As three-time Stanley Cup winner Pat Maroon hoisted the trophy with the Tampa Bay Lightning, Mark Hunter was filled with pride.

Maroon and the Lightning claimed the Cup July 7 with a 1-0 victory in the fifth game over the Montreal Canadiens.

But as Hunter watched, there was also a little regret for a missed opportunity in Petrolia many years before.

Hunter, owner and vice president of the London Knights, was the owner of the Petrolia Jets when Maroon was just 16 and he tried out for the Junior B team. It didn’t work out so well for the teen. He was cut before the season began.

Maroon was big for his age and it was a drawback.

“He needed to get in shape,” recalls Hunter.

But there was promise there. “He’s got really good hands and a really good brain. He was that big then as he is now… his conditioning wasn’t where it should be at. And so he came down, he played pretty well.”

And he made a good impression, Hunter says. “He was a nice young man, very mature man. You know, but he was only 16 at the time.”

Maroon had also signed with a team in St. Louis which wasn’t very interested in releasing him.

Hunter says after trying to convince St. Louis to release Maroon, it got complicated.
The combination meant Maroon was cut from the team.

But that wasn’t the end of Hunter’s encounters with the man who goes down in the history books as one of the few modern day NHLers with three Cups to his name.
Maroon ended up with the London Knights after the Hunters bought the team. The change, Mark says, was remarkable.

“He played well, he got 90 points for us. He played really well. So he ended up getting drafted and getting a contract and going down this road – his way through the minors – to be national hockey league player. Three Cup repeat winner. So that’s pretty impressive with the battle he went and the road he went – he didn’t take an easy route.”

Hunter says that work ethic which materialized between the time he was 16 and 19 was sheer determination to be in the NHL.

“He had size, determination, and he did his work to get better. And a lot of young men get discouraged. He didn’t get discouraged and you can see that by the results.

“But, did he have some potential? Yes, he did as a lot of young people do. Other young people get discouraged too quickly. He didn’t. He battled.”

And while Hunter was rooting for him as he watched the Stanley Cup, there were a few other players on his mind as well. Both Corey Perry and Josh Anderson of the Montreal Canadiens played for the Knights. Hunter wanted them to hoist the cup, too.

“I guess I’m like a parent now. You hope the individuals do well,” says Hunter, noting both Perry and Anderson put in a lot of hard work to get to that final.

“If you had seen Josh Anderson, he came to us at 17, you’d be shocked what he is now, he is a beast now. He was just a skinny little boy when he came at 17.”