BUFFALO, N.Y. — Finding good things to say about the boys on the U-16 Halton Hurricanes AAA team at a year-end party was no chore for Darryl Giancola. In many cases, he’d been coaching them since they were only nine or ten years old, and through the years he’d formed strong relationships with the players and their families. In a way, though, Matthew Schaefer was an exception.
Schaefer had just joined the Hurricanes ahead of the 2022-23 season, after years of going head-to-head against Halton as a player with Hamilton, Ont.-based AAA teams. Though Giancola had gotten to know Matthew and his family over the years thanks to spring travel teams, the defenceman was still a new guy when it came to the Hurricanes. By season’s end, however, Schaefer — on the verge of being taken first overall in the 2023 OHL Priority Selection Draft — was a beloved member of the squad and, in a room full of players and parents gathering to mark the conclusion of Halton’s year, Giancola gushed when it was time to speak about him.
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Later in the evening, Matthew’s dad, Todd, asked Giancola for a favour: could he record what he’d said earlier so Todd could go home and play it for his wife, Jennifer? Giancola had already noted Jennifer’s absence that night. Though he knew she was battling cancer, Matthew’s mom had been a fixture around the team all year and the broader understanding was, all things considered, Jennifer was doing okay and getting a leg up in the fight. Whatever the case, Giancola told Todd he’d be more than happy to record his praise of Matthew and send it along. “And then he started crying,” Giancola recalls of the interaction with Todd. “He confided in me before Matthew even knew that the cancer was at a point where [Jennifer wasn’t going to get better].”
The praise Giancola had for Schaefer that night is in step with the high regard most everyone in the hockey world has for the Hamilton-born prospect. As a defenceman, he’s willing and able to do anything the moment calls for. As a person, Schaefer maintains an upbeat bearing despite being a 17-year-old who’s faced the type of tragedy many seasoned adults couldn’t imagine. In addition to losing his mom, Schaefer has been impacted by the death of two other important figures in his hockey life. But whether navigating a sheet of ice or a world where nothing is guaranteed, you rarely find people who move with Schaefer’s grace and purposeful manner. That’s why, if the New York Islanders do what’s expected and select Schaefer first overall at the 2025 NHL Draft on Friday night, they’ll be adding the type of guy who can define a franchise in every possible way. “He’s one of the most authentic people you’re ever going to find,” says Giancola.
THE NHL SCOUTING Combine in Buffalo is the place where teams and media members really get to know the pool of prospects in a given draft year. Of course, the first few bullets of a top prospect’s CV tend to be familiar, but the rest is often a mystery. In Schaefer’s exceptional case, though, everybody in the LECOM Harborcenter already knew the kid had been through hell. On the off chance they didn’t, Schaefer ran through the series of events.
“I lost my billet mom due to suicide, and I lost my mom two months later to cancer, she battled for two years,” he said. “Lost my owner when I was at the world juniors.”
Jim Waters, the hockey-loving owner of the Erie Otters, died unexpectedly in his sleep just before Christmas this past December, when Schaefer was gearing up for the WJC with Canada. Waters, who was 73, and his wife, Sheila, were a huge reason why Todd and Jennifer felt comfortable sending Matthew to Erie the summer he turned 16.
About three months after he landed there in 2023, the woman Schaefer refers to as his “billet mom” — Emily Matson — was struck by a train, her death ruled a suicide.
Then, in February 2024, Schaefer lost his biggest fan and always-willing mini-stick opponent to breast cancer. “If love could have saved them, they would have lived forever; that’s a good saying I go by,” Schaefer told the pack of media gathered around him in Buffalo shortly after his combine ended with the physical testing.
Maybe love couldn’t save those people Schaefer held so dear, but the young man is determined to do what he can to assist others who know the pain of loss. Early on during the week-long combine, Schaefer visited Western New York Compassion Connection to share his story.
“I want to help people,” he said. “I’ve been through a lot.”
In the immediate aftermath of Jennifer’s passing, Schaefer — a native of Stoney Creek on the east edge of Hamilton — spent time at home with Todd and his big brother, Johnny. After a couple weeks, Matthew asked his dad how Jennifer would have felt if he picked his stick up and headed back to Erie. “She’d be mad if you stayed home,” Schaefer recalled his dad saying.
By the end of an OHL rookie campaign that was unspeakably difficult off the ice, Schaefer had totalled a modest three goals and 17 points in 56 outings. While he was certainly still highly regarded, the likes of American centre James Hagens and Canadian power winger Porter Martone seemed like better bets to go first overall one year out from the 2025 draft. Then Schaefer went to the 2024 Hlinka Gretzky Cup in August, served as Canada’s captain and led his team to gold.
“He wore the ‘C’ because guys gravitated to him,” says Kris Mallette, the coach of that squad. “When we spoke to him as a staff, [he was]very mature, very outgoing, very serious when needed. He had all these intangibles where you’re just like, ‘This guy has a lot of qualities you wish a lot of [other]players had.’”
