Jacqueline Hurlbert’s resume keeps getting deeper with each passing year as Cochrane Generals general manager. The 23-year-old aspiring pro sports executive finished her second year as GM of the Heritage Junior Hockey League (HJHL) team to go along with the B.A. degree she’s receiving this spring as a University of Calgary graduate.
Next up, another season of guiding the Generals through the HJHL minefield, and enrollment in a Masters program for sports management.
Her tireless effort as team GM cannot be overstated. Along with managing a junior B hockey team through a 36-game schedule, she marshalled her troops for numerous community initiatives including a breast-cancer fundraising drive, a Movember promotion that raised money for prostate cancer, donating game-day tickets to the Cochrane Activettes for Christmas hampers, post-game player access for minor-hockey teams, appearances in the town parade, the outhouse races and a day-long team visit for young hockey fans in Morley.
“It has its challenges, for sure,” Hurlbert understates at the team’s year-end awards banquet April 5 at Cochrane Legion. “The combination of being young, and female, some people really don’t listen to what I have to say sometimes. It can be a bit of an old-boys’ club.”
But, after a trying first year learning the ropes as a junior-hockey GM, she’s now up to speed with the rigors of the job. And others around the league have caught up to the no-nonsense, all-business approach she brings to the position.
“There’s some stuff that’s easier now. But there has been more stuff thrown on my plate. More of a challenge, but a good challenge,” Hurlbert relates. “For the most part, with the meetings and going to games and stuff, the guys have gotten to know me. And what I say at meetings is a little more relevant now. So they listen a little more.”
Not content to just talk, she’s spent plenty of time listening to others and observing the constantly-shifting junior B hockey landscape. She’s been taking notes.
“The entire league has gotten more competitive,” she observes. “The bottom-end teams are up there, way more competitive than last year. Where we’ve been situated with such a young team, we’ve actually had a lot of positives this season.”
And she’s hoping to guide those positives through next season.
“We still have to have our AGM,” she says. “I would like to be here next year, so it will be up to the board.”
