Hockey has changed. So has insurance. We’ve changed the insurance game by offering customized coverage, in language you can understand, at a competitive price—and we do it all online. To find out how hockey has changed, we asked a few players to sit down with Devin Smith, Senior Director of Marketing & Community Relations over at
[We open on a black backdrop with Mark Scheifele]
[On-screen text: Mark Scheifele, Winnipeg Jets]
[Speaker: Devin Smith // Job Title: NHLPA]
>>DEVIN: Mark, I’m happy to be here with you on this…
[Cut to Devin Smith]
[On-screen text: Sonnet Brand Mark]
…this Sonnet segment.
[On-screen text: Presents Then & Now]
It’s called Then & Now
so we’re going to take you through a few things
[Cut to Mark Scheifele]
in the past and talk about where you’ve come in your career.
[Cut to Devin Smith]
And, a lot of people say, ‘if I only knew then what I know now, things might have been different for me.’
[Cut to Mark Scheifele]
What advice would you give your younger self?
[Cut to Devin Smith]
>> MARK: I think the biggest thing would be
[Cut to Mark Scheifele]
like ‘don’t sweat the small stuff’. You know, I think growing up you start thinking about eh, you know things that you can’t control or um, you know stuff that, you know really doesn’t matter in the grand scheme of things and I think I worried about that stuff a little too much growing up
[Cut to an old photograph of Mark as a child, skating with another boy]
and if I could re-do it over I would eh, tell myself
[Cut to Mark Scheifele]
‘don’t sweat all that small stuff’.
[Cut to Devin Smith]
>>DEVIN: I want to ask about the skills that you picked up,
[Cut to Mark Scheifele]
living on your own…
[Cut to Devin Smith]
laundry, cleaning…
[Cut to Mark Scheifele]
all that kinda stuff.
What was your eh, were you good at all that stuff?
Did it take a while to get used to doing that? Those chores, on your own?
>>MARK: Oh, it definitely does.
I think, laundry was the toughest one that I needed to learn you know, just in terms of like, separating lights and darks, um what temperature to do certain clothes at. Whatever…whatever it is. I think that’s been the toughest.
I’m actually not a bad cook. I learned… I lived with a roommate one summer, Julie Malciori and he eh, he kinda, he was a good cook.
He had a year of pro under his belt and he kinda learned how to cook and grew up from his Dad and learned how to do a lot of things so he taught me how to cook so I’m actually not a bad cook.
I don’t do it too often but I’m not bad
[Cut to Devin Smith]
when you put me at the helm of an oven, or whatever
[Cut to Mark Scheifele]
it is but um, I think laundry was the toughest thing for me to learn.
[Cut to Devin Smith]
>> DEVIN: Do you have any stories about going back to Kitchener
[Cut to Mark Scheifele]p>
and seeing some fans or kids or do you get recognized?
>>MARK: Um, you know the last few years maybe a little more than the previous ones, but it was actually funny at Christmas I was just at a random diner with my agent and we were having
[Cut to Devin Smith nodding]
breakfast and guys from a hockey
[Cut to Mark Scheifele]
team walked in with some little kids and you know, one of the kids recognized me and all of a sudden by the end of the breakfast I was signing all of their napkins with like crayons.
>> DEVIN: [Laughing] That’s awesome.
>> MARK: Um, so that was a really cool experience to do in my hometown and see that kind of support and kinda get recognized. So, that was definitely very humbling.
>> DEVIN: That’s great. Wasn’t too long ago that you were getting autographs yourself.
>> MARK: Yeah. I would have been doing the exact same thing.
[Cut to over Devin’s shoulder shot of Mark Scheifele]
>> DEVIN: You talked a lot about your parents and the influence that your dad, Brad and your mom,
[Cut to Mark Scheifele]
Mary-Lou had on you and you answered some questions about your upbringing and things so we thought it would be nice to bring your mom in here, bring Mary-Lou here to verify some of your stories and get her to answer some questions.
>> MARK: Cool.
[Cut to Devin and Mark looking in the direction of the camera smiling at Mark’s mother, Mary-Lou, walking into the set]
[Cut to Mark Scheifele]
Hey Mama.
[Speaker: Mary-Lou Scheifele // Mark Sheifele’s mother]
>> MARY-LOU: Hey honey.
[Mary-Lou walks into frame and sits on a chair next to Mark]
I’m not so sure about that laundry that you did.
>> MARK: What do you mean?
>> MARY-LOU: You do laundry?
>> MARK: I used to.
[Cut to Mary-Lou laughing and reaching out of frame to shake Devin’s hand]
>> DEVIN: Hi Mary-Lou. I’m Devin.
>> MARY-LOU: Hi Devin, nice to meet you.
>> DEVIN: You’ve raised a wonderful boy here.
>> MARY-LOU: Thank you. I think he’s given us too
[Cut to Mark Scheifele smiling and blushing]
much credit, I think.
>> DEVIN: Oh, no. You deserve it.
[Cut to wide shot of Mark and May-Lou]
Let’s get into that!
[Cut to old photograph of Mark as a child in a blue, white and red uniform on the ice]
The credit and sort of, growing up, when he was a boy.
What was he like?
[Cut to Mark-Lou Scheifele]
Same as he is now?
>> MARY-LOU: I think, the word that comes up most of the time is, he was intense… about whatever it was.
>> DEVIN: Intense? Ok.
>> MARY-LOU: Intense,
[Cut to Mark Scheifele, smiling]
intense - whatever the sport was, you know?
Was it going to be
[Cut to Mary-Lou Scheifele]
volleyball season at Highschool? Him and his brother were out volleying on the roof and wrecking all the shingles.
