How Hitchcock, Belfour helped turn Dallas into a “hockey city”

The week started with Ken Hitchcock and Ed Belfour talking about how much Texas means to their respective hall-of-fame hockey careers and ended with the Stars holding a full-house practice in Euless to help bond with the fans from the 817.

It was a real full-circle moment.

Hitchcock and Belfour were inducted into the Dallas Stars Hall of Fame last Sunday. In their acceptance speeches, each talked about how important it was to be part of the growth of hockey in the Lone Star State. On Saturday, it was clear just how much the sport means to a place where the lakes rarely freeze. It’s been 30 years, so there has been a real opportunity for this game to catch on, but the fact that so much progress has taken place is a matter of real promise.

“When I came here in 1996, there were 125 kids playing minor hockey,” Hitchcock said. “Now, there’s 10,000 kids playing minor hockey. That’s incredible growth.”

Hitchcock was a big part of that surge. A hard-working kid from Edmonton, he relied on the charity of youth coaches to help him get started. He sold hockey equipment and coached kids for a decade in Sherwood Park before he finally got a chance to coach Major Junior in Kamloops. After six years with the Blazers, he became an assistant with the Flyers and then a head coach with the Stars’ minor league team. All along the way, he attended seminars and tried to gain as much information as he could from any coach that wanted to chat.

When he made it to the NHL – eventually winning the Stanley Cup in 1999 – he started giving back in so many ways. He hosted his own seminars and fielded calls from any younger coach who wanted to talk.

“Hitch is one of those guys where you can sit an hour with him while he tells stories, and you’re surprised that he’ll do that all day,” Stars coach Pete DeBoer said. “My coaching career, a big part of it, was coming up through Hockey Canada and having all of those coaches share, and Hitch was one of those guys. He loves to share his knowledge, and that’s rare in our sport, and a lot of young coaches like myself owe him a debt of gratitude for that.”

Hitchcock loyally patronized Starbucks in his time here, and often struck up conversations with fans. He invited them to games, he answered their questions, he made them fans. Hitch came up with the idea for The Ticket’s Charity Challenge on Ice, and that alone was a genius move. Radio hosts learned to play hockey and even joined adult leagues. That made it so much easier to talk hockey on the radio, and that helped build the popularity of the sport.

DeBoer has coached in Florida, San Jose and Vegas, and said he fully understands how important building the game can be in “non-traditional” markets.

“Hockey is one of those contagious sports where you have to see it live and you have to play it to really fall in love with it,” DeBoer said on Saturday as he soaked up the atmosphere in Euless.

Belfour built the game in similar ways. One, he was big in giving to charity with Make-A-Wish (his favorite). Two, he connected with fans directly. Eddie could be prickly with the media, but he loved a direct connection with his supporters. He loved the “Eddie’s Better” chants and he loved talking to fans when he was out and about.

And that was his way of building the game.

Jamie Benn came to Dallas in 2009, so a lot of the base had already been built, but he said he has always embraced the responsibility of being in a Sunbelt market.

“Those guys laid down the foundation for us, and what the Stars have done since has been awesome,” Benn said Sunday in Euless. “Hockey has grown so much here.”

Hitchcock said it best in his acceptance speech.

“This is not just a sports city, this is a hockey city,” he said. “You’ve got a great following here that you should be really proud of.”

This story was not subject to the approval of the National Hockey League or Dallas Stars Hockey Club.

Mike Heika is a Senior Staff Writer for DallasStars.com and has covered the Stars since 1994. Follow him on Twitter @MikeHeika.