Alumni Association of Lakehead University

Veltman to Play Final Game

The Canadian Press
Wednesday April 23, 2008
Toronto

Jim Veltman is about to play his last National Lacrosse League game and accolades are pouring in.

Jim Veltman is about to play his last National Lacrosse League game and accolades are pouring in.

The 42-year-old captain of the Toronto Rock has been on eight championship NLL teams.

"He is a tremendous leader and I think it's because he's a man of great integrity," says Derek Keenan. "There is nothing fake about Jim Veltman.

"When he speaks, there is substance and meaning to what he says, and people listen with great respect."

Keenan played alongside Veltman and he coached him, and he knows as well as anybody that Veltman has an innate ability to perceive where the ball is going and react before anyone else.

"To me, that is what makes him so great," says Keenan, now GM-coach of the Portland Lumberjax. "Because of this sort of sixth sense, I don't think there's ever been another player like him in lacrosse.

"Maybe in hockey, and that would be Gretzky."

Veltman, who will be behind the Rock bench next season, plays his last NLL game on Sunday afternoon when the Philadelphia Wings visit Air Canada Centre in the season finale.

"It's definitely time to hand over the reins to other people and let them do their thing," Veltman says. "I'll help guide them along as a coach."

Toronto has missed the playoffs for the first time in the franchise's 10-year history, but it won't be a meaningless game for Rock and Veltman fans.

"He is the classiest player to ever play the game," says boyhood pal Troy Cordingley, who coaches the Calgary Roughnecks. "He shows so much respect for other players."

Veltman was a scorer who became a defence-conscious transition player leading the league in loose-ball pickups most years -- hence the nickname Scoop.

"You adapt and find a role for yourself," Veltman explains. "When others take over the scoring role, you have to find a way to adapt because, if you don't, you eventually find yourself on the outside looking in.

"Not enough players think about that and their careers are cut short."

Veltman grew up the middle child among three brothers and a sister and played lacrosse, soccer and hockey in his youth. He and Cordingley would ride their bicycles from different Brampton neighbourhoods to an outdoor lacrosse bowl and spend hours honing their skills. They were teammates through junior and senior, including a stretch in Coquitlam, B.C., and they ran together as Buffalo Bandits.

"He plays hard but in a fair way," says Cordingley. "He is just such a classy guy."

Veltman was a calming influence in the dressing room and led by example.

"You'd see him sitting there with his knees bleeding (from artificial turf burns) and you had no choice but to give 100 per cent," says Cordingley.

Veltman didn't turn pro until he was 26 because he was in Thunder Bay, Ont., attending Lakehead University. He became a teacher and now is a phys-ed instructor at Toronto's Agincourt Collegiate.

Veltman joined the Buffalo Bandits when they entered the league in 1992. Teammates included Keenan, Cordingley, John Tavares and Bob Hamley, who remain prominent in the sport today. With Les Bartley coaching, they won three titles.

Veltman began wearing 32 because it was the number worn by NBA great Magic Johnson.

"I liked the way he made his teammates better and did whatever it took to win," Veltman explains.

He lived up to the ideal.

Veltman didn't play in 1997. He and wife Teresa were on a humanitarian mission in Uganda, instructing teachers in new methods and helping run a district resource centre that provided equipment and books that teachers could borrow for their classrooms.

"It really does change you," Veltman says of such experiences. "We still live by some of the principles we learned while we were there -- like live as simply as possible.

"I'm a guy who has no problem paying taxes because I've seen a country where taxes aren't collected, where there were no ambulances, no street lights, roads that were all potholes . . . We take so much for granted here, like health care. People were going to hospitals (in Uganda) with tumours the size of fists wondering if doctors could do something for them."

The Bandits tried to retain him upon his return to Canada but the league ruled he was a free agent and he signed with the expansion Ontario Raiders.

"It was a difficult decision," Veltman recalls. "Buffalo was well established and I would be leaving a secure situation to go to Hamilton on a promise and a prayer."

But Bartley was going to coach and John Mouradian, who had been Bandits GM, were going to guide the new franchise so Veltman hopped on board. He'd been their captain in Buffalo and retained the C with the new team.

"He knows when to be a vocal leader and when to be a quiet leader," says Mouradian. "In a game, he has that sense of when to speed things up, when to slow things down.

"He really has the leadership qualities you need to win championships."

Veltman is without pretence.

"He'd look after the rookies when they came in and he'd interact with the fans after games," said Mouradian. "His actions are consistent no matter who he's dealing with.

"His values and morals helped shape his teams."

The Raiders moved down the highway after one year to become the Rock, and five NLL titles in seven years followed. Veltman never got tired of hoisting the Champion's Cup.

"You set a goal as a team at the beginning of the year and there's such a strong emotional feeling when you reach the goal," he says. "The first one is always special but 2003 in Rochester was probably the most unlikely one that we won.

"That one sticks out as the most difficult one to win, yet, we found a way to win it."

Teammate Blaine Manning recalls that triumph, which provides an example of Veltman's value to his team.

"The thing I'll never forget about Jim as a teammate is his ability to not be denied on the lacrosse floor," says Manning. "No matter what the situation was, in a game or in a season, if we needed a big play or loose ball or goal, he always seemed to be the guy that got the job done."

Toronto jumped to a 5-0 lead in that 2003 final. The Knighthawks charged back. Bob Watson's goaltending kept the Rock ahead by a goal, but it seemed only a matter of time before the home team would make the Rock crumble. Veltman had played defence all season. By halftime in this final, he wanted the ball.

"Jim changed positions in the third quarter and scored two beautiful goals," Manning recalls. "He dived across their crease to give us a lead that we never relinquished thanks to our defence and goaltending.

"That is just one example of what Jimmy brings to the table. He truly would do whatever it took to win, and that's why he's a true champion."

Colorado Mammoth GM Steve Govett tried to hire Veltman as head coach last year but the Rock countered with a coaching offer that kept him in the fold after his last game as a player.

"Jim Veltman is the most respected player -- and perhaps person -- in the NLL," says Govett. "I don't think you could find one person that would have an ill word to say about Jim.

"He is the quintessential professional on and off the floor. His immense success in the game is only exceeded by how outstandingly he treats people away from the game."

Govett was a Coquitlam teammate in their amateur days.

"I was in awe of his ability to bring the best out in his teammates," says Govett. "He made so many others better just by stepping foot in the same locker-room."

Veltman will become a premier coach in the NLL, Govett predicts.

"I'm sad it won't be with the Mammoth but I'm happy for the sport that he will be involved in making our product better into the future."

Veltman is "one of the all-time great players in lacrosse," adds Keenan.

The Veltmans live in Stouffville and have two children: Kris, 9, and Sara, 6.

The faded sweater that Veltman always wears under his shoulder pads for NLL games is about to be peeled off one last time.

"I don't put it in the wash because I'm afraid it might fall apart in the spin cycle," Veltman says of the relic from his Brampton Excelsiors minor lacrosse days. "I air it out a lot.

"That's another reason why I should retire -- the shirt won't last another year."

The memories will last forever.

If the Rock get lucky in the entry draft next September, another Veltman might appear on the Air Canada Centre carpet in Toronto colours. Daryl Veltman is Jim Veltman's nephew and brother of San Jose Stealth player Peter Veltman, and the native of Georgetown, Ont., will be a top prospect for the entry draft next September.