Kerfoot is ready for Leaf Nation
TORONTO — Alex Kerfoot has an idea of what’s coming. He grew up alongside Toronto Maple Leafs defenceman Morgan Rielly, and his father owns a professional soccer team.
But actually living in the spotlight that comes with playing hockey in Toronto is something entirely different.
“I don’t think you can really prepare for the market until you get here,” Kerfoot said. “I’ll just try to embrace it.” He’s going to have to. The soft-spoken West Vancouver, B.C., product was enjoying Canada Day with family in the province’s interior when a call came from Colorado Avalanche general manager Joe Sakic telling the forward that he and blueliner Tyson Barrie had been traded to the Leafs for centre Nazem Kadri and minor-leaguer Calle Rosen.
Kerfoot, who turns 25 next month, played Jr. A in the BCHL, starred at Harvard University and spent the last two seasons in relative National Hockey League anonymity in Denver.
Those days are now over, and he knows it.
“It’s obviously nothing like what I’ve experienced,” Kerfoot said ahead of Thursday’s Smashfest charity ping-pong event in Toronto. “It’s going to be different from that side of things, but at the end of the day it doesn’t impact how you play on the ice. “I don’t think I can let it affect me.” Kerfoot does know a thing or two about being the centre of attention, even if it’s begrudgingly.
His dad, Greg Kerfoot, is majority owner of Major League Soccer’s Vancouver Whitecaps. The elder Kerfoot, who made his fortune in computer software, guards his privacy closely. His son is well aware that won’t fly in Toronto.
“It comes with the business. You get used to it,” said Alexander Kerfoot, who signed a four-year, US$14-million contract extension as a restricted free agent with the Leafs after the trade. “I’m more than happy to make appearances, to talk to the media, to do whatever’s asked of me. That’s one of the great things about this market. “I’m looking forward to that.” Kerfoot, who has registered 34 goals and 85 points in 157 NHL games, was selected in the fifth round of the 2012 draft by the New Jersey Devils out of the BCHL, but chose instead to go the U.S. college route.
He was a finalist for the Hobey Baker Award in his senior season at Harvard before signing with the Avalanche in 2017.
Kerfoot said having off-season training partners Barrie and Rielly in the dressing room should help make his transition to the Leafs easier. And the fact he and Rielly grew up playing in the same minor hockey association and remain close doesn’t hurt either.
“Both of our dads went to school together, we grew up in the same area so the families are close,” said Kerfoot, who has put up 43- and 42-point campaigns in the NHL to go along with two goals and three assists in 18 playoff contests. “It’ll be pretty cool to play with him.”
Kerfoot, whose family built an indoor rink on their property in Whistler, B.C., when he was a youngster, can play centre or on the wing and looks likely to start on the third line in Toronto.
“The Leafs talked to me about what they expect from me as a player, the type of game they want the team to play,” he said. “But they haven’t got into specifics.
“That’ll come once we get to training camp.”