Vernon Move Got Metropolit Going:

This is in todays Morning Star Newspaper:

Vernon move got Metropolit going

April 23, 2008

ANAHEIM – Former Vernon Lakers forward Glen Metropolit has made a lifetime of beating tough odds and proving doubters wrong.The eldest child of three siblings was raised by a single-mom in Toronto's Regent Park - one of Canada's most violent and drug infested inner-city slums.When his mother couldn't afford the bills, Metropolit and his younger brother, Troy, were shuffled in and out of foster homes. But hockey became a salvation for Metropolit, who despite the chaos, managed to somehow skate his way through the confusing labyrinth of gangs, pimps and crackheads that were the norm of his youth."My childhood was hard," said the 33-year-old Boston Bruins forward. "I would be taking the garbage out and there would be someone there doing crack. My mom did everything she could but it was tough. I bounced around as a kid and there were money troubles so my mom had to send us to a foster home for awhile. I saw it all."But nothing, it seemed, was going to stand in the way of his ultimate goal of playing professional hockey. And he said the time he spent in Vernon was one of the most important stepping stones in his development as both an individual and a hockey player.“I wanted to leave Toronto because of all this other stuff going on," said Metropolit. "I wanted to go to Vernon because I figured it would be good for my schooling. I wanted to get away from the distractions."Vernon head coach Rob Bremner spotted Metropolit at a select junior player camp in Guelph, Ont. following his second year of junior B. "He knew my story and how I was going down the wrong road," said Metropolit, after a regular-season loss to the Anaheim Ducks at the Honda Center.Metropolit compiled 43 goals and 117 points with Vernon (28-28-4) in the 1994-95 B.C. Junior Hockey League season, and he started to get noticed for the first time by all those scouts who had ignored him growing up in Toronto.His mother, Linda, couldn't afford to let him play travel hockey so he played in neighbourhood house leagues until he was 17.After lighting up the BCJHL, Metropolit signed a letter-of-intent to play for Bowling Green but he couldn't get in because of low grades. He landed in Nashville instead, thanks to a connection one of the Vernon assistant coaches (Troy Mick) had with the ECHL club.After recording 61 points in 58 games in his first season (1995-96) of pro hockey, Metropolit played in Pensacola, Quebec, Grand Rapids and Portland over the next five seasons before being signed as a free agent by the Washington Capitals in July, 1999.He played 138 games over parts of the next five seasons with the Capitals and the Tampa Bay Lightning. After a couple of years with teams in Switzerland and Finland in the European leagues, he returned to the NHL in 2006-07 for his first full NHL season where he split time between Atlanta and St. Louis.Metropolit estimates he moved 20 times  within Regent Park as a youngster and his hockey career has been just as nomadic. He scratched and clawed his way out of the housing projects and it is the same perseverance that has propelled him to the top of the hockey ladder. The married father of three now tries to pass along his personal knowledge and experience to his own children who enjoy a much different childhood than their father. He says he gets his work ethic from his mother."My mother always told me to 'chase your dream'. She would say 'follow your dream and believe in yourself,'" said Metropolit, who was signed as a free agent by the Bruins last September.Metropolit could have just as easily ended up like his younger half brother Troy, who is languishing in an Ontario prison for his role in one of Canada's most notorious kidnappings. Convicted, along with two others, in the kidnapping and torture of a prominent Toronto lawyer and his wife, Troy's 16-year sentence is one of the longest in Canadian history for that type of crime. Glen was determined to let his surroundings stifle his sense of self being."Hockey was my escape," Glen said. "It was my outlet. I had a group of about five friends and we would play any kind of hockey. Ball hockey in the summer and ice hockey in the winter. It was always hockey."Metropolit may not have  had a normal hockey upbringing, and he seldom caused trouble, but in those rare moments he did, Linda, knew how to deal with it."All I would have to say is 'No hockey tonight', and he would  be crying," she told the Washington Post. "And I would never have to do it again. He'd ask for a licking instead. We had to drag him off the ice to get him to eat. There were lot of freezing cold days and there's no one there but him. He's the only one smacking the puck against the boards. Nothing ever distracted him from hockey. He never wanted to stop playing."His first big break came at 17 when he followed a friend on a  whim to a tryout for the Richmond Hill junior B team. Metropolit made the team, barely. In his second year ,he had 100 points in just 49 games earning an invite to the Guelph camp."I never played at a  top level as a kid. The Richmond Hill team recruited one of my best friends and I was the last one to make the team. They couldn't decide whether to keep me or this other younger kid, but lucky for me they eventually decided to send him back to his Triple A Midget team."