He was living alone at age 15 in Finland, doing his own cooking and washing hockey sweaty gear at his apartment, which didn’t have a dryer.
The next year, Slafkovsky moved to Finland to play for the TPS U16 team.
In Finland, Slafkovsky lived by himself in an apartment. He was 15!
I’m the father of two kids in their early 20s still living at home, and that’s hard to imagine. Slafkovsky said moving away from home at such a young age was harder on his mother than it was on him.
“I was happy,” Slafkovsky said with a big smile after he scored a goal in the Canadiens’ first scrimmage of training camp Thursday in Brossard. “See ya!”
But it wasn’t easy for Slafkovsky, either.
Slafkovsky would cook most of his meals by himself, as well as doing his own laundry and all the other things that come with living alone. Again, he was 15!
There were no laundry facilities at the rink, so Slafkovsky would have to bring his sweaty gear back to his apartment after practices and games and wash it himself.
“No dryer, so hang it,” he said.
“It wasn’t as hard for me to move overseas and all the time change and being without my parents,” Slafkovsky said about making the jump directly to the NHL. “It probably would have been way harder if I was living at home my whole life and then had to when I was 18 come here. I already knew how is it to be alone.”
Slafkovsky lived with a family in Montreal during his rookie season, but there must have been times when he really felt alone as he struggled to find his game in the NHL, posting 4-6-10 totals in 39 games before suffering a season-ending knee injury.
“If you still look at my first season and probably 25, 30 games of the second season, I was lost out there,” Slafkovsky said Thursday. “Just still trying to figure it out. I was mad after games because I knew I know how to play hockey. I just couldn’t translate my game.”
Canadiens management still believed the best place for Slafkovsky’s development was the NHL and they were right. Slafkovsky would finish the season with 20-30-50 totals while playing in all 82 games. He had 16-19-35 totals in the last 41 games while playing on the No. 1 line with Nick Suzuki and Cole Caufield and his confidence grew — which he said was the key.
“Thankfully, we have great coaches and everyone around helped me to translate my game, find my game,” the always affable Slafkovsky said. “It’s there, but it’s not where I want to be. It’s not there where I want it to be yet.”
Where does he want it to be?
“Well, I only had 50 points, no?” he said about last season. “We’ll see what I can do this year. I want to be the best.
“Points and team wins,” he added about his goals for this season. “When you get enough team wins then you probably also have enough points and then you’re battling for something bigger and that’s most important.”
That became a big story in Slovakia — like everything Slafkovsky does. He noted that the media spotlight on him back home is much brighter than it is in Montreal and it can sometimes get outrageous.
“I have three bedrooms, first of all,” Slafkovsky said. “He said four. And now in Slovak media they say, ‘Oh, Juraj Slafkovsky bought a new luxurious apartment in Montreal.’ ”
Slafkovsky has learned to handle the pressure in Montreal and back home.
He’s still only 20 — but he’s mature way beyond those years.