BLOG: Gretzky shares memories of Hawerchuk

EDMONTON, AB - Two of the greatest hockey players ever shared memories from their glory days one last time on Monday, one day before one of them passed away after a courageous battle with cancer.

Oilers legend Wayne Gretzky told NHL.com's Tim Campbellthat he talked on the phone with Dale Hawerchuk mere hours before the fellow Hockey Hall of Famer succumbed to his fight with stomach cancer at the age of 57.

Gretzky and Hawerchuk entered the NHL just two seasons apart and played countless games against one another in the 1980s with Wayne's Oilers and Dale's Winnipeg Jets both members of the old Smythe Division.

The bulk of their last conversation on Monday wasn't about their longtime rivalry, though, but rather the time they joined forces to capture the 1987 Canada Cup with Hawerchuk winning the faceoff to start the play that saw Gretzky set up Mario Lemieux for the tournament-clinching goal against the Soviets.

"I had a really nice conversation with Dale yesterday and his son, Eric, and we were talking about the Canada Cup," Gretzky said on Tuesday. "And I was telling his son that he should be really proud of his dad, and obviously he was, that if you watched highlights, and because of the pandemic we've gotten to see some of the games from 1987 that we haven't seen for a long time. But if you looked at it and followed it closely, which I did, Dale played pretty much everywhere but left defence with Paul Coffey, left wing, right wing, everywhere."

Hawerchuk won the 1982 Calder Trophy as the NHL's top rookie, and was inducted into the Hockey HOF in 2001 after a career that saw him score 1,409 points (518 goals, 891 assists) in 1,188 games for the Jets, Buffalo Sabres, St. Louis Blues and Philadelphia Flyers.