Sheffield Steelers: Captain Jonathan Phillips on 1,000 games and helping inspire the next generation

When the 40-year-old winger steps out on the ice at Braehead Arena tonight for the Steelers’ Elite League encounter against Glasgow Clan it will mark his 1,000th game for the team.

As captain for all but one of the 17 seasons he has played for the Steelers (ask former coach Doug Christiansen why) Phillips has been at the centre of some of the most memorable moments for the club.

Of course, when he arrived, he never envisaged still being here 16 years later. He has long regarded Sheffield as ‘home’ and couldn’t see himself being anywhere else, even when he does finally hang up those skates, whenever that may be.

“A thousand games for one team is certainly not something you set out to do,” said Phillips. “More than anything you are just honoured and privileged to play for that long, especially for a team like Sheffield. I’ve loved every single minute playing here.

“It’s kind of snuck up on me to be honest, because it only feels like yesterday since I started. I remember how I felt coming into a professional team when I was so young with butterflies and everything. I still get them now, I still get excited every time I go out on the ice or go into that locker room with the rest of the guys.”

Phillips had already racked up more than 200 games for hometown team Cardiff Devils before the opportunity to move to Sheffield came about. But before a puck had even dropped on the 2006-07 season, the coach who had signed him, Dave Whistle, had already left, taking up the opportunity to coach junior hockey back in Canada.

He was replaced by Dave Matsos, who had been player-assistant coach in South Wales. After making Phillips his captain in the summer of 2007 ahead of their second season together, they would go on to lead the club through one of its most successful periods. First came the 2008 play-off trophy, followed 12 months later by a memorable league and play-off double.

A Continental Cup bronze medal came the following season, after which Matsos moved on, taking up a coaching opportunity in the OHL.

Matsos had already signed the majority of the roster for the 2010-11 season, a team inherited by former NHL forward Ben Simon who, taking his first steps into coaching, then steered the Steelers to another league title.

In all, Phillips has won four league titles and four play-offs with the Steelers. Throw in a Challenge Cup in 2020 – a triumph which ended the club’s 17-year wait to lift it. Enjoying such success is why he made the move to Sheffield in the first place.

“I wanted to move on before I found a comfort zone and it is easy to do that in your hometown,” explained Phillips.

“I just wanted to win trophies, it’s something I had seen growing up watching the Devils doing, winning league titles, play-off finals. Sheffield were a new team in the 90s and just made winning part of their DNA from day one. And, as a player, you wanted to be a part of something like that, to play in a building like this.

“To be part of the Steelers was just something that really appealed. They were in a bit of a rebuild at the time, I’d played for Whis’ in Cardiff and then he came up here, signed me.

"At the time there were some ownership issues in Cardiff, things weren’t going great and they were moving buildings – I just needed a new challenge.”

It wasn’t just on the ice that Phillips quickly settled, he quickly felt comfortable in his new surroundings off the ice too and now regards the Steel City as home, his children growing up here, now playing hockey themselves and maybe wishing to one day emulate their dad.

“I don’t really think about how many more games I’ve got,” he added.

“As long as I’m still enjoying it and as long as I can stay as fit and as fast as I can, I’ll just keep playing. The only thing that would stop me is be a job opportunity elsewhere. I’m not being selfish, but at some point I’ve got to find a career after playing hockey and go into the ‘real world’.

“Coaching isn’t something that interests me, I don’t think I’d enjoy it. If you’re a coach you’ve got to be willing to move around and I’ve been lucky enough to settle here for so long now and the family, the kids are settled. I would much prefer just watching the kids play and coming down here to watch the Steelers.”

When it comes to leaving a legacy, Phillips will be up there along with others to have pulled on a Steelers shirt in recent years, helping inspire the next generation of British players – the likes of Rob Dowd, Davey Phillips, Ben O’Connor, Jason Hewitt and Mark Thomas.

Phillips believes youngsters should focus on a more recent Steelers’ star in Liam Kirk, the Maltby-born winger currently trying to make his way to the NHL having been drafted by the Arizona Coyotes in 2018.

“In a way, they can’t be looking at me, Dowdy, Benny or Davey,” said Phillips. “They’ve got to be looking at Kirky and what he has achieved and realising what the potential actually is.

“Before it was a case of you just dreamt of the NHL, you just dreamt of being drafted – it was so, so far away. Kirky has proved it is now a realistic possibility.

“How well we have done with GB at the World Championships in recent years has also helped push this league’s profile, I believe.

“Aim as high as you possibly can. Kirky has raised the bar 100 per cent in terms of what kids should be aiming for and he’s also opened up a window where scouts are now looking at this league.

"The rest of the world are now talking about UK hockey – before they weren’t.”

WHAT THEY SAY ABOUT JONATHAN PHILLIPS ...

Dave Matsos (Phillips’ first coach at Steelers): “He was the pillar of the foundation of what we were trying to achieve in Sheffield.

For me, Jonno was a controller of what really happened. He was a great personalit and he just captivated the whole thing. You talk about leadership skills and this guy is still going, I understand why.

He is probably one of the most fascinating athletes I’ve ever had to work with on every level - competitiveness, fitness, team mentality. This guy just embraced all of it. It’s almost like he’s timeless.

Jonno was a guy for who the glass was always half full. Whether it was a good game or a bad game he would find a way to embrace a positive out of any particular moment.

He was that guy that brought everything together and that’s why it makes total sense to me that this guy has been a leader and the captain of this team for so long and why he is still going.”

Jason Hewitt (former team-mate): “It’s incredible what he’s achieved. It’s no secret, everybody always says is how he keeps himself in shape, but it’s about more than that.

He’s committed his life to the Steelers, the best part of his adult life and the team has benefitted so much from having him there for so long over the years.

It’s his drive is something I’ve never seen anywhere else, ever since I’ve met him like that and that’s in everything in his life.

His kids, his family, the jobs he’s had to get in summers in between seasons, he’s just a committed guy and a good friend.”

Aaron Fox (current Steelers’ head coach): “Playing a 1,000 games period is unbelievable; playing 1,000 games with the same team is something else.

It says a ton about what kind of character-guy he is. From day one here for me he’s been a consummate leader, he’s been through it all here and he has a great pulse of what’s going on in the room and just the work ethic side of things – he’s probably our fittest guy. He brings it every day and I don’t think the pace he plays with has changed at all.

A great leader on and off the ice – what an accomplishment.”