Remembering TJ Oshie’s hockey origins after his NHL retirement

EVERETT — Exactly seven years after he swam in the fountains of Washington Harbour in Washington, D.C.’s Georgetown neighborhood to celebrate his Stanley Cup Championship as a member of the Washington Capitals in 2018, TJ Oshie returned to the site on Monday to announce his retirement after 16 seasons playing in the NHL.

The 38-year-old Everett native first thanked his family in an emotional, nearly 20-minute speech. The next person he thanked was his youth coach, Mike Murphy, who was watching in his office across the country.

Now the President/GM of the Seattle Totems in the United States Premier Hockey League (USPHL), Murphy coached Oshie – who was born in Mount Vernon and raised in Everett – in Seattle Junior Hockey from the squirt and pee-wee levels all the way to the “midget” level.

“To Seattle Junior Hockey Association, in particular my youth coach, Mike Murphy: Thank you for giving me my start in hockey,” Oshie said in his speech, over the course of which he paused several times to compose himself.

Murphy had to compose himself as well. The former coach deals with acoustic neuromas, which are rare, non-cancerous tumors that press on the hearing and balance nerves in the inner ear, according to UW Medicine Health Library. Due to the tumors, Murphy lost hearing in his left ear, and his left eye no longer produces tears.

But not even that could stop the emotions from flowing out as he watched Oshie’s speech, reflecting on the career of his best former player with whom he still shares a close relationship. Afterwards, Murphy sent Oshie a text message.

“I told him, ‘Jeez, you know, you made me tear up a little bit, too.’” Murphy told The Herald in a phone call on Monday. “I think just thinking about the fact– I kind of knew it was coming, obviously, but yeah, it was emotional knowing that he’s not going to be doing it anymore.”

Oshie did not play at all in the 2024-25 season, which he spent on long-term injured reserve (LTIR) for chronic back issues. It was the final season of the eight-year contract he signed ahead of the Stanley Cup-winning season in 2017-18, which caused many to speculate his retirement.

Oshie spent his first seven seasons with the St. Louis Blues, who drafted him 24th overall in 2005, making him the seventh Washington-born player ever drafted to the NHL, and just the third first-round pick (David Wilkie in 1992 and Ty Jones in 1997). He signed with the Blues in 2008 after three years with the University of North Dakota, and was traded to the Capitals in 2015, where he spent the final nine years of his career.

He became a star in the 2014 Winter Olympics for Team USA, where he almost single-handedly beat Russia in a 3-2 shootout preliminary round win by converting four of six shootout attempts.

But it all started with 10 years in the Seattle Junior Hockey Association, with Murphy as his coach for most of it. Murphy recalls laughing with other coaches about how much better Oshie was than his peers. At the ages of 10-12, he was pulling off plays that typically only players in their 20s could make.

Not many players from the area make it professionally, but Murphy always believed Oshie would be the exception.

“You never know for sure, but just so much fun (seeing him) growing up, watching him play and turning into the man that (he is now),” Murphy said. “He’s obviously (an) unreal hockey player, but I think he’s an even better person.

“We’ve had a lot of great kids here at Seattle Junior Hockey, but (he was) just different. I don’t know, was it God-given? A little bit of that, and a lot of hard work, too. I mean, he always had a stick in his hand. He was always stick-handling. He was always shooting pucks. Loved to be on the ice.”

Oshie attended Stanwood High School for his freshman year before moving to Warroad, Minnesota in 2002 to live with his father, Tim, who died from complications with early-onset Alzheimer’s in 2021 at the age of 56.

Murphy coached alongside Tim for some time and remained close with Oshie even after he moved away. Anytime the Capitals would visit Seattle and Vancouver, Murphy would go see him. Murphy even stood next to Oshie’s uncle, Michael, as he read the starting lineup card in the Capitals’ locker room ahead of Oshie’s 1,000th NHL game in Vancouver on March 16, 2024.

Even as Oshie’s playing days are officially over, his relationship with Murphy is as strong as ever.

“I love him like my own son and would do anything for him,” Murphy said. “Can’t be prouder than I am of him as a man, and first and foremost, husband, father, kid and then hockey, obviously, too.”

Oshie starred in two state championship runs with Warroad and excelled at North Dakota before his pro career, but he never stopped giving back to his roots.

When the Totems were trying to move up into the Canadian Junior B league at the time, they played several exhibition games to prove they could handle themselves at that level. With the high school season in Minnesota not started yet, Murphy had the then-17-year-old Oshie fly out for a week to practice and play with the 17U team, which consisted of many of Oshie’s former youth teammates.

The Totems beat a team from Hope, B.C. 9-6, and Oshie scored seven of the nine goals.

“He could’ve had more,” Murphy said. “But he always got a little bit embarrassed, so to speak, and he would always start overpassing and not wanting to be like, ‘I’m the whole show.’”

Oshie was only allowed to spend the week with the Totems after the Warroad coaches were assured that Murphy and the coaching staff would do what they could to prevent him from getting injured or suspended.

So when a line brawl broke out and prompted the benches to clear, the coaches grabbed Oshie and held him back from going over the boards with them.

“He was pretty mad that he didn’t get to,” Murphy recalled. “He was a scrappy little bugger. He was pretty mad at me. I promised the North Dakota and Warroad guys that nothing would happen.”

Oshie played in two exhibitions — his only times ever suiting up for the Totems — before going back to Warroad, but made an immeasurable impact. He’ll still post positive messages on X to the Totems, which Murphy says the players always appreciate.

Good luck this weekend @SeattleJrTotems!! Looking forward to some updates from my old coach @TOTEMSMURPH #GoTotes— TJ Oshie (@TJOshie77) January 17, 2019

An Oshie “shrine” exists in the lobby of Olympicview Arena in Mountlake Terrace, where Murphy will occasionally run into Oshie’s mother, Tina; brother, Taylor; and sister, Tawni. Taylor’s kids play with Seattle Junior Hockey.

While Oshie made his name in Warroad and with North Dakota before starring professionally for St. Louis, Washington and Team USA, the people from his very first stop in Seattle and Everett are proud to claim him as one of their own.

“For Seattle Junior Hockey and all the Northwest, but Seattle Junior especially, he’s their hero,” Murphy said. “You just hear him around the rink, (they) talk about it, like the legend that he is.

“It’s just cool to hear the little guys that weren’t even born, but they know of him and he’s their favorite player. … It gives that whole next crop of little guys hope that they can make it, maybe, somehow. And that’s pretty neat.”

At the end of his speech in Washington, D.C. on Monday, Oshie looked back on his career using a quote that Tim and his other youth coaches would laminate and put up on the door: “Today I will give all I have, for this moment may never come again.”

“That has always stuck with me because that is the only thing I’ve ever had full control over,” Oshie said in his speech. “No amount of skill, size or speed could control how hard I worked and whether I could give 100 percent or not. That was only up to me.

“So to my family, friends, coaches, trainers, teammates, fans, and to the game of hockey, I promise you this: The moment my skates touched the ice, I gave you everything I had.”