Former Penn State men’s hockey player Tommy Olczyk takes lessons from program off the ice

For former Penn State hockey player Tommy Olczyk, the sport is in his blood.

His father, Eddie Olczyk, is a Hockey Hall of Famer, and played in the NHL for 16 seasons with clubs such as the Chicago Blackhawks, Toronto Maple Leafs, Winnipeg Jets, New York Rangers, Los Angeles Kings and the Pittsburgh Penguins.

But for Tommy Olczyk, 29, stepping back from hockey and into an accounting job has been a long time coming.

“I think after playing for so long and being around the game, basically from the day I was born, I just needed a little break and I needed to get away from it,” he said. “The transition has been easy for me and I think mostly it’s because I was ready for it.”

Spending five years with the program, Olczyk saw Penn State go from the ACHA to the NCAA. The lessons he learned from the program, especially from Head Coach Guy Gadowsky, have stuck with him long past graduating in 2016.

One of his biggest takeaways, now part of his everyday life, is a phrase that Gadowsky preached and that appeared in the team’s handbook every year: “Be where you are.”

“That was the rule, simple as that,” Olczyk said. “How he would explain it to us was, if you’re in the classroom, be a student. Don’t have your laptop or iPad out watching hockey videos or video of the last game. Be present. Be where you are. But if you’re at the hockey rink, put school stuff to the side, your family drama, your friend drama to the side and be a hockey player and be a professional at the rink.

“I think that’s definitely something that I have lived by since I left Penn State and something I will continue to live by.”

Former teammates remember Olczyk as a character. Matt Skoff, who has known Olczyk since he was 12 years old, remembers him lightening the mood before games and cracking jokes.

“He’s the epitome of what you would want in a student-athlete. He was super smart, a good representation off the ice and on the ice, did all the little things very, very well. Was a great teammate, a fantastic friend,” Skoff said.

Outside of the impact Gadowsky had on Olczyk, who was in the Master of Accounting program at the Smeal College of Business, former accounting professors also had a large influence on him and his time at Penn State.

“My professors expected the most out of me, they didn’t care that I was on the hockey team, some probably didn’t even know there was a hockey team yet because it was so new,” Olczyk said.

Olczyk spent four semesters as a teaching assistant for Accounting 211, and considered it his favorite part of every week.

“Every Friday at 11:15 I’d have a class. Kids would come in and we’d go over some problems and then I’d have a couple hours of office hours every week on the third floor in the business school,” Olczyk said.

Former teammates who knew about Olczyk’s passion for accounting did what any good teammates would do — they decided they had to see his skills in person.

“When the season ended that year, we crashed his class. It was me, Eric Scheid, and James Robinson ... he was up there teaching, and he didn’t really see us walk in,” Skoff said. “He didn’t know what to do, and the class started laughing.”

After graduating from Penn State, Olczyk wasn’t ready to leave the ice, and spent time playing in the minor leagues. He played for the now defunct Alaska Aces in the ECHL. When he went home the next summer, he skated and trained before playing in Indianapolis for the Indy Fuel.

“That was actually the year that my dad was going through chemo with his colon cancer diagnosis and treatment,” Olczyk said. “It was a lot nicer to not be in Anchorage, and to be in Indy and be able to go see him on and off.”

After playing in the minor leagues for two seasons, Olczyk was ready to hang up his skates. First, he seized an opportunity to play in Europe.

“When you’re a college athlete, you’re not afforded the opportunity to study abroad like a lot of kids are, so that’s definitely something I missed out on, something that was always in the back of my mind – finding a way to get over to Europe,” he said.

After talking with Robinson, who had also never been to Europe, the two headed to Cergy, France, to play in the Synerglace Ligue Magnus for one year.

“It was awesome, we both went into it with the same mind frame – knowing that it was going to be our last year of hockey,” Robinson said. “We both went into it with the mindset that we just wanted to go have fun and not take things too seriously, not be too stressed out — just enjoy Europe and see some new cities and some new countries and have as much fun as we can, and that’s exactly what we did.”

Looking back on his time in the minor leagues, Olczyk remembers it as a “love-hate relationship.”

“They don’t really offer multiple year contracts in those years to begin with, so guys really start to move around and realize how big the grind is. I think that’s something that maybe deters guys from wanting to play professional hockey. They see what their former teammates and their friends go through and it’s definitely not for everyone,” he said.

Now adjusting to a 9-to-5 job, he is enjoying his new routine away from the rink.

“I’m very schedule oriented, and I think that definitely worked in my favor getting into it. Some guys really struggle, unfortunately — luckily I was not one of those people,” Olczyk said. “Luckily there are some people at my firm who are affiliated with hockey ... I never seem to have a shortage of things to talk about and a lot of my co-workers are eager to hear about my experiences and why I’m a first-year auditor at 29 years old now.”

Olczyk still enjoys watching the occasional hockey game, and living in Chicago has made him partial to the Blackhawks. While he still has a love for the sport and the place it had in his life, Olczyk isn’t rushing into joining any “beer leagues,” or getting on the ice anytime soon.

“Over the past year it’s kind of been nice to get away from it and reflect on my entire career and how it has assisted me in transitioning and helped me in the office and being more personable and responsible and disciplined,” he said.

This story was originally published July 26, 2020 at 3:48 PM.