Park, 18, Came of Age Far From Home : Hockey: Former Rancho Palos Verdes resident who moved to Toronto to play junior hockey is expected to be picked in NHL draft.

When the winds gusting off Lake Ontario made his teeth chatter, Richard Park knew he wasn’t in Rancho Palos Verdes anymore.

“My first winter, wow! I didn’t even know what a winter coat was,” he said. “Well, maybe that’s an exaggeration, but it’s pretty much true. I like winter now. It’s nice to see the change of seasons.”

Park was 13 when he gave up the warmth and comfort of home to play hockey in Toronto, hoping to improve his skills in Canada’s youth and junior leagues. His parents, who had emigrated to the United States from Korea when he was 3, didn’t approve of their youngest child’s plans, but his determination melted their opposition. Smiling bravely, they packed him off to Canada, chaperoned by their older daughter, Christina.

The separation was especially wrenching for Jean Park, who helps her husband, Paul, in the family’s import-export business. Jean speaks little English, but her anguish over Richard’s departure needed no translation.

“She was really hurt when Richard was leaving, and she still feels the same way,” said Claire Park, the middle of the three Park children. “But as long as Richard is happy, she’s happy.”

For Richard, there was no question. He had to go.

“I played at a tournament in Vancouver when I was 13, and the three centers on the Blackhawk team were supposed to be the best American players,” Park recalled. “People were already talking about them playing in the NHL, and I was this kid from California, so nobody was talking about me.

“I went to this super series and adapted pretty well. But people were still talking about those three centermen and I didn’t enjoy that, so I decided to move and prove to myself, my parents and other people in Toronto that Richard Park was going to be a better player than those three.

“Where are those three now? In junior B (the second-best junior level). They’re not really anything.”

But Park, who turned 18 last month, might be something.

A center for the Belleville Bulls of the Ontario Hockey League, he was rated the 30th-best junior prospect in the NHL entry draft by the league’s Central Scouting Bureau. He was ranked 10th in the midseason ratings, an honor for any player, much less one born in South Korea, raised outside the usual hockey circles and modest in stature at 5 feet 11 1/2 and 185 pounds.

At the time of his first ranking, Frank Bonello, director of Central Scouting, called him “a centerman with exceptional ability (whose) size will not hold him back. He’s got a lot of exceptional talent and a lot of hockey sense.”

His end-of-season rating, however, plunged sharply.

Still, he’s considered a second-round pick in today’s draft.

His talent was evident last winter in the world junior tournament in the Czech Republic, where he scored three goals and two assists for Team USA in eight games.

Wherever he is picked, Park will be the second native of South Korea to be drafted, joining defenseman Jim Paek. The Pittsburgh Penguins drafted Paek and traded him to the Kings last season.

For Park to get this far has taken a lot of dedication and concentration.

His friends usually went surfing and skateboarding after school, but Park, who was drawn to hockey after seeing a game during a public figure skating session, wasn’t tempted. He was at the Olympic Ice Arena in Torrance, working on his skating or his passing.

“When I laced up my skates and put on my helmet, no one could distract me,” he said. “When I get on the ice, that’s fun time.

“On Sundays I’d get up at 5 and skate, go to church from 8 till noon, go back to the rink. I’d skate seven to 10 hours on Sundays and during the week skate and play . . . It was like pond hockey. I’ll never forget those Sunday mornings.”

Those hours on the ice refined his skills quickly and he played against opponents two or three years older. To progress further, he would have to play against the best, and that meant Canada.

He couldn’t go alone, though. That’s where Christina, six years his senior, stepped in. She agreed to keep an eye on him, becoming his advocate when the Metro Toronto Hockey League kept him off the Young Nats midget team and becoming his guardian to give her legal authority to make decisions for him.

“People didn’t like the fact that a California kid came to Toronto to play hockey and maybe took the spot of a Canadian kid,” said Christina, who is studying law at the University of Toronto. “People wrote letters to the MTHL and he wasn’t able to play the first 20 months. I remember he had tears coming out of his eyes.

“It was hard, but I think that helped him mature, got him tougher and made him work hard. He’s really a mature kid now.”

Given a chance, Park showed that being from Southern California was as good as being from South Porcupine, Canada. He scored 49 goals and had 107 points for the Young Nats during the 1991-92 season and was chosen seventh by Belleville in the OHL’s 1992 draft of midget-level players. He made an effortless jump to major junior hockey, scoring 23 goals and 61 points last season and made the OHL’s all-rookie team. In his first 35 games this season he had 18 goals and 46 points, but tailed off to finish with 27 goals and 76 points in 59 games.

“I never had a disadvantage,” he said. “I had the support of my parents and that was a big plus. A lot of those Canadian kids are pressured into doing well. I had the advantage of knowing I had nothing to lose. If I didn’t succeed, I could still succeed at life. I always thought I had an advantage with living.”

He enjoys living in Belleville, a city of about 37,000 located 90 minutes east of Toronto. He boards with a local family and has lunch every weekend with Christina.