{"id":41043,"date":"2025-05-21T04:39:09","date_gmt":"2025-05-21T04:39:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/41043\/"},"modified":"2025-05-21T04:39:09","modified_gmt":"2025-05-21T04:39:09","slug":"wayne-gretzky-visited-stars-locker-room-after-they-advanced-to-west-final-rematch-with-oilers-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/41043\/","title":{"rendered":"Wayne Gretzky visited Stars locker room after they advanced to West final rematch with Oilers"},"content":{"rendered":"

DALLAS (AP) \u2014 Wayne Gretzky was in the Dallas Stars locker room<\/a> congratulating them after they advanced to their third consecutive Western Conference final, where they will face the franchise with which \u201cThe Great One\u201d was a four-time Stanley Cup champion.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe said we\u2019re going up against a pretty good team now,\u201d Stars captain Jamie Benn said Tuesday, the day before hosting Game 1 against Edmonton. \u201cAnd I had to ask him who he was cheering for. It felt right, and he didn\u2019t answer, obviously.\u201d<\/p>\n

Benn said it was \u201cpretty cool\u201d that Gretzky visited the Stars after their 2-1 overtime win<\/a> Saturday night over Winnipeg that set up a West final rematch against the Oilers.<\/p>\n

Edmonton won the West final over the Stars in six games last year, then lost to Florida in a seven-game Stanley Cup Finals.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat a great honor to have the greatest player of all time come down after the game and say hello,\u201d Stars coach Pete DeBoer said.<\/p>\n

Gretzky told the Stars<\/a> he had so much fun watching them play, and that they were now going to play \u201cone of the greatest teams ever.\u201d<\/p>\n

DeBoer was on the coaching staff for Canada for the team\u2019s 4 Nations Face-Off title earlier this year, and during that period got to spend some time with Gretzky.<\/p>\n

\u201cExtra special. That\u2019s my era. That\u2019s the guy we all grew up watching,\u201d DeBoer said. \u201cHe\u2019s a special guy when you get him 1-on-1 or in a coach\u2019s room or behind the scenes. You can see his passion for the game. He can sit and talk hockey and tell stories all night.\u201d<\/p>\n

Gretzky was part of four Stanley Cup titles in a five-season span in the 1980s with Edmonton. He was the NHL career-leading goal scorer with 894 goals until Alex Ovechkin passed him<\/a> on April 6, but still has the most points (2,857) and assists (1,963).<\/p>\n

So when meeting the Stars and DeBoer, did Gretzky say anything that would create headlines in Edmonton, like saying he was hoping Dallas would win?<\/p>\n

\u201cHe didn\u2019t. He would never say that and I would never put him in that spot,\u201d DeBoer said. \u201cHe was very respectful of our group and the job we\u2019d done to that point. I think we all understand his allegiance to Edmonton and appreciate that, so he never went beyond that.\u201d<\/p>\n

___<\/p>\n

AP NHL playoffs: https:\/\/apnews.com\/hub\/stanley-cup<\/a> and https:\/\/apnews.com\/hub\/nhl<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"DALLAS (AP) \u2014 Wayne Gretzky was in the Dallas Stars locker room congratulating them after they advanced to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":41044,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[377],"tags":[278,147,198,146,5,3733,4,292,2087,43,14,300,104,1275,279],"class_list":{"0":"post-41043","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-hockey","8":"tag-alexander-ovechkin","9":"tag-dallas-stars","10":"tag-edmonton","11":"tag-edmonton-oilers","12":"tag-hockey","13":"tag-jamie-benn","14":"tag-nhl","15":"tag-nhl-hockey","16":"tag-pete-deboer","17":"tag-sports","18":"tag-stanley-cup","19":"tag-stanley-cup-finals","20":"tag-stanley-cup-playoffs","21":"tag-tx-state-wire","22":"tag-wayne-gretzky"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nhl\/114543982303379187","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41043","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=41043"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41043\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/41044"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=41043"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=41043"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nhl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=41043"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}