Current Islanders Pay Tribute to Mike Bossy

Anthony Beauvillier didn't grow up watching Mike Bossy, but his father Sylvain did.
Sylvain idolized Bossy during his heyday, when the Montreal native was filling nets nightly for the New York Islanders. When Beauvillier was drafted by the Islanders and put on the jersey for the first time, Sylvain told him "same team as Mike."
"My dad idolized him," Beauvillier said. "He was a big part of his growing up. He would talk about him all the time and how he would play the game. Yeah, it's tough day for the Islanders."

Some of that fandom trickled down to Anthony, who put out a touching Instagram post to honor Bossy, who passed away on Friday at 65 after a bout with lung cancer. As a New York Islander himself, Beauvillier had chances to meet Bossy and when he did, he told the Hall of Famer he was one of his father's favorite players.

"He said it made him feel old and we'd have a laugh about it," Beauvillier said. "But I did tell wanted one picture with him because that would make my dad jealous. He was obviously great man and I got to share a few chats with him and only good things to say."
Beauvillier was one of three current Islanders to share memories of the late Islanders legend on Friday. Head Coach Barry Trotz started his pregame press conference by calling Bossy a great ambassador for the team and the sport overall.
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"I want to send our thoughts and prayers from the Islanders family to the Bossy family," Trotz said. "Mike Bossy was a great ambassador to the Islanders and a great ambassador to the game of hockey. He was one of the great scorers and one of the great people in the league. He will be missed."
No conversation about Bossy's greatness could be had without acknowledging his prolific goal scoring. Bossy's 573 goals are the most in franchise history and he did so in only 752 games. To this date, Bossy's 0.76 goals-per-game average that is the highest in the League's history for players with over 200 goals.
What impressed Trotz, who coached Alex Ovechkin for four years in Washington, was how an undersized Bossy made such a big impact on the scoresheet.
"He had a nose for the net and he would find ways," Trotz said. "Mike wasn't overly big. He used his smarts and his determination and his skill to score. And he went to those hard places when you get you know, you get cross checked and the padding wasn't the same all that. He was very, very tough in those areas. For sure."
Anders Lee, who is 11th on the Islanders all-time goal list with 210 tallies, spoke in awe of Bossy's accomplishments.
"He gets labeled as one of the best pure goal scorers of all time and he rightly has that," Lee said. "He had a skill level that you could see would have transcended different generations."

Lee became the first Islander in over a decade to hit the 40-goal mark in the 2017-18 season and knows what it takes to even hit that lofty height. When asked to put Bossy's run of nine-consecutive 50-goal seasons into perspective, he just shook his head.
"The moment he stepped into the league all the way through he was a dominant force," Lee said. "The reason why the Islanders had so much success in those days. Really just a phenomenal career, one reason why he's a Hall of Famer and all of those things."
Mathew Barzal only met Bossy on a handful of occasions, but one of them was at Centre Bell in 2018, during Barzal's rookie year, so being back in the building stirred memories of that encounter.
"He gave me some insight on what it means to play for the Isles and just what it takes to be an elite player in this league," Barzal said. "Definitely had some funny lines just about how easy it was scoring goals the NHL, so he gave me a good laugh and just seemed like he was very charismatic and you know, obviously one of the best goal scorers of all time."

Barzal alluded to being big leagued by players with a smaller stature than Bossy, a Hall of Fame inductee in 1991, so he appreciated that Bossy took the time to have a chat with the then-rookie.
"I was pretty lucky to get a chance to meet him and have a little conversation with him because that knowledge of such an elite player you don't get unless you talk to them kind of behind closed doors a little bit," Barzal said.
Bossy's passing comes in the wake of the team losing two other pillars in Hall of Famer Clark Gillies in January and Jean Potvin in March. It's been a tough time for the Islanders family as a whole, especially after Friday's news.
"Those guys paved the way on and off the ice," said Josh Bailey, whose 985 games rank third all-time in franchise history. "It was great to have the opportunity of getting to know them over the years and those two among others were a big part of Islanders franchise and still are to this day."