MELFORT — Jaxon Joseph died in the Humboldt Broncos bus crash, but his spirit lives on through the teams he played on, the friends he made and the memories he shared.
The Melfort Mustangs is one of those teams. Jaxon played on the team for a year-and-a-half before being traded to Humboldt. On Sept. 15, the team officially retired his number, draping a banner in the arena with his name and No. 11, being displayed for future players to see.
The ceremony happened on Jaxon’s birthday. The Edmonton product would have been 21.
“He really enjoyed Melfort. It was mostly because of the community and the people around him,” said Jaxon’s dad, Chris Joseph. “Junior hockey should be fun, and they made it fun for him. He really enjoyed the people here and he didn’t know anything about Saskatchewan so it was a new thing for him, and he really fell in love with the people.”
According to Chris, the Melfort Mustangs was Jaxon’s longest stay on any team.
“He just was proud to be a Mustang. He would come home in the summers and look forward to going back to being a Mustang,” Chris said. “He was grateful for the opportunity after being released from Surrey [BC] to come here. He just really enjoyed being a hockey player. Melfort gave him that opportunity.”
Even after being traded from the Mustangs, Chris believed that there remained respect between Jaxon and Trevor Blevins, the head coach of the Mustangs.
“We know that Trevor had a hard time trading Jaxon and that it wasn’t an easy decision, and coaches and players don’t always have a real easy relationship, and I wouldn’t say theirs was anymore close. But they respected each other, and Trevor would always push Jaxon to be at his best and Jaxon would try to give him his best.”
Chris saw going to Humboldt as an opportunity for Jaxon.
“When he went to Humboldt we didn’t look at it like Trevor was getting rid of him. In a lot of ways he was giving him an opportunity to do something Jaxon always wanted to do, which was to play on the top line and be that guy. When he went to Humboldt he had that opportunity.”
Chris believed Jaxon played better in wanting to show Trevor that trading him was a mistake.
“When their series ended last year, I was watching on TV and I was watching the handshake lineup. I was curious to see how the guys reacted to him. And he was holding the line up. Jaxon was holding the line up because all the players wanted to talk to him, especially when he got to Trevor. They talked for quite a while, and I asked him after, ‘what did you say?’ And Trevor told him congratulations and he was proud of him, and Jaxon thanked him for the opportunity. It was respectful.”
Chris wants his son to be remembered as happy and positive. Jaxon’s mother, Andrea Joseph, wants him to be remembered similarly.
“I mean, he loved his teammates,” Andrea said. “He hung out with them all the time, he always said good things about the community. He was pretty happy.”
Mantracker
One of Andrea’s favorite memories with Jaxon was his mantracker story.
Mantracker was a television series that aired from 2006 to 2012 and simulating it was something Melfort Mustangs assistant coach Dan Meyers did with the team.
“There’s a big field and the goal is to get across to the other end without getting caught, and if they catch more players than what makes it to the other side then they won and the players lost,” Andrea said. “But if more players can make it to the other end before they’re caught, then they win the trophy. Last year, the first year Jaxon was here, they won. Then last fall they lost. There actually is a trophy they have.”
It serves as a non-hockey related team building exercise.
“So he gets on a horse and chases the boys down a field,” Chris said.
For a family from the city, this story stood out to them.
“He was being chased by a thoroughbred, pounding the grass and running as fast as they could not to get caught, their hearts pounding so hard and feeling the ground shake below them as these horses are coming closer and listened to their breath,” Andrea said.
“They were so scared they didn’t even want to look up because there’s this horse breathing right down them, and it was intense, and they loved it.”
Andrea felt Jaxon loved to tell that story.
“He loved telling that story to everyone, he just loved it,” Andrea said. “He was just so happy. He loved it. And like I said, there are players that played with him and against him, there’s players that knew him but didn’t know him and said they loved to play against him because he challenged them and made them play their best.”
Melfort
With the couple’s full-time work they never had the opportunity to explore the Melfort community until now.
“I never knew what actually was in Melfort because we just had no time to explore,” Andrea said. “A seven hour drive, and then game and turn around to go home. So we can see how he liked living here and he enjoyed it here, and we thank Melfort for welcoming him and taking care of him while we couldn’t.”
She believes hockey was Jaxon’s dream.
“He was living his dream, and you can’t live your dream in your hometown. You have to go play junior hockey where you are selected to play and living your dream means you got to grow wings, you got to grow, and you can’t do that living at home if your dream is hockey. Hockey will take you away from your home and that’s what all these small town communities do. They take care of the boys while their parents can’t.”
Andrea and Chris are taking things one step at a time.
“We’ve had five and a half months of this, we said the other night in Humboldt that it was very difficult, but it is a necessary step we have to take,” Chris said.
“It’s a necessary step hockey has to take, the Broncos have to take, the country has to take, and we’re by no means healed. This is going to be with us forever. But it was a step and tonight was another step, and we have to find a new normal, and we’re working on it. That’s all we can really say is we take it from day to day. We hope for the best tomorrow and we just go from that.”
