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Jarome Iginla

One Goal Short

He scores, he fights, he’s half Nigerian, and he’s one of the best to play the game. Meet Jarome Iginla, the man who could save hockey.

You think you know what pressure is? Don’t talk to Jarome Iginla about pressure. The captain on a team of overachievers, Iginla threw the underdog Calgary Flames on his back and carried them through three division champs to get to the Stanley Cup.

As the finals started, the pressure grew strongest: The Flames were overmatched by the talent-laden Tampa Bay Lightning. No Canadian team had won the Cup in 11 years, so the entire country had pinned its hopes on him. And having led the league in goals in the regular season and the playoffs, Iginla’s name was suddenly being thrown around as the best in the NHL.

Then came “the Shift.” It was only one minute in the pressure cooker of overtime in Game 5, but it was enough to secure Iginla’s legend: A bone-crushing hit knocked off Iginla’s helmet, but it didn’t stop him from making a brilliant pass that almost—almost—created a goal to give Calgary the win. Rather than skating off the ice, Iginla raced back to the Calgary zone to play defense, then turned and flew back up the ice into the Tampa end, letting loose a blistering slap shot that bounced off Lightning goalie Nikolai Khabibulin right to Iginla’s teammate, who shot it home.

From small acorns

Now people are saying he could be one of the greatest of all time. “It’s flattering,” Iginla replies with an aw-shucks humility that’s surprising to hear from a top athlete. “I mean, it’s nice of them, but I don’t really consider myself up there with Bobby Orr or Gordie Howe or Wayne Gretzky.” As much as he seems to love shouldering the heavy burden, Iginla is uncomfortable receiving praise. He was born Jarome Arthur-Leigh Elvis Adekunle Tig Junior Iginla (no, that’s not a typo) in Edmonton, Alberta. His father came over from Nigeria at age 18; their last name means “big tree” in his native Yorùbá.

Jarome grew up playing baseball and hockey, but it was the ice that called to him. “I loved watching the Oilers and Flames battle in Alberta,” Iginla says. “I wanted to be like them.” Even if he kind of sucked. “I loved the speed of the game and the skills it took…but I didn’t have many of them to start. I wasn’t a very good player; I fell around a lot. But I just kind of stuck with it, and fortunately I got a little better.”

He idolized local heroes Wayne Gretzky and Mark Messier, but it was goaltender Grant Fuhr whom Iginla really admired: “He was an acrobatic All-Star goalie. But also, as a young black kid, some kids would say that there weren’t many black players in the NHL, that maybe I should play another sport. So I really looked up to the ones who were there—Grant Fuhr and Tony McKegney and Claude Vilgrain. They gave me a lot of strength. Now there are a lot more black players—tough guys, scorers, great goaltenders, all different roles.”

From his first season, in 1996, Iginla was a hard-hitting, goal-scoring standout. But outside of Calgary he was unknown, and he didn’t make the 2002 Canadian Olympic team. “I never got invited to tryouts,” Iginla explains. But when an injury took out one of the players, Iginla happened to live nearby. “I had watched the first day of camp on TV. That night I went out to dinner, and my fiancée called and said, ‘Wayne Gretzky called—you’re invited to camp.’ I thought, Someone’s playing a joke on me. That would be a good one, me showing up at the rink with all my equipment. But it was real. It was good that I didn’t have time to get too nervous, being out there with Mario Lemieux and Joe Sakic for the first time.” Iginla helped Canada win the gold—the first for the home of hockey in 50 years.

The gloves are off

For all their greatness, players like Gretzky and Lemieux need protection. Not Iginla. He’s led the league in goals in two of the past three seasons, but he also isn’t afraid to mix it up. “I love the speed, I like the combination of skill and intensity,” he says, “but I also enjoy getting in a battle from time to time. I’m getting myself in trouble here, but I like that balancing act—there’s a time to skate quick and be a finesse player, and there’s a time for fighting.” He dropped the gloves in each postseason series last year. Between visits to the penalty box, he led all players with 13 playoff goals. “Everybody has his own opinion about fighting, and my opinion is fighting is an important part of what makes the game hockey,” Iginla explains. “It’s a fierce game. People might not understand this, but fighting actually helps keep the sport cleaner—you’re keeping people accountable for high sticks and things like that.”

At only 6'1" and 208 pounds, the 27-year-old Iginla isn’t in the same weight class as some of the league’s heaviest hitters, but that’s never stopped him from dishing out punishment. “I used to train like a bodybuilder,” he says. “But it didn’t help with speed. Over the years I’ve worked more on sprinting, and I think I’ve gained a step. Where I used to get one breakaway, now I might get 11 or 12. I still don’t score on them that often, but I’m working on that.”

