Let’s go back to 1986 and check out the heated battle between the Toronto Maple Leafs and Chicago Black Hawks over North Delta’s Gary Nylund.
Sports pages that year, including the Sept. 12 edition of the Optimist, covered the controversy that saw the Maple Leaf defenseman late in the summer sign as a restricted free agent (a rarity, even today) with the Black Hawks (the team name used two words back then) and the Leafs demanding high compensation for their rugged blueliner .
The Hawks offered defenseman Jerome Dupont, forward Ken Yaremchuck (neither would go on to distinguished careers) and a fourth draft pick in 1987 for signing Nylund. Toronto owner Harold Ballard demanded young Hawks’ winger Ed Olcyzk, who would go on to play over 1,000 games in the NHL.
It was up to judge Edward Houston to decide on one offer or the other and he ruled the Leafs demand was simply too high.
The ruling incensed Ballard who felt he was losing a top notch defenseman, only 22 at the time, and getting two minor league prospects in return.
Nylund was the Leafs’ top pick (third overall) in the 1982 entry draft after starring for three seasons with the Portland Winter Hawks of the Western Hockey League.
As a student at Seaquam secondary, Nylund played junior hockey with the Delta Sun out of Sungod Arena. He was on the first Canadian team to win World Junior Gold in 1982.
Nylund ended his NHL career with the New York Islanders in the early 90s.
Following this playing days, Nylund, who eventually moved to Surrey, would go on to be a longtime firefighter in Delta.
He and three other Delta firefighters were awarded the Medal of Bravery in 2003 for their role in saving the lives of trapped colleagues in a chemical fire on Annacis Island.
Also involved with the Surrey Eagles of the B.C. junior league, he was inducted into the Delta Sports Hall of Fame in 2006.
