“And I remember saying to the coaches, ‘This is unbelievable. They’ve all figured out right now who the best player here is.’ Before the game, they had it figured — get Johnny the puck, get open, and he’ll get it back to you.”
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Gaudreau, 31, and his brother Matthew, 29, who also played at BC and later in the minor professional leagues, were killed Thursday evening by an alleged drunk driver while riding their bicycles in Oldmans Township, N.J. The tragedy was compounded by the fact that their sister, Katie, was scheduled to have her wedding Friday in Philadelphia. The Gaudreaus grew up in Carneys Point, N.J., just south of Oldmans along the Delaware River.
For Burke, reached by phone in northern Ontario, the loss was painfully relatable. His youngest son, Brendan, was killed at 21 while driving back to his college campus (Miami of Ohio) during a snowstorm on Feb. 5, 2010.
“Both brothers were supposed to be groomsmen today,” said Burke, noting what pain the Gaudreau parents, Guy and Jane, must be experiencing. ”There’s no … there’s no … there’s no tragedy like this … but this is compounded by double, really sad. Matthew was a great kid, too.
“What it tears out of your life is bad enough when it’s one child, but when it’s two … and this is such a tight-knit family … just a horrible, horrible day.”
Mainly because of concerns about his small stature at 5 feet 9 inches and 165 pounds, Gaudreau was a late pick (No. 104) in the 2011 NHL draft. He reported that fall to Jerry York’s BC team for his freshman season, launching a college career in which he collected 175 points in 119 games.
Johnny Gaudreau played the last two season with the Columbus Blue Jackets.Paul Vernon/Associated Press
Gaudreau topped off his stay at The Heights by winning the Hobey Baker Award in 2014 as Division 1 college hockey’s best player.
“I probably handed him a trophy or two, I imagine,” said a somber Joe Bertagna, who was commissioner of Hockey East for nearly a quarter century. “I certainly remember him as a player who lifted you out of your seat.
“You can imagine, in 23 years of Hockey East, I saw a lot of very talented hockey players — Hobey Baker winners, stalwart NHL players — but you can name with one hand the players who lifted you out of your seat in a unique way. Paul Kariya, Connor Hellebuyck, Chris Kreider.
“But the goals Johnny Gaudreau scored … you’d watch him weave his way up ice through bodies in a way I never saw before.”
Often, noted Bertagna, “No one put a hand on him. Then he would finish. It didn’t matter whether you were rooting for BC or BU. If you were just a hockey person, you shook your head and said, ‘I’ve never seen anything like this.’ ”
In his 10 NHL seasons, eight in Calgary and the last two in Columbus, Gaudreau scored 243 goals and collected 500 assists — 743 points, in 763 regular-season games. In the 2011 draft class, only Tampa Bay superstar Nikita Kucherov (873) has been more productive.
Johnny Gaudreau could often be mesmerizing to watch when he had the puck.Ezra Shaw/Getty
“ ‘Wizardry’ is a great word to describe him,” added Bertagna. “Because it wasn’t like he was faster than somebody or shot the puck harder than somebody, or he was bigger and just plowed through. He was just finesse at a time when that wasn’t the case.”
Also not always the case, noted Bertagna, that the best player on the ice stands out — true both in college and pro hockey. Rosters routinely are stocked with fast, skilled, often large players. The blizzard of skill can cloud the picture.
“You’ll see interchangeable parts of big, fast, modern athletes,” said Bertagna. “Then there was a Paul Kariya. Then there was a Johnny Gaudreau. You wanted to see Johnny Gaudreau come over the boards because he was going to entertain you in a way nobody else did.”
Gaudreau put all the small talk to rest in his rookie NHL season of 2014-15 when he scored 64 points, making him a Calder Trophy candidate as rookie of the year. But the trophy went to 6-4 Florida defenseman Aaron Ekblad, who had been chosen first overall in the ‘14 draft. Size and pedigree often help garner votes.
While playing at the Worlds prior to his first camp with the Flames, Gaudreau displayed bountiful competitiveness and accompanying fearlessness — to a point that Burke eventually felt the need to caution him.
“We were playing Slovakia. He got drilled twice that tournament, really big-time hits near the boards,” said Burke. “He got up and skated away both times. I thought, ‘This kid is going to be just fine.’ ”
A few months later, during Gaudreau’s first rookie tournament with the Flames, Burke witnessed him sustain a hit “for no good reason” — one the GM felt his promising tiny dancer should have ducked.
“I remember walking to the bus with him after the game, saying, ‘Johnny, why did you take that hit?’ ’’ recalled Burke. “And he says, ‘Because my teammates can’t think I’m afraid.’ And I said, ‘Forget that!’
“It was a big 6-foot-4 defenseman who got him. I told him, ‘You step out of the way of those.’ Early on, we had to tell him that a few times. And he’d say, ‘Well, I can’t look like a matador out there, because the guys’ll think I’m afraid.’
“ ‘What?’ I said. ‘You want to look exactly like a matador!’ ”
Burke, not prone to hyperbole, added, “He was a magical player. He sold tickets. He got people to stand up, brought people to their feet. Not many players do that.”
Kevin Paul Dupont can be reached at kevin.dupont@globe.com.