How Flames analyst Kevin Sawyer sparked the nastiest night time in Saddledome historical past

CALGARY — The Ugly Duckling.

That’s what the front-page headline screamed below Kevin Sawyer’s mugshot the morning after one of many strangest, nastiest and most memorable nights ever staged contained in the Saddledome.

Sawyer was public enemy No. 1 after he and his Anaheim Mighty Ducks had spent the earlier night serving to flip an unusual Calgary Flames loss into an NHL demolition derby nonetheless talked about at the moment. 

Twenty-five years later, there’s a pleasant twist to the story.

Only now he’s carrying a headset.

Sawyer will debut Thursday as Sportsnet’s rink-side color commentator on Flames broadcasts (9 p.m. ET / 7 p.m. MT), and whereas loads of Calgary viewers could also be questioning who he’s, they’re about to search out out he has a quite intimate historical past with this franchise.

He later got here an autograph away from changing into a Flame himself.

But first got here that night time.

Sawyer was in his first full NHL season after 5 years within the minors. He was undrafted, 208 kilos, and knew exactly what his job was.

“I was a fourth-line mucker, grinder, fighter,” the 52-year-old native of Christina Lake, B.C., mentioned. “Chip and chase, get on the body, and piss people off.”

So when Flames powerful man Craig Berube ran goalie J.S. Giguere behind the online with simply over 4 minutes left, after which swatted away Niclas Hävelid, Sawyer knew he needed to reply.

“I’m thinking immediately to myself, ‘OK, I have to do something just as stupid, or I’m going to the minors,” mentioned Sawyer, who racked up an unfathomable 398 penalty minutes in 60 IHL video games three years earlier.

Sawyer jumped over the boards and tried to battle Bob Boughner.

So Sawyer went again to the bench and informed linemates Dan Bylsma and Denny Lambert: “Boys, no matter where you’re at, get the puck on net.”

Two shifts later, Jarome Iginla was hooking him close to centre ice when Sawyer lifted the puck towards the Calgary internet, the place Mike Vernon was tending objective.

“I remember thinking to myself, ‘I actually hit the net — that’s a shot on net,’” he laughed.

He saved skating straight at Vernon and bowled the susceptible netminder over.

“The truth is, I never really hit him that hard,” he insisted. “It was more of a push.”

Sawyer instantly spun round with gloves off and fists clenched, prepared for an ensuing assault, which got here from Robyn Regehr.

Then the gloves began flying all over the place.

Suddenly the Saddledome had turn into a boxing gymnasium with hockey boards.

That was solely the start.

Shift after shift, the sport descended into line brawls. By the top, Craig Conroy vividly remembers the lone Flames participant left on the bench was Jukka Hentunen.

“That was the wildest game I played in the Saddledome, I’ll tell you that,” Berube mentioned from his dwelling in Philadelphia. “And I had a front-row seat to observe all of it.”

The numbers stay ridiculous.

A complete of 279 penalty minutes had been handed out within the ultimate 85 seconds. 

The Flames’ 190 penalty minutes within the third interval was an NHL file, since damaged by the 2004 Flyers.

Sawyer was suspended 5 video games. Berube received three. Scott Nichol and Flames coach Greg Gilbert each sat for 2, whereas the Flames had been fined $25,000.

Sawyer forfeited $10,954 in wage: “I misplaced a mid-sized sedan,” he joked.

And one way or the other, the night time received even higher.

Late within the sport, with gamers disappearing into penalty packing containers and dressing rooms at a feverish tempo, Dave Lowry realized that if he received a stoppage in play within the ultimate 14 seconds he might spring Berube from the field for one final battle. So, with nobody round him he turned at centre ice and blatantly flipped the puck into the higher deck. The crowd went wild as Berube lined up in opposition to Jeff Friesen.

“I actually got a call from (league disciplinarian) Colin Campbell because they were thinking of suspending me,” mentioned a winking Lowry, now an assistant with the Flames.

“I just said, ‘Hey, listen, I was just trying to turn and get it off the glass and it got caught in my curve.’”

Sawyer remembers watching within the dressing room with greater than half his teammates, like they had been witnessing the Super Bowl.

Berube went after Jeff Friesen, however Friesen wished completely no a part of it and promptly turtled.

“Coli called and said he had to suspend me because I kept things going,” chuckled Berube. “I said, ‘Alright, Coli, no problem.’”

Sawyer remembers the post-game euphoria as being the last word team-builder, prompting the lads to complete the night time at Cowboys nightclub.

However, highlights from the sport had been being proven within the bar continuous, as patrons rapidly caught on who they had been.

“We started getting some looks from some big ol’ cowboys, so I’m like, ‘We better get the hell out of here,’” laughed Sawyer, whose quick profession included fights with all of the heavyweights like Bob Probert, Tie Domi, Stu Grimson and Tony Twist. 

Following blended response to the chaos he helped gas, Sawyer’s agent, Jeff Solomon, informed him it had been “the best thing you could have done for your career.”

He was proper, as two summers later Darryl Sutter provided Sawyer a two-year, one-way contract with the Flames.

“I was that close to being a Flame,” mentioned Sawyer, who needed to decline, as a concussion suffered in a battle whereas standing up for Paul Kariya ended his profession in 2003.

All informed, he had three targets and 403 penalty minutes in 110 NHL video games, to go together with his whopper of a narrative.  

He ultimately moved into teaching, then broadcasting, spending 9 years with TSN in Winnipeg earlier than shifting to Calgary this summer time.

The irony is sort of too excellent.

Sawyer is aware of that night time has turn into a part of his personal mythology.

“Clips of that night go around the internet every once in a while and if it wasn’t for that night I don’t think my kids would know that I played in the NHL,” smiled the daddy of two.

Now they — and an entire new era of Flames followers — are going to know him for one thing else.

Starting Thursday, when the Flames host Seattle, The Ugly Duckling will get an opportunity to make his mark from between the benches — throughout from the penalty field with which he was so acquainted.