McNab's consistency on offense led to U.S. Hockey Hall of Fame

Peter McNab's world was turned upside down when he was diagnosed with cancer in August, but the retired NHL forward's main message in his acceptance speech at the U.S. Hockey Hall of Fame induction ceremony Thursday won't be about that. It will be about being grateful.

"Hockey gave me the opportunity to meet people that were so important to my life, the most important people in my life, and gave me the opportunities to experience things that I never ever would've experienced," McNab said. "The places I went, the people I met, it was absolutely phenomenal what the game of hockey gave me."
McNab's appreciation hasn't lessened while undergoing chemotherapy treatments once every three weeks and continuing his duties as a color analyst on Colorado Avalanche telecasts.
The 69-year-old considers it good fortune that the induction ceremony is being held in Denver because he isn't permitted to fly (he works Avalanche road games from a local studio) and it will allow many of his family and friends to attend.
"It's just the mere fact of the luck of it to be here in Denver," McNab said. "I won't kid you. It has been an unbelievably difficult time for all of the family and all of that. Something like this, it's really nice that as many people from my family can be in as possible."
McNab was elected to the U.S. Hockey Hall of Fame Class of 2021 along with retired NHL forward Paul Holmgren and journalist Stan Fischler. The 2020 ceremony was postponed due to concerns surrounding the coronavirus, so the three will be enshrined with the inductees from last year: retired NHL forward Tony Granato, Boston College coach Jerry York, Dean Blais, who won two NCAA Division I men's championships as coach of the University of North Dakota, and four-time Olympic medalist Jenny Potter.
The son of former NHL player and general manager Max McNab, Peter played 14 seasons in the NHL with the Buffalo Sabres, Boston Bruins, Vancouver Canucks and New Jersey Devils before retiring in 1987 and transitioning to a broadcasting career, initially with the Devils and, later, the Avalanche.
McNab scored 813 points (363 goals, 450 assists) in 955 NHL regular-season games and 82 points (40 goals, 42 assists) in 107 Stanley Cup games.
A naturalized U.S. citizen who was born in Vancouver, McNab moved to San Diego when he was 14 after his father became coach and GM of the Western Hockey League team there.
McNab played hockey when he was high school despite the scarcity of ice time in San Diego, but also exceled as an outfielder in baseball, which led to a split scholarship to play both sports at the University of Denver.
"But I was a hockey player at heart," McNab said. "I loved the game, the imagination of it, and playing it."
McNab scored 170 points (78 goals, 92 assists) in 105 games during three seasons with the University of Denver from 1970-73 and helped them reach the NCAA Final his junior season. He signed after that season with the Sabres, who selected him in the fifth round (No. 85) of the 1972 NHL Draft.
After three seasons with the Buffalo, including a run to the 1975 Stanley Cup Final before losing to the Philadelphia Flyers, McNab was traded to Boston in 1976. McNab played eight seasons for the Bruins and found a home playing center on their second line with Terry O'Reilly and John Wensink.
McNab is 11th in Bruins history in goals (263), 13th in points (587) and 16th in assists (324) in 595 regular-season games. He scored at least 35 goals in each of his first six seasons with Boston, including at least 40 goals twice: an NHL career-high 41 in 1977-78 and 40 in 1979-80.
He scored an NHL career-high 86 points (38 goals, 48 assists) in 80 games for the Bruins in 1976-77 and was named a Wales Conference All-Star.
"Peter was the No. 1 goal scorer, the guy you looked to right off the bat," retired Bruins forward Rick Middleton said. "That's what we needed after [Phil] Esposito was traded (to the New York Rangers in 1975), that center that we could depend on. And he was pretty much as big as 'Espo' and played very similar, right in front of the net, got the rebound. … He had a great shot and he had a nose for scoring goals. That's hard to teach. You either have it or you don't."
McNab helped Boston reach the Stanley Cup Final in 1977 and 1978 before losing to the Montreal Canadiens each time. The Bruins lost to the Canadiens again in the 1979 semifinals after a too many men penalty with 2:34 remaining in Game 7 (served by McNab) led to Guy Lafleur's tying power-play goal with 1:14 left and Yvon Lambert's winning goal 9:33 into overtime.
"People ask years later, 'Do you talk about it?' No, not even a little bit," McNab said. "I haven't sat down with any one of the guys on that team and talked over that series or that game or that moment. It was so unbelievably painful, we just left it alone."
McNab finished his NHL career playing two seasons with Vancouver and two seasons with New Jersey, where his father was the GM.
Ken Daneyko, a young defenseman during Peter McNab's tenure with the Devils, said the forward was a valuable mentor for a team that was still learning how to win.
New Jersey qualified for the playoffs for the first time in 1987-88, one season after McNab retired.
"He was the perfect guy for young guys. He kept things loose," said Daneyko, a three-time Cup winner and now a color analyst for the Devils. "I remember as a kid just how positive he was with us guys and he was a guy that you looked up to not only because of the career that he had, but he was still solid for us."
At 33, McNab was the oldest player on a United States team that finished sixth at the 1986 IIHF World Championship in Moscow. His younger brother David, a longtime assistant GM with the Anaheim Ducks, was an assistant GM for the U.S. and helped put together a roster that included 21-year-old forwards Granato and Brett Hull and 19-year-old goalie Mike Richter.
"If anybody ever asks me, 'Would you go and play for a Team USA?' I would absolutely," McNab said. "Just the experience was one of the greatest of my hockey life."
As a former member of the U.S. Hockey Hall of Fame's selection committee, McNab understands how much work goes into the process, so it meant even more to him when was elected this year.
"When I got in and I realized the process that I had put in every year as far as taking it seriously, it just gave it an added appreciation, an added feeling of, 'That's pretty cool,'" McNab said.
McNab also thinks it's "pretty cool" that he'll be inducted alongside Fischler with Gary Thorne as the ceremony's emcee. Thorne was his first play-by-play partner with the Devils and Fischler was the ice-level reporter.
"It just gets back to the same thing that I've always felt in hockey," McNab said. "Hockey itself, just the game, has offered me so many opportunities."