How did 11-year-old Jude Gullan’s Saturday morning tournament game go? Kraken goaltender Chris Driedger wanted to know.
A shutout, fellow goalie Jude responded, ever so nonchalantly.
“No big deal,” Driedger said through laughter.
The Jr. Kraken goalie has the attitude down. Jude’s team won 6-0 Saturday morning at Angel of the Winds Arena, home of the Western Hockey League’s Everett Silvertips. His team has its own version of the Kraken’s Davy Jones hat, which is handed off in the locker room to someone who just turned in a noteworthy game performance.
Brienne Gullan, Jude’s mother, said her kid was awarded the Jr. Kraken honorary hat Saturday. Jude made a speech dedicating it to his defensemen. So he has the script down, too.
There are two Judes on his team, so he goes by “Baby Driedgs” in honor of his NHL mentor.
In Driedger’s quest to keep busy during a seven- to nine-month expected recovery time after tearing his ACL last summer, he decided to pay it forward. That’s how he met Jude, and the two hit it off right away.
“He’s just tickled to death,” Brienne said of her son.
Driedger, 28, was injured in the gold-medal game of the IIHF World Championships following the Kraken’s inaugural season, when he split net duties with Philipp Grubauer and made a career-high 27 appearances. Thankfully he’d never rehabbed a major injury before, but needed ways to pass the time. A lot of online chess — “my fiancée says I’m addicted,” he said — and culinary experiments followed.
He launched Driedger’s Keepers, a program that allows Seattle’s aspiring young goaltenders to try the position without their parents sinking hundreds of dollars into pricey pads. Once that was up and running, he looked for more.
Jude’s coaches started asking around for mentorship candidates.
“Everybody just kind of said ‘Jude,’ and I think it’s because he has a good head on his shoulders,” Brienne said. “He’s cool as a cucumber on the ice.
“I’m biased, as a mom. Every day I see him, I’m like, ‘I couldn’t be more ecstatic about the human being he’s turning out to be.’”
Jude was obsessed with hockey well before the Kraken came to town and his classmates caught the bug. He tried every position but gravitated to the one with the highest stakes, greatest impact and fewest roster spots on any team he’ll try out for.
“I get a lot more attention when I’m a goalie,” Jude reasoned.
It’s also the most expensive. Brienne applied for some relief through the One Roof Foundation, the philanthropic arm of the Seattle Kraken and Climate Pledge Arena, and got it. It supplements Jude’s ice time, freeing up funds for more important things, like goalie-specific coaching and sweet new pads, once his bright red ones get too snug.
Brienne herself has played everything except goalie, the position she’s somehow now coaching.
“He wants me to get in pads. Mainly, I think, to laugh at me when I get out there,” Brienne said. “Be like, ‘It’s not so easy, is it?’”
Another invaluable resource is a guide who can show what’s possible and how to get there. Driedger’s father, Kelly, said at around Jude’s age, Chris caught the attention of a former major-junior player. It had a huge impact on the young Winnipeg native.
“Sometimes they don’t have to do a whole lot,” Kelly said. “He spent the time to get to know Chris and talk to him, watched him play and said, ‘Here’s some things you could work on.’ And that’s kind of what [Chris] is trying to do here.”
Driedger and Jude met for the first time at 32 Bar & Grill, which overlooks the Kraken practice facility, and started chatting. They’re both Star Wars fans and play piano and chess.
They went to a Kraken game, where Jude acquired a now-autographed hat he sported Saturday. They’ve done a few on-ice sessions but “mostly just hang out,” according to Jude. They spent hours playing a Star Wars virtual reality lightsaber game at Dave & Buster’s.
“It was fascinating as a parent just to listen, because there were so many similarities between the two,” Brienne said. “When I was looking at Chris, I was like wow, I’m looking at what my kid’s going to be.
“I can’t say any more positive things about him. He’s been great and he’s been really nice to Jude. They really clicked.”
It wasn’t necessary per se, but the similarities helped.
“It’s cool to put myself back in his shoes as a young goalie,” Driedger said. “He’s just the sweetest kid. He’s been a lot of fun to hang out with.”
Jude said he’s a little nervous about a 12U AA Select Team tryout coming up in April. Hopefully all goes well, but if not, Driedger has insight there, too. Dad Kelly said Driedger was cut from a team at around the same age and in hindsight, it might have been the best thing to happen in his young career.
“Then he had something to prove, and the next year he did prove that he belonged there,” Kelly said.
“He’s always been that way. Hit the bottom, and then ‘OK, I’ve got to work my way back up.’”
Driedger started skating at Kraken Community Iceplex roughly six months after his June 6 knee surgery and is now traveling with Seattle, taking part in practices and morning skates. In his long and looming absence, the team acquired free-agent goaltender Martin Jones, who guided the team to a much-improved first half of the season. Grubauer, meanwhile, found his game and has been “playing unbelievable this past stretch,” Driedger said.
Driedger isn’t ready to join the mix yet, but the day is coming.
“It was a slow progression, but we’re seeing a light at the end of the tunnel,” he said.
“I’m feeling good. ACLs are the kind of thing where you want to make sure you don’t come back too early, so we just need to find that sweet spot. When I’m ready, I’ll be very, very excited.”
Giving back made a difficult time more bearable. What he called a “learning experience” for himself was also a teaching experience.
His days are busier, but whenever the stars align, he knows a fun-loving, cool-as-a-cucumber Star Wars aficionado who would enjoy a chat or a hang.
“The thought definitely comes up — how many kids can say you’ve been mentored by an NHL goalie?” Jude said.