WEEKS before Willie Rioli walked into his exit meeting at the end of last year and dropped his retirement surprise on Port Adelaide, the small forward decided on what he would be doing at the end of his AFL career.

After a year engulfed by personal challenges and on-field controversy, Rioli already knew his next passion when he told Port coach Josh Carr, list manager Jason Cripps and then football boss Chris Davies of his call to retire effective immediately, despite having another year to run on his contract.

He was off to work in Darwin for the Clontarf Foundation, which has staff across the country working to improve the education and lives of young Indigenous people. Rioli was a part of the same program in his youth.  

"Kids can gravitate to athletes and mentors so that was something I was very passionate about, post-footy, and I knew there was a couple of spots available through family friends who worked through Clontarf and as soon as I told them I was retiring, which was before it all got announced, they asked if I wanted to do a bit of mentoring up here," Rioli told AFL.com.au in his first interview since his AFL career ended.

"It was all planned pre-retirement but I wanted to enjoy the retirement moment."

Rioli, 30, had actually planned on telling teammates before the end of the Power's season that he was done. But he says his timing was off as the Power bade farewell to champion midfielder Travis Boak and long-time coach and mentor Ken Hinkley.

"I was going in to the club to do it and I came in early that day and I wanted to talk to the coaches first but I saw 'Boaky's' family and the media there so I thought it's probably not a great day or time for me to do it. I read the room a bit," he said.

"I wasn't at Port long enough to be celebrated as those two were. That was their club and for me I was just honoured to retire alongside those two guys. I was in the moment those last few weeks, understanding that it had been a long nine years of ups and downs. I'm super grateful and honoured to be able to even say I played AFL. I left the industry with what I wanted to accomplish."

More on the ups and downs later.

But his 109-game and 151-goal career across West Coast and Port Adelaide – as well as the Rioli family's incredible history in the AFL – has made a mark already in his time at a Palmerston region primary school in Darwin, where Rioli works every day with the school kids in a bid to improve their self-esteem and confidence to participate in education.

"I definitely feel like this is for me. I always say my dad and my family's way of giving back was in the community," he said.

"A lot of these kids I'm working with now, I'm either related to their family or I went to high school or played footy with their families up here, so that's why the passion of working with them is there. I say it's like a cycle – their family used to give back to me, I learnt off a lot of their grandfathers, grandmothers, so it's good to give back.

"The start of this term, we had our highest school attendance rate ever and the principal was so happy with the improvement. It makes me feel really proud to be a part of that, especially with some of the kids who weren't engaging in Clontarf because their family doesn't understand Clontarf.

"I'm one of those kids who is an ex-student of Clontarf, an alumni, so educating them about attendance is so important. For me to be seeing that little improvement means I'm doing my job. Playing footy, you know you're doing something right when your team is doing well and I feel like with the school doing well I'm a small part of it. I'm really happy."

Rioli's final year in the AFL was enveloped in controversy. It first came after the Power's Gather Round win over Hawthorn, which saw Rioli kick two final-quarter goals – during the first of which he provoked opponent Changkuoth Jiath with the ball before booting it from point-blank range, which saw him shoved and win another free to put the result beyond doubt.

Post-game, he took to Instagram to reveal his "hatred" for Hawthorn for "what they did to my dad, and my brother", before deleting the post.

"It was one of those things. A lot of people (outside) the footy club don't know the personal stuff I was going through. My mum was very ill – really, really crook – so that took a toll on me. My little cousin was nine and was doing chemo and we got some bad news with her. That flipped on its head at the back end of the year and became positive," Rioli said.

"When the Hawthorn stuff happened, that was when I was dealing with her personal stuff. I let my emotions get the best of me. I love the way the Hawks play, it was more just what they did to my family [in the past]. It had nothing to do with the present playing group, it was more hearing stories about my family. That was it. I was a Hawks supporter growing up when Cyril (Rioli) was there."

Several weeks later, Rioli was suspended for a game after sending a threatening message to Western Bulldog Bailey Dale following their round eight clash. On the eve of Sir Doug Nicholls Round, the Power called for the AFL industry to do more to seek to understand the challenges faced by First Nations players in the game.

"Every footy journey, you have little regrets and that was one of them," he said.

"One of their players messaged me post-game and asked me 'What did the boys say to you?' I said 'Brother, you can't say this stuff and don't talk like this if you don't talk like this outside of the oval'.

"I don't shy away from anything, it's a mistake I have to live with and be a man about. I love the way they play, I love the way Bailey Dale plays. Once the game was over I literally forgot about everything and it was only after one of the players reminded me about it."

Rioli's rollercoaster career started at West Coast, when he debuted as a 22-year-old in 2018 and kicked 28 goals in their premiership season, including one in the Grand Final win over Collingwood.

He received a backdated two-year anti-doping ban for tampering with a urine sample in 2021 and battled off-field while in the Northern Territory, making for a three-year gap between games for the Eagles.

The brilliant small forward returned for West Coast at the start of 2022 before requesting a trade to Port Adelaide at the end of that year. His best two seasons came in 2023-24, when he kicked 64 goals from 38 games and was a key cog in the Power's finals tilts.

His mum has his premiership medal tucked away and retirement has given him more of a chance to play with his sons.

"I've got two boys and I've come back at a right time where this is the stuff they'll remember at six and eight years old. This is the age where they need me. The youngest one doesn't really know I'm a footy player, he just knows dad's home and for me that's more than my 15 years of chasing footy," he said.

"I miss the competitiveness of the AFL, the want to get better every day alongside your team. That's what I'm missing right now.

"Outside of footy everyone has different goals but when you're in that environment, everyone has one goal, and I'm missing that. I say to people that you find things that fill those holes and it makes things a lot smoother (when) transitioning. I think I've found my competitiveness in my kids and they're at that age where everything is competitive."

Football is never far away, though. Since returning to Darwin, Rioli has gotten involved again with the Tiwi Bombers, the football club he grew up at.

"My grandfather Cyril snr made Tiwi Bombers, because when I was growing up we had the highest suicide rate in Australia at the time. They made that club to help other teenagers to not fall through that hole and give them an opportunity to be something of themselves," he said.

"That's the bigger picture of Tiwi Bombers. People say it's winning flags and football is about winning and getting people to jump on board, but some clubs have more meaning behind them and Tiwi is that. I don't want to coach yet… I don't want to go bald."

He has considered playing some games with South Fremantle in the WAFL, with the club having a proud Indigenous history, but isn't expecting to line up this year.

"When I retired I always planned to go and play there but probably not this year, I probably can't this year. To graduate the course I'm doing, they want me to do a two-year apprenticeship at a school or location, so after this year I'll be able to relocate if I want to. I said to them 'I respect the WAFL too much to be an interruption in that league'," he said.

"I'm one of those players when once footy is done I try to stay out of the spotlight as much as I can."

Which brings us back to what is driving Rioli now. His AFL path highlighted the successes and challenges Indigenous players face in the game and he has seen the number of Indigenous players decline during the length of his career.

His former Port teammate, Quinton Narkle, is also working in Darwin with Clontarf, with Rioli determined to make an impact.

"A lot of the kids I'm seeing are coming to school and I'm noticing what they're missing out on. The kids don't understand their talent until they're 16 up here so that's why it's somewhere I can help," he said.

"There's definitely pathways there. It's just about giving these Indigenous kids opportunities and I want to help bridge a gap."