Coach, Mentor, Organizer: The Life of Tim Oshie

A Snapshot

Family and Roots

Tim’s story begins with a small constellation of family ties that shaped him. Born in 1964, he lost his father at a young age—an event that reframed family life and responsibility. Raised in Anoka, Minnesota and then relocated to Everett, Washington in 1977, Tim’s teenage years landed him in Cascade High School, where he graduated in 1982. He later earned an AAS in Communications from Everett Community College.

His immediate family expanded and shifted across decades: marriage in July 1986 produced children who would carry his name and values forward, most notably his son Timothy Leif—T. J.—born December 23, 1986, who would go on to professional hockey. The family includes three other children—Taylor, Tawni, and Aleah Rae—alongside a circle of siblings, nieces and nephews. Names fill the pages of Tim’s obituary like threads on a woven blanket: Alvin “Buster” Oshie and Carol Jean Oshie (parents), Richard Oshie (step-father), sisters Marilyn and Stacy (predeceased), living siblings such as Pami Baudry and Michael Oshie, and extended relatives that speak to deep Midwestern roots. Relationships here are not abstract; they are dates, addresses, photographs—tangible markers of a life lived among kin.

Coaching, Community, and Career

Tim’s public identity was built on the ice. He founded and operated Oshie Sports and Entertainment, a small business that organized youth hockey tournaments, basketball events, and inline-hockey meets. The business name alone signals purpose: sports, entertainment, structure. He coached in the Seattle Junior Hockey Association and worked with the Mukilteo Boys & Girls Club. In 2002 he moved to Warroad, Minnesota—a town steeped in hockey tradition—and continued his work with youth programs and the Indian Education program there.

“Coach” was not merely a title. To players he taught, he was a daily presence: voice, whistle, plan. He built tournaments into calendars and put together teams that learned how to win and how to lose. In the local communities—Everett, Warroad, and the broader Western Washington region—his imprint reads like a ledger of practices, rinks, summer camps, fundraisers, and the small, stubborn rituals that shape young athletes.

The numbers are modest but meaningful. He married on July 12, 1986. He moved across states twice. He coached dozens, likely hundreds, of players across years. Those athletes remember him not for national headlines but for the single defining act: showing up. That repetition—practice after practice—becomes its own quiet achievement.

The Timeline: Key Dates and Milestones

• July 23, 1964 — Birth in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
• 1971 — Death of father Alvin “Buster” Oshie; family restructuring follows.
• 1977 — Move to Everett, Washington.
• 1982 — Graduated Cascade High School, Everett, WA.
• July 12, 1986 — Married Tina (Moen).
• December 23, 1986 — Birth of son Timothy “T. J.” Leif Oshie.
• 2002 — Family relocation to Warroad, Minnesota.
• ~2003 — Birth of daughter Aleah Rae Oshie.
• 2012 — Diagnosed with early-onset Alzheimer’s disease. Returned to Everett to live with family.
• May 4, 2021 — Passed away at age 56.

These dates serve as checkpoints that guide the narrative. Between them are seasons of tournaments run, ice resurfacings surveyed at dawn, and buses loaded with boys and girls heading into the bright glare of small-arena lights.

Battling Alzheimer’s and Public Presence

In 2012, at roughly age 48, Tim received a diagnosis of early-onset Alzheimer’s. That diagnosis changed the axis of the family’s life. The years that followed combined the private labor of care with public candor—family members spoke openly about the diagnosis and its impact. The illness is a ledger of losses: memory fragments misplaced like pucks under a bench, routines that fray, relationships that must be translated into new languages of patience and support.

Even as Alzheimer’s advanced, Tim’s legacy persisted in the people he had coached and in the family that surrounded him. His son, a high-profile athlete, became a conduit between the local legacy and a wider audience. For Tim, the community’s response—tributes, remembrances, team gatherings—read like a scoreboard of affection. Numbers here are not stats but measures of presence: the years he coached, the decades he influenced, the handful of grandchildren who would inherit stories more than plays.

Remembering Through Names and Numbers

Names matter. So do dates. They are anchors. Tim’s life, cataloged in a roster of relatives and marked by moves in 1977 and 2002, by a marriage in 1986, and by the 2012 diagnosis, reads as a sequence of choices and chances. His business, Oshie Sports and Entertainment, stands for one practical thing: he organized play. He gave structure to young lives, scheduling tournaments and opening doors to competitive experience.

Consider the arithmetic of a life lived for others: one man, four children, three grandchildren, dozens of players coached, and countless tournaments run. Each number is a ripple. Each date is a shore against which memory breaks. The story is neither tidy nor abrupt; it is a patchwork of rink boards, bus rides, quiet hospital rooms, laughter in family kitchens, and the slow geometry of a disease that redraws every map.

Portraits Without Portraits

What remains are images assembled from other peoples’ recollections—a man on a bench, a whistle in hand, the soft thud of skates sweeping ice. He is a lighthouse for kids learning to navigate the brittle waters of competition. He is a parent whose own child would skate into arenas the size of dream and map family lessons onto national stages. Tim’s life is both public and private: a ledger of dates, a bundle of names, and the long, luminous trail left when someone shows up for a thousand ordinary practices.