Lemieux Is Pushing Himself — and Westfield — Forward.
Westfield junior has spent most of his hockey life chasing the next level. After a four-goal performance against HSE B, he’s helping the Shamrocks chase one too.
Brady Lemieux has never been one to stay comfortable.
Whether it’s earning a spot with Indiana Elite, finishing among the state’s best in pole vault, or scoring four goals to help Westfield to a win, the junior has always been looking for the next way to push himself.
“I was never content with my ability,” Lemieux said. “I always just strived to be a little bit better every day.”
That mindset has followed the Westfield junior through nearly his entire life in hockey — through different organizations, different levels, a position change, a difficult roster cut and eventually a decision to leave AAA hockey behind and spend his final two high school seasons playing for the Shamrocks.
Now, Lemieux isn't just trying to become a better player.
He wants to help make Westfield a better program.
“My biggest goal for myself this year is helping the team as much as I can and bringing everyone to a level that Westfield has never seen before,” Lemieux said. “I want Westfield to become a program that other schools do not wanna play.”
Sunday offered a pretty good example of what that might look like.
Lemieux scored four times — half of Westfield's offense — in an 8-1 victory over HSE B, earning THE FINAL.’s Player of the Week honor.
“The one thing that was working on Sunday for me was my speed,” Lemieux said. “When I started to utilize my speed in the corners and on odd-man rushes, that really brought me success.”
Of the four goals, one stands above the rest in his mind.
“The goal that sticks out to me the most was my second goal,” he said. “I just cut to the middle at about the dots from the wall, then just ripped a backhand shot and it went top shelf.”
Four goals might suggest a player who simply had one of those days when everything found the net.
Westfield coach Tyler Hebert saw something different.
Before the game, Hebert and his staff gave Lemieux a challenge that had almost nothing to do with scoring. They wanted him concentrating on creating opportunities from dangerous areas of the ice. The target was 15 shot attempts.
Forget the goals. Focus on the process.
“A major theme for our team this year has been ‘control the controllables,’ and he has really taken that to heart,” Hebert said. “Before Sunday’s game, we challenged him not to focus on scoring goals, but instead on generating shots from high-danger areas.”
Lemieux didn’t quite reach 15 attempts.
Four goals made for a reasonable consolation prize.
“More importantly,” Hebert said, “he bought into the process we were asking for.”
That process matters to Lemieux because improvement has been at the center of his relationship with hockey for nearly as long as he can remember.
Hooked at three
The Lemieux name naturally gets attention around a hockey rink.
Brady has heard the question plenty of times.
“Yes, lots of people ask me if I am related to Mario Lemieux,” he said. “It comes about every game or two from either the refs or other kids.”
He isn’t. There is, however, a Pittsburgh Penguins connection to the beginning of his hockey story.
Brady was 3 years old when his father, Matt, was watching a Penguins game on television. Something about the game caught Brady’s attention.
Then it kept it.
His parents signed him up for learn-to-skate lessons. Before long, they realized this wasn’t going to be a passing childhood interest.
“He picked it up pretty quickly,” Stephanie and Matt Lemieux said. “He was small but fierce and competitive. He was always very independent, never wanting help tying his skates or carrying his bag. He wanted to do it all himself.”
He watched NHL games. He wanted to skate whenever possible. Birthday and Christmas lists started including training equipment so he could work on his game at home and in the garage.
“Hockey has really been a part of my whole life,” Brady said. “As long as I can remember I have been playing hockey. It has been the most important thing that has ever happened to me, probably with the things I have learned.”
He played for the Racers, then Indy Fuel and Indiana Elite, spending much of his youth hockey career playing AAA.
And throughout it, Lemieux said, there was always the same feeling.
Not enough yet.
“I have always wanted to take it seriously,” he said. “I always wanted to become better.”
Eventually, hockey tested whether he actually meant it.
The team he didn't make
For a young player accustomed to playing for Indiana’s top-tier team, Indiana Elite AAA hockey, getting cut can feel enormous.
Lemieux experienced it when he didn't make the 16U team his first year and dropped to AA.
His parents remember how difficult it was for him at the time.
“He was quite upset when he didn’t make the AAA team, like any teenage boy would be,” Stephanie and Matt said. “But it taught him the hard lesson of coping with failure at something he loved.”
At the time, it was a disappointment. Now, Brady sees it as a turning point.
“My first year at 16U, I did not make (Indiana Elite), and it was the best thing that could have happened to me,” he said.
The disappointment opened the door to former Indy Fuel 16U AA coach and current Communications Director of the Indianapolis Youth Hockey Association (IYHA), Oliver Wenck, a coach Lemieux still describes as his favorite.
Wenck didn't simply work on Brady's hockey.
“He improved me as a guy off the ice (rather than) just on the ice,” Lemieux said. “He pushed and expected things from me that no other coach did.”
There was another significant change too.
Lemieux had been a defenseman.
Wenck and his other AA coaches moved him to forward.
It required him to see the game differently, learn a new position and adjust to a different team at the same time. His parents watched him struggle through the transition before eventually embracing it.
