Rookie Championship | Noah Corson and Perseverance

(Buffalo) Stories about the sons of former players must focus on the father. Nothing is more natural; It’s what amateurs know.

Clouds Lifrancois
Journalism

In the New Jersey Devils formation in the Junior Championships is a player named Noah Corson, who thus inherited from Shayne Corson a family name and physical traits that leave no doubt. The similarity is astounding.

But during our meeting with Noah Corson on Saturday, under the stands of LECOM Harborcenter, Quebec spoke about his mother long before his father. His story is one of perseverance, and he gives it a lot of credit.

“She’s my rock, as we say in English… She was always there for me on the 19th and 20th, when things weren’t going well and I was thinking of taking another route, she told me not to give up, believe in myself. I just need this. I Really grateful.”

If his mother, who asked not to be named in the article, was so important, it was because she raised Noah Corson on her own. The kid was two years old when Shayne Corson left Canadians – after his second spell in Montreal – for the Toronto Maple Leafs. At this time the couple broke up, and the relationship between father and son was not very close.

“We’re still in touch,” he said. He writes to me, tries to check in. But all my life, I’ve had my mother and little brother, and I don’t need any more. »

You don’t have to talk to him for long to understand the importance of his mother. “She is the woman of my life. She gave everything for me. When we were younger, we had financial problems, but she made sure I always had the best sticks, the best skates, and the best hockey software. She gave me everything.”

At the end of the line, his mother affirms the many sacrifices. When Noah was a teenager, for example, the family moved to Eastern Townships so the young man could play in the college hockey program in Mont-Sainte-Anne. “I sold my work in Montreal, emptied my savings, and there, I had problems, to pay for hockey and school, she admits on the phone. But I learned to support myself in life. I’m a fighter, I think Noah learned that from me.”

Corson admits he didn’t have the typical childhood of a player’s son, although he does carry the baggage that comes with this label. “The likeness is there, people talk to me about it and it’s normal. I don’t mind. I’ve lived like this for 21 years. I cheated. [narguer] There on the ice sometimes and it goes about six feet above my head, it’s part of the game and anyway, me too, I cut the others!

“This situation created a little ball inside me, a fire that made me the person I am on the ice.”

grip

Corson is alleged at 37^e His ranking in the 2014 QMJHL Draft, but a lack of seriousness and at times problematic attitude prevented him from starting in the Courteau circuit. He splits his time between QMJHL and Inouk de Granby, at junior AAA level.

Once his time at QMJHL was over, he began traveling to the Four Corners of America, first in junior AAA with Saint-Gabriel-de-Brandon, then Grande Prairie, in Alberta, before staying with third and fifth tier clubs in Sweden. He then returned to the mainland to play for Evansville and Knoxville in the Southern Professional Hockey League.

An epidemic arrives, during which Corson succumbs to taking “a profession “At $15 an hour,” her mother said proudly. But on the hockey front, the doors are closed, so in 2020, his mom writes a letter she’s sending to dozens of MLS general managers asking them to give her son a chance.

It bites into the Chicago Wolves, who invite Corson to their camp. But the pandemic, which holds the 2020-2021 season, is changing plans. A year later, with the support of agent Nicolas Reubel, Corson received a new invitation from the Wolves, who want to keep their word after the previous year’s invitation.

Corson exits with the MLS contract. The Wolves ceded it to their branch in Norfolk, ECHL. Contrary to all expectations, Corson explodes there offensively. With 55 points in 57 games, he concludes the 2021-2022 season with a score of 2^e Rank his team counters. His success even earned him two MLS game recalls, a feat for a striker who has not racked up more than 25 points in a single season in QMJHL.

“It’s my physical development, but also my maturity. I take hockey very seriously. Before, I didn’t do all the details a professional has to do. I understood this later in my journey.”

He was suspended twice and finished the season with a 162-minute penalty, a club record. “I have to be careful, but I should never lose that aspect. It’s a part of me. This is how I give 100% to a team,” he explains.

It would be easy to associate his playing style with his father’s, but rather it was life in a one-parent family that he believes shaped him in this way. “I’ve always had a personality, a coincidence for my mom and little brother. The protective aspect towards my teammates comes from there.”

Corson is now hoping his perseverance will lead him to the NHL, though he hasn’t given a timeline for getting there. “I’m going one day every time. I just want to show the youngsters that even if it’s hard in the youngsters, there is always a chance if I give 100%. The National League is still my dream even though I am 24.”