The Team NB coach is also a chef in Charlottetown
Outside of playing ball hockey recreationally, Adam Loo didn’t grow up around sports. However, that changed 15 years ago when Loo was encouraged to hop in a chair and try wheelchair basketball.
Within a month of trying wheelchair basketball for the first time, Loo was playing for the PEI Mustangs and hasn’t looked back.
“I think I was discovering my interest in sports at that time,” Loo explained. “Wheelchair basketball aligned, and I got into sports. I’m very much into sports, and I’ve played many different sports since then. Wheelchair basketball has always been the one that I stuck to, played the most and got into a training schedule—committed to it.”
A chef by trade
A chef by trade, coaching wheelchair basketball was a natural progression for Loo.
Loo grew up in a farming family in Charlottetown—his father was an organic farmer; as a result, Loo was raised in the food service industry. At 15, when looking for his first job, Loo took a position washing dishes at a local restaurant.
“I realize now how lucky I am because so many people don’t do this, but I just knew that’s what I wanted to do,” said Loo. “I was addicted to learning how to cook and do it and realized there was just this whole world that I could learn and could never stop learning. So that’s what got me into it.”
Loo graduated from the Culinary Institute of Canada at Holland College in 2011 and has been with the Murphy Hospitality Group—where he is currently the executive chef—for 12 years.
The 33-year-old credits his father, Raymond Loo who passed away in 2013, for helping him find his career path.
“He was my main mentor. He taught me so much. He was a very humble guy and was a well-respected, good leader here in his field,” Loo said. “He was the guy that encouraged me to take on every challenge that was ahead of me. I think even to this day I continue to do that, because of that reflection, that inspiration, that he had on me.”
Coaching on and off the court
These days Loo, who will coach Team NB at the 2023 Canada Games in PEI, is coaching both on and off the court.
In his role with the Murphy Hospitality Group, most of his time is spent coaching up-and-coming chefs. At the same time, he’s preparing to coach in his third Canada Games.
“I drew a lot from sports coming up the ranks, and sports helped me come up the ranks in my career, too, because you learn so much about working with different people,” Loo said. “I’m a competitive guy by nature; I love competition. But I’m also really into watching team chemistry develop. I love seeing people discover they can do things they maybe didn’t think they could do—unleashing or unlocking potential in people.”
Loo originally got into coaching as a way to give back.
When Clary Stubbert moved to Nova Scotia, he handed the coaching reins to Loo. Loo coached the PEI Mustangs and even served as the league commissioner in the Maritimes.
“It’s paying it forward for all the people that have done that for me,” he said. “I hope that some of the people I’m coaching now and have coached or worked with in the past, look back on the memories as positive experiences.”
Whether he’s coaching on the court or in the kitchen, Loo says there are similarities.
“One, is definitely the common goal element. I think whether you’re in a workplace or whether you’re on the sports field or working on a family project—what brings everybody together is generally a common goal,” said Loo. “When it comes to the team side of things, I’ve always believed everybody has to rely on everybody else for greater success.
“True success is when your whole team is a part of it and contributed to it.”