Gillies remembered as dear friend, loyal Islanders teammate by Trottier

Bryan Trottier said he has "a gazillion" stories about his dear, late friend Clark Gillies, so many about his fellow New York Islanders legend that he hardly knows where to begin.

So Trottier chooses to start on a baseball diamond in Swift Current, Saskatchewan, in the summer of 1971.
A talented 15-year-old, Trottier was playing quality ball for Swift Current; Gillies, two years his senior and bound for the Houston Astros' minor-league organization, was in the starting nine for Moose Jaw.
"I played some left field and second base, 'Clarkie' played third base and caught," Trottier said on Tuesday from Pittsburgh, still coming to grips with the death of Gillies from cancer on Jan. 21 at age 67.
Indeed, the loss of one of his best friends is so fresh that during a half-hour talk Trottier flips between present and past tense, Gillies still with him in many ways. As tight as they were with the Islanders, Trottier most cherishes their time away from the ice, two deep-rooted Saskatchewan boys bonded by family, friends, prairie community "and oh yeah, hockey, too," he says.

"At 17, Clarkie was an animal, already a man," Trottier said. "It really wasn't fair. He was built like the Marlboro man, V-shaped. Scary. He could run and hit. What a ballplayer. Football, hockey, golf, baseball, just an athlete.
"First game of a doubleheader, I hit a dribbler, struck out and got on base with a fielder's choice. Clarkie hit a rope to center field for an out, then a rainmaker pop-up to the warning track, then in his third at-bat, he hit a three-run homer so hard and so far that I think it's still circling the Earth."
A fine ballplayer, Trottier knew he'd never make it in that game, no matter his full toolbox, though Gillies had a pretty fair shot at it given the Astros' interest. As it turned out, each focused on hockey, together winning the Stanley Cup four times consecutively with the Islanders, from 1980-83.
"A year later (1972-73), I'm playing junior hockey in the Western league against Clarkie, me with Swift Current, him with Regina," Trottier said. "I lucked out in a whole bunch of ways. I had Tiger Williams as a teammate in junior and Clark Gillies in the NHL, two big brothers looking over my shoulder. The hockey gods kind of shone on me.
"One game, Ian MacPhee and I sandwich Clarkie, the three of us go down and when I get up I'm inches from his face. When Clarkie's mad, he just drops his chin and looks at you through his eyebrows. 'I'm going to rip your head off,' he growls at me and I say, 'You've got to catch me first!' "

New York Islanders linemates Clark Gillies (l.), Bryan Trottier (c.) and Mike Bossy in 1979.
Trottier, Gillies and Mike Bossy would prove to be a lethal line for the champion Islanders, the three players a perfect complement to each other.
"During all of our time together, the only times Clarkie yelled at me was when I fought," Trottier said with a laugh. "He'd say, 'Number one, you're an ugly fighter. And number two, if you hurt your hands and you're out for eight weeks, I'm going to miss my bonuses.' "
Trottier recalled an exhibition game rumble involving himself, Gillies and Islanders forward Garry Howatt, the three jammed into the penalty box. Sorting themselves out, Gillies handed Trottier his gloves.
"I'd probably been rag-dolled and now I'm in the box and here are Clarkie and Howatt giving it to me from both sides for five long minutes. Clarkie says, 'If you ever fight again, I'm going to kick your (butt). You're inspiring the other team by how bad you fight.'
"I played bigger with him on the ice, with a lot less hesitation knowing that I wouldn't be blindsided or have my head taken off because they'd have to pay a price with Clarkie. I always told him, 'I won't put you in the position that you'll have to come and protect me but it's nice to have you on the ice.' I had a few scraps (four fights in 1,279 NHL games) but he never tried to jump in and beat the guy up. If someone took a run at Mike, though, there was a price to pay. That irked him more than if someone took a run at him, or at me."

Friends and Islanders teammates Clark Gillies (l.), Mike Bossy (c.) and Bryan Trottier in 2008.
Trottier recalled an exhibition game in Buffalo against the Sabres, who were stocked with robust defensemen.
"They had (Jerry) 'King Kong' Korab and Jim Schoenfeld and Jocelyn Guevremont, it seemed like every defenseman was bigger than the next," he said. "Suddenly I'm backed up and here's King Kong and Jimmy coming at me and I'm, 'OK, which of these monsters am I going to have to scrap?' I'm backing up and there's Clarkie and he's, 'Are you OK?' King Kong and Jimmy veer off and I'm, 'Yeah, I am now!' I think just Clarkie's presence was enough.
"He was as good a hockey player as he was a fighter. I mean no disrespect to anyone, but I just think Clarkie's the toughest man in the world. Tiger is probably the scrappiest tough guy but Clarkie is just the biggest man. He's the big-man presence in the room, on the ice and on the bench. Whether he realizes it or not, I tell him, 'Clarkie, where you go, we go.' He never lets us down, he's always there.
"Ask anyone in our room who's the guy they love the most and I'll say to a man they'll say Clark Gillies. Always upbeat, ready to help, cares about every guy in the room. If you're down, he'll lift you up. If you're not ready, he'll give you a kick in the butt, just enough. It was comical. There were guys you'd yip and yap, but Clarkie would just stand up and say, 'Let's go, boys.'

Bryan Trottier (rear) and Clark Gillies in action against the Minnesota North Stars, and with Bob Nystrom and Denis Potvin for the raising of the Islanders' 1979-80 Stanley Cup championship banner.
"He brought some levity to the room, very calm and composed in appearance but wound pretty tight. He played to win. He never said, 'I'm going to go beat somebody up tonight,' he said, 'I'm going to score two or three goals, dig in the corners and make an impact on the game. And if somebody starts some (nonsense), I'll finish it.' He was the biggest, strongest, toughest, the best at doing that."
Trottier laughed about the two warriors struggling with injuries long into retirement, Gillies with a pelvis infection, using a walker, Trottier with a bad hip, using a cane, happy to rib each other as they hobbled around.
Far and wide, they were quite the team on stage, too, Gillies warbling country chestnuts like "The Gambler," "Folsom Prison Blues" and "Friends In Low Places" to Trottier's energetic guitar.
"I dragged his butt out to my hometown of Val Marie, Saskatchewan, talked him into it, and we had a blast," Trottier said. "He said, 'This tiny little town knows how to party!' The whole town fell in love with him.

From left, Jean Potvin, Clark Gillies, Denis Potvin and Bryan Trottier celebrate an Islanders goal.
"He was the greatest joke-teller in the world. I've heard his jokes a hundred times but I laugh every time. 'Don'tcha git it?' he'll laugh. People go crazy for his singing, how he leads up to it and finishes. 'Kenny (Rogers) beat me to the punch recording 'The Gambler,' he always says."
For Trottier, it's friendship that burns brightest with Gillies and Bossy, who's now in a fight with lung cancer.
"As friendships and people in my world go, Clarkie is at the very top with Mike and those guys," he said. "Friends as much as old teammates. Hockey was part of it, but it's the other fun stuff we did through our lives.
"Clarkie is a very special human being. He made a lot of people very happy and helped a lot of children with money he raised through his foundation. That goes a long way and impacts a lot of lives. I'm going to honor his memory. To me, I'll grieve and miss him every day, but he'd want me to live my life to the fullest as he did his. He's gone way too soon but he brought joy to others, and that made him a happy man."