Ron MacLean is synonymous with Hockey Night in Canada and now the pride of Red Deer is the face of the Rogers Hometown Hockey Tour.
The Alberta Sports Hall of Fame inductee, eight-time Gemini Award winner, television personality, hockey referee and author started anchoring Hockey Night in Canada telecasts out of Western Canada in 1986/87, but near the end of the season was relocated for Toronto games when Dave Hodge was fired for protesting a CBC programming decision on-air. MacLean’s duties including hosting the popular Coach’s Corner with Don Cherry.
In 2014/15, MacLean was hired by Rogers Media, when the company acquired the national rights to the NHL, but retained his role as host of Coach’s Corner and became the new host of Sportsnet’s Sunday night game of the week through the Hometown Hockey Tour stop in various Canadian communities.
The Gazette reached out to Rogers Media for an interview request with the 55-year-old MacLean and Cherry’s sparring partner comes across over the phone exactly the same way he does on television as a genuine individual with an encyclopedic knowledge of hockey.
What memories of the St. Albert Saints do you have while growing up in Red Deer and broadcasting the Rustlers on radio?
MacLean: “There are certain places in Canada as a Red Deer boy that were kind of mythical for me. Guelph was one because Guelph had great junior A hockey teams but St. Albert was the other. Even before they would roll into town as the Saints, the Spruce Grove Mets with Paul and Doug Messier were kind of an iconic squad, but some of the best Red Deer Rustlers’ teams with Kelly Kiso, and Darryl Sutter they could not beat St. Albert. They had great teams.
“I could remember the chicken wire screens, the Plexiglas replaced the chicken wire at the end boards, and there used to be players crawling up and down that chicken-wire fence to get after fans at the Red Deer arena when the Saints were in town.”
Why is the Hometown Hockey Tour so popular?
MacLean: “It’s mind-blowing because of the NHL alumni. (On the St. Albert tour stop) We have Mark Messier, Lanny McDonald, Ryan Smyth and Meaghan Mikkelson, a two-time Olympic gold medallist on the women’s national team, and they won’t hesitate to come in and talk about some of the people who shaped their lives.
“I always say it’s not a six degrees of separation, it’s a six degrees of unification the game in our country and you’re going to hear that story and I hear it everywhere we go. It’s always just so fascinating to see how it’s so engrained in our country and whether I’m in Victoria or Corner Brook and now St. Albert, that sort of thread plays out. It’s just really special.
“The circus part of it, when we have bands and interactive stuff for the kids, the festival that happens each day, Saturday and Sunday, that is neat because everybody is in such a great mood. We’re all rink rats at heart and you see it week after week.”
Connor McDavid, what do you think of the kid?
MacLean: “He is right there with Wayne Gretzky and Bobby Orr. He is just unbelievable to watch. He has Mark Messier’s speed and Wayne’s vision.
“There was a moment (in Thursday’s 4-0 win in Philadelphia) where Connor is deep in his own end as a centre is supposed to, they usually say slow and low so you’re there for the outlet pass in front of the goalie or you’re there defensively, so he circles back and I don’t have to tell you it’s one hundred miles an hour, he’s sort of like that freight train coming north, and Jordan Eberle sees him and just hands him the puck and he does the rest. Even though Yakupov got the goal it was all Connor. It’s all done with this blinding speed that changes everything.
“Taylor Hall plays well when McDavid is in the lineup even if they’re not together and Yakupov plays well playing with McDavid so you can see the future is so bright in Edmonton. It’s an inevitability the cup is coming back.”
Jarome Iginla, our St. Albert hometown hero, will he make the Hall of Fame?
MacLean: “For sure he is going to be in the Hall of Fame.
“There is his work on the national teams. That was such a great surprise that he got invited to Salt Lake City kind of as an afterthought. Simon Gagne got hurt so they needed a guy at training camp in Calgary and because Jarome was just up the highway they invited him down and the rest is history. He formed a line with Joe Sakic that was unstoppable at Salt Lake City in the later stages of the tournament.
“And then, of course, there is the 600 goals. He also should have won the Hart Trophy in 2002. Jose Theodore won it but it was because one of the writers didn’t even have Jarome on the ballot, which is so ridiculous. It was a glitch in the procedures.
“He is by far at one point the best of his time and his body of work speaks for itself. He is also a great guy and born on Canada Day, too.”
Your thoughts on the NHL today, specifically the Canadian teams.
MacLean: I wrote a blog a few weeks ago about the Canadian conundrum. For us watching the seven Canadian teams, Edmonton has fallen into drafting over and over again great players and that is the only way you get them because if players have no movement, no trade clauses in their contact they don’t choose Alberta or Canada and the biggest reason is you can’t escape the game and it’s really hard on you to play meaningful hockey with that constant commotion in your life. Everywhere you turn and everywhere you go you can’t escape.
“The hardest part for a pro is to think about the game. They need that mental break from it in order to be successful. The usual path to that is marriage and children. It gives you a forced escape from thinking about your game or your profession but it’s really hard in Canada.
“With no trade, no movement, those good players who have that they’re not coming to Canada. Free agents, they’re not coming to Canada, so for the seven Canadian teams to build the only way is through the draft. It’s always a crap shoot and in the case of Edmonton it took until McDavid to get it not right, but to get that player that guarantees you, I think, success.”
What’s it like working with Don Cherry on Coach’s Corner?
MacLean: “People always say, ‘In our house, no one is allowed to talk when Coaches Corner is on,’ and I say, ‘Well, neither am I!’
“I remember vividly going up to my first NHL game in Edmonton in 1980. The Leafs were playing, it was a February game against the Oilers, and I was so excited to sneak down to the lower bowl in the Northlands Coliseum and catch a glimpse of Don Cherry and obviously it’s a ‘pinch-me’ thing that it happened. Thirty-one years later maybe I’m not quite as bright eyed about it but I really admire him. I admired him when he coached, I admired him as a television personality so to work with him and to kind of help him share his gift has really been an unbelievable blessing.
“We’re different but we’re not. I think he’s Kingston and I’m Red Deer and that part is core. For all the other stuff – politics, religion, whatever we might have a difference of opinion on – the one thing we kind of know is in Red Deer or Kingston they’re going to keep you humble if you get too high on your horse so we kind of have that joy of seeing that preserved.”
