The Friendly Giant.
A fitting reference for Pasadena’s Cameron Costello when comparing his gentle demeanour with his brute physicality.
Costello is soft-spoken and reserved at 15 years of age, but he’s certainly a physical presence cruising down the left side with his six-foot-three — six-foot-five if you include the skates — and 210-pound frame on skates.
The former forward with the Western Kings AAA bantam hockey team is hoping to make his presence known as a rookie with Peterborough Countty’s Lakefield College Prep School in the Canadian Independent School Athletics Association (CISAA) Division II hockey league.
Costello isn’t known for his explosive speed or knack around the net, a half dozen assists in 28 games with the Kings last season is a good indication of that, but his physical brand of hockey created room for some of the smaller teammates and he held his own crashing and banging in the corners for loose pucks.
He knows the team was interested in him because of his size and physicality so he knows what he has to do once he gets settled in with his new teammates, which will officially get underway this weekend with a number of workouts planned for the squad.
“Taking the body is pretty much my game,” Costello said Thursday afternoon.
Costello has aspirations of playing the game at the college or university level when he graduates from high school. He attended several showcase tournaments in Atlantic Canada over the past couple of years and spoke with a couple of schools about playing hockey there this season and he decided Lakefield was the right fit for him after taking a visit to Peterborough earlier this summer.
He figured the best way to improve his chances of finding his way was to move away and is happy with his decision in the early going and plans on making the most of it by working hard on and off the ice.
“It’s a better way to get noticed,” she said. “I want to play college or university hockey and really the only way to get noticed is go to different places and play.”
He’s all about being friendly as he gets adjusted to a new home and new buddies, but he don’t want anybody to think for a second that he’s not willing to punish bodies to get where he wants to go.
