January 11, 2009 was looking to be just another evening at the rink for then-Premier Floyd Roland. The 6'4 defenceman was patrolling the blue line for the Black Knights hockey club and keeping the puck away from his opponents, the Talbot Maple Leafs.
By the end of the night, the Premier had been thrown out of the game and suspended for three more by the Yellowknife Rec Hockey League.
"When I played hockey, I played hockey," reminisced Roland. "I never worried about my position in office."
(courtesy Floyd Roland)
It all started when Roland noticed a Maple Leaf player rushing to the net repeatedly. Roland zeroed in on him and they met at the right boards of Roland's end.
"Even though it was non-contact, I had to separate him from the puck," said Roland. "I picked up his tendencies quite quickly and he came down my side and I rubbed him out on the boards.
"It was no big contact, just a rub-out. Then I took the puck, shot it around the net and didn't think much of it."
Roland said he skated away when he was suddenly punched "in the kisser" by the player. He began to follow the player when teammate Jackie Jacobson, who was then and still is a member of the legislative assembly, called him back to the bench before he got himself in trouble.
But a few plays later Roland met the player on the ice again. Tensions between them escalated throughout the game until near the end of the third period when the player rushed the net and was poking at the fallen goalie who had covered the puck.
"I thought, 'That's enough of that BS,' so I give him a bit of a shove and told him to settle down," he said. "I said there's no scouts in the stands, just freaking settle down.
"He was just yapping away, so I thought to myself 'Okay, I'm going to take 3 minutes. If he gets the puck I'm going to do old-school hockey and give him some body.'"
His wish was granted. The puck went straight to the offending player, Roland looked to the heavens and gave thanks then b-lined right to him.
"He saw me coming and passed off right away," he said. "I let up, and wouldn't you know it, he comes right at me. As he's skating towards me, I put the shoulder down and hit him good. He stumbled backwards and was having a hard time keeping his balance.
"I went back to take my position. I turned around and he was coming at me. He brought his gloves up and put them up in my face.
"And I just said, 'You know what? Just drop them.' And he obliged."
The pair fed each other several punches before one of the Maples Leafs grabbed Roland from behind and started pushing his helmet over his eyes. So Roland braced himself until another teammate pulled the second attacker off. Roland gave his opponent a short chop to the chest and fell on top of him.
"I'm not one to go looking for a fight, but I'm always ready to finish. I was seeing red. I was fully cocked and ready to just smoke him."
He was handed a five minute major penalty, with less than five minutes left in the game he went to the dressing room.
Officials attempted to sweep the incident under the rug, just putting Roland's jersey number down instead of his name. But reporters picked up on it quickly and the story went national.
"It just so happened the next day we were heading to Ottawa for the First Ministers meeting," he said. "Word has spread like wildfire, so no pun intended but it was a great icebreaker for the meeting."
Taming the Tiger
Another highlight of his career was getting to body check a genuine hockey legend. While playing at a Native Hockey Tournament in Whitehorse one year, Roland bumped into NHL bruiser Dave "Tiger" Williams, who was and remains the league's all-time leader in penalty minutes with 4,421 minutes spent in the pen.
"Tiger Williams was making a rush down the ice and I saw an opportunity to steal the puck from him," said Roland. "I got about four feet from him and the opportunity presented itself to leave the puck alone and just take the man.
"I stepped into him pretty good and put him on the ice, picked up the puck and handed it off to one of my teammates. My stick got stuck in the legs of the referee, so I let it go. One of the opposing players picked it up, and Tiger Williams grabbed it from him and started coming towards me.
"I thought to myself 'Oh, son of a gun — this is gonna hurt,' and he just gave me my stick and said 'Good hit, but next time the train comes around the corner, toot the horn.'"
Born in Inuvik, Roland was on skates before he was 10 years old, playing hockey in the Grollier Hall skating rink.
"It was unorganized and not affiliated with a league or anything," he said. "It was just getting boys together and playing hockey."
Roland bounced around the ice, rotating between goaltender and defence as he progressed through the junior ranks before joining the Inuvik minor hockey league, playing out of Dave Jones arena.
In his first year in the Inuvik Senior Hockey league, he clocked 6 penalty minutes. But by the end of the second year, he had a reputation for getting out there and getting things done.
"It was contact hockey and part of the sport I liked was the fact I could hit pretty good, even though I was a fairly light guy," he said. "I learned the technique of body checking, whether it was boards or open-ice hits.
"If you had the puck and crossed the blue line in our end, we were probably going to meet," he said. "It was always good to get out on that ice."