Thomas McCollum, like the rest of his 10-year-old teammates, stood there shocked. The time-out was supposed to calm his Wheatfield Blades goaltender. Instead, the kid lost his melon. It was the middle of the game, but he was taking his pads, and he was going home. At practice a few days later, the coach spread the news. The boy with the goalie equipment wasn’t coming back. So, who wanted the job? ‘Everybody kind of turned and looked at me,’ McCollum recalled Thursday. The squirt defenseman from Sanborn had already earned a reputation as a shot-blocking madman, diving headfirst for the puck whenever he could.”

Dave Gross writes in the Canwest News Service, “Goaltending carries enough pressure on its own. So throwing in a little intangible such as being the No. 1 rated goalie for the coming National Hockey League draft in Ottawa, well, it's easy to shrug off. ‘I was surprised when I found out, but at the same time it was exciting. It's a real honour when you think about,’ said stopper Thomas McCollum of the Ontario Hockey League's Guelph Storm. And that's about as exuberant as the native of Sanborn, N.Y., ever gets.”

Adam Kimelman writes on NHL.com, "It's hard to figure just what the top NCAA hockey programs were thinking when they looked at goaltender Thomas McCollum. 'I actually didn't have that many offers from universities at the time,' McCollum, an Amherst, N.Y. native, told NHL.com. 'I only heard from one, Canisius College.' The NCAA's loss has become the Guelph Storm's gain."

Aaron Bell writes on NHL.com, "It's a safe bet that Thomas McCollum has enjoyed life as an adult so far. After failing to pick up a win in more than a month, the Guelph Storm goaltender has suddenly become the hottest netminder in the Canadian Hockey League. He has won five games in a row, including three shutouts since blowing out the candles to celebrate his 18th birthday on December 7."

Tony Saxon writes in the Guelph Mercury, "To know Thomas McCollum, you need to see the double garage doors at the end of a paved driveway just off the busy Saunders Settlement Road in Sanborn, N.Y. The white paint is blanketed in dents, every one of them similar in size, most partially outlined in streaky black vulcanized rubber that once belonged on a hockey puck. This is where the Guelph Storm netminder learned the game. First pretending to be former Buffalo Sabre Brad May or Mike Foligno helping inflict the damage, then as a budding goaltender defending the steel doors."