Nilan - Fighting back: the chris nilan story

Chris Nilan lives by a motto: Never back down. Never stay down. That motto describes the man through and through.

I have known Chris for close to thirty-five years, and over that time, I have grown to respect him as a teammate, a player, and a person. We became and remain close friends.

I first heard about Chris Nilan, though I didnt yet know his name, early in May 1979 when I was playing for the Montreal Canadiens. We were in Boston for games three and four of an epic seven-game Stanley Cup semifinals series en route to the finals, in which we beat the New York Rangers four games to one. We took the first two games in Montreal. Boston evened the series with wins in the next two games at Boston Garden.

The day after Game 3, with Game 4 set for the next night, we had a skate around at the Garden. Later that day, I was talking with Gilles Lupien, our six-foot, six-inch, 205-pound defenseman, whom we relied on heavily for his physical play and toughness. He told me an interesting story about something that had happened after practice. He, Guy Lafleur, and Jacques Lemaire, having showered and changed into street clothes, were leaving the Garden to grab a cab to our hotel. We were staying in the bordering city of Cambridge, across the Charles River from Boston.

As they reached the sidewalk, a long boat of a car pulled up. In the front of the car were the driver and passenger: two kids, maybe in their late teens or early twenties. They offered my teammates a ride to the hotel. Gilles, Guy, and Jacques, always adventurous, jumped into the backseat.

In no time, the kid sitting in the front passenger seat turned around and started to babble. He said that he and the guy driving the car had sneaked in to our practice that morning and watched all of it. He then started yapping about how he had been drafted by the Canadiens, and that he would be on the team the next season. This information got the three Canadiens, who were already on the team, looking at one another. Then Guy leaned forward and peered closely at the draftee. With incredulity and great curiosity in his voice, he asked, And who are you? Well, the name the young man provided didnt register with anyone, but the kid maintained that the Habs had drafted him the previous year. He also explained that he was a forward who played for Northeastern University in Boston. During that ten-minute trip to the hotel, the occupant of the front passenger seat had much to say.

You meet all types, especially if you play hockey.

It most certainly was a funny story, one worth retellingand we believed that, for sure, this young man, the one with the incredible and fanciful tale, would never be heard from again by any Montreal Canadien.

Except he would be heard from again. In a major way.

A few months later, in early September, it was the first day of training camp. We were all there in the locker room at the Forumveterans, rookies, draftees, minor leaguers in the Canadiens systempulling on our equipment and getting ready for the inaugural skate of the new season.

I heard Gilles and Guy laughing, and I saw that they were talking with a fresh-faced kid who had a head of curly dark brown hair and intense eyes. The kid was sitting down and fully dressed for practice, save for his skates.

Gilles and Guy were calling him, whoever he was, Boston.

Guy said something like, You said you would be here, and you are here.

So he was.

Chris Knuckles Nilanthe college boy from Boston, the one who had told my teammates the incredible yarn about being drafted by the Canadiens, asserting that he would soon be one of ushad arrived. The 231st player of the 234 selected in the 1978 NHL draft, he would be around for a while.

Right from the get-go, Chris exuded attitude and confidence and enthusiasm, and a bit of craziness but a bit of craziness in a good way. His hockey skills were rough and in need of polishing, but he also possessed a rare mix of focus, guts, determination, physical and mental strength, and work ethic, which the Montreal Canadiens needed. Truth is, from the first days of training camp, even before Chris was sent to our AHL affiliate, the Nova Scotia Voyageurs, for seasoning and development, the Canadiens coaches and management took notice of him.

There are very few NHL players who would eventually do what Chris did for usprotect and stand up for the high-scoring stars, score twenty or more goals a season, and defend against the oppositions top offensive threats and throw them off their game.

Now, let there be no doubt: Chris Nilan came into the league and earned his roster spot as an enforcer. But being an enforcer alone would not satisfy him. He needed to become a total hockey player; indeed, the Montreal Canadiens needed him to become a total hockey player. And Chris responded by working exhaustively, inviting coaching and advice, watching, listening, learning and getting better.

He established himself as a well-rounded forward integral to the success of the franchise with the most wins in NHL history. And he teamed with Guy Carbonneau and Bob Gainey to form one of the most effective checking lines in the annals of hockey.

What most of the public most commonly associated with Chris Nilan were his physical play and his fighting, paired with a no-holds-barred and brutally frank personality. Yet those who knew him best saw his extraordinary generosity, his loyalty, and his empathy for those who were hurting and in a bad way.

When Chris was playing for Montreal, as he still does today, he gave considerably of his time in visiting children in the citys hospitals. He not only visited with young people, but he made an effort to get to know them and to understand the specific challenges they faced. Chris forged strong bonds with the patientsand they adored him, as did their families and the hospital staff.

Yes, Chris is giving and generous. He will give you his final dollar if he believes you need it.

When I was general manager for the Habs, I made the painful decision to authorize trading Chris following his prolonged disagreement with Coach Jean Perron. I admired and respected Chris, but for the good of the team, I had to back Jean. Chris loved being a Montreal Canadien, and being traded away hurt him immensely. But Chris never held my decision against me on a personal level.

A few years later, when Chris was at the end of his playing career, it gave me and the Montreal Canadiens organization, and the Canadiens fans, tremendous happiness, and an opportunity to show our gratitude for all he did for the team, to be able to bring him back to Montreal. It was the only proper way for Chris to go into retirementwearing, in his final game in the NHL, as he did in his first game in the league, the Montreal Canadiens tricolor.