Every day during this emotional ringer, as he has grappled with the heartbreaking news that has shocked the entire hockey world, Calgary Flames general manager Craig Conroy has wandered out of his office or made the drive from home to visit the memorial to Johnny and Matthew Gaudreau outside the Saddledome.
Conroy has watched the flowers and the hockey sticks and the Skittles stack up. He’s read the messages scrawled in sidewalk chalk. He certainly wouldn’t be surprised to hear that many local convenience stores have sold out of purple Gatorade.
“I don’t know if you’ve seen it lately, but it’s pretty amazing,” said Conroy of a touching tribute that started shortly after Friday’s devastating announcement that Johnny and Matthew Gaudreau had been killed the previous evening by a suspected drunk driver while biking on a rural road in Salem County, N.J.
“I think it would mean so much to Johnny and obviously I think it means so much to the family. I mean, it just shows you how much he meant to Calgary and how much people here care about him. There’s some people that never met Johnny, but a lot of people have and he’s touched them in different ways. Maybe it was just one encounter. Maybe it was a note to one of their kids …
“Calgary is a big city, but it’s a small city, you know what I mean? We have always looked after our own here. And Johnny, he was a Calgarian through and through, and I think the support shows that.”
Conroy was at the Flames’ draft table in 2011, just a few months into his front-office career, when they selected this oh-so-talented but oh-so-tiny left-winger as a fourth-round long shot.
When Johnny was putting up big numbers with the NCAA’s Boston College Eagles, Conroy recalls annual summer trips to New Jersey to check in with the promising prospect and to pitch the perks of a future in Calgary.
They would arrange to meet with the family at a rink that was managed by proud dad Guy Gaudreau. They’d sit together in an upstairs office, overlooking the ice, but it wasn’t long before Johnny would lose interest in the conversation.
No offence, of course.
“All he wanted to do was be on the ice,” Conroy reminisced. “Jay (Feaster) and I would go in the summer and we’d be talking to him and his family would be there, and he’d be looking out there, like, ‘OK, we’ve been talking for way too long. I just want to get out there.’ And he’d go back down to the ice, and we’d keep talking to his family.
“Obviously, we flew all the way across the country so you’re hoping to get more time with him. But we got more time with the family. And then we’d just say, ‘Well, we’ve got a player. He loves it.’ It was hockey, hockey, hockey, all the time. He just loved the game, and he was really, really good at it.”
Sure was.
In parts of nine seasons at the Saddledome, Gaudreau racked up 210 goals and 399 assists. In franchise lore, only four gents — Jarome Iginla, Theoren Fleury, Al MacInnis and Joe Nieuwendyk — have produced more points in the Flaming C logo.
“He came in and we were going with a youth movement, and he became our star,” Conroy said of Gaudreau, who’d skated for the past two seasons with the Columbus Blue Jackets and was still in the prime of his NHL career. “He was electric. He’d bring people out of their seats. For a small guy, you didn’t know at first how it was going to go for him, but he was so competitive.
“I always tell people, it’s amazing to see what he did in the games. But some of the stuff he used to do in practice, I’d be saying, ‘Oh man, I wish I had a video of that!’ Or we’d all be looking at each other and saying, ‘Whoa, did you see what he just did out there!’ I mean, it was pretty special.
“And he was such an unbelievably good person, in the community. I loved being around him. You wouldn’t find one person in hockey that would ever have a bad thing to say about Johnny Gaudreau.”
Around the Saddledome, and around this city, they’ll continue talking about Johnny Gaudreau. He was only 31 and leaves behind a wife and two young children.
The Flames have made counselling available to all their players and staff members, and Conroy will continue his daily visits to that heart-wrenching memorial, which had to be shifted slightly Tuesday to allow access for concert-goers.
“It makes me be proud to be a Calgarian also, to see how everyone has come together in tough times,” Conroy said.