John MacNeil
Daily Herald
Athens Shingoose has been a marathon man in the past year, during which he smoothly skated through multiple hockey experiences across Canada.
Beyond his regular duties with his U18 prep team, RINK Academy in Winnipeg, and his call-up to the major junior Prince Albert Raiders, the 16-year-old forward from Waywayseecappo, Man., scored a hat trick of sorts with his participation in extracurricular hockey events.
Last fall, the Raiders’ first-round pick from the 2025 draft stepped into the WHL Cup at Red Deer, Alta., and helped Manitoba post a 5-0 record and win the Western Canadian U16 championship. With six goals and 12 points in five games, he led all scorers in the tournament.
In the spring, Shingoose was part of another golden Manitoba team, the champions of the National Aboriginal Hockey Championship in Regina.
This summer, he was invited to Hockey Canada’s development camp in Oakville, Ont., for the top under-17 players in the nation.
“Yeah, I would say my teammates, my coaches, they created me into the player that I am today,” Shingoose said last weekend during his second Raiders’ training camp. “Pushing me in practices and everything.
“That little short base of when we were in Red Deer, it was a great group. We were so tight, it was like, ‘All right, we’re going to win this gold.’ Our coach said, ‘Be phenomenal, not forgotten.’ We really took that personally, so we won that.
“Then, we went to the Indigenous tournament in Regina. We had a really tight group there, too, and we won gold.”
His journey continued in July at the national camp, the best from which will return to Oakville to compete in the World U17 Hockey Challenge during the first week of November.
“I kind of showcased myself really well there, and hopefully I get the chance to represent Canada,” said Shingoose, whose “really exhausting” summer has turned toward fall and his push for a Prince Albert roster spot this season.
“It really is exciting,” he said during camp at the Art Hauser Centre. “I got my feet wet last year. I’m coming here much stronger. I feel really strong coming into camp this year. I hope I can crack this squad. There’s a lot of high talent here, but I’ll showcase myself and try to do what I do best. Showcase my speed and showcase my shot, and kind of get in that offensive area. Try to play a 200-foot game. I’ve been trying to get used to that, and just keep moving forward.”
His talent and tenacity have been most noticeable to the Raiders’ management, which used the 16th overall draft choice to select Shingoose back in 2025.
“He’s very tenacious,” said Prince Albert coach Ryan McDonald. “You watch him on the ice, he’s always in the mix, he competes extremely hard. You look at his body of work from the off-season and you can see the work that’s paying off for him out there.”
McDonald believes Shingoose’s multi-faceted hockey excursions in the past year can only help his development as he strives to reach the WHL.
“I think they’re huge,” said the Raiders’ coach, fresh from a gold-medal-finish himself this summer with Canada’s under-18 team in the Hlinka-Gretzky tournament. “Any experience you can learn from (is beneficial). For this summer, him getting to the under-17 development camp and playing with the best players across the country in his age group. Looking at the body of work he had out there and the production that he had was extremely promising.
“It points to how hard he works on the ice every day. He’s a guy that doesn’t stop moving. He’s tenacious. He gets to the net front. He gets to the inside and he knows how to score goals.
“Again, he’s a player that plays extremely hard. He had an ability to be up with us last year for parts of the season and towards the end as we continued to go on our run. He knows how Raider hockey is played. He’s given himself a real good opportunity to be here full-time.”
Shingoose showed some of that tenacity at the Raiders’ camp last weekend, as he stood his ground against bigger opponents in front of the net during intrasquad action.
Playing against older boys last winter, he scored 15 goals and 31 points in 30 games with RINK’s U18 prep team in the Canadian Sport School Hockey League.
“My first half of my first year in the U18 league wasn’t very great,” Shingoose said. “But then, as soon as I got into the second half, I kind of played like my old self.
“Coming into (Prince Albert’s) camp, I feel really confident and I’m so ready to play in the Western Hockey League.”
Shingoose is already living with a P.A. billet and he appears that much closer to stepping into the Raiders’ mix on a permanent basis.
His love of the game is rooted in his hometown of Waywayseecappo, home of the junior A Wolverines of the Manitoba Junior Hockey League.
“My step-parents billet the Wolverines, so I go to the games quite a bit,” he said. “We actually advanced past the first round of the playoffs (last season), so that was very exciting.”
Almost five-foot-nine and 168 pounds, Shingoose is an exciting player in his own right.
“I kind of model my game after Cole Caufield and Mathew Barzal,” he said. “They’re very fast, and Cole Caufield is one of the smaller guys and he has a heck of a shot.”
