Watching from a Calgary restaurant as the Vancouver Canucks celebrated their NHL Western Conference championship at the Rogers Arena Tuesday, Cliff Ronning felt the rush of excitement that surged through the west coast city.
Ronning, a resident of Vancouver, was a key member of the last Canucks team to qualify for the Stanley Cup final — the 1993-94 squad that fell to the New York Rangers in seven games.
“Yeah, this brings back great memories,” he said Thursday, while preparing for a hockey-stick fitting session at the Penhold Multiplex. “The excitement is building in Vancouver and this is the first time ever that the Canucks have been the favourite going into the Stanley Cup final.”
Ronning and his ‘94 Canucks mates were the underdogs against the Rangers.
“People were hoping that we would win, but there’s a little different pressure now on this Vancouver team. They’re expected to win,” said the Burnaby, B.C., native, who retired as a player in 2004 after a 17-year NHL career that included five full seasons with the Canucks from 1991 to ‘96.
Ronning is still involved with the Canucks Alumni and has been involved with the CBC post-game show Chasing Stanley during this year’s NHL playoffs. So he’s more than familiar with the pulse of the city, the sense of euphoria that has spread from Vancouver to throughout the province.
“The excitement is really building, as is the anticipation,” said Ronning. “If they (Canucks) don’t win the Cup this time it won’t be a good feeling. But this is a good team, a team that is built for the playoffs. All the ‘94 guys . . . we’re happy for them. We know what we went through and the disappointment we felt, but this group looks poised to be very good for a long time.”
Ronning, who was a small — five-foot-eight, 170 pounds — but highly-skilled and fiercely competitive centre during an NHL career that also included stops in St. Louis, Phoenix, Nashville, Los Angeles, Minnesota and Long Island, has no problem with the apparent soon-to-be relocation of the Atlanta Thrashers to Winnipeg.
In fact, he’s happy for the hockey fans of Winnipeg. He’s also happy that it’s the Thrashers and not the Phoenix Coyotes who will be moving to Manitoba.
“I want the Phoenix team to stay right there, just for personal reasons. I love the city after playing there for two years,” said Ronning. “Really, from Day One I don’t think the support was there in Atlanta. Winnipeg is ready to support a team and I think the city could use an NHL team there to really bring up the morale. The Moose (of the AHL) has been popular in Winnipeg but it’s different when you bring in the best talent in the world.”
Ronning is the co-owner of Base Hockey, a company that builds and distributes customized sticks.
Customers, such as the minor hockey players who visited one of the company’s four mobile units set up Thursday at the Penhold Multiplex, undergo an extensive assessment, with their style of play and equipment discussed and a high-speed camera used to photograph them shooting pucks. From there, an appropriate stick is designed for the customer, complete with shaft flex, curve and lie.
“And the sticks are direct from my (Burnaby) factory to you, with no middle man. We can give you a better product for a better price,” said Ronning, who recently concluded a fitting session at the Edge School near Calgary and has additional mobile units in his home province as well as Montreal and Vancouver.
The graphite-kevlar composite Base sticks — which range in price from $100 to $175, roughly half the price of other leading composite products — have been used by NHL players Mike Green and Paul Gaustad, and Coyotes captain Shane Doan has expressed interested in coming on board.
“We have a lot of high-end players in B.C. who are loving the product,” said Ronning. “I’ve been fitting hockey players for two years, some at the NHL level, so we’re just bringing that pro experience to whoever would like it, from the beer-leaguer to women’s hockey to kids. The best thing about it is you’re getting the best quality stick for your money. It’s another option for people.”
gmeachem@www.reddeeradvocate.com