After Travis Green left the Canucks we stayed in touch and only a month ago he dropped me an email saying he was a bearcat on the prowl for another NHL job. Both Toronto and Calgary reportedly were interested but Tom Fitzgerald, who remembered Travis from the island got him.
As one who covered Travis Green as a skater for the New York Islanders, I couldn't be happier that the Devils have hired my buddy as an assistant coach under head coach Lindy Ruff.
I knew Travis from his rookie year in Uniondale. I had interviewed him for our then SportsChannel network.
"Thanks for the interview," Green chuckled. "My grandmother back in British Columbia saw it and she said we did a good job."
And so our friendship flowered thanks to Grandma Green.
But, of course, it was more than that. As so often happens there arecertain players who bond with certain newsmen more than others.
So it was with me and Travis.
Actually, the real moment of bonding happened when the Islanders had a game in Hartford.
I was out there with our SportsChannel crew and, for some reason -- and I'm still not sure why -- I drifted over to the arena about mid-afternoon expecting to find no one there.
And there was no one there until I drifted past the visitor's dressing room and over to the stick rack. At first it seemed that I was the only one in the clubhouse when, suddenly -- from behind me -- I heard a voice: "Hi, Mave, how are ya?"
Sure enough it was Travis Green working on his hockey sticks when he should have been taking his afternoon nap.
Personally it was an historic moment because up until that moment I was known as "The Hockey Maven." And here, Pal Travis has wisely shortened it to "Mave." And, to this day, I sign my emails with a "Mave" thanks to the gregarious Mister Green.
As always is the case, when a media guy loses a good contact the way Green and I got along, I felt unhappy that he was departing Long Island. But I followed his career and, lo and behold, we ran into each other after he had retired.
My older son, Ben, and his family live in Oregon and the city of Portland happens to have one of the best Major Junior teams on the continent. Well, who should be an assistant coach with the WHL Winterhawks but Travis, himself.
We resumed our friendship and I got to see my buddy behind the bench showing just how smart he was as a coach as he had been savvy as a stickhandler.
"How do you like your new gig?" I asked him after a win Portland's Memorial Coliseum. "Love it," he said, "but I'm still learning."
He learned well and eventually made it to head coach and helped develop a number of players who made it to the NHL including Blackhawks defenseman Seth Jones, among many others.
"Travis knows his stuff," Winterhawks manager Mike Johnston told me. "Sooner or later he'll make it to the show."
It happened sooner, actually, and Green did a masterful job with the Canucks until -- well -- it went wrong through no fault of my pal. After he left the Canucks we stayed in touch and only a month ago he dropped me an email saying he was a bearcat on the prowl for another NHL job.
Both Toronto and Calgary reportedly were interested but Tom Fitzgerald, who remembered Travis from the island, got him.
LIndy Ruff has a good one. Green's a wise one on power plays and will use his Long Island penalty-killing experience to advantage.
I can't wait to see him in the fall and to hear the dulcet tones call out.
"HI, MAVE!"