NHL Referee Garrett Rank Starts the Season on the Links

The NHL season opens September 29, but referee Garrett Rank (#7) is spending the first days of it on the golf course.

Rank is competing in the 45th U.S. Mid-Amateur Championship at Sand Valley Resort in Wisconsin through October 1. He opens match play Monday as the No. 14 seed against No. 51 Michael Padilla.

Rank punched his ticket to Sand Valley with a win in August, capturing his fourth Canadian Men’s Mid-Amateur Championship on August 21 at Brantford Golf & Country Club. He closed it out with a 3-under 69 to finish at 18-under 270, edging third-round leader Evan Nachtigall by one stroke. He sank a six-footer for par on the final hole to break the tie.

“As soon as I saw my ball was on the back of the green, I knew it was a good time for lag putt to try and two putt, and luckily enough I was able to make the six-footer at the end to win,” Rank said after the victory.

His previous Canadian Mid-Am titles came three years in a row from 2014 to 2016, making this his first in a decade. Combined with his 2012 Canadian College/University Individual Championship, Rank now owns five national titles.

“It’s a huge honor,” Rank said. “Winning a golf tournament is never easy. To do it four times is pretty special. I think it’s been 10 years since I last did it so to do it close to home in a place like Brantford is something that I will remember for the rest of my life.”

Winning a Championship after Working a Championship

Just four months before his Canadian Mid-Am win, Rank worked his first Stanley Cup Final. The NHL selected him as one of four referees for the 2026 Final between the Vegas Golden Knights and Carolina Hurricanes, where he was paired with veteran Jean Hebert; Rank and Hebert were the only referee pairing to advance together from the Conference Finals. The duo worked Game 2 in Raleigh on June 4 and Game 4 in Las Vegas on June 9.

It capped a season that saw him work 76 regular-season games and 12 playoff games, picking up a nice $124,000 bonus along the way.

Pulling Double Duty

Rank’s double life is well documented. The Elmira, Ontario, native played on a golf scholarship at the University of Waterloo and spent 2012 to 2014 on Golf Canada’s national amateur team alongside future PGA Tour players Mackenzie Hughes and Corey Conners. He stepped away from the game to battle testicular cancer in 2011, then returned to win the 2011 Toronto Star Amateur, the 2012 Canadian College/University Individual Championship, and finish runner-up at the 2012 U.S. Mid-Amateur.

“The reffing, you’re an accessory to the game, just out there monitoring and trying to let the guys have fun, keeping it safe and fair,” he told Sports Illustrated. “I think the golf provides me with my competitive balance, where I can go out and play and try to have some success, try to do well and win. I think they complement each other well.” (SI, 2016)

Rank’s amateur golfing highlights:

2015, 2016: Canadian Men’s Mid-Amateur champion
2015: Ontario Men’s Mid-Amateur champion
2015: Represented Canada at the Pan American Games in Toronto
2016: Made the cut at the RBC Canadian Open, finishing 77th
2018: Qualified for the U.S. Open at Shinnecock Hills; Ontario Men’s Amateur and Ontario Men’s Mid-Amateur champion
2019: Won the 117th Western Amateur, becoming the first Canadian champion since 1977 and the first non-U.S.-born winner since 2008
2026: Won the second flight of the Crump Cup at Pine Valley

Rank made his NHL debut on January 15, 2015, working Minnesota vs. Buffalo, and was promoted to full-time referee in 2016.
On balancing both

Back in 2018, Rank was asked whether he’d rather finish top 10 at the U.S. Open or work Game 7 of the Stanley Cup Final.

“I answered the top 10 at the U.S. Open,” Rank responded. “I said I’d save the Stanley Cup finals for 15 years down the road when my golf game wasn’t as strong.”

It took eight years, not fifteen, for him to reach the Cup final – and his golf game looks plenty strong.