If you’re a hockey fan like I am, this has been a tough week.
Monday, UMD legend and former NHLer Tom Kurvers died after a two-plus year battle with inoperable lung cancer. Kurvers, the 1984 Hobey Baker Award winner at UMD (the first of what is now six Hobey winners, the most of any program in college hockey), was diagnosed in January 2019 ($) despite having never smoked. He played 11 years in the NHL before eventually becoming a top front-office figure with the Phoenix (now Arizona) Coyotes, Tampa Bay Lightning, and most recently his home-state Minnesota Wild.
But his legacy is about so much more than hockey. Kurvers was, above everything else, a tremendous human being. Scroll the internet upon his diagnosis (or even more since his passing this week), and you’ll see countless stories of Tom Kurvers’ humility, selflessness, and compassion for others. On a podcast this week, Wild television voice Anthony LaPanta talked about Kurvers’ ability to remember even the most minor of details from conversations with other people. Kurvers was the type of person who didn’t do small talk. If he asked a question or started a conversation, he was engaged, listening, and had amazing recall, even with people he rarely spoke to.
Appearing on my radio show this week, an emotional Mike Sertich talked about coaching Kurvers at UMD. His leadership skills were clearly there, even before the decision was made to have Kurvers captain the 1983-84 group. Sertich said Kurvers won that Hobey with the overall package. Yeah, he was a great player, but his character and leadership, Sertich said, put Kurvers over the top for the award.
Kurvers was a treat. I got a chance to visit with him a few times at UMD games over the years, probably the most during that 2011-12 season when Kurvers was working for Steve Yzerman in Tampa and the Lightning were hard after UMD sophomore JT Brown. Tampa eventually signed Brown, who ended up being a part of the group that went to the 2015 Stanley Cup Final (losing to Chicago). After he moved on to Minnesota, I had a couple chances to interview him on the radio show, and he really enjoyed talking about the Wild’s prospects. We chatted in May of 2019, a few months after his diagnosis, and he talked more about his appreciation for the support he got from all over the world of hockey than he did his health.
That was Tom Kurvers. It wasn’t about him. It was about the people around him.
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The Duluth hockey community lost another key figure this week, as we got word early Friday that former Duluth Marshall boys’ hockey coach Brendan Flaherty died after a three-year battle with throat cancer. Flaherty was diagnosed in April of 2018. He lost short-term memory as a result of a brain infection that occurred during treatment, and he eventually had to step away from coaching the Hilltoppers in 2019 after sitting out the 2018-19 season.
Flaherty coached at Duluth Central, but he was a Cathedral (now Marshall) alum, and he saw the state of disrepair the Hilltoppers were in. When the chance to head there came, Flaherty made the jump to turn around the Marshall program. He would eventually be the first (and until his health betrayed him, only) rink manager at Mars Lakeview Arena when it opened.
The results were tremendous. Marshall soon became a perennial contender in Class A. Flaherty led the program to three runner-up finishes in the state tournament, and the Hilltoppers were producing quality players (most notably, 2012 Hobey Baker Award winner Jack Connolly at UMD).
After making the jump to Class AA, Duluth Marshall appeared to be on its way toward becoming a force in Section 7, but Flaherty’s diagnosis and a long period of uncertainty in the program was a setback. Bill Owens coached the ‘Toppers on an interim basis in 2018-19, Mark Vichorek took over for 2019-20, but both only lasted one year. Marshall hired Jasen Wise last year, and while the results weren’t great, it looks like the work is underway to again bring Marshall back to the level it wants to be at.
Flaherty took tremendous pride in the Marshall program. His players were extended family. He cared about them, their well-being, and of course their development.
On a personal level, Flaherty’s kindness will always resonate.
When my son, Hunter, was a ninth grader at Marshall, he was still playing youth hockey as a Bantam in Proctor. Circumstances arose where we decided as a family that it would be best for him to leave Proctor, but a deep Hilltoppers team wasn’t exactly clamoring for a 5-10, rain-thin freshman who wasn’t anywhere near ready — physically or emotionally — to play high school hockey (even on a JV).
That said, Flaherty offered a meeting with me, and we discussed Hunter and his situation. He allowed Hunter to try out, then called me after the tryouts had concluded to let me know he would be on the team. They weren’t going to play him in every JV game, being mindful of his safety as a smaller and less experienced player. But he got an opportunity that Flaherty didn’t have to give him.
Hunter played four years of high school hockey. He never scored a varsity goal, but popped a few in JV, took a few penalties, and even got kicked out of a game. It wasn’t perfect, but he had a good experience at Marshall, and it took us to some really cool places to play against some really good players (in his last game, Hunter had the honor of getting knocked on his butt by future UMD Bulldog Wyatt Kaiser 😁).
Brendan Flaherty believed in his kids. He gave them a chance, and he never stopped caring about them.
Our family will never forget that, and we will always appreciate him.
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Loss is hard.
Even with people like Kurvers that we might not have known terribly well, it hurts. It hurts to see people you care deeply about struggle to process the bad news. It hurts to see people you care about struggle with their emotions, knowing their life will forever have a hole.
We lost two icons this week, both way too young. They leave behind families and scores of people who were impacted by them. Our thoughts and prayers go to all of them.
Their impact — both in hockey and away from it — will be felt for a long time.
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