Melrose was 'just a great guy,' Maple Leafs legend, cousin Clark tells NHL.com

Toronto Maple Leafs legend Wendel Clark has many memories of his cousin Barry Melrose, the former NHL player, coach and ESPN broadcaster who died on Wednesday at age 70.

Both natives of Kelvington, Saskatchewan, Clark fondly remembers teaching alongside Melrose, 11 years his senior, at the Barry Melrose Hockey School in the early 1980s.

He recalls a melee at Maple Leaf Gardens involving himself and Melrose -- and everyone else -- on Jan. 13, 1986, the benches of the Maple Leafs and Detroit Red Wings having fully emptied during a brawl that lasted almost 19 minutes before the smoke had cleared.

And Clark remembers shaking Melrose's hand on Gardens ice on May 29, 1993; coaching Los Angeles, Melrose had just guided his team to the elimination of the Maple Leafs in the seventh game of the Clarence Campbell Conference Final, sending the Kings to the Cup Final that they'd lose in five games to the Montreal Canadiens.

Barry Melrose on the ESPN set in 2019.

But a memory away from hockey is what burns most brightly for Clark when he considers his late cousin.

"Barry was the leader of our group of 10 or so guys who every summer played fastball in the small towns of Saskatchewan," Clark said in a conversation with NHL.com on Thursday. "We were always together as a group and Barry was the focus on that team. He was catcher, I pitched and played shortstop, my brother Don played first base and (fellow NHL veteran) Joey Kocur played third. Barry was the guy. I've never seen anyone hit a fastball the way he could, and he was still using a wood bat when everyone else had switched to aluminum.

"I can imagine him as a hockey teammate. I talked with (fellow Maple Leafs icon) Darryl Sittler about that recently. Barry played with Darryl in Toronto (from 1980-83). He was just a great guy."

Clark's connection with Melrose began in Kelvington, their fathers running the community arena at different times. Melrose's dad was in charge of the facility when Clark began skating as a youngster, and the future captain of the Maple Leafs who would be hugely popular with fans as "Captain Crunch" signed on at age 16 as an instructor at Melrose's summer hockey school, its namesake already playing with Toronto.

A 1993 Kelvington, Saskatchewan sports program featuring Barry Melrose, Wendel Clark and Joey Kocur.

"I'd graduated to be an instructor at 16," Clark said with a laugh. "I guess I was good because I was the right age to teach kids. When you're 16 and you're teaching 6- and 8- and 10- and 12-year-olds, they can really relate to you. Young players who wanted to be instructors were good teachers because kids could relate to someone who wasn't 30 years older than them. So my first teaching at hockey schools would have been with Barry."

Another mainstay in the area was future Red Wings heavyweight Joey Kocur. Brothers in the Clark, Melrose and Kocur families, among others, were a tight-knit group, "something in the water of Kelvington," Clark believes, fueling NHL careers.

Clark's NHL career would intersect just one year with that of Melrose the player, in 1985-86, the rookie Clark colliding behind a net with Melrose in what raised the tent on a three-ring Gardens circus on Jan. 13, 1986.

Melrose tried to hit Clark at 14:31 of the third period, but the latter saw his cousin at the last second, lifting an elbow. A scuffle among all on the ice seemed to be the end of it until Red Wings coach Brad Park sent his team over the boards.

Wendel Clark greets fans during NHL Kraft Hockeyville Canada festivities in September 2018.

"I didn't know it was Barry," Clark told the Toronto Star's Frank Orr. "I just saw a red sweater and hit it before it could hit me. It was just like Saturday night in a bar in Kelvington, a little scrap to liven things up."

Clark was given a fighting major in the ensuing rumble, but that wasn't against Melrose. Referee Ron Hoggarth assessed 296 penalty minutes by the final siren of Toronto's 7-4 victory, 160 charged to the Red Wings.

A little more than seven years later, Melrose and Clark met again on Gardens ice, shaking hands at the conclusion of the Kings-Maple Leafs Conference Final.

"Barry had been an excellent junior coach in Medicine Hat (winning the Memorial Cup in 1987-88) and he coached a team in Los Angeles that was a lot better than many people thought," Clark said. "I congratulated him and wished him well against Montreal.

Barry Melrose drives a Zamboni ice-resurfacing machine as part of an ESPN/NHL promotion in 2021.

"I tell people in Toronto today that a lot don't know how good teams are out west because we're sleeping when they start playing."

Clark got a charge out of Melrose's legendary hair -- his forever mullet that would become familiar to millions of ESPN viewers during his broadcast career and even spawn its own tribute websites.

Indeed, a 2008 St. Petersburg Times story mentioned that Melrose had a fishing fly named for him -- the Melrose Mullet.

"Imagine, being from Kelvington with the dress code of the prairies farm, to the way he looked on TV," Clark said. "I guess he became a clothes horse coaching in LA.

"I think Barry wore long hair for so long, because he knew that the rest of us had none.

Wendel Clark is interviewed during the NHL All-Star Legacy Project event at Toronto's Alexandra Park on Jan. 31, 2024.

"I remember the 1993 Conference Final, Barry behind their bench and (the late) Pat Burns behind ours. We joked that as much as was happening on the ice, it was a war of suits and ties behind the benches, two well-dressed guys arguing the entire series.

"We kidded Barry about his broken Kelvington English, which I think made him so popular on TV. He had his own sayings, expressions, how he put things together… I think a lot of people enjoyed his honesty."

Clark is processing all his memories today, so many pages in the scrapbooks of his mind to flip through. And again, he drifts from the rink for his favorite.

"Now, when I think of Barry, what comes to mind most is his being the leader of our fastball group, of having a few pops after a ball tournament in many small towns around Saskatchewan."

Top photo: Wendel Clark at Toronto's Exhibition Stadium for the 2016 NHL Centennial Classic, and Barry Melrose in an ESPN Studios pose in 2014.