Riley Hearn, the 21-year-old founder of RushYYC hockey development, was born and raised in Calgary and played hockey from a young age. Beginning his career for the Glenlake Hawks, he later graduated at the U15 level to play for the Calgary Royals until U18 where he played at the AAA level for a six-game stint in 2021 during the COVID-19 pandemic before the season unfortunately came to a close.
Hearn’s smaller size at five-foot-three never held him back from reaching another level in his game, and a pandemic couldn’t either. He went on to play three years of Junior A for his hometown Calgary Canucks in the Alberta Junior Hockey League (AJHL) as an assistant captain, and last year, the Canucks captured the Inter Pipeline Cup as league champtions. His journey as a player unfortunately came to an end following their championship season, but his journey behind the bench was just beginning.
Hearn is now invested in teaching the game as an assistant coach with the Calgary Canucks and a development coach at RushYYC since founding the program locally in 2023 and amassing over 20,000 followers on Instagram. His passion for lacing up the skates was inspired by many coaches before him, and he looks to spread the same values and connection with up-and-coming players the same way he experienced. Hearn shares the ice and vision at RushYYC with assistant coach Scott McKenzie as well.
Here is my conversation with Hearn:
Scott Rowan: To start off, how did you get started with RushYYC and what’s your origin story?
Riley Hearn: So, I’ve been coaching since I was pretty much old enough to push pucks around. My mom was an elite-level figure skating coach and power skating coach, so she had me pushing pucks for her programs. I helped out different coaches across the city too. As soon as I made Junior A, the doors kind of flew wide open for coaching opportunity. So I started volunteering, doing a lot of coaching for U13, and then it got to the point where parents were starting to reach out and say, “Hey, can we throw a group together?” So, I figured out that I could actually turn this passion of mine into my job. And one day I made a logo, threw it on an Instagram page and just waited to see what would happen. And then three or four months later, that hobby turned into a business.
That sounds like a great story. It was really organic how it all came together online. But why do you feel your program is important for players to dive into and really get to learn from your experience?
Yeah. I think it’s important. When I first started, I wanted to make sure I gave access to high-quality training in small groups for an affordable price. That’s the training that I found helped me get to the level that I was able to get to. I also had a lot of skill coaches that were older, and they didn’t necessarily know how to demo the drills. They could explain them really well because they have that experience, but the demos weren’t there, that direct connection of still currently playing the game wasn’t there. I had felt that if I could start doing this at my age (21) I would have quite a lot of years where I could still demo drills at a high pace. Having a guy that can connect to kids and where they can ask questions and feel they have somebody that has been there recently, I think that is a reason for kids to go out on the ice with us.
Congratulations on winning the AJHL championship, by the way.
Thank you.
What sort of lessons did you learn from that playoff run that you take into coaching?
I found that my business had taken off right around the time that we were making our playoff run. The main reason why was that we went from being a good team in the Alberta League to being a championship team when we started changing the word ‘value.’ Everybody started feeling valued on our team and I thought there were times in the year when guys didn’t really feel valued in their jobs. That was even up to the first-line guys that were putting up all of our points. They would have two or three points a game, but maybe they were criticized for a couple of minuses. And so across the lineup, guys didn’t feel valued. I remember chatting with the coaching staff and I think they made a pretty decent change in making players feel valued. And so taking that world value, how can I apply value into my coaching? Every time a kid steps on the ice, does that kid feel appreciated? Can I find a way to talk with each kid at least once or twice, whether it’s giving them advice on a particular skill or maybe it’s just “What did you have for breakfast?” I started applying that, and I felt that the word of mouth for my business blew up and suddenly it made my summer quite a busy one.
I agree. I’m in my last year of junior now, but my coaches are so beneficial to me and every time we’re on the ice they make us feel valued. Who are some of the mentors that you looked up to and who made you feel valued?
There’s a coach in my minor midget year, Brad Hodge. He had always made me feel valued when I was on the ice and in the role that I played, and I thought my major AAA head coach, Scarfie, did the same. It didn’t start out that way, but as the year went on, me and a good buddy took a really good penalty-kill role, and he made it feel like, “Hey, you guys help us win by being really good at the penalty kill.” And then there’d be games that we get 20 plus minutes and eight of those on the kill, and we’d be 100 per cent.
That’s great. It’s definitely important to know your role on a team, but it’s important to feel valued in that role, like you said. What were some of the challenges that you’ve overcome with your business starting out and learning how to run a hockey program?
I would say right at the start it was making sure that I didn’t step on anybody’s territory. I think it kind of stirred the pot a little bit with me entering the market, it’s pretty competitive in Calgary, and there’s a lot of supply of kids really wanting to get high-quality training. But there’s also a lot of options out there. It was making sure that everybody that I had worked with in the past was on board and I made a mistake early, and then fixed it. When it came to growing it, another challenge was getting my confidence with kids that are close to mine. I’m 21, but I look probably 18. I’m a smaller guy. Coaching kids that are a year younger than me was a bit of an adjustment at the start. Once they get halfway through the session, they realize that this guy knows his stuff. It turned to designing my sessions to grab the attention of players no matter what their age and skill was right off the bat, and demand that respect as a coach.
What are some other things that you’re addressing with your program that you wanted to do differently than other programs?
I found that there are a lot of people that are doing this. So when I was looking at getting into this, I’m going to need to find a niche in this market, right? So from the start, I am going to charge an affordable price to be out in a small group. And that’s not crazily sustainable. At some point, you have to bump your price. If I’m going to have six kids, I can charge $60 to $70 a session because that’s still affordable in terms of value compared to other coaches charging $70 and having 20 kids.
Yeah, for sure. To wrap up – thanks for your time Riley, I appreciate it, what are some of your plans for the future? I know you’ve you’ve you have a lot of following on social media. Having a presence like that is awesome. But what are some other plans that you’d like to pursue?
I look to continue to grow the social media. At the point that it’s at it just became a part of the business plan. I haven’t spent a ton of time or a ton of money on marketing or advertisements because it all comes from word of mouth and social media. So that’s saved me a ton of money, which I’m grateful for. I’m also offering a wide variety of programs with what I originally could draw, but then also offering summer camps and offering other training options that tie everything together. We’re running a summer league that I ran last summer, but really expanding the summer league this summer. Offering options for elite levels at all different ages and maybe levels that are trying to get to that elite level. And then I’d say a challenge with that would be not growing too fast because a lot of people have that opportunity to grow. They offer a good program and then they hire guys that might not share that same passion. I wanted to make sure that if I’m going to expand and bring people on, they are going to be good.
Editor’s note: This interview has been edited for length and clarity.