Cheers in Heaven
By zach weinstock
Islander fans knew Dave Scatchard hardly three weeks before he opened up to them.
We mean really opened up - all the way - as in weeping on camera between periods of a game in Boston on January 8, 2000, wiping tears on his road white Islanders jersey while paying tribute to his 12-year-old buddy Nicholas Beresford, who had just passed away from leukemia.
At the time fans were still learning what the 23-year-old Hinton, Alberta native was like, both as a player and a person. Turned out, if this game and this intermission interview with FSNY's Howie Rose and Joe Micheletti were any indication, the player and the person were similar – resilient, emotional, tough, and full of heart.
Scatch met Nicholas while he was with the Vancouver Canucks, cheering up sick children at the local Ronald McDonald house with his teammates. The pair bonded over their mutual interest in cars.
Visiting a young boy with leukemia is invaluable on its own, but as Long Islanders would one day find out, Scatch likes to go the "extra mile." In fact, together Scatch and Nicholas went more than a few extra miles, or as they're called in Vancouver, kilometers.
That's because the new best buds could soon be seen riding together all around town in go-carts or in Scatchard's beloved manual transmission, twin turbo Dodge Stealth. One day Dave let Nicholas drive, first in the spacious confines of an empty parking lot, then on the streets and highways of Vancouver.
Nicholas died peacefully at his home in British Columbia on January 4, 2000, two weeks after Scatchard was traded to the Islanders. Reluctant to upset her son, Dave's mother withheld the terrible news for a few days. Whether what happened next falls in the category of divine intervention or coincidence is up to you, but right when Nicholas got to heaven, Dave started to produce, and continued for years.
Unaware of his little buddy's passing, Scatch registered an assist that night and another two days later, just his sixth and seventh points of the entire season. That's when the phone rang. Heartbroken, Dave told his mother he was dedicating tomorrow's game at Boston to Nicholas, and he was going to score a hat trick in his honor.
Now, these types of vows are not often made. Legend has it Babe Ruth promised a young boy a home run in Game Four of the 1926 World Series, and hit three. Cosmo Kramer made a similar pledge on behalf of another Yankees slugger, Paul O'Neil, in a 1995 episode of Seinfeld. But that's about it.
Scatchard, meanwhile, was no "Great Bambino," nor fictional character on a scripted TV show. In his 2021 memoir The Comeback, he speaks of an episode from his minor league days when a teammate told him there was "no way" he would make the NHL. Dave did go on to make it, but not exactly in a Bossy-like blizzard of goals. He'd scored just one in 29 games so far in 1999-00. In other words, this was not the type of guy who walks around promising hat tricks.
He was also not the type of guy you'd expect to fight Marty McSorley, because back then nobody wanted to fight Marty McSorley. The heavy fisted giant built a storied career out of knocking people around, people bigger and meaner than wiry Dave Scatchard. But on this night, in Dave's mind, he was not alone.
So after the fabled enforcer jabbed him with a nasty spear late in the first period, Scatchard challenged him. McSorley was as surprised as anybody, and happy to duel, though less so when Dave attacked with 10 right hooks, yanked Mammoth Marty to the ice and rolled over him, victorious. Emotion poured from Dave as he marched off to the locker room.
In the second frame, Scatchard unveiled the accurate right-handed shot which would help him become the Islanders' leading goal scorer in a few years' time. He nailed a long slapper from the left wing boards and a snapper from the bottom of the circle, punctuating each tally with elated howls and hysterical swings of his fists. He was celebrating, frankly, like a 12-year-old boy.
After 10 punches and two goals, it was time for Scatchard's best connection of the evening, which was with the Long Island audience. He went on the air with Rose and Micheletti and bared his soul about Nicholas, exhaling between sobs. Some viewers, no doubt, were crying right along with him.
Scatch didn't get his hat trick, but he came as close as possible. When fellow former Canuck Bill Muckalt tipped home an empty netter to seal the Isles' 5-2 victory, Dave was right behind him, in case he was checked off the puck. In hockey that's called giving "support," a fitting descriptor for a player who provided just that for families in battles far tougher than any loose puck scramble with a toothless Bruins defenseman.
"I just want to say 'hi' to Nicholas up in heaven," Scatchard quivered in his postgame rendezvous with FSNY. "I could only get two today Nick, and you probably helped me out with both of them up there, so thanks."
If it was in fact Nicholas helping Dave light the lamp, he didn't stop then, just as Dave's goodwill did not stop with Nicholas.
Scatchard netted 81 goals in four and a half seasons on Long Island, including 21 in 2000-01 and 27 in 2002-03.
He also furthered his reputation for befriending and caring for ailing youngsters in the community. The potential he showed on January 8, 2000 – both on and off the ice - was realized.
Back then Islander fans knew him hardly three weeks. And he was already a favorite.