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Light Drizzle Fog/Mist Seaford native has NHL aspirations
Since he attended his first Islanders game as a young boy with his father, Will Campion has been hooked on hockey. Now, the Seaford native is pursing a professional hockey career of his own.
Campion, who is finishing his Junior career in the British Columbia Hockey League, will be taking his talents to the Division 1 University of Minnesota-Duluth. His hope is that he will be able to sign with a team in the National Hockey League within four years.
“If you do well at college, you could sign with any pro team,” said the 20-year-old, who graduated from Seaford High School in 2013.
As a child, he played for the Long Island Gulls and Long Island Royals youth hockey teams. During his freshman year of high school, he was a member of the Wantagh-Seaford Baymen before moving on to the New Jersey Rockets youth hockey team. Campion said he missed a lot of school during his junior and senior years for road trips, but he credits some very understanding teachers and guidance counselors for allowing him to make up the work and still graduate on time.
“I know I definitely missed out on a lot of things,” he said, adding that as a teenager he would “eat and sleep hockey.”
He still does. A member of the Langley (B.C.) Rivermen for the past two years, Campion lives the life of a full-time hockey player but without the pay. As an amateur, he can’t receive a salary, but the team takes care of his meals and set him up with a host family to live with. “They’ve taken great care of me,” he said of the mother, father and son who he lives with and who come to most of his home games.
He has summers off, which he spends in Seaford, but during the season, Campion doesn’t get to see too much of his family. He typically gets a 10-day break around Christmas to come home, and said his parents will come out for a week once during the season. His family, he said, is very supportive of his hockey aspirations, and they watch many of his games on the computer.
The first year away from home was rough, he said, but now he has come to accept the lifestyle that comes with playing hockey. “I’ve learned to really like it and be independent,” he said.
