CALGARY – For the most part, the Garden is where hockey careers have come to die over the last seven years. But Chris Simon is an exception to that rule, resurrecting his career on Broadway after signing as a free agent last summer. Still, even after playing sturdy and effective hockey on lines centered primarily by Mark Messier and Eric Lindros, he was on a team going nowhere with four weeks to go in the season. Now, he’s two wins away from the Stanley Cup.
“The guys cared in New York and wanted to win. We tried a lot of different things,” said Simon, traded to the Flames on Mar. 6 in exchange for Jamie McLennan, Blair Betts and U. of Maine right winger Greg Moore. “I wish I had the answer why it didn’t work there.
“This is a huge change. I’m just so glad to come to a team that had a chance to make the playoffs and to have been put into a position where I could contribute. This is a team where all of our guys work so hard all the time.
“I’m a huge hockey fan. I watch all the games on TV. When I watched Calgary and played against Calgary, I just respected how hard they work. They did a lot of great things before I got here. I’m just so happy to get the opportunity.”
Simon, who scored the opening goal in Saturday’s 3-0 triumph that sends his team into tonight’s Game 4 with a 2-1 edge over Tampa Bay, has fit right in on a Darryl Sutter team whose objective it is to go bump in the night. The last two games of this series have featured the most physical work in the Finals since the vicious Games 5 and 6 between the Devils and Dallas in 2000. The 32-year-old, 6-3, 230-pound winger has played his fair share on Jarome Iginla’s first line and has been an important force down low on the power play.
“He’s been so big for us,” said Iginla. “His presence on the power play, the way he’s helped out. He’s very well respected by all of us.”
This is Simon’s third trip to the Finals in the last nine seasons. Originally a 1990 draft choice of the Flyers and among those sent to Quebec in the first Eric Lindros trade two years later, Simon earned a ring in 1996 with the Avalanche though he did not play in the final round sweep against Florida. He then played on the 1998 Washington team that was swept in the Finals by Detroit.
“I learned a lot just from listening in Colorado from great players like Patrick Roy, Joe Sakic and Claude Lemieux, and then in Washington I learned from Dale Hunter playing with him on a checking line,” said Simon, whose current hairstyle of choice is a Mohawk. “But to get a chance to play and to be depended upon night in and night out is awesome.”
When Simon scored his second goal of the Finals Saturday on a third whack from the right doorstep to break a scoreless tie at 13:53 of the second, he leaped in the air, then raced to the right wing corner and jumped up against the glass. Someone wanted to know the symbolism of the celebration. Simple, Simon said.
“I was just so excited I didn’t know what to do,” he explained. “That’s my type of celebration – to bang into something.”
