Color of Hockey: Playing for Japan in '98 Olympics led to careers in game

William Douglas has been writing The Color of Hockey blog since 2012. Douglas joined NHL.com in 2019 and writes about people of color in the sport. Today, as part of NHL.com's celebration of Asian Pacific Islander Month, he profiles NHL Group Vice President, Events Chie Chie Yard, San Jose Sharks European scouting supervisor Shin Larsson and Ryan Kuwabara, coach of Niagara of the Ontario Hockey League, who each played for Japan in the 1998 Nagano Olympics -- Yard on the women's team and Larsson and Kuwabara on the men's team.

Shin Larsson said Japan's men's hockey team entered the 1998 Nagano Olympics with one goal.

"Not to finish last," Larsson said. "Because then people were going to say that we were there only because we were the host country."

Larsson scored in a shootout that gave Japan a 4-3 win against Austria and secured 13th-place in in the 14-team Olympic tournament.

"It was a mission accomplished for us," he said a quarter century later.

The Japanese men's and women's teams collectively managed only one win at Nagano, but left a legacy of players who have risen to key positions in the NHL and major junior hockey.

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Larsson, a Japanese Swede, is supervisor of European scouting for the San Jose Sharks and has been with the organization for almost 16 years.

Chie Chie Yard, a former defenseman on Brown University's women's hockey team, is Group Vice President, Events at the NHL.

The Houston, Texas, native is one of the linchpins of the group that stages some of the NHL's marquee events, including the Stanley Cup Final, the NHL All-Star Game, NHL Global Series and Stadium Series games and Kraft Hockeyville preseason games.

Ryan Kuwabara, a third generation Japanese Canadian, coaches Niagara of the Ontario Hockey League. He became the first coach of Asian descent in the OHL when he was hired in November 2022.

Their ascension in the North American hockey ranks doesn't surprise Dave King, who coached the Calgary Flames (1992-95) and Columbus Blue Jackets (2000-03) and was general manager for the Japanese men's national team.

"I think beyond being good players, they all provided an element of confidence and an element of leadership to the teams that they played with, both the men's and women's," King said. "I think the experience helped them to stay with the game that they really loved, to go with it further."

Yard said playing in Nagano and the unique hockey journey that she, Larsson and Kuwabara traveled to get there "just made us stronger and more prepared in life in general."

The Nagano Games were historic because it was the first Olympiad that NHL players and women's teams competed. It also marked Japan's return to hockey competition for the first time since 1980.

Japan automatically qualified for the hockey tournament as the host nation. Not being a hockey power, the country's ice hockey federation began scouring the globe for talented players with Japanese roots to help fill out its Olympic rosters.

Through family contacts, the federation recruited Yard, then Chie Chie Sakuma, who played for Brown from 1990-94 while earning dual degrees in anthropology and business management.

Kuwabara was in the Montreal Canadiens system when Japan came calling. The Canadiens selected the right wing in the second round (No. 39) of the 1990 NHL Draft and later assigned him to Fredericton of the American Hockey League, where he had 23 points (13 goals, 10 assists) in 54 games from 1992-94.

He had 240 points (107 goals, 133 assists) in 196 games with Ottawa of the OHL from 1989-92.

"Growing up a Japanese Canadian, it was always, 'Wow, that'd be that'd be pretty cool to be able to go over to Japan' just to see it first," Kuwabara said. "I didn't know they had high-level hockey at the time when I was thinking about it.

"Then the opportunity presented itself, and it was the right fit at the right time for me. I was ready to try something different and one of my goals was to eventually, maybe try to play in the Olympics at some point, whether it was for Canada or Japan."

Larsson was recruited from Leksands, Sweden, and Verdun of the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League. Like most young Sweden-born hockey players, he dreamed of playing for the country's vaunted national team.

"But it's pretty tough for us to crack, so I looked at playing for Japan as another great opportunity," said Larsson, who was known as Shin Yahata in Japan.

The opportunity meant he, Kuwabara and Yard had to move to Japan around 1994 to establish citizenship while playing for the national and local teams.

"I think having to move there and assimilate into that culture just made us stronger as people," Yard said. "It's a very different culture to have to meld with teammates and learn a different style of just living."

Kuwabara went over not knowing a word of Japanese. The classes he took as part of his citizenship requirement helped, and so did his teammates who taught him slang.

"The bad words first," he said.

The trio adapted to their adopted home. Larsson led the Japanese men at Nagano with five points (two goals, three assists) in four games. Kuwabara was third with two goals in four games.

"I love Ryan, he was my line mate for most of those years," Larsson said. "Off the ice he's the kindest best friend that you can have. On the ice, he was taking of me. He's a big boy (6-foot, 209 pounds in his playing days). ... it was a good comfort to have him by my side and I could play my game. He not only was a tough, tough player, he was also a very smart and skilled player."

Yard was scoreless in five games but played a pivotal role as an alternate captain on the women's team.

"Her leadership skills were really, really important because the Japanese women's team was a good team," King said. "Chie Chie was important because she was a good, stable player and then a terrific leader on that team."

Larsson and Kuwabara continued playing for Japan's men's national team and local teams after the Olympics. Larsson also played in France and England, and Kuwabara had stops in Northern Ireland, South Korea and Canada before they retired as players.

Yard moved on to the NHL post-Olympics, with King's help. Yard occasionally did translation work for King, and he recommended her to Lori Boesch, a director in the events department at the NHL. She was hired as an intern in October 1998, became full time by December, and climbed the ladder to her current position.

Kuwabara transitioned into coaching after finishing his career playing senior hockey in Hamilton, Ontario, in 2009-10. He was an associate coach for Saginaw (2017-19) and Flint (2019-21) of the OHL and an assistant for Wheeling of the ECHL (2021-22) before being named Niagara's coach in November.

Larsson became general manager of the Nordic Vikings, a Beijing-based team in Asia League Ice Hockey, in 2005-06. He gravitated toward scouting and landed a part-time position with the Atlanta Thrashers in 2006-07.

"Actually, it was Dan Marr of NHL Central Scouting (who was the Thrashers' director of amateur scouting and player development from 2003-11) who gave me the first opportunity," Larsson said. "I really loved the job and wanted to do more."

The Sharks hired him as a full-time European scout in September 2008, and was promoted to supervisor of European scouting in August 2017.

"It's been a great group to work with from Day One," he said. "Those people taught me pretty much everything I know in scouting and gave me room to grow."

It's been more than 25 years since the Nagano Games, but Larsson, Kuwabara and Yard still manage to stay in touch and keep tabs on each other. The two former men's team players speak almost monthly, and Larsson and Yard usually see each other at the NHL Draft or whenever NHL Global Series games are played in Europe.

"The first time, it was a lot more reminiscing," Yard said. "Now it's a yearly thing. I always look for him, we always take a picture and get a good chuckle."

Photos: Sei Uchigasaki, Brown University Athletics, Shin Larsson, Natasa Corfield/Vivid Eye Photography