At the combine, Schaefer spoke about entering this past season wanting to prove there was ample offence in his game, a mission that really began with the six points he put up in five Hlinka contests. Still, Mallette’s lasting memory isn’t a dash down the ice or a sweet feed from the point. “Gold-medal game, he loses his glove in the play and he’s out there still trying to block the shot,” Mallette recalls. “I think scouts after that tournament, in particular, were really excited about what lay ahead.”
Unfortunately, more challenges — albeit far less grave — were around the bend. Schaefer had a bout of mononucleosis that delayed the start of his season with Erie, then broke his collarbone crashing into the net during his second game at the World Junior Championship. Even still, he’d shown enough during selection camp and the early days of the event for everyone watching to know that, in addition to being Canada’s second-youngest player, he was also the team’s best. “There’s just natural poise to him,” says a member of a rival OHL club’s front office. “There’s such a calmness.”
While he was ultimately limited to just 17 outings with Erie, Schaefer proved he could be a force in the offensive zone by netting 22 points in that limited showing. His sublime skating is the foundational element of Schaefer’s game — “He’s got feet of gold,” Otters teammate Malcolm Spence says. When Schaefer was an AAA player with Giancola, the coach would sometimes have him practice as a forward and even play him up front in blowout games so he could get a better feel for what to do in the offensive zone. “That’s a demonstration of his open-mindedness,” Giancola says of Schaefer’s willingness to try something different. “He did what he was told, but also had his unbelievable creative mind to take it to the next level.”
At nearly six-foot-two and 183 pounds, Schaefer’s size is no issue, nor is doing whatever the game calls for in a given moment. “You can play him in all situations,” Spence, a projected 2025 first-rounder himself, said at the combine. “He penalty-kills, he [plays on the power play], he’s on for the last minute of the game whether you’re up or down a goal.”
Indeed, while others are busy comparing him to the NHL’s edgework gods, Schaefer — who, of course, appreciates the work done by the likes of Miro Heiskanen and Cale Makar — also surfaces the name of a signature shutdown guy when asked which players he models his game after. “I mean, I love watching [Chris] Tanev block shots, kill penalties,” he said.
That’s music to any bench boss’s ears.
In an unlikely twist, Mallette — after being let go from his job with the Kelowna Rockets this past season — became Schaefer’s full-time head coach when he was hired by the Otters in February. Schaefer was healing his busted collarbone at home in Ontario at that point but, even knowing the defenceman was unlikely to play again in the season, Mallette immediately summoned him back to Erie. “I wanted him back around our players. When guys were coming off the ice between periods, I wanted them to see his face,” Mallette says. “I do believe having him around really benefited our group. Even when we were practicing and he was involved in just drills, it made us that much better because he was so close to being able to come back and he challenged our payers to be on their toes and be ready. We needed him around.”
While Schaefer was almost game-ready by the time Erie advanced to Round 2 of the playoffs, everybody understood there was a bigger picture to consider for a player who remained atop many mock drafts despite his lack of time on the ice. “We wanted what was best for Matthew,” says Mallette, whose team was wiped out by the eventual Memorial Cup-champion London Knights.
For his part, Schaefer said he relished being around the team when he was hurt, doing lineup reads before games and just being on the bus with the boys. As for those who question the validity of his small sample size, he’s content to let the work speak for itself. “I think I really showed what I was capable of in the 17 games,” he said.
Spence was certainly happy to have Schaefer back around the Otters. The pair lived together on a couple different occasions during their time in Pennsylvania and Schaefer’s presence in the home was unavoidable. “There were many times I’d wake up in the morning — it’s early, I’m kind of out of it, trying to do my own thing — and he’d come into the bathroom and make me laugh because that’s the kind of human he is,” Spence said. “He’s a guy who, you wouldn’t even know what he’s gone through. He wakes up every day with a smile on his face.”
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Spence is far from the only one who’s been touched by Schaefer’s gracious, gregarious nature. “I don’t think I ever saw him walk away from anybody who called his name,” Mallette says. “If it was a kid, a grownup, anybody who wanted to talk with Matthew Schaefer, he would stop and sign or take a picture.”
At the combine, prospects are always asked which teams they’ve met with and how the endless interrogations have gone. When asked about meeting suit after suit, Schaefer simply beamed. “I’m a talker, I love these interviews,” he said. “I love meeting new people.”
Naturally, there’s an added layer to that when it’s people who’ve been hammered by life the way Schaefer has. As a young man who knows more than he should about the weight of grief, Schaefer is committed to sharing his experience with everyone, especially those who carry a burden he can lighten in even the slightest way.
“When they keep it in, they’re burning inside,” he said. “I think when you let it out, it’s a little bit better.”
Everything seems to be when Schaefer is around.