Yet Iginla’s balls-out play has a physical price, measured in stitches and broken bones. “A lot of guys get bumps and bruises, but you get those in other sports too,” he shrugs. “My worst injuries were broken bones—both of my hands, a broken nose. Most hockey players have that; it just comes with time. Hockey is a tough sport, and it takes its toll.”

Captain crunch

When the game is on the line, Iginla is out there, seemingly everywhere. The last minute of a period, the first minute, power play, penalty kill, Iginla is on the ice. Teammate Martin Gelinas called him “the best leader I’ve ever played with.” This from a guy who followed Mark Messier to a Stanley Cup.

So how is it that few people outside of die-hard hockey fans and the half-dozen folks brave enough to live in frozen Alberta know his name? “We’re a small-market team, and we haven’t had a lot of success until this year,” Iginla explains. “We were out of the playoffs for seven years—that’s a long, long time, especially in hockey. It’s tough on players, but it’s extremely tough on fans. But they still came out and supported us—we sold 13,000 season tickets last year, so we always had a full barn. I can’t imagine a better hockey city than Calgary. It’s one of the best sports cities in North America.”

Case in point: During the playoffs, crowds of thousands packed a stretch of 17th Avenue in downtown Calgary (population: 933,495) known as the Red Mile, many of them noticeably female, hot, and more than eager to show support for the Flames by stripping. “I definitely heard about that,” Iginla says with a tinge of sadness in his voice. “Unfortunately, I didn’t make it down to that magnificent mile.” But he still made time for fans. After their Game 3 win, he stopped outside the arena to sign more than 200 autographs. “We try to stop and sign things at the games. I enjoy it. The fans are what made that run we had so exciting—to see they were getting as involved as we were. When we were the only Canadian team left in the playoffs, to hear that Canadians across the country had Flames flags flying, calling us Canada’s Team—that’s a great feeling.”

Maxim

You’d never guess that at the time of our interview Iginla was a free agent, with no contract guaranteeing he’d even be back with the Flames this year. But he’s unfazed, trusting that his team will work things out. “I can’t imagine not playing in Calgary.”

Face-off

Another burden has come along for Iginla to shoulder, and it’s no small task: to make hockey matter again. Hockey fans will argue until you’re bloody in the face, but the truth remains: Ratings are down, revenues are down, overall interest in the sport is down. Many see Iginla as the next Wayne Gretzky, a goodwill ambassador for the sport. “The way he handles the press—big smile on his face, speaks like an English teacher, looks you in the eye, never ducks a question—they love him,” explains ESPN commentator Barry Melrose. “He’s there after a win, he’s there after a loss. And he plays hard every night. He’s the flag bearer of the league.”

At a time when the league and the players can’t even agree that they need to play a season to make money, the situation is bleaker than ever. But Iginla, characteristically, doesn’t worry. “The owners and the players are working on a new collective-bargaining agreement, and I’m sure it’s going to work out,” he predicts nonchalantly.

But what then? How to help a sport that craves both its devoted fan base and the lure of American dollars in cities where the only ice they know is in their raspberry daiquiris? “A big part is trying to make hockey more accessible to kids—more rinks, more equipment—and making it more affordable,” Iginla says. “If you’re a parent and your kid likes basketball and hockey, basketball usually wins out—it’s a lot easier to get into. I think the more kids get involved, the more hockey will grow.”

There’s always tomorrow

For all the heroics of his single-handed effort last June, the Shift left Iginla spent. He played the last six periods of the finals without a single shot on net, and his Flames lost their spark. “Losing is losing. To think that we were that close, one goal away in overtime in Game 6, and then didn’t win…” Iginla trails off, and for a moment the upbeat attitude is gone. Maybe last year was a fluke: Superstar-laden squads fell asleep in every sport, opening the door for blue-collar teams—the Pistons, the Marlins, the Panthers, and the Flames—to shoot for championships. “It’s just being so close to a dream. I thought I wanted to win the Stanley Cup before, but after having been so close and tasting it…it hurts. It hurts a lot. I want to win more than ever. “We have a lot to prove as a team, there’s no doubt,” he admits. “There will be more pressure on us this year, but it’s fun. That’s hockey.”

Charles Coxe. One Goal Short. Maxim. October 2004.

17 Winning Face-Off Plays This video features Dan Fridgen, Head Coach Rennsaleer Polytechnic Institute (RPI). Face-offs can win or lose hockey games! Fridgen shares his repertoire of winning face-offs for defensive, neutral, and offensive zones along with 6x5 face-offs for a pulled goal tender situation. Each play is diagrammed and explained in detail. He then offers on-ice demonstrations with and without defenders to give you a clear-cut idea as to how each play works. Fridgen also offers invaluable coaching expertise as to how each play might fit different game situations. Winning Face-off Plays can give you a BIG advantage in this small part of the game!

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