Before a packed house at Madison Square Garden, Gretzky earns the 2,857th and final point of his NHL career, an assist in the New York Rangers'
2-1 overtime loss
to the Pittsburgh Penguins in their season finale.
The pregame festivities include videotaped messages from
Gordie Howe
, his boyhood idol. After Pittsburgh's
Jaromir Jagr
ends the game by scoring at 1:22 of OT, Gretzky takes a few laps around the Garden ice; they are reminiscent of the ones he takes with the Stanley Cup during his days with the Edmonton Oilers in the 1980s.
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Gretzky is still in uniform when he meets the media; when that's done, he sits for a while longer, allowing the moment to linger.
"Probably, subconsciously, I don't want to take it off,'' he says when asked why he hasn't changed. "I'm not going to pull it on ever again. It's hard. It's hard to take it off right now. I have to be honest with you. I don't want to take it off.
"I was a boy that happened to love a game and got lucky, and the good Lord gave me a passion for it."