Former Calgary Flames forward Matt Stajan is the latest of many notable NHLers, both active and retired, to share their memories of the late Johnny Gaudreau.
Gaudreau and his brother, Matthew, were tragically killed in late August after being struck by a vehicle while they were on bikes. The deaths have rocked the hockey world, along with anybody else who came into contact with the brothers throughout their lives.
Many former teammates and close such as Matthew Tkachuk and Sean Monahan, have shared stories of Johnny and, even more recently, Brad Richardson. In a recent appearance on the Cam & Strick Podcast, Stajan did his best to share some of his favourite memories from their time spent together in Calgary.
“At training camp, he came in, and he’s just light and small. Everybody was like, ‘I don’t know if he’s going to do it,’ but you just saw the raw talent,” Stajan said. “He was going to make it work. He just loved hockey. He’d come to the rink, go out there and do this thing. It changed our team. His rookie year, we made the playoffs because of him. No other reason. We don’t make the playoffs if Johnny Hockey doesn’t come in and just kind of change the whole dynamic of our team.
“It’s so sad. It’s emotional talking about it because you can’t believe [it]. I don’t even want to believe what happened, happened. He was such a good kid, too. Just some of the fun times we had together. He just loved hockey.”
Matt Stajan reflects on the great Johnny Hockey. #Flames @CamandStrick pic.twitter.com/zftRx0oaxS
— Andy Strickland (@andystrickland) November 6, 2024
Stajan had already been with the Flames for more than four seasons before Gaudreau’s rookie campaign, so the fact he attributes making the playoffs in 2014-15 to Gaudreau’s play holds a ton of weight.
The two were teammates for four seasons before Stajan left the NHL after the 2017-18 campaign to finish out his career in Germany.
As difficult as the losses of Johnny and Matthew have been, hearing stories from the many they impacted in a positive way has been very heartwarming. Rest assured, we will hear plenty more for a long time.
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