By Will MacLaren
Joe Sakic ranks no. 6on the CHL’s Top 50 Players of the Last 50 Years
Patience is a virtue. Joe Sakic is proof. It took a while for Burnaby, BC’s favourite son to lead his NHL club to glory but, by the time he hung up the blades, he had become synonymous with success.
Before he became one of the most reliable players in NHL history, he was a sensation in the WHL, albeit one dealing with the spectre of a tragedy. Sakic was a member of the Swift Current Broncos for two seasons. Midway through his rookie campaign, on December 30, 1986, the bus he and his Broncos teammates were travelling in crashed, resulting in the deaths of four of Sakic’s teammates. In one of the earliest displays of leadership and perseverance that would personify his career, Sakic led the Broncos to the postseason with a 60-goal, 133-point campaign that resulted in his selection as the league’s top rookie.
Sakic’s sophomore season was even more remarkable. With a league-leading 78 goals and 160 points, he was named the CHL’s Player of the Year. That year also saw him strike gold with Team Canada at the World Junior Hockey Championship. Most poignantly, Sakic’s play earned him WHL Player of the Year honours, an award now known as the Four Broncos Memorial Trophy. With the 15th overall selection at the 1987 NHL Entry Draft, the Quebec Nordiques wasted no time welcoming Sakic to the fold.
Life in Quebec City was not easy on the ice early on. Sakic would not taste the NHL postseason until his fifth season. Just as the team’s fortunes began to move in the right direction, the franchise itself would move to Denver, becoming the Colorado Avalanche in 1995. Sakic and crew immediately reached another level in the heart of the Rockies. Over the next six seasons, the club won two Stanley Cups and Sakic enjoyed the high point of his career. In 2001, he would not only lead the Avs to a championship, he would win the Hart Trophy as NHL MVP and Lady Byng Trophy as the league’s most gentlemanly player.
By the time of his retirement in 2009, Sakic’s 20-year NHL career included 625 goals, 1,641 points and three First Team All-Star appearances. In addition to those two Stanley Cups, Sakic won gold with Team Canada at the 1994 World Championships. But it was his performance at the 2002 Olympic Winter Games that was truly the stuff of legend. His goal in the gold medal game would stand as the winner, cementing his status as the tournament’s best forward and MVP. It also gained Sakic entry into the exclusive Triple Gold Club. He was called to the Hockey Hall of Fame in 2012, the IIHF Hall of Fame in 2014 and, during the WHL’s 50th anniversary celebrations in 2016, was named the league’s top player of all time.
It was a career with plenty of high notes, a few challenges and one unspeakable tragedy. All of it played a part in forging Joe Sakic’s marvellous career, one that Broncos fans still recall with pride.