Alaska And Back Again Spokane Chiefs Rookie Is A Valley Original Who Cut His Teeth Playing Alaskan Hockey

When 16-year-old Ty Jones takes to the ice in the new Arena with the Spokane Chiefs hockey team, he has his own built-in fan club.

The Chiefs’ first-round pick is a Spokane Valley product by way of Eagle River, Alaska.

“It was a great move by the Chiefs to draft him. They knew he was a hometown boy,” said his dad, Terry Jones, a 1975 graduate of Central Valley High School.

“Every relative he’s got, except for Mom, Dad and Sis, lives (in the Spokane Valley). Between them and the guys I knew from school he has a big rooting section.”

Terry Jones and his wife Cathy grew up in the Valley and their families still live here.

Terry played first base for CV’s 1974 state runnerup and ‘75 third-place finishing baseball teams.

“We had our class reunion this summer and the baseball team got together,” Terry said. “Just about everybody came back.”

Their son was born in Richland but lived here until he was 3-years-old. That’s when Terry moved to Alaska and became a painting and drywall contractor.

For the past 13 years, the family has lived in the Anchorage suburb where he established his business.

“I wound up there Super Bowl Sunday, whatever year it was, in a bar in Anchorage with no place to live,” Jones recalled. He was taken in by friends until he got established.

Terry got Ty into hockey before his fourth birthday because it was the only sport someone that young could play.

“Dad just put me in there,” Ty said, at further loss to explain how he came to be a hockey player in a baseball family.

Ty said he later told his dad that if he wanted him to play baseball they’d have to move to California. Otherwise, he was going to stay with hockey. It is Alaska’s No. 1 sport, with 12,000 kids participating in the Anchorage area alone.

“I learned everything I know about hockey in Alaska,” said Terry. “I wasn’t a big hockey guy. Now I’m a hockey aficionado.”

Ty advanced through the state’s Midget system and played with an elite team that traveled across the United States for competition. His dad said it cost “probably $10,000 per year by the time you paid for travel, clinics and ice time.”

The investment in the 6-foot-3, 210-pounder proved sound. While playing on a USA select team for 14- and 15-year-olds in the Vancouver (B.C.) Super Series, Ty was discovered by the Chiefs’ scout.

“He said he was a kid with good talent whose parents were from Spokane and liked the Western Hockey League,” said Chiefs coach Mike Babcock.

Last winter Spokane traded its best player, Brian McCabe, to Brandon for its first round draft pick and used it to take Ty.

Babcock said Ty has the size, skill and good instincts for the game. “He’s very, very skilled,” said Babcock. “He has no points yet but is going to have lots.”

The Chiefs wing has had to deal with minor rules changes and learn to play a more aggressive style with the Chiefs, patterned after the National Hockey League’s Canadian style of play.

“The American game is more skating and Canadian game is more hitting,” he said. “There is also a lot more commitment. You have to play every day.”

Ty lives with Terry’s school chum Kevin Wagar in the West Valley area. He is a junior at Ferris High School, which all Chiefs players still in high school attend.

Being around family has made the move from Alaska easier.

“You kind of like to have some stability around,” said his dad. “If he has a bad day he can come sit with the family.”

Currently injured, Ty’s playing time has been limited. But as his future unfolds, expect WHL opponents to see more and more of the rookie player.

“He will dominate in league one day,” said Babcock, “Maybe as early as next year.”

, DataTimes ILLUSTRATION: Photo