It's never easy to quit something you love.
That's the tough choice Nate McDonald made in the summer of 2023.
"I mean, at the start of the season it was definitely tough," said McDonald.
The 24-year-old just finished playing goal for the OUA's University of Guelph. Before that, he had played three seasons of NCAA Division I hockey at Cornell.
The North Bay product who won an NOJHL championship with the Powassan Voodoos in 2017, made the difficult decision to retire from hockey and transition into coaching.
"It's definitely a little bit different for me, but I knew right off the start, when I was still playing that I wanted to get into coaching and I've always loved coaching goalies and trying to give back," said McDonald.
Since then McDonald has been hired as a goaltending consultant with the OHL's North Bay Battalion, and he has also created his own hockey goaltending business called Gateway Goalie Consulting.
"North Bay gave a lot to me in terms of the city and gave me opportunities to go to some really cool places to play hockey, so I wanted to do something for the community and just give goalies in town another set of eyes and another option for training," said the former AAA Trappers goaltender.
"So, we are doing our best to just give goalies that opportunity that I don't think they've had in the past.
"There are some good guys in town that have done a lot for goaltending and just trying to try to add to that, like I said give another chance.
North Bay has proven to be a solid development ground for goaltenders. Nipissing University has two local netminders in Zach Roy and Reece Proulx on their roster. North Bay's Ken Appleby played an NHL game this season with the New York Islanders, and Ben Gaudreau attended the Tampa Bay Lightning's main camp last summer.
However, despite all that local success, McDonald admits getting young hockey players interested in becoming goaltenders is still a challenge.
"The biggest thing for young kids is just to have fun with the position," he explained.
"So we want to give boys the opportunity to try the position out and that's kind of the goal of that mentorship program that we have with North Bay minor hockey. And then once they're out we want to keep them so having fun on the AC is a big focus for us. I'm not trying to be a drill sergeant and just go through drills. We'd like to really develop relationships with the goalies and the families that we work with."
McDonald believes his game experience at various levels will benefit the young goalies he teaches.
"I think something unique to me is all the different experiences that I've had as a goalie so I was drafted into the OHL so have had some experience with OHL camps, that kind of process and then I went to US college route, NCAA Division One so I had some experience there and navigating that route."
McDonald credits Battalion goalie coach Maverick Parks for helping him this season.
"Working with the Battalion here has been really helpful to allow me to just be a sponge and learn off our goalie coach Maverick Parks and you know the resource for our Battalion goalies, too and give them pointers.
"So I think I have a lot of different viewpoints that I can provide to the goalies and the goalie families and that's something that kind of sets us apart here."
