Bishop Guertin assistant boys hockey coach Cam Hult is a head coach-in-waiting, learning the ropes in hs third season on the Cardinals bench. (Telegraph photo by TOM KING)

TYNGSBOROUGH, Mass. – Cam Hult never felt like he was finished with hockey.

He had a stellar championship career at Bishop Guertin, but lacrosse was his sport in college with UMass-Lowell. But now he has enjoyed another season, a second life, if you will, on the ice as an assistant coach with the Cardinals. Unfortunately that season came to an end Saturday with a loss to Hanover in the state tournament.

“I always wanted to play hockey in college, but never got to,” Hult said. “But coming back to BG, they had an opening three years ago, and it was kind of just a match made in heaven. Got me back in the game, and I get to be on the ice every day.”

Hult has always had coaching in his blood. He started doing it in youth lacrosse, and just over three years ago he was an assisant coach with the Bishop Guertn field hockey team that made it as far as the semifinals.

“My sister (Lindsay) was a senior at the time, I felt it would be a great way to coach her senior year,” Hult said. “Again, it was me more making sure the girls were working hard. Again, I grew up with a lot of them as they were friends with my sister. I just wanted to be there, support my sister in her senior year. I knew how to run sprints and everything like that, so it was a good fit for me.”

Of course half the time Hult admitted he was still learning about the game.He used that experience to learn how to communicate with high school kids, and the fact he was a substitute teacher at BG at the time helped.

“Seeing the girls during the day, and at practice, you build that connection with them,” he said. “Again, I picked up the game very quickly. … It was an awesome experience.”

Hult watched a lot of film given to him by then-coach Erica Chareth, and did a lot of study, watching the positions, how people played, “so I could make sure that if a girl had a question, and Coach Erica wasn’t there, I had to be able to answer that. That’s what a coach is supposed to do.”

What did he learn about coaching high school athletes at that time. Remember, it hadn’t been that long since Hult had been one himself.

“They have to handle a lot of things with school, practice, homework, there’s a lot of stuff that’s involved that’s not just the sport itself,” Hult said. “You want to make sure it can be easy for them and less stressful for them, make sure they’re in a good environment to learn and get better each time they’re on the ice or on the field.”

So Hult officially caught the coaching bug. After that fall, he pursued a career in law enforcement while working on a Masters in criminal justice, but always kept open the idea of coaching.

“My goal was to always come back to BG and help out with hockey eventually at some point,” he said. “Ever since I played my last game here (2016), I was missing it. I knew I always wanted to come back here, it was just a matter of what time that would happen.”

Two years ago an assistant’s job opened up, Hult talked with Bishop, and presto – a hockey coach was born.

“The timing worked out perfectly,” Hult said.

Now he’s learning that coaching one sport isn’t exactly the same coaching another.

“Coaching hockey is totally different,” Hult said. “I sometimes put myselves in the shoes of (the current players), like when I was playing. Again, making it less stressful for them, because they have a lot going on. Just making sure they’re in a good environment to learn, and I’m trying to put in my own two cents. I’ve been to two state championships, lost one, and won one. So whenever I can put in my influence on how to win one, and also how not to lose one.”

That influence certainly helped last year when the Cards beat Bedford in OT to win their first title since that 2015 Hult played on.

It was nice to win one as a member of the coaching staff.

“It was awesome,” Hult said. “You almost want to jump over the bench and go with the team (in celebrating). But again, a coach can only do so much. It’s all the team. They have to be thankful for them, that they put in all the hard work.”

This year, Hult has helped head coach Gary Bishop deal with a different type team – 15 new players.

“There’s a lot of young kids here,” Hult said. “I’ve been just trying to give them any piece of advice that I can. It’s a long season. We’re all trying to get to that one last game at the end of the year.”

Hult said the transition to coaching a sport that he played instead of one he didn’t has been easier.

“Coaching field hockey I was starting from the basics,” he said. “Learning. I didn’t even know how to stick handle. I was learning all that stuff. But with hockey, you expand the scope of everything. Trying to teach these kids more advance stuff, that’s what I’m trying to teach them. In field hockey, I was just learning the basics. Coaching hockey’s easier because it’s a sport I’m familiar with. Again, I’m familiar with that locker room and knowing what the kids are going through.”

But Hult says he’s still learning, and learning from the best in Bishop.

“I’ve been around him for what, eight years,” Hult said. “He’s taught me a lot of things. How to handle adversity, how to be a professional in high school sports and college sports. A lot of stuff I took all the way through college to now. I owe a lot to Coach Bish.”

“He does a great job,” Bishop said of Hult. “He’s great at practice, he identifies with the kids, a lot closer in age, so he can talk to them on their own level.”

Bishop says he relies on Hult. “He’ll come over and say, ‘What do you want to do?’ And we’ll talk,” Bishop says. “He does a great job with the kids. He understands the game, he loves the game, he gets into the game.”

Hult also knows the day-to-day rigors. He doesn’t just show up as he was a player. He goes to the rink early, prepares with the other coaches for practice, but the time still flies by.

Then there’s the time after practice. “We’ll stay a little bit after the players leave,” Hult said. “We’ll talk about what we did, what we need to do better. What we did well – there’s a lot that goes into it.

“But I love it. Every second I’m here at the rink, with this team. I’m very grateful for it, I’m just glad to be a part of it.”

Hult’s law enforcement career began as a police officer in Concord and then now in Nashua. It’s in the family as his father Lance was a police officer for over 20 years in Amherst and was also a football coach at Souhegan.

“I always talked with my Dad (about the dual role),” Hult said. “He balanced it. He’s my best friend. Seeing him go to work, and also go to football games, that’s what I’ve modeled my life after.”

Hult’s shift is the overnight, “so it works out perfectly for this. I go home, sleep til about 1:30, wake up, go to the rink, then home, take a nap and have dinner then go to work.”

He loves the career; he learned from former BG girls coach Scott Czisek who was also in law enforcement. And talked about how to balance things with him.

“He told me to get into a routine,” Hult said. “The team doesn’t know what you’re going through on the midnight shift, so you leave it behind at work. The boys and girls come here for an hour of practice. They’re here to get better. And I have to be at my best to make sure when I come there that they can get better.”

And the rink is obviously an escape. Hult was one of the Nashua officers involved in a fatality last month, and hockey was his escape.

“Coming here is actually a nice place, I can come and relax, and not have to worry,” he said.

But, he tries to impart his wisdom on life at times with the BG players without getting into specifics.

“I teach them stuff about hockey, but there’s also part of me teaching things about after college, after high school, how to become a better individual,” Hult said.

And, of course as one may tell from his words so far, Hult wants to be a head coach some day.

“I would love to,” he said. “That’s my ultimate goal. Right now, just learning from Bish, watching him every day. And take whatever I can get.”

And someday being a coach at Guertin, Hult said, “would be a dream come true. Coming back to my alma mater, and just having pride in the colors in every sense.’

So much so Hult says it would be tough being a head coach anywhere else.

“I think my heart’s set on being at BG,” he said. “Being an assistant for however long, this is the only place I want to coach.”

“He defiinitely is going to be a (head) coach someday,” Bishop said.