When the NHL schedule came out last summer, Ray Bourque mentally circled the date -- March 24. For the first time in his 22 seasons, he would be playing in Boston as anything but a Bruin.
|  | | Ray Bourque, left, is Colorado's All-Star defenseman now, but Bruins fans don't mind. |
Perhaps the most eloquent testimony about the relationship between athlete and market is that New England fans didn't interpret Bourque's trade request, and even his change of teams in his career twilight, as a repudiation or betrayal.
So when No. 77 returns to the Boston ice on Saturday with the Colorado Avalanche, the reception will be as if a favorite son has returned after a brief trip. After all, one year is a relative blink in a 23-season career, and certainly not enough time to diminish the fans' affection.
"I'm happy that I have an opportunity to come back," Bourque said Friday after the Avalanche arrived in Boston. "The way things went down last year, I wasn't sure exactly when they were going to happen, but I knew I had kind of played my last game." He said he regretted not being able to "say thank you for all the special days and moments, and great years I've had here in Boston. I didn't get to thank the fans. I'll have an opportunity to play in front of them tomorrow, and it's going to be great for me. I kind of think it's going to be likewise for them."
That's the point: They not only seem to know Bourque in Boston, they still embrace him. In another uniform. Other players who ask to be traded get mixed receptions -- at best -- in their returns. Even the Avs' Patrick Roy, who was banished and didn't ask to be traded, drew significant boos among the diverse reaction when he returned to Montreal. That almost certainly won't be the case on Saturday.
"But nobody plays 21 years in one place," Bourque said. "And a lot of people will always think of me as a Bruin, especially in Boston. I hope and expect people to understand it."
Avalanche television analyst Peter McNab was a longtime Bourque teammate in Boston, and he expects the same thing.
"Ray stayed when everyone said, 'Go! You can make more money!'" McNab said. "Remember, Ray could have been a free agent at least three times. No restrictions, he could have gone anywhere he wanted. He took less money to stay in Boston. He took heat from the Players Association, and it was always, 'I love the city, I love the fans, this is what I'm going to do and this is where I'm going to win.'
"I can remember asking him, 'Have you ever thought . . . ?' And he'd cut me off. He'd say, 'No!' Then I'd say, 'Come on, never?' And he'd snap, 'No!' He'd always have people telling him the Bruins weren't paying him enough.
"So he's shown his loyalty so many times. He just wanted one thing, and that was to win a Cup. If he had said, 'I gotta go someplace and make some money,' then it would be different. And plus, there never was one thing off the ice bad about him. He was great in the community, he loved the city, he respected the city, and he was typical of what the Bruins were all about."
McNab laughed.
"There wasn't a lot to get too mad at," he said.
And there still isn't, which is why the Fleet Center reception Saturday will be so warming. (If you think that's corny, you didn't cry in "Old Yeller" or "Bambi", either.)
"I think I'm going to enjoy the weekend and really have fun in that game," Bourque said. "Emotionally, I don't know how I'm going to feel, but I'm looking forward to it. It's a game I've been looking forward to for a long time."
Bourque's wife, Christiane, and their two sons, Christopher and Ryan, all have made the move to Denver for this season. But they also will return to Boston for the game against the Bruins. Melissa, the Bourque's oldest child, is attending school in New England and will rejoin the family.
Out of deference to Bourque, the Avs' chartered flight won't return to Denver until Sunday, a departure from the team's usual practice of trying to get home as soon as possible. (The Avs will leave for Edmonton on Tuesday.)
"After the game, I'll be pretty busy," Bourque said. "My sisters and my dad and my wife's siblings and dad will be there as well."
Bourque and the Avs beat the Bruins in Denver on Feb. 21, so this won't be Bourque's first game against his longtime team. But the emotionalism tied to first appearance in a Boston arena as an opponent will be more unique.
Something else about Bourque's first appearance back in Boston will look familiar: He won't have any other marquee names joining him on the blue line. It wasn't supposed to be that way with the Avalanche, of course, especially following last month's acquisition of Rob Blake from Los Angeles. But Blake is out with a sprained knee for at least two more weeks, and Adam Foote -- Colorado's third elite defenseman -- won't return to the lineup until at least next Wednesday at Edmonton.
"It's the same thing," Bourque said. "I still try to do the same thing every day. We'll have to have different guys step up and play different minutes, but I think we'll be all right."
Joe Sakic is the Avalanche captain, providing leadership and levity in ways he never displays when tape recorders or cameras are turned on. And he's having a Hart Trophy year. When healthy, Foote is the Avs' most fiery and physical force, and that will be true even if and when Blake returns. Forsberg's feisty resilience is a form of leadership as well.
But Bourque's aura somehow envelops a team as well, and unless injuries prove to be debilitating, the Avs will enter the postseason as the logical second choice, behind the peaking Devils.
That all has validated trade request, although Bourque had hoped to go to a team closer to Boston -- and his family, which remained behind through the remainder of the regular season and the playoffs a year ago.
"I think I've given myself an opportunity to win again," he says. "For me, that's very important. That's very special for a player going out, playing this game. Not everybody can say that. I think you have a few teams you look as as really being serious contenders, and I'm just happy to be one of those teams."
As a visiting player, Bourque had been to Denver many times -- both to play the Colorado Rockies from 1979-82, and then to face the Avalanche since 1995. So he wasn't like many lifelong residents of the East, who often seem to assume that Denver residents get to work one of two ways -- cross-country skiing through two feet of snow, or on horseback. This season, his wife and two sons are with him, and the boys are playing hockey and enjoying their new schools and friends.
"I don't think it could have worked out any better," Bourque said of the trade. "When I was looking at being dealt, the initial thing was trying to stay as close as I could to Boston, and that had a humongous factor in it all. But with that not happening, I don't think I could have gone to a better place. The team, the players and the city have been a lot of fun."
Bourque says he still hasn't decided if he will play again next season under the mutual option year of his two-year contract with the Avalanche. The widespread assumption has been that if the Avs win the Stanley Cup, Bourque would happily retire, having finally captured the sport's holy grail. Yet he said the Avs' playoff performance wouldn't be a major issue in his decision.
"Last year, at this point in time, I knew I was going to play this year," he said. "At this point in time, I don't really know about next year. Winning it all would be awesome, but I don't think the final decision about next year will have all that much to do with it."
So he might play again in Boston.
But there only will be one first time.
Terry Frei of The Denver Post is a regular contributor to ESPN.com. His feedback email address is ChipHilton23@hotmail.com.
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