At 32 years of age, he decided to leave the highly competitive intermediate level of hockey to play hockey "Oldtimers Hockey" played on an exhibition and tournament basis.  He joined the Sherwood Park Lancers hockey organization.  Ed played with the Lancers in a Lethbridge tournament (1976) and the COHA tournaments held in Victoria (1980 and 1981). In 1982, he joined the Edmonton Oldtimers to play in the "Snoopy Senior World Hockey" at Santa Rosa, CA.  With the Sherwood Park Lancers he played in the First Hawaii Tournament in 1984. Ed was credited with the very first goal scored in the tournament and his team won the Gold Medal in their division. Ed was also a member of the Edmonton Oldtimers, Edmonton Vintage, Salty Old Dogs, and Sherwood Park Senior Lancers.

There was a pivotal change in Ed's life in the 1970's. Ed began to have problems with his heart. He had major heart surgeries in 1978 and in 1985.   Ed's role in hockey gradually shifted from playing to less strenuous work for the club.  He acted or assisted within the organization as needed: player recruitment and registration, schedule drafting, fundraising, uniform and equipment purchases, managing and coaching.

During his managing and coaching days, Ed took teams to tournaments in Calgary, Red  Deer, Kamloops, Vernon, Burnaby, Victoria, Parksville, North Vancouver, Las Vegas, Reno  and Santa Rosa. Ed's teams won 18 gold and 10 silver medals. With this, there was pride  among the players and within the community in accomplishing something as a group.

In early 1994 Ed's heart condition worsened and he was placed on the list for a heart transplant.  With his condition most critical in early December of that year, his name was moved to the very top of the list.  Mere hours from death on December 21, a priest was brought in to pray with him and read him the last rites.  The very next day  a compatible donor heart was found in British Columbia and he underwent his successful heart transplant operation on December 22. He was saved in the nick of time and given a "second chance".

By April 1995, Ed had fully recovered. He felt deeply that there was "divine intervention".  Most grateful to the family that had consented to having their son's or daughter's heart donated, Ed felt compelled to "give back" to society.  He wanted to promote organ and tissue donation in some way and began writing "Letters to the Editor" and submitting information to newspapers.

The idea for the "Giving the Gift of Life" came to Ed as he and John Young drove to and from Santa Rosa that July - he would promote the   Human Organ Procurement and Exchange Program  HOPE Program.

His first major endeavor was to roller blade from the University Hospital in Edmonton to the Foothills Hospital in Calgary - a distance of 305 kilometers.  The "Rollerblading for HOPE" excursion was organized to draw attention, through various media, to the critical shortage of organs and to raise funds for HOPE Transplant Services.  Ed trained hard for this excursion with help from the University of Alberta heart exercise program and left Edmonton on October 10, 1995 and proceeded south on Highways 2 and 2A, stopping at the various towns and cities where he met with dignitaries for concentrated awareness sessions.  His message was clear: Albertans should sign their donor cards and talk to their families about becoming donors themselves in the event the unthinkable does happen.

When he stopped in Wetaskiwin the Wetaskiwin Colonels gathered for a dinner in his honor; several service clubs made contributions to the HOPE program; and he left the city joined by Roy Romaniuk, a  former Colonels teammate, who rollerbladed with him part of the way south.

This rollerblading trip to Calgary was one of his many causes to raise donor awareness and give comfort and hope to others.  Ed's mission was to live and breath the slogan "Giving the Gift of Life".  He would visit hospitals to be with patients awaiting transplants, sharing his experiences to help keep them in a positive frame of mind; he addressed students at several assemblies to give them information about organ donations, and was instrumental in  starting the "HOPE Oldtimers Hockey Challenge" in 2000.  Recently renamed "Ed Zaharichuk HOPE Hockey Challenge", the annual tournament continues to promote awareness and raise funds for the hope program. 

Ed Zaharichuk died of Hepatitis C on July 3, 2008 at age 70.  During the thirteen plus years after receiving his donor heart, Ed fulfilled his promise to "give back" to the medical profession, to the family of the donor, to society and to God by continually promoting organ and tissue donation. 

He is quoted as saying,

 "The issue isn't money and it isn't the transplant program. The issue is the lack of suitable donor organs. My purpose is to raise donor awareness, by encouraging our somewhat complacent society into acting now rather than wait for a crisis situation."

 "Don't take your organs/tissues to Heaven, Heaven knows we need them here."