OBITUARY: College hockey legend Gene Kinasewich, 63 (03/20/05)

OBITUARY: College hockey legend Gene Kinasewich, 63

PARSIPPANY, N.J. - Ukrainian Canadian Gene Kinasewich, a legend of North American college hockey lore, died of cancer on February 23 at a hospital near Boston, The Boston Globe reported. A respected and well-liked Harvard University ice hockey star, he devoted a considerable amount of energy and time toward promoting the sport in Ukraine. He was 63.

Mr. Kinasewich, the second youngest of 13 children of Ukrainian immigrants, was raised in Thorsby, Alberta. His parents died when he was 10.

"It was hard, but it would have been a lot harder if we weren't a big family that stuck together," Mr. Kinasewich told The Boston Globe in 1964.

As an athlete, he was perhaps best known for scoring the overtime goal against Boston College to win the Eastern College Athletic Conference hockey championship in 1963.

"His skates never touched the ice for two nights ... he was flying," Snooks Kelley, the coach of the Boston College team that lost the championship game, told a Boston newspaper after the loss.

"He was one of the most amazing men I've ever met," said Tim Taylor, a former teammate and current coach of the Yale hockey team. "He was all about helping others, not looking out for himself," The Boston Globe reported.

Mr. Kinasewich also was the sponsor of a hockey exchange program with North American and Ukrainian youth.

According to his son, Robert, his advice to young Ukrainian hockey players was: "If you don't know what to do [with the puck], put it in the goal."

Mr. Kinasewich continued to play hockey until about three years ago with the Bombers Hockey Club, a team for older players. A former teammate of his, Tom "Red" Mechem, said "he never lost his competitiveness."

"But that's not what he'll be remembered for. No matter whether you were on the fourth line or the first, he treated everybody the same," Mr. Mechem told The Boston Globe. "That's why he was so loved."

But Mr. Kinasewich also excelled outside of the hockey rink. He graduated from Harvard University magna cum laude in June 1964, and went on to earn two master's degrees and a doctorate from the Graduate School of Education. He later taught American history at a private day school.

Mr. Kinasewich worked for the Massachusetts Department of Education before moving back to Edmonton to help expand the family business, K-Bro (Kinasewich Brothers) Linen Systems, a hospital laundry service.

By his mid-20s he was assistant dean of Harvard College. As an undergraduate he combined both his academic talent and his athletic prowess to create for himself an enviable future.

"Hockey gave me something hundreds of boys in Canada would want if they knew about it - an education at Harvard," Mr. Kinasewich said at a dinner in 1964 for the Friends of Harvard Hockey. "Harvard has given me a life," he said after having earned the Bingham Award as the school's top athlete the previous year.

Mr. Kinasewich played hockey with his older brothers and on an Edmonton team sponsored by the National Hockey League's Detroit Red Wings, though his professional career did not extend far beyond that.

In addition to his son, he leaves a daughter, Tanya Kinasewich of Duxbury; another son, Gregory of Duxbury; his former wife, Janet Mittell Kinasewich of Cambridge; eight siblings, Anne, William, Stephanie, Nicholas, Michael, Raymond, Orest, and Robert; and two grandchildren.

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