By Brandon Canevari, Vermont Country Magazine.
LAS VEGAS, Nev. — Just over a month ago, the life of a Bellows Falls native was dramatically changed and, in the process, a boyhood dream was fulfilled.
Elliott Groenewold, 18, a defenseman, was drafted in the fourth round by the Boston Bruins with the 13th pick, 110th overall, in the National Hockey League draft, which took place June 28 and 29 in Las Vegas, Nev.
“It’s been a crazy couple of weeks for sure being drafted by the Bruins,” said Groenewold in a phone interview. “It’s an honor and I’m super excited to have that opportunity.”
Groenewold grew up on Griswold Drive in Bellows Falls in a tight-knit community. The rec center was nearby and Groenewold said he would often go there to play street hockey or basketball with friends.
From a young age, he was focused on hockey. Growing up, there was a deck on the outside of his parents’ house where he and his brothers would shoot pucks and play two-on-two or three-on-three hockey games. The games, he said, helped his development and his brothers, all of whom were older, played a big role in developing his love of the game.
“They would always bring me along to the rink with them because they started playing at a pretty young age as well, so I was always tagging along with them and I’m super fortunate enough that they were able to put up with me and always take me along with their friends,” said Groenewold. “We’d go skate at the rink for hours. We knew the Zamboni guy and he kind of let us in the back door all the time. We were rink rats back in the day and that’s kind of how I got into the game was kind of due to my brothers and I’m super grateful for that.”
When Groenewold was in middle school, he decided to play club hockey in New Hampshire. He said the experience changed his approach to the game because he recognized the sacrifice not just for himself, but for his parents. Playing on the club team not only involved long car rides, but it was more expensive than playing on a local team. At that point, Groenewold said he felt he owed it to both himself and his parents to take it seriously and try to make it as far as he could in the sport.
When it came time for high school, Groenewold attended boarding school at Bishop’s College School in Sherbrooke, Quebec, Canada, through his junior year. It was another experience that Groenewold said helped shape him as both a player and a person.
“Those years, it’s like prime-time development, and the coaching staff up there was unbelievable. They helped me so much with my game, with my skating, with all aspects of the game,” said Groenewold. “It’s a little bit of a different style in Canada and everyone’s really good there. They eat, sleep and breathe hockey up there, so it’s a great culture to be in. I’m happy I had that experience and it definitely is a reason why I am where I am today.”
After his junior year, Groenewold played for the Cedar Rapids RoughRiders, a Tier 1 junior ice hockey team in the United States Hockey League in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. It was while he was playing there that he said the Bruins first started showing interest in him. Groenewold said he had a few conversations with representatives of the team throughout the season. The day before the draft, Groenewold said he had a meeting with members of the Bruins and at that meeting, they told him they were planning to select him in either the third or fourth round.
It wasn’t until after the draft, when he had been flown to Boston for the Bruins player development camp, that Groenewold said the reality of the situation began to sink in.
“Obviously being drafted and hearing my named called by the Bruins was an amazing experience. It gave me the chills. Having my whole family there to experience it with me was amazing and being able to shake the whole staff’s hands and put on the jersey for the first time with my last name on it was really special. You know, definitely being in Vegas, it did not sink in for a while just because everything’s so crazy,” Groenewold said.
There was another incredible experience after the draft. Growing up, Groenewold had been a big fan of Bruins forward Brad Marchand. After he arrived in Boston, Groenewold had the opportunity to meet him.
“That was awesome. It was pretty surreal,” said Groenewold. “He’s a guy that I’ve looked up to my whole life. He’s just got great character. His perseverance is amazing and being able to meet him, talk hockey with him and talk life with him was really special. Just getting to meet him, he’s such a wholesome guy, such a great guy with a lot of great values, so it was awesome to just sit down and talk to him for a little bit.”
While their positions are different, with Groenewold being on defense and Marchand being a forward, Groenewold said one of the things he loved about Marchand was the way he competed on the ice. While Marchand may not have been the biggest guy on the ice, Groenewold said he was always impressed with his physical style of play and his ability to win battles night in and night out. In that aspect, Groenewold said he has tried to model his game after Marchand.
Once the player development camp began, the reality of being a Boston Bruin began to set in and Groenewold realized he needed to keep working in order to play at the next level. Pro players were also participating in the player development camp and Groenewold said it was an adjustment to play with some of the players who were older, stronger and faster and catch up with their strength and pace. Still, he said he thought he fit in pretty well overall.
During the camp, players underwent several different tests to evaluate things such as their fitness, strength, conditioning and mobility. When Groenewold got the results back, he shared them with his strength coach at Quinnipiac University, where he will be matriculating this coming fall, to be able to work with his strengths and focus on improving his weaknesses. There were also several meetings at the camp that focused on nutrition and sleep relative to performance, which Groenewold indicated was eye-opening. He said the biggest takeaway for him was having a greater understanding of how to train, eat and sleep to be a professional player.
While he was at the Bruins player development camp, Groenewold said he was able to work with one of the directors of player development, and former Bruin, Adam McQuaid.
“I’m working with him a lot to improve some areas of my game, just like working on my puck touches and my hands a little bit more. I’m kind of improving my offensive game, but keeping my game pretty simple and not changing the way I play in the defensive zone, (which is) being really hard to play against and taking pride in doing a really good job of shutting other team’s top lines down,” said Groenewold.
With fall coming soon, Groenewold is currently getting ready for his first season at Quinnipiac University. A typical day for him, he said, usually begins with a workout sometime between 7:30 and 9 a.m. followed by a skate. That is typically followed by an academic or team meeting around noon, and he takes a course and usually has homework to do in the afternoon.
Groenewold was drawn to Quinnipiac after getting to experience the culture of the team while taking a tour of the university. The respect they had for each other, their core values and their desire to win were all attributes that became factors in Groenewold’s decision to attend Quinnipiac.
“I want to win all the time and be successful as a team and as a player individually, so I think that’s kind of what attracted me and I’m really excited to get the season started here in the fall,” Groenewold said. “I think that this team has a lot of aspirations to do really great things this year and I think that’s what I’m most excited about is pushing to win our league, win the championship there and then move onto the tournament, make the frozen four and win a national championship. I think that’s all of our goal. That’s all what we’re looking forward to and the work we’re putting in now is all going toward that.”