>> MARK: [Laughing off-screen]
[Cut to Mark Scheifele laughing]
>> MARY LOU: Or if it was, you know, basketball, they spent hours,
[Cut to Mary-Lou Scheifele]
you know basketball.
Lacrosse, they just spent hours with the lacrosse stick.
It was whatever he was doing, he went full out at it.
So, you know, once he realized it was hockey,
[Cut to old photograph of Mark as a child in a hockey uniform next to a jersey saying ‘Scheifele 55’] was going to be his, it was always his passion but when he focused
[Cut to wide shot of Mark, Mary-Lou and the back of Devin’s head]
totally on hockey kind of,
[Cut to Mary-Lou Scheifele]
knew that he was going to give his all to it and he has.
[Cut to wide shot of Mark, Mary-Lou and the back of Devin’s head]
>> DEVIN: How proud are you, as a mom
[Cut to Mark Scheifele]
and your husband, Brad? And, I think
[Cut to Mary-Lou Scheifele]
that the hockey player part is so amazing but in that
[Cut to wide shot of Mark, Mary-Lou and the back of Devin’s head]
with being such a good person. How does that feel as a mom?
>> MARY-LOU: Yes, it’s, it’s
[Cut to Mary-Lou Scheifele]
it brings tears to my eyes lots of times.
[Cut to wide shot of Mark, Mary-Lou and the back of Devin’s head]
You read a little clip about him giving up his parking spot to,
[Cut to Mark Scheifele]
you know somebody who is running to an exam, you know,
[Cut to Mary-Lou Scheifele]
those little things sound like a little thing but that’s, it’s probably what I’m most proud of.
[Cut to Mark Scheifele]
[Cut to Mary-Lou Scheifele]
We always knew he was a good athlete um, but every level he, you know, was at, he kind of excelled.
I can remember the first game you got a hattrick with Barrie.
[Cut to Mark Scheifele]
You lost to Brampton 9 – 3
[Cut to wide shot of Mark, Mary-Lou and the back of Devin’s head]
but Mark got all the goals.
And, for probably
[Cut to Mary-Lou Scheifele]
2 or 3 weeks later, every once in a while, it would hit me and I’d think ‘he got a hattrick in the OHL’ and it was just kind of, felt a little unreal and it would just take
[Cut to Mark Scheifele]
me back and now he’s done that in the NHL too!
>> DEVIN: [Laughing off-screen]
That’s awesome.
>> MARY-LOU: I like to replay some of them.
[Cut to Mary-Lou Scheifele]
You know, you save some of those moments and you just, yeah you just think, it’s really kind of amazing.
[Cut to Mark Scheifele blushing]
>> DEVIN: Always a pleasure to chat with you.
Thank you for joining us here
[Cut to wide shot of Mark and Mary-Lou]
and have a great day.
[On-screen text: Sonnet Brand Mark + NHLPA Logo]
[Mark Scheifele is a paid spokesperson for Sonnet. NHLPA, National Hockey League Players’ Association and the NHLPA logo are trademarks of the NHLPA and are used under license. © NHLPA. All Rights Reserved. Sonnet Insurance is a registered trademark. Sonnet Insurance Company is a federally regulated insurance company.]
By the time Mark Scheifele gets to the change room, his towels are folded, his socks are darned, and his jersey is hung.
That’s because there’s a full team of professionals taking care of laundry and equipment for the Winnipeg Jets, all 5,000 lbs of it. The equipment managers are the ones washing up to 60 pairs of underwear and 140 towels in machines running from morning to night, making sure everything is perfect before the players hit the ice again, whether for the morning skate or the Saturday night showdown.
It’s a different story at home, where Mark has to fend for himself. It’s one of the many things that’s changed in Mark’s life, and which we get to hear about when Mark sits down for Sonnet’s Then & Now series, in partnership with the NHLPA.
“ I’m actually not a bad cook ”
He picked it up from a roommate, Julian Melchiori, currently under contract with the Florida Panthers, who showed Mark around the kitchen when they lived together for one summer. Mark might have a private chef for meal prep these days, which is why he doesn’t do it too often, but he swears he’s not bad when you put him “at the helm of an oven.”
Not so much with laundry, which Mark calls “the toughest one” of all the skill he had to pick up. “You know,” he says, “separating lights and darks, knowing what temperature to do certain clothes at.”
He seems to have it under control these days. At least according to Mark.
Mary Lou, Mark’s mom, is far less certain:
“I’m not quite sure about that laundry,” she says.
“What do you mean?” says Mark.
“Do you ‘do’ laundry?” asks Mary Lou.
Basic life skills aside, it’s clear from talking with Mary Lou that she is tremendously proud of her son. “It brings tears to my eyes lots of time,” she says. And it’s no wonder. Her son is, by all accounts, not only a great player, but a pretty alright guy. An ambassador-for-charities kind of guy. A leads-by-example kind of guy. A give-up-your-parking-spot kind of guy.
Okay, that’s more than alright. It’s why he gets recognized more and more in Kitchener, Ontario, his hometown. And it’s why young players line up in diners looking for his autograph. “I would have been doing the exact same thing,” he says, back when he was a kid growing up and playing for the minors, obsessing over stats and lineups in a way that’s become required reading in every article about him. To be the one who is now signing, rather than holding out the napkin to be signed, is an experience he calls “humbling.”
His advice to those kids, and to himself as a younger player?
“ Don’t sweat the small stuff ”
because if he could do it over again he wouldn’t worry about the stuff “that really doesn’t matter in the grand scheme of things.”
Which, if you think about it, is kind of like saying, “it’ll all come out in the wash,” except, you know, maybe we should avoid that subject while his mom’s still sitting beside him.
Hockey has changed. So has insurance. Whether it’s your first home, your dream home, or the car you’re driving your friends around in,