OILERS HOF: Gregg, MacTavish enshrined for deep Oilers loyalties

EDMONTON, AB – One, an accomplished Doctor – graduating from the prestigious University of Alberta Golden Bears program led by the infamous Clare Drake – and still the owner of a flourishing medical practice here in Edmonton after spending nine of his 10 NHL seasons with the Oilers from 1981-90 and winning five Stanley Cups.

“Many people think he was the best coach in the history of hockey, and you've heard the saying a million times that it really resonates when you're in that dressing room and nobody cares who gets the credit,” Gregg said.

“It's amazing what can be accomplished when nobody cares who gets the credit, and it was just like that: you did your eight hours of medical school, and then, you went to the rink and dressed for three minutes and you went out and did your best. Probably not the best you could, but I saw the same thing with these men when I came to the Oilers.”

The other, an owner of four Stanley Cup rings – three with the Oilers from 1985-92 – and a former head coach, president of hockey operations and long-time ambassador for the club who helped create the team of a generation during the 2000s that made it all the way to Game 7 of the 2006 Stanley Cup Final.

“I was a decent player until I got to the NHL and I had to adapt because there were many players on this team that had much more talent than I did,” MacTavish said. “And I think my ability to adapt my game gave me great longevity.”

Both Randy Gregg and Craig MacTavish took different routes to the Oilers Hall of Fame – one as an infallible blueline presence and the other as the often-helmetless forward – and each will see their names live forever in the Ring of Honour above the PCL Loge Level inside Rogers Place, having embodied ‘Once an Oiler, Always An Oiler’ to the highest of respects during their different but well-respected tenures in Oil Country.

They weren’t necessarily the stars in the room on a team that boasted the likes of Wayne Gretzky, Paul Coffey, Glenn Anderson, Kevin Lowe, Grant Fuhr and more, but each one of those Hall of Famers will tell you just how important those guys were to all those championships.

“Are you wearing your Stanley Cup rings?” Gregg asked MacTavish on stage in the Oilers Hall of Fame Room. “I don't even know where my Stanley Cup rings are. I know I have five of them, but I don’t wear them. It's just that we worked hard enough together to get them.”

Randy Gregg was "always the lover, not the fighter," as his defence partner of four seasons, Don Jackson, eloquently said, referencing his 333 career penalty minutes in 474 career NHL games where he also scored 41 goals and added 152 assists.

The now 66-year-old took breaks from competing with the Oilers on two occasions – once in 1986 and again in 1988 – to continue pursuing his medical degree. But both times, he'd return to the Oilers and help guide them to two more Stanley Cups, serving as a loyal partner to Jackson on the blueline and an important presence in the locker room.

"For four years, we were partners and Randy had a great sense of the game and was a partner and teammate I could always count on," Jackson said. "Whenever I needed an outlet, Randy was there. He was always there for me in case I needed him. When we were under heavy pressure, we just kept coming back for the puck and we just made sure that we skated back just as hard as the other guy and to be ready just to be an outlet."

The only time Gregg would fight was to defend his friends, with his biggest battle coming off the ice in Pittsburgh with a reporter from the Montreal Gazette, who tried to leverage his education as a doctor to slander the demeanour of his fellow Oilers teammates.

"I want to tell you because this epitomizes these gentlemen around here," Gregg said.

As a player who went to university instead of taking the major junior route, an attempt by the reporter to use his words at the expense of his teammates wasn't taken lightly, leading to a physical altercation between the two after he saw the published words in The Hockey News a few weeks later.

"He was trying to use my medical background to demean how great these young athletes were... and every hockey player in the NHL thought that I was better than somebody else because I simply went to university, and that was absolutely not the case."

"And in fact, I respect many of them more than I do the doctors I work in the hospital because of their commitment and respect they have for the game."

MacTavish came to the Oilers in 1995 and found himself a fit with the leaders inside Edmonton's locker room – a culture that was established under Head Coach & GM Glen Sather and one he carried with him into his coaching and management career with the Oilers.

"I was really fortunate to come to a group that was so mature in their leadership with Glen Sather at the helm. He had a great balance of intimidation and approachability, and that's a difficult balance to walk as a coach and he definitely did that.

"Wayne, Mark and Kevin were our captains, and Paul certainly in that group as well. They were great leaders, and the leadership part of it for me, I've given it some thought about why these guys were such good leaders, and they were exceptional for all the right reasons playing the game to win."

"You don't win the Cups without talent, that's for sure. But at the same time, you don't win it without the depth of character and leadership that those guys had. They were a great example of how a locker room was going to be formed and run."