10 Things I Learned From Tyden Redlick on The Creator’s Game Podcast

1. These Boys Can Talk Lacrosse

Episode 56 showed just how much ground The Creator’s Game can cover in one conversation.

Deya, Jake and Chris carried on a 100-plus-minute conversation about lacrosse with their guest Tyden Redlick, a goalie from Alberta, Canada, who most recently played for the Six Nations Arrows of the Ontario Junior A Lacrosse League.

The conversation was engaging and informational as they weaved in and out of a variety of topics. Much of it centered around Tyden’s background, his knowledge of lacrosse history in his home province of Alberta, his approach to being a high-level lacrosse athlete, and his goals and aspirations.

From there, the conversation shifted to the current status of the NLL — from pending free agency and contract negotiations to what seemed like an unavoidable dispersal draft. Somehow, that eventually landed on a hypothetical development of a Deya Miller–Chris Vale agency, where the boys help lacrosse athletes negotiate their contracts.

The episode ended with another shift toward the many national championships being played throughout Canada, including the Founder’s Cup, the Minto Cup and the Minor Box Lacrosse National Championships.

All in all, there is plenty to digest in this episode. The conversation felt effortless for these lacrosse heads, which is evidence of their knowledge, chemistry and outright love for the game.

2. Chris Vale Needs a Life Outside of Lacrosse

LOL. But, for real.

When asked what he had been up to during the previous week — specifically something outside of lacrosse — Chris responded, “I went to the grocery store…”

He literally couldn’t think of anything else. I love it.

Having met Chris a few times when we have been able to visit the ILA Store, you quickly understand how he has built his encyclopedia of lacrosse knowledge. The guy knows all things lacrosse because he lives it every day.

Lax is life.

And you know that’s true when you literally cannot think of anything else going on in your life except going to the grocery store.

Which begs the question: What is on Chris Vale’s grocery list?

And I hope he’s not playing Cher in his earbuds while shopping, because Jake Henhawk would not approve.

Jake made a comment about Deya playing Cher during intermission at one of the recent Junior C games. So apparently the 80-year-old rockstar known as the “Goddess of Pop” does not do it for Jake. Despite Cher selling over 100 million records and being the only solo artist with number-one singles on the U.S. Billboard charts in seven consecutive decades, a lacrosse arena is one place her music does not belong.

Who knew?

It does make me wonder what is on the guys’ music playlist.

3. Alberta Lacrosse Still Has Plenty of Room to Grow

Lacrosse in Alberta is somewhat in its infancy… Is that okay to say?

Again, I can admit that I am a lacrosse casual. I started paying closer attention to lacrosse during my time as an intern at the University of Denver in 2012, when part of my job was to set up the lacrosse fields. That was NCAA field lacrosse.

I still have so much to learn about the box lacrosse game in Canada, even though my knowledge has grown exponentially since we started covering the Six Nations Chiefs at the 2023 Mann Cup in New Westminster, B.C.

My point is, I could be wrong, but I got a sense from this conversation that there is plenty of growth to be had when it comes to lacrosse in Alberta.

Tyden shared a story about how his team had only 11 kids when he was younger and could barely field a team. He continued to mention how the lack of numbers has stunted the growth of lacrosse in Alberta at times. It seems as though Alberta is more of a hockey province.

But that is what made this conversation engaging.

Tyden shared plenty of nuggets about how he thinks the game can continue to grow in Alberta, including how his own success can be used to return home and grow the game for the next generation.

Since the episode aired, Alberta lacrosse history has already shifted.

Which leads me to my next learning outcome…

4. Alberta Made Minto Cup History — And Episode 56 Nearly Called It

Predictions are hard. But that’s why we play the games.

One prediction from Tyden was that St. Catharines would walk through the round robin of the Minto Cup. Well, they didn’t even win a game.

On the flipside, Jake mentioned that this was Alberta’s best shot to win the Minto Cup. Tyden added that if the Raiders were going to have a chance at winning, Nate Whittom would need to stand on his head.

In Game 1 of the Minto Cup Finals, Whittom finished with 38 saves on 45 shots for an 84% save percentage. In Game 2, the Shamrocks broke through for 14 goals as Whittom gave up eight goals on 20 shots.

But Whittom responded in Sunday’s clinching game, finishing with 30 saves on 36 shots for an 83% save percentage.

