team will look after the power play, offensive zone faceoffs and six-on-five tactics in the last moments of the game when the team is either up a goal or down a goal.
“It’s a different responsibility than what I had last year. It’s a little more and it’s nice to get the opportunity,” he said.
The schedule includes two weeks of intense practices as well as exhibition games against the Russian U-18 team.
Next summer, the summer camp will pick the team for Switzerland.
“You only get two weeks to work with them and then two weeks next summer to prepare,” Rhindress said. “This is our first evaluation of the younger players. You want a good mix of younger players and older players because you need really good leadership with that small window to come together fast.”
Rhindress said the coaching staff has a great relationship with coaches across U-Sports and they are always sharing information and video to help prepare.
Ultimately, Rhindress is hoping to continue with the Hockey Canada program with the possibility of eventually becoming a head coach of a Canadian team.
“The ultimate goal is to be the head coach and you never know you may get the opportunity to be the coach of the Under-22 or Under-18 teams. I just want to keep the doors open because it’s a great opportunity and it’s rewarding to get this opportunity again. I'm pretty pleased.”
This is Rhindress’ third experience with Hockey Canada after working at the evaluation camp last summer as well as the university games in Russia, in which Canada lost 2-0 to the host club.
Rhindress is entering his second full season as coach of Mount Allison.
Another Amherst native, Jordan Hunter, is working as a video coach with the men’s team. Hunter won three national championships as video coach at UNB.
