There's no mystery in this Alaskan success story

Sporting News, The, May 15, 2000 by Larry Wigge

On the verge of being benched for poor play early in the second round of the playoffs, Scott Gomez heard the whispers that he was not pulling his weight. It was the first time in his brief NHL career that things weren't peachy keen.

Being the first player from Alaska wouldn't help him with this. Neither would being the first Hispanic player in the NHL. Or being THE SPORTING NEWS Rookie of the Year.

This is the playoffs--and you have to pull your weight or you don't play, regardless of who you are or where you came from.

"It's one thing to face the pressure of playing against the best players in the world," Devils goaltender Martin Brodeur says, "but the ones who do it and have fun, have the look, are the ones who make this game so special."

Gomez hasn't had the look since leading the Devils in scoring for nearly three-quarters of the season. The marathon 82-game NHL schedule can do that to the best of rookies. But being able to find that look again, that's what makes players such as Gomez special.

When you go into the meat market of the NHL entry draft, you are looking for more than just size and speed. With Gomez, the Devils saw good hands, good vision, a good skater, an outstanding passer and unlimited potential.

That's what we've seen in the last three games of the Devils-Maple Leafs playoff series as Gomez got himself back on track with two goals and three assists.

"He makes everyone on the ice better," Maple Leafs goaltender Curtis Joseph says. "He could be exactly what that team has needed for the last few years--a game-breaker."

No longer are the Devils slow up front. They have an explosiveness and depth they haven't had before. It's still in its infancy, but you can see how the playmakers they have can take over the game at times.

Gomez, who finished his rookie season with 19 goals and 51 assists, laughs about how far he has come since being drafted with the 27th pick in the 1998 draft.

"The first time I met (Devils G.M.) Lou Lamoriello was in 1997 when I was a member of the U.S. world junior hockey team," Gomez says. "Mr. Lamoriello invited about a dozen of us up to his office to show us his Stanley Cup ring."

Gomez noticed the Devils' depth chart on Lamoriello's wall and secretly scribbled his name at the bottom of the list.

"After the visit, I approached Mr. Lamoriello and asked, `Why is my name so far down the list?'" Gomez laughs. "He looked at the board and saw what I had done and just laughed. But that meeting must have made an impression on him because he went on to draft me--and now I'm on a better list, the NHL list."

Though he's a rookie and often gets caught up in the gee-whiz world of the NHL, Gomez sees the ice like a veteran. And it's no fluke that his passes find their way through sticks and skates. He has grown up well through it all. It isn't easy, after all, to be a pioneer in this game.

Gomez has been inundated by Spanish-language newspapers and television networks for interviews. The son of a Columbian mother, Dalia, and a Mexican father, Carlos, Gomez is the first NHL player whose parents are both Hispanic. The product of a rising youth program in Anchorage, Alaska, he also is the first representative of the 49th state to play in the NHL. (Carlos moved from San Diego in 1972 to Alaska, where he has been an iron worker on the Alaskan pipeline).

"Sometimes they make it sound like I crossed the border two years ago with a bottle of tequila and a pair of skates--and voila, magic, I'm an NHLer," Gomez says. "I'm proud of my heritage. I know the sacrifices my mom and dad had to make.

"But growing up in Alaska, it wasn't, `There's Scott Gomez, the Mexican hockey player;' it was more like, `There's Scott Gomez, the hockey player.' And if a kid sees me and wants to be another Scott Gomez, well, that's the part I like best."

Gomez is only 20 with the best part of his career ahead of him.

He's almost like an old-school player in the now-generation," Lamoriello says. "He has God-given ability to see plays before they happen. You can't teach the kind of hockey sense he has.

"We liked him so much, we traded two second-round picks to Dallas to get the last pick in the first round so that we wouldn't miss getting Scott."

Gomez was largely self-taught, having studied the geometry of the sport in his living room in Anchorage with a stick in his hands and a ball on the floor.

"He knows what he's going to do with the puck before he gets it," defenseman Scott Stevens says. "Most young players don't think until they get the puck--and then it's panic mode."

Not Scott Gomez. Not the player who will be/is the game-breaker the Devils have been hoping for since Claude Lemieux helped the team to its only Stanley Cup in 1995.

It may not happen this year or next, but someday Gomez will be leading the Devils to another.

RELATED ARTICLE: Marathon on ice

Mud Bruneteau is still No. 1 and Ken Doraty is No. 2. But we have a new No. 3 star--Flyers center Keith Primeau.

Those are the goal-scorers in the NHL's three longest games, the third of which occurred last Thursday after Primeau faked right and went left against Penguins defenseman Darius Kasparaitis to beat goalie Ron Tugnutt high to the glove side 92 minutes, 1 second into the game. The result was a 3-2 win for the Flyers, tying the second-round series at 2.