From sticks to jerseys: The Vancouver Canucks share their favourite ...

10 hours ago

The Province

Everyone has a favourite Christmas gift from when they were growing up. The Vancouver Canucks' players are no exception.

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Published Dec 19, 2024 • Last updated 9 hours ago • 3 minute read

Vancouver Canucks' Tyler Myers got his first Easton Synergy stick when he was 11 or 12, which remains his favourite gift. Photo by Derek Cain /Getty Images

When you’re a 10-year-old hockey fan, there’s nothing like getting something exciting and new, that you had never imagined was possible, for Christmas.

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When Ray Ferraro was 10, he looked around the room at his three brothers all thrilled with their big gifts and wondered why he didn’t have one. In the Ferraro family, you would get an assortment of little things, socks, small toys, plus something major.

Where was the big gift for him?

In a scene that has been played out many times over the years in many different houses around the world, dad piped up: “Look under the couch, over there.”

What Ray found under the couch still blows his mind. A hockey stick, the lightest stick he had ever held.

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“I got a yellow Torspo stick. Nobody had one. I don’t know where my dad found one in Trail. They were made in Finland and they were light. Most sticks back then were heavy,” Ferraro recalls. “This thing was by far my favourite Christmas gift. I had never seen one, so when I unwrapped it, it was the best.”

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In a 1984 ad in The Hockey News, about a decade after Ferraro got a stick that was ahead of the curve, Torspo’s North American supplier bragged about how the sticks “are handmade in Finland using only selected Finnish birch and poplar wood which, when combined with quality craftsmanship and strict production control, results in the best hockey sticks that can be purchased in today’s market.”

Ferraro remembers wanting to use it right away. Of course that meant the stick had to be cut down to size and that meant dad had to help.

“I used it in games the next week. It was my stick. I loved that thing,” he said.

Current Canucks defenceman Tyler Myers has a similar memory for his favourite stick growing up.

“I remember I got my first Easton Synergy stick when I was 11 or 12,” Myers said, smiling at the memory.

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He was already a tall kid, so getting a big composite shaft was a big deal. Wood sticks were still the most common going in those days, though composites were more the choice of top players.

“That was pretty cool. I was pretty excited.”

For Teddy Blueger, getting anything NHL-related was a thrill for a little child in Latvia. When he was seven or eight, his parents pulled off a big surprise: a real, full-on NHL jersey. And not just a fan replica.

“My favourite player was Peter Forsberg. And my dad had, like, a friend of a friend who had a son living in Colorado, so he ended up getting a jersey through him,” Blueger recalled.

“That was probably the one that was a special surprise. It was really cool. It was an authentic jersey. The real deal.”

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For 106 years The Province’s Empty Stocking Fund has been dedicated to making the holidays brighter for B.C. residents who are less fortunate. With the generosity of our readers and supporters, the fund gives money to 25 B.C. community organizations that provide food hampers and gifts to children, needy families and single people.

Donations can be made by:

Scan the QR code here.

Online at: https://theprovince.com/esf

By mail to: The Province Empty Stocking Fund 968 East Cordova St., Vancouver, B.C., V6A 1M6

By calling: 604-253-6911

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