Like Father, Like Sons: Evan Rodrigues' Boys Following in his Footsteps
By
Grace Heidinger
Pittsburgh Penguins
The couple - who met in college at Boston University - welcomed their first son, Grayson, on Oct. 28, 2018. He was born in Buffalo, where the new father at the time was playing for the Buffalo Sabres. A little over a year later, Rodrigues was traded to Pittsburgh, so the Rodrigues family had to relocate to a new city in the midst of raising their 1-year-old.
"We were just excited to kind of get a fresh opportunity and start fresh in a new place," Rodrigues said. "Hockey wasn't going great for me at the time, so it was just kind of a good change for us."
Grayson then became a big brother on June 17, 2020, when Evan and Christina's second son, Noah, was born in Salem, Massachusetts.
"When we had Noah, it was actually right before the bubble," Rodrigues said. "I was out in Pittsburgh, and I ended up driving home for the birth, then drove back to Pittsburgh three days later."
The Toronto native thought there was a chance he could be away from his family for two months or so. While it was disappointing that the Penguins were eliminated by Montreal in the Qualifying Round, Rodrigues was happy to get back home to his family after just a couple of weeks.
"It was definitely a lot when Noah was born," Rodrigues said. "My wife did a great job of being able to take care of a newborn and my oldest when I was gone. It was nice to get a break after the season and be able to spend some quality time with them."
Now, it's been a little over three years since Rodrigues became a dad. And when asked about being a father to Grayson and Noah, he said it's been absolutely life-changing.
"Every day they get smarter and they get more communicative," Rodrigues said. "It's a lot of fun watching them grow up."
Watching them develop their own unique personalities has been a special experience for Rodrigues, especially when that's happening around the rink. And for the 28-year-old forward, having the boys around has actually been really beneficial for his own game.
"You don't dwell and overthink on your play and the games," Rodrigues said. "You kind of just go home, you see your kids, and you kind of forget about everything."
Well, to some extent. Aside from the few minutes that the boys sit down for a break to watch Paw Patrol, during the season it's all hockey, all the time in the Rodrigues household.
It's often a part of Evan's pregame routine to play hockey with his little guys on their mini hockey rink in their living room at home, which Christina fashioned from a rug that she had bought.
Grayson makes sure to sing the national anthem before the puck drops in their game, welcomes the Pittsburgh Penguins back to the ice after an intermission, and announce goals and penalties with the arm motions.
"I think that comes with the territory of being the son of an NHL player," Rodrigues said. "When it's what you're around so often, I think you kind of just gravitate towards it."
Evan and Christina had a conversation before their kids were born, and decided that they were going to leave it up to the boys on what they wanted to do when it came to playing hockey. While the parents don't ever push hockey on them, it's almost in their DNA to get involved with the sport.
"She always tells a story about when we were back in Buffalo," Rodrigues said. "There was a family who had a son around Grayson's age, and the mother told her that it was just kind of in their blood, and it's going to end up happening."
And it certainly did.
"Lo and behold, she was right, because here we are," Christina said. "We've got this hockey rink, which is what Grayson wanted for his third birthday. He asked me for a Zamboni, so that's how we got the makeshift (Penguins) Zamboni."
The older they get, the more interested they become in hockey - so much so that Grayson is already following in his dad's footsteps at just three years old.
"We would just put skates on him if he wanted to, and he only used to skate once a week just to kind of get him out there and give him something to do," Rodrigues said. "But then this year, he really took a real liking to hockey, and he loves watching the games. He also loves being a referee, and he loves following the referees during the games."
And when he wasn't wearing a #9 Penguins jersey with "DADDY" on the back to Penguins games, Grayson would sometimes wear a referee shirt instead.
"His favorite part about hockey right now is the referee," Christina said before adding with a laugh, "So, if you're ever at the game and look around and see someone dressed up as a referee, you'll know who it is."
When they weren't at PPG Paints Arena cheering on their dad or on their living room rink at home, Grayson and Noah would be at UPMC Lemieux Sports Complex. Christina and the boys would sit in the stands to watch some of the Penguins practice before it was time for Grayson to lace up his own skates. So, when Rodrigues would be practicing with his team on one rink, Grayson was skating on the other - like father, like son.
"It's been amazing because Grayson is here at the rink almost every day skating," Rodrigues said during locker cleanout day. "He comes, he skates three to four times a week. He's here and seeing all the staff behind the scenes that work here, and it's just been amazing."
It became routine that once both practices are over, the family would head to The Training Table, the rink's cafeteria, for some lunch. And because they'd gotten to know the amazing staff at the facility, sometimes personal pizzas got delivered to their table for Grayson and Noah.
"They started just loving to come here and eat lunch here," Rodrigues said. "Everyone in this rink treats them unbelievably, and it adds kind of a whole new dimension to your career path when you start to think about what your kids want."
