It's almost mind-boggling how time flies.
Martin Brodeur
On the personal level, it's hard for a goalie. You don't get awards for save percentage or anything like that. Your work is really put into how many wins you can get, how many times you can get your team in the playoffs and all that. So I took a lot of pride in winning.
If I'm not going to play a lot I'd like to have a chance to win every time I jump between the pipes.
I couldn't care less lots of times about getting scored on late in a game because it would affect my goals-against average or my save percentage.
When I got drafted I just wanted to play one game in the NHL. I didn't really care anything about winning.
I try to eat a lot of carbs, especially the day of the game, because it fills you up. I have my breakfast and I have a huge lunch before I play. For me it's always having pasta and chicken to get some protein in me, so I don't play on an empty stomach at night. The day before a game it's high protein, mostly, with fish or steak, but nothing crazy.
When you play hockey, it's a team game, and when I win, everyone around me is happy. I was able to make my teammates, the organization, my fans, happy 691 times during the regular season.
You have to go through some adversity to be able to be successful.
I think I was just really comfortable in my goalie equipment, just being in the net and being by myself for 60 minutes and talking to myself sometimes.
I had never won anything until I won my first Stanley Cup.
My life was going to school, having a snack and going outside to play hockey until dinner time. I would then do my homework and go back out to play, but only if the Canadiens weren't playing that night. That's what I did every day, whether it was street hockey or pond hockey.
In New Jersey, you're able to live your life.
I've played golf everywhere in New Jersey. People are nice to me. It's great.
Yes, there's Montreal, but my real home, where my kids were born, where I became a citizen of this country, is New Jersey.
Winning makes coaches, teammates, owners, fans all happy... I didn't care if we win 7-6 as long as we win.
Getting into the Hall is such an honor. It's like the dessert of your career. The Hall is the top of the mountain.
Growing up, I'd never play goalie in street hockey or at shinny. I liked playing out. So the entire time I played goal, I liked handling the puck better than most.
The most important record is the wins record that I have.
If you play hockey, you might as well win.
When I get scored on or something doesn't go my way, I think of what I'm able to do and I'm reminded that I'm capable of doing it. I'm honest about myself - I know I'm not going to stop everything, so I don't try for perfection. I'm going to try to get there, but I know I'll never be perfect. I think that helps me to deal with everything.
Coming from Montreal, Patrick Roy was the guy that everybody looked up to. He was consistent and successful early in his career; he won the Stanley Cup when he was really young and he played with a great organization. For me it was also a French thing, like one of us had made it that big in the NHL, and you tried to follow in his footsteps.
I've tried to incorporate new ways of playing the game. That's why you hear people call me a 'hybrid goalie' and say I adjust to the situation, never doing the same thing over and over like a butterfly goalie. I try to see what works and hopefully with my talent I'm able to play it and make it happen.
When I got the call of being drafted by the Devils, I was in shock more than anything. I didn't have a clue where New Jersey was, but it was just nice to be taken in the first round and nice to know where my future would be, which organization I was going to be a part of.
I wasn't ready to get drafted in the first round.
It's a big step to be drafted. Ultimately, it's everybody's dream. That's where you start thinking about making the team, maybe about winning the Stanley Cup.
I wanted to be consistent in my career and not have an off year. I wanted to play well and be on top of things.
Sometimes as a goalie, it doesn't matter how good you are, everything has to fall right for you.
In New Jersey, we won in '95, but after that for four years we never had a sniff at it. The next thing you know we went on a run of three Stanley Cup Finals in four years in 2000, 2001 and 2003.
Well, as a player you try to learn how to win, and when you get exposed to success there's also disappointment that comes along the way. So it becomes about how you deal with the ups and downs.
My dad took a lot of pride in what he did for a living.
I hate not playing. That's the bottom line.
For some reason, people think goalies need their rest.
I'm just a hockey player. I want to play every day.
People should realize my job is not as tough as a forward playing 80 games and getting hit every day.
I've tried so far to learn as much as possible. I think I've got a good grasp of what a hockey GM needs to do.
When you play hockey, you don't realize how much it takes to put a team together and the business people around the team, what they do to get the franchise to the next level.
There's so much of a rivalry there, the Devils and Rangers.
It's amazing what the power of sport does for children and communities.
When kids want a picture or autograph, you reflect later on and realize you did something good. Then you see them come back five years later, they're all grown up, have their own lives and they tell you how much you inspired them. You're like, 'Whoa.'
I was fortunate to have talent, play on a good team and make the NHL.
Winning is what I need, and winning is what the team needs.
Playing for Canada changed my career.
Competition, for me, is healthy.
I watch a lot of tapes, a lot of games, all the replays. You watch the highlights on TV, those are all about goals getting scored or big saves. So you just look and see what guys do and how they're successful, and sometimes I see something and I go, Wow, that could work for me.
You act in different ways for your own personal well-being, and you don't think about the people you hurt along the way. wish I would have thought about it.
I don't know where sports in general will go. But when I grew up, you just played the sport. Parents just wanted to make sure that you were happy doing something.
Growing up in Quebec, we were always playing sports. Your first athletic competition was against the kids living on your block.
It's kind of funny the way it happened - the way I became a goalie. I was playing forward on this one team when I was little, and there was another team that needed a backup goalie. I mean, to me it just meant a chance to play more hockey, so I was all for it.
My dad used to be a goalie. He actually won a bronze medal with Team Canada in 1956.
After his hockey days, my dad became a photographer, and a really good one, at that. He used to shoot the Expos and Canadiens, and he'd give me five bucks to haul around his equipment during games. He never had to ask me twice to do it.
