Article content

Julia Hird was by her brother’s side the morning he died.

She’d gone to sleep the night before excited about seeing him back in Calgary after he’d spent the previous year with his terminally ill grandfather in South America.

We apologize, but this video has failed to load.

tap here to see other videos from our team. Try refreshing your browser, or Eric Francis: Hockey community steps up big-time to help sister of murder victim continue to pursue her passion Back to video

The original plan was for the family to decorate the Christmas tree together that morning.

Instead, the gathering was around Lukas Strasser-Hird’s hospital bed as his first night back in town ended with a swarming outside a Calgary nightclub that prompted a 4 a.m. phone call with news he’d been stabbed.

By 10 a.m., the 18-year-old was dead, leaving Julia with a lifetime of questions and pain.

She was nine.

Three years later, few things in life have helped her cope with the loss as much as playing hockey has.

For several years, she wore her brother’s equipment, excelling to the point she was voted captain last season on a Glenlake Hawks team full of boys.

However, when her father Dale — a single dad — lost his job one month before last spring’s gut-wrenching trial for the three men eventually convicted, there was a very real threat Julia was about to suffer another tremendous loss: