Falling In Love with the Sport
While in many ways it feels like Vogelhuber has become inseparable from the city of Columbus, he was actually born on the east side of Cleveland.
Dan grew up a standout basketball player at Whetstone High School but moved north for a job after college, and the young family ended up in northern Ohio. That’s how the Vogelhuber family ended up at the ice rink at Kent State, which at the time still sponsored varsity hockey.
Taking note of their son’s interest in the sport, the Vogelhubers decided to encourage him to get involved, but with a caveat that proved to be a blessing.
“Once I yelled at him for leaving us, then we said, ‘If you want to play hockey, you can, but you have to learn to skate,’” Dan said with a laugh.
“He did that for about two years before we let him start to play hockey, so I think that was one of his assets because everybody along the way said that one of his proficiencies was his skating,” Dawn said. “He skated before he ever had a stick in his hand.”
From there, the Vogelhubers had a bit of a journey, returning to Columbus for a few years and also living in San Diego for a few more for another job. Trent had some sporting interests off the ice, playing soccer, lacrosse and basketball, though he never quite matched his father’s 6-foot-5 frame.
The Vogelhubers returned to Columbus for good in 1999, which proved to be good fortune in a lot of ways. A year later, the NHL came to town with the establishment of the Blue Jackets in 2000 when Trent was 12 years old, and by then, he was fully bitten by the hockey bug.
It helped that Dan went in on some season tickets, making the Vogelhubers part of the sellout crowds that greeted the Jackets in their early years, and Trent’s abilities soon became clear. He participated in the prestigious Quebec International Pee-Wee Tournament and advanced through Mid-Am tryouts, and while the Vogelhubers were flying a bit by the seat of their pants given their unfamiliarity with the hockey landscape, there were signs Trent was a top player among his peers.
“He always worked hard, and I think he had a sense for the game early that I didn’t notice,” Dan said. “When he’d go to a tryout or something, people would comment to me, ‘Did you see that pass, or that pass?’ I didn’t know that was something that a 12-year-old didn’t do commonly.”
Leading the Way
As Vogelhuber progressed from youth hockey into his teenage years, he played high school hockey for a season at St. Charles, but he soon had a decision to make.
The Blue Jackets were set to partner with Gingher to start the AAA program, and Vogelhuber was among the players targeted. He had been approached by other prep and AAA programs over the years, but being part of the first wave of Columbus kids to represent the area and wear CBJ colors felt like the right move.
Gingher can still remember the phone call from Dan Vogelhuber delivering the news that Trent would be joining the program. In fact, it would be hard to forget it.
“I remember the exact moment his dad called me to tell me he was going to play for that first team,” Gingher said. “I was actually in the delivery room with my wife because we were expecting our oldest, so (the call came) June 21, 2004, at about 6 o’clock. I remember that vividly, and our son (Ryan) was born the next morning.
“His dad said, ‘Did I catch you at a bad time?’ And I chuckled and I said, ‘Well, I’m kind of in the delivery room, but nothing seems to be happening.’ It’s funny how often that story comes up.”
The AAA team was based at Hara Arena in Dayton, where Gingher had worked with the ECHL's Dayton Bombers, the first season, meaning each day required a drive of more than an hour each way to practice. The Vogelhubers and two other families set up a carpool, trading off days to drive – the other fathers were Doug MacLean, the CBJ general manager whose son, Clark, was on the team; and Terry Fairholm, a former Notre Dame captain whose son, Bryan, also played.
Fairholm has remained close to Vogelhuber, and while kids don’t often think in these terms, he looks back now and sees the skills in Vogelhuber the player that have translated to Vogelhuber the coach.
“He wasn’t like a rah-rah, I’m gonna say everything guy,” Fairholm said. “He was more of a follow me, I’ll just put the team on my back kind of guy. He led by example that way. He just relates so well with guys. I think guys really respect his messaging, and he was always very coachable himself. There was never any kind of drama. He was just a hard-working kid, wanted to do the right thing, and was a smart hockey player.”
Going up against competition from such hockey-rich areas as Detroit and Chicago, the program struggled when it came to wins and losses in the early years, but Vogelhuber continued to improve. No player who had grown up and played in Columbus had made it to the Division I college level to that point, and Vogelhuber made that his guiding light.
The Vogelhubers made clear the inspiration for Trent came from within, but they did everything they could to encourage and inspire him.
“I didn’t know what it took to be a D-I athlete," Dan said, "but I said, ‘It’s a process. It’s every day. You’re not better than the other kids tomorrow or next week, you’re better because you stick to things longer than they do.’ As an example, I said, ‘Can you do 10 pushups?’ And he got down and he did 10 pushups, and I timed it. It was, I don’t know, 12 seconds. I said, ‘If you don’t have 12 seconds every day before you go to bed to do 10 pushups, then you don’t really want to be a D-I athlete.’ He got up to 25, 30, 40 pushups, and he did it for years.
“I think he just had the understanding in his own mind of what the process was, and to be dedicated to something, you have to do something every day. He was an unusual kid that way. He was pretty serious about it.”
As time went by, Vogelhuber started to look the part, and he drew recruiting interest from both junior hockey and colleges. A then little-known coach named Jon Cooper recruited him to play for the St. Louis Bandits of the North American Hockey League in 2006-07, and he moved up to Des Moines Buccaneers of the Tier I United States Hockey League a season later.
In between, there was a moment the Columbus hockey community will never forget. While Vogelhuber was clearly moving up the hockey ladder, he didn’t expect that he would be chosen when the NHL draft came to Nationwide Arena in 2007, so he and some friends planned a lake getaway in Apple Valley, Ohio, for that weekend.
When word started to filter down that the Blue Jackets planned to select him, Vogelhuber had to hurry back, and his parents had to hustle to find a suit and deliver it to Nationwide when he was chosen with the 211th and last pick in the draft in his hometown.
“It was just an unbelievable moment for him, such pride for us that his dreams were coming true,” Dawn said.
When it happened, Vogelhuber became the first player to come up through the Columbus hockey ranks to be drafted by an NHL team, and celebrations ensued.
“That night, a bunch of friends and his friends, we went to Rusty Bucket and there were a lot of people in there,” Dan said. “We were celebrating, and the news came on and had his picture on there, and people started cheering, we started cheering. Then he went to the restroom or something and we watched him come back, and some little kid went and asked for his autograph. And a line lined up, and I just thought, ‘My goodness, this such a moment for us. They’re asking for his autograph.’”
Another dream came true when he earned a chance to play at Miami University, though the road wasn’t always easy. Vogelhuber suffered a torn ACL his final season with the AAA team, then did it again while playing with the Bandits, limiting him to just two games in his season with Des Moines. His injury luck proved to be difficult to overcome as time went on, as Vogelhuber suffered a knee injury at the Jackets’ development camp in 2009 and a shoulder injury in 2011.
Still, with the resolve that had allowed him to work his way into becoming an NHL draft pick, he soldiered on. Vogelhuber played four seasons at Miami, coming just a whisker shy of winning the NCAA championship as a freshman in 2009, and embarked on a seven-year pro career. His best season was 2015-16, when he was an assistant captain with the Jackets’ AHL affiliate in Cleveland, set career highs with 11 goals and 27 points, and won the Calder Cup with the Monsters.
After two final seasons in the Colorado organization, the injuries forced him to call it quits on the ice, and he never realized the dream of taking the ice as an NHL player. His legacy, though, is that he showed a kid from Columbus could make it to the highest levels of hockey, paving the way for the Sean Kuralys and Jack Roslovics of the world to make it.
“If you look at all the other players that have moved on to higher levels, they all look at Vogues as the OG,” Gingher said. “He’s the guy that paved the way. He’s the guy that took that initial group to another level (and proved) that quality hockey players can come out of Columbus and kids don’t have to leave. All of our top kids have those decisions to make, but that first team and those first couple of years, those guys were the trailblazers. They all have tremendous pride in being that, and that’s really cool.”
Moving Behind the Bench
The funny thing is that if you ask Vogelhuber, it never occurred to him during his playing career that he would want to join the coaching ranks once his skating days were over.
Now, it’s hard to imagine him anywhere else. When his playing career came to a close, the Blue Jackets organization had an opening on the staff in Cleveland and quickly reached out, with Vogelhuber joining the staff of head coach John Madden in 2018.
“It’s funny, you’re a player your whole life dreaming of playing in the NHL, and I never thought about being a coach,” Vogelhuber said. “Some people saw something in me that I didn’t see and thought I’d be a good coach. Then after that first year and you get into the second year, it feels like this is really what I am meant to be doing. It’s funny how that works out. Now after eight years, I couldn’t imagine doing anything else.”
Vogelhuber served one season under Madden in Cleveland, then stayed on staff when veteran coach Mike Eaves took over. When Eaves stepped down in 2022, Vogelhuber was promoted to head coach, leading to a successful run with the Blue Jackets’ top affiliate.
Vogelhuber piloted the Monsters to the playoffs in three of his four seasons, won a playoff series in each of those three campaigns, and skippered Cleveland all the way to Game 7 of the Eastern Conference final in 2024.
Thought to be one of the top young coaching minds in the game, Vogelhuber wasn’t pressing to make it to the NHL level, but the Blue Jackets saw his potential and added him to Rick Bowness’ staff in late June.
“I’ve just been enjoying what I’m doing, trying to get better at what I’m doing and trying to help the guys that I’ve been with,” Vogelhuber said. “There was never a moment where I’m like, ‘Man, when is this going to come,’ or, ‘I want to get to the NHL.’ I’m just trying to do my job to the best of my ability with the faith and trust that down the road, whether it was four years, eight years or whatever long that if you do your job properly, people will come knocking.”
As a result, his career has now come full circle, from the kid who sat in the stands at Nationwide Arena to someone who will be behind the bench for the upcoming season. For those who grew up with Vogelhuber, it’s both a fitting turn of events for someone who has a passion for hockey and his hometown, and something they can still hardly believe has come true.
“It’s just so cool,” Fairholm said. “You dream of that kind of thing. I think when you’re in your early teenage years, you’re playing hockey and you love it. Obviously, everyone wants to keep going, and for Trent, it’s been so cool to see his whole journey. It’s so unbelievable. Pick the word – it's surreal, it’s incredible. I’m so proud of him.”
For the Vogelhuber family, having Trent, his wife Kathleen and the grandkids back in town will be a significant perk. They’ve been Blue Jackets fans for the past 25 years, and now the bond will be strengthened even further when they sit in Nationwide Arena and see Trent on the bench.
His dream of making it to the NHL on the ice didn’t come to fruition, but when the puck drops Oct. 1, the Columbus kid's hard work will have paid off when he reports to work at Nationwide Arena.
“His dream was always to play in the NHL, but when he had to retire and he started coaching, he was given this new life in hockey,” Dawn said. “He said to Dan, ‘You know, maybe my route to the NHL is through coaching.’ Change your dream, right? We’re just thrilled. One dream came to an end, and another one, doors have opened for.”