Overall, he finished with a 5–1 record and an 82% save percentage to help the Raiders secure the Minto Cup Championship for the first time in club history — and the first Minto Cup championship for the entire province of Alberta.

I think it is safe to say that Nate Whittom stood on his head.

And now they owe Jake a ring for his help with the team.

Furthermore, Chris predicted later in the episode that the Seneca Warchiefs and Akwesasne Thunder would meet in the Founder’s Cup Finals. The Thunder would end up winning the Founder’s Cup with an 11–4 victory over the Warchiefs.

Predictions are hard. Episode 56 did pretty well anyway.

5. Knowing the Rulebook Can Make You a Better Lacrosse Player

Rules matter. Or, do they?

Tyden shared his background as a lacrosse referee during past summers in Alberta — even giving Dawson a delay-of-game penalty for yelling at him from the bench.

He says reffing has helped him in the lacrosse community in a variety of ways. Knowing the rulebook allows him to influence the game from his goalie position.

Tyden implied there are situations where he has mentioned a specific rule number to a ref, only for them to have no response because his rules analysis is spot on.

I thought this was a very cool story. It connected his experience as an official directly to an advantage he can use as a player.

Yet Tyden also pointed out that knowing the rules does not always change how they are enforced.

He shared a specific instance in Juniors where they called out a rules violation and the refs acknowledged the violation but did not penalize the team. They simply made the team fix what I am assuming was an equipment violation.

As someone who is not a fan of officials in any sport — I have a long history of conversations to prove it — it’s my time to pile on and tell those officials to have a spine and enforce the rules, just as they are paid to do!

6. Coming Soon: Head Coach Tyden Redlick?

Tyden comes from a family of coaches.

His dad has coached in the Western Hockey League and Midget AAA hockey in Saint Albert. His mom and grandparents all have coaching backgrounds as well.

Tyden says he wants to continue playing professional lacrosse in the NLL and summer box lacrosse while also finding time to jump into coaching.

Being brought up in a coaching family has helped him digest and dissect the game, particularly when he is able to sit on the bench and watch it unfold. He has recently helped coach U17 and U18 in Alberta and enjoys coaching kids and the next generation of lacrosse players to help grow the game at a higher level.

He is currently thinking about getting a high school coaching job somewhere in the U.S. to start building his experience and connections.

This has me thinking: What types of players make the best coaches? What helps a good player become a good coach?

Do you have examples of great players who made terrible coaches? Why were they terrible coaches? What did not translate for them from player to coach?

7. Is the NLL Becoming a Young Man’s Game?

Following last season’s announcement that the Philadelphia Wings would cease operations, there were rumors strongly swirling during the Episode 56 conversation about the impending doom facing the Ottawa Black Bears franchise.

That could mean the potential loss of 25–50 player spots, along with other job losses for coaches, administrators and staff in the National Lacrosse League.

One shifting component could be how a shrinking number of available roster spots throughout the league impacts the careers of aging veterans.

Chris proposed the possibility of teams like Halifax getting younger and faster, despite coming off a trip to the NLL Finals. Jake followed up by acknowledging that the Thunderbirds have some interesting decisions to make, but they are not alone.

The league and team rosters could look drastically different as the dominoes continue to fall with the folding of not just one, but maybe two franchises, and the dispersal drafts that could result.

I am not here to be a rumor mill, but top point scorers like Brennan O’Neill, Joe Resetarits, Sam Leclair, Dalton Young, Jeff Teat, Rob Hellyer and Reilly O’Connor — along with strong goalies like Zach Higgins — will all need a place to land.

According to Jake, this might then squeeze the salary cap even tighter, with some veterans being offered less than before and having to make decisions about their own worth and how the game fits into their lives at a potentially discounted pay rate.

This is only the tip of the iceberg, and at the time of the episode, free agency was scheduled to open September 1.

So, some questions to be asked: How will the potential for a dispersal draft impact veteran players? Which young players will emerge this year in the NLL?

8. Does Team First Nations Lacrosse Need a Leadership Change?

Part of me wanted to stay away from this conversation, mostly because I truly have no idea what’s going on and I was very much raised to mind my own business. LOL.

But the conversation was rich, and I certainly learned a lot about the thoughts and feelings of some as they relate to the current state of Indigenous lacrosse programs.

Toward the end of the episode, the conversation shifted to the recent performances of Team First Nations in the Carol Patterson Cup. This is a topic that has clearly been discussed in previous episodes and in other social forums.

