Jordan Staal was 20 years old when he held up the Stanley Cup in victory, letting out a big howl, a blondish playoff beard making him look older.
Then again, it might have been the strain of winning the Cup, the grueling pursuit, that made him look older.
It can do that.
Staal, wearing No. 11 for the Pittsburgh Penguins, and was on the ice in the final seconds of Game 7 against the Detroit Red Wings as the Pens refused to give up a tying goal. When the final horn sounded at Joe Louis Arena in Detroit, the guy the Pens called "Gronk" quickly put a bear hug on goalie Marc-Andre Fleury.
"I've been playing a lot of Game 7s in the Stanley Cup finals and I used to always score the game-winner," a beaming Staal said of his boyhood dream during a postgame TV interview. "But I'll take the win."
That was in 2009. The years have passed, and quickly. Staal is 33. He still wears No. 11, though now for the Carolina Hurricanes.
His grownup dream: win the Cup again. He'd take that.
Staal and the Canes have another chance. They opened the 2022 Stanley Cup playoffs Monday against an old playoff nemesis, the Boston Bruins, after a regular season in which the Canes won the Metropolitan Division and more games and any team in franchise history.
Any team, including the Canes' 2006 Stanley Cup champions.
"We're forever trying to get better and I think we have done that," Staal said Saturday. "We've got a team I'm sure most teams don't want to play, and that's what you want."
Follower to 'ultimate leader'
In 2009, Staal was in his third NHL season. The Pens, led by Sidney Crosby, was the kind of team that few wanted to play. But they had to prove themselves against the Red Wings, the Cup champions in 2008, and they did.
Traded to the Hurricanes in June 2012, Staal hoped to join Eric Staal, his oldest brother, in winning a Cup together. Eric won with the Canes in 2006 but was denied a shot at another in 2009 when Carolina was swept by the Penguins in the Eastern Conference finals.
Talk about a difficult-to-manage handshake line. It was a case of tough brotherly love as the Staal brothers passed.
Once with the Canes, Jordan Staal had a broken leg one year. He saw his brother traded and their Cup dream end. it wasn't until 2019 that Jordan Staal was a part of a playoff team again, one coached by Rod Brind'Amour and led by captain Justin Williams that reached the Eastern Conference final — and lost to the Bruins.
Staal now has the "C" on his sweater. He's the one others can look to — the "ultimate leader," Canes center Sebastian Aho said — when things become turbulent, as they always do in the cauldron of the Stanley Cup playoffs.
"There are times in the playoffs I'll probably be more vocal or do different things than I would have in the past," Staal said. "It's not going to be a smooth road. There's going to bumps and hard times."
The Boston Bruins look to their captain, center Patrice Bergeron. Championship-caliber teams always tend to have strong team captains. Bergeron is one.
"He's every similar to Jordan, for me," Brind'Amour said Saturday. "He's their leader. Over his career he has just done it right all the time. They're similar, obviously play the same position. I think their value to the team is the same."
Brind'Amour, a former center, was the Canes captain in 2006. He sees a lot of himself in Staal, whose value to the team can't be measured in mere goals or points. He wins the big faceoffs and board battles, forces turnovers, screens goalies with his 6-foot-4, 220-pound frame, kills penalties.
More than anything, he sets the example for others to follow.
"Jordan is a humble, team-first person who does everything right day to day," Eric Staal said in an N&O interview.
'Emotionally invested'
Jordan Staal has centered the Canes' most consistent line this season, joining wingers Nino Niederreiter and Jesper Fast in providing an aggressive forecheck. Playing heavy minutes, Staal and his line gave the Canes some much-needed heavy play that should continue in the playoffs.
"He doesn't give you a shift off, ever," said brother Marc Staal, a Red Wings defenseman. "He's emotionally invested in every game."
For much of this season, Staal couldn't find the net. Then, almost in a flash, he did. He scored nine goals in a seven-game stretch in April, including a hat trick against Anaheim that was his first in almost 14 years.
"Look at our record, look at where we are, it starts with him," Brind'Amour said. "Any great team has to have good leadership. He's got good guys around him but it's because of him."
Brind'Amour, as head coach, created a new team designation — "C5 Hurricane." It goes to the the player who best represents what Brind'Amour, in setting a higher standard for his team, calls the five C's: Compete, Care, Consistent, Culture, Championship.
Staal is the only one to be named a C5 Hurricane twice.
"He's led the way for a while now and continues every day, which makes him so good," BrindAmour said. "What he's doing for the next generation of captains is very, very important."
Playing for something greater
To win this year, with this team, would have extra meaning for Staal, but for more than the hockey.
"It would be different," he said. "Obviously my life is a lot different than when I was 20 years old. I'd have my family there and my kids. Everything we've been through already, to be able to pull that off, would be different for me personally and just for my career."
In 2009, Staal was hugged on the ice after the Cup clincher by his parents, Henry and Linda Staal. They raised Jordan and his three brothers on the sod farm in Thunder Bay, Ontario, the ultimate hockey parents, and wanted to celebrate with their son.
Jordan's now the father of three kids — daughters Abigail and Lilah, and a son, Henry. Their hugs would be different.
Staal and his wife, Heather, went through the pain of having an infant daughter die in February 2018. Hannah, who had a rare but terminal birth defect, was stillborn.
Staal never told most of his teammates any of that until after Hannah's death, continuing to play and do his best amid the heartbreak. The respect level the Canes had for their teammate grew even more, and Brind'Amour named him captain before the 2019-20 season.
Staal said he has his Penguins championship ring stored away — somewhere. He said he's not "big into that stuff," that it's more about the memories that come with winning.
"There's no better feeling than to accomplish your lifelong dream with guys you love battling with," he said.
Staal did that in 2009. He'd love to do again, even if his playoff beard might have a gray hair or two.