What initially looked like a step backward became one of the defining developmental stretches of his hockey career.
He learned to adapt. He developed as a leader. And during his freshman year, his team reached Nationals in Wayne, New Jersey, advancing all the way to the championship game before losing in overtime.
“It’s an experience he never would have had if he wasn’t moved down to AA,” his parents said.
The player who had dropped from AAA eventually earned his way back. By his sophomore year, Lemieux was playing AAA hockey again.
But heading into his junior season, he made another change — this time by choice.
He came to Westfield.
Choosing Westfield
AAA hockey can consume a high school player's calendar. Lemieux wanted something different for his final two years before graduation.
While he wanted hockey, he also wanted high school.
He wanted the chance to be more connected to Westfield, participate in school activities and experience the parts of being a high school student that can disappear when hockey takes a player somewhere else every weekend.
So he joined the Ice Rocks.
“I think playing for Westfield means more than just playing hockey,” Lemieux said. “The program is great with an awesome coaching staff. I am so glad I came to Westfield this year.”
It didn't take long for Hebert to notice the impact of the new arrival.
“Brady is new to Westfield this year after coming from AAA, but in the short time I’ve known him, he has impressed me at every turn,” Hebert said. “I can already tell he is going to leave a lasting impact on this program well beyond his own time here.”
It isn't simply because Lemieux can score.
Hebert calls him a “momentum player,” someone he wants on the ice when Westfield needs to change the feel of a game.
“He takes a lot of pride in leading through his play and isn’t afraid to sacrifice his body, finish a physical play, or do something difficult that can change the course of a game,” Hebert said. “What has been really cool to see is some of our younger players starting to follow his example. That’s how you begin building a great program.”
That last part is important to Lemieux.
He isn't shy about what he believes Westfield hockey can become.
“I think people should start taking us a little more seriously,” he said. “I think we will start really finding success in the program and maybe down the road become an official sport for Westfield, not just the club.”
Hebert sees that mentality in the locker room.
Lemieux is often smiling when the coaching staff enters. When a teammate is struggling, Hebert said, Lemieux notices. He tries to pull him back up.
And when Lemieux himself is struggling?
He works.
“When things aren’t going well for Brady personally, his response is usually to dig in and work even harder to get himself and the team moving in the right direction,” Hebert said.
More than a hockey player
That drive doesn't end when Lemieux leaves the rink.
At Westfield, he is also a pole vaulter.
A very good one.
As a sophomore, Lemieux finished 10th at the IHSAA state finals. His father doubles as his track coach, creating another athletic relationship between the two.
“I look up to my dad outside of hockey because he is an awesome guy to want to be like,” Brady said. “But he is also my track coach, and I look up to him because he knows what it takes to run at a high level and he will do anything for me to get there.”
His parents describe him as someone who rarely stays still.
When he isn't playing hockey or pole vaulting, Lemieux enjoys rock climbing, fishing and spending time with friends.
He and a group of friends also started a car-detailing business.
That entrepreneurial streak caught Hebert's attention.
“He is constantly trying to learn more about the business and figure out how they can grow it,” Hebert said. “I think that says a lot about who Brady is away from the rink too. He’s ambitious, curious, and always looking for the next thing he can improve.”
There is another pursuit that could eventually take Lemieux considerably higher than a pole vault bar.
He has developed an interest in aviation and hopes to become a commercial pilot after high school and college. His parents said he is already working through ground school and taking flying lessons when his schedule allows.
Hockey. Track. School. A business. Aviation.
His parents see the same characteristics running through all of them.
“Brady strives to be the best he can be no matter what it is,” they said. “He’s a very good student, son, brother and friend.”
They've also watched hockey teach their youngest child lessons that extend well beyond winning and losing.
“Brady has learned dedication, adaptability, patience and perseverance,” they said. “He learned that if you want to get better at things, you have to do the hard work, even when nobody is watching. He learned that life isn’t always fair. And he learned that coaches are going to push you and expect you to work hard.”
Those lessons have followed Lemieux from a 3-year-old watching hockey on television to youth hockey, from AAA to AA and back again, from defense to forward, and finally to Westfield.
Now they're showing up in the details Hebert sees every week.
Shot volume. Dangerous scoring areas. Physicality. Rebounds. Leadership.
Small challenges rather than some distant result.
“I’ve seen his confidence grow through the challenges we give him each game,” Hebert said. “Whatever the challenge is, Brady embraces it. As he has continued accomplishing those smaller goals, you can see his confidence in his overall game growing with them.”
That confidence showed Sunday.
Lemieux said he felt comfortable holding onto the puck, making moves and trusting himself instead of forcing plays. He was also quick to credit his linemates for helping create his opportunities.
Then came the speed. The chances. And four goals.
For someone who has spent most of his life pushing beyond where he is, four goals aren't going to change the standard.
Lemieux already knows what he wants people talking about later this season.
“I hope we are talking about end-of-season awards,” he said. “And I want to be top three in pretty much all the stats.”
It's an ambitious target.
But ambition has never really been the problem for Brady Lemieux.
For most of his life, the question has been what he can find to work on next.