Us Natives love a good Facebook discussion. My unsolicited advice: stay away from those if you care about your mental health.

Jake shared stories about the tryouts being neglected by leadership, thus leaving others to run the tryouts alone with limited evaluations and resources to effectively lead a program.

Jake was clearly frustrated with how things played out as players and coaches were dropping from TFN and choosing to play with their provincial programs. Some of the TFN programs that did play got beat handily.

For example, in the U22 women’s division, Quebec beat First Nations 22–1, with many of the players on Team Quebec being players who could have played for TFN. In addition, the U13 boys TFN did not even go, and the U15 boys TFN also got beat 22–1 by Team Ontario.

When prompted to think about potential solutions for the issues, Jake called for a change in leadership.

Again, I personally am as far away from this situation as anybody.

But I can understand the frustration when you hear about people from Native communities not wanting to play for programs that are designed to highlight and showcase the talents, culture and community we carry as Native people.

It feels apparent to me that several people and communities are seeking a change in the leadership of the Team First Nations lacrosse program.

Right or wrong, I get the sense this frustration comes from wanting to push the program forward: a desire rooted in a devout love for the game of lacrosse and wanting to be competitive when representing Indigenous lacrosse.

There is an understanding that the potential for these teams to compete is not limited by a lack of talent or interest. Rather, the concern raised in the conversation was that players and families did not like the direction the program was headed, so they chose to take their talents elsewhere.

That doesn’t seem like a scenario that is good for the future of Indigenous lacrosse programs.

I’ll be interested to see where this story goes.

In the meantime, the question I have is this: Would Jake rather be forced to listen to a Cher album front to back or run a lacrosse program with the current TFN leadership?

9. Box Lacrosse Gets Weird Sometimes

The conversation came up because apparently teams are allowed to bring players from Junior A back down to Junior B to play in the Founder’s Cup playoffs.

This stems from Junior B teams holding the rights of players whose game found them elevated to Junior A. However, if those players are eliminated from the Junior A playoffs, then I guess they are allowed to go play in Junior B.

I am sure there is a limit to how many players the Junior B programs are allowed to pluck from Junior A.

Several examples were shared to illustrate how things can get even more complicated, such as North Shore Junior C playing in the Junior B Founder’s Cup after winning the Junior C championship. Or apparent all-star teams from Nova Scotia playing in the Founder’s Cup, or Saskatoon playing in the President’s Cup, which apparently hasn’t gone so well for some of those teams.

The point is, players find themselves playing in multiple leagues all the time, which is another thing I’ve always found fascinating about box lacrosse leagues.

The game is unique in that way.

10. Is Edmonton the Next Stop for the NLL?

Who knows. Would a team draw a good crowd?

Tyden thinks yes — if organized correctly.

As the conversation wrapped up, things shifted to the new-ish arena in Edmonton that was set to host the upcoming President’s Cup. The Silent Ice Centre in Nisku, Alberta, was built by the owners of Silent Ice Sports and Entertainment, who are prominent in hockey with teams like the Seattle Thunderbirds of the WHL and the Spruce Grove Saints of the BCHL.

Tyden introduced the connection that the group may be interested in polishing up the arena as a potential landing spot for an NLL franchise.

Nevertheless, Tyden thinks Edmonton is primed for an NLL team.

If the team was marketed properly and could feature some local players from the Edmonton area, he believes the team would do well.

Tyden reminisced about his childhood memories of the Edmonton Rush and how a professional team’s presence could help grow the fanbase and local lacrosse community.

Are there better options out there right now?

With two NLL teams potentially folding at the time of the conversation, it couldn’t hurt to try to re-enter a market with a starving fanbase and a province fresh off its first-ever Minto Cup victory.

But what do I know? I’m just a casual fan with lots of ideas and even more questions.

That’s why I listen to The Creator’s Game Podcast.

Watch Episode 56 of The Creator’s Game Podcast

Hear the full conversation with Tyden Redlick, Deya Miller, Chris Vale and Jake Henhawk for more on Alberta lacrosse, his development as a goalie, coaching, the NLL, the Minto Cup and the future of the game.

About the Series

10 Things I Learned is a recurring reflection series built around conversations from The Creator’s Game Podcast. Brandon Joseph of Decolonize Sports brings the perspective of a lifelong sports fan, Indigenous sports storyteller and self-described lacrosse casual to the topics, debates and stories shaping the game.

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