Jas Kang’s Hockey Love is Spreading
Jas Kang loves hockey. The fact that he’s Canadian could make that statement seem redundant but his relationship with the sport is not so obvious. The son of immigrant parents whose knowledge of hockey was almost nonexistent prior to moving to their adopted and beloved new home of Canada, Saturday evening hockey became the Kang family’s hearth. The most Canadian of all events became a part of their DNA with moments like the Vancouver Canucks in the ’94 and 2011 Stanley Cup Finals. While his road hockey skills never developed to Arena level, it was watching and the “chess” aspect of the sport that always intrigued Jas the most. When Ann Schmaltz of Sportsnet Radio Vancouver offered him the anchor/reporter position covering the Canucks, Kang advanced to his own major league. Owned by Rogers Communications (the owner of Canada’s largest publishing company, Rogers Publishing Limited, with more than fifty-two radio stations and television properties), NEWS 1130 in Vancouver made Jas a national voice in Canada for hockey as well as a part of the RTDNA award winning news team. He continues in his passion for this beloved sport to present day.
There’s an irony to Kang’s career. A successful career in sports journalism is the culmination of a lifetime of love for the game and athletes; yet once one becomes a professional, the vocation requires restraint and impartiality. Overt exuberance must be curtailed in the spirit of proper conduct. It’s not an easy restriction when you’re a Canadian covering a source of national pride like the Canucks. Still, pointing out the shortcomings of players as well as their triumphs is essential to the job. Jas concedes, “You can’t be a fan in the press box or as a reporter. I remember when Henrik Sedin scored in overtime against the St. Louis Blues early in the season; I put my arms halfway up to celebrate before realizing that I was working and not a fan.”
The pressure of difficult times often yields positive future results. It’s part of how loyalty and sincerity is measured, whether in a team or its fans. Covering the Vancouver Canucks for Rogers didn’t place Jas at the center of a golden era but it offered a number of instances to dig for the most relevant stories. For example, Brock Boeser’s first game injected a mood of hope during a down period for the team. When the Jannik Hansen trade was finalized during a game, Kang tweeted out the news and a Tweet storm ensued. Hockey fans are passionate and rarely resistant to sharing their different views about a team’s decisions. Even so, hockey has a unifying effect for Canadians in general. Kang points out that his own grandmother who immigrated to Canada from India barely speaks any English and yet is a massive Canucks fan. He relates, “To be Canadian is to love hockey. We’re aware that its popularity reaches much further than our borders with coverage by ESPN and it’s a source of pride. There’s a lot of great hockey markets in the US: Detroit, Chicago, Minnesota, Boston, just to name a few, and the fans there are crazy about the game.”
Jas Kang has become something of a sports bridge for America and Canada as the host of Vox Media’s Lakers Podcast and also co-hosting the Lakers Nation postgame show. Lakers Nation boasts the largest non-NBA basketball site in the world with more than three million subscribers. Even though he seeped in the NBA frenzy these days, Jas still finds time to contribute his talent to hockey…though this time it’s for the US. The Hockey News recently featured Kang’s story on the growth of hockey in California. (https://thehockeynews.com/all-access/article/california-dreamin-big-thirty-years-after-gretzky-arrived-hockey-is-booming-on-the-west-coast)
The relationship among sports fans in Canada and America appears to be as affable as ever. Jas Kang is pulling more than his weight in international sports relations.
