Fleury had fun on road to 400 NHL wins

VANCOUVER --There was no shortage of former NHL goaltenders cheering for Marc-Andre Fleury when the Vegas Golden Knights goalie celebrated his 400th NHL win Monday.
Talking to Fleury's former playing partners before his milestone-clinching 3-2 victory against the Philadelphia Flyers, it was clear how hard all were pulling for him, in large part because of his seemingly ever-present smile and sincerity of the man behind it.

"Marc-Andre is like chocolate, you just can't not like him," said Jocelyn Thibault, Fleury's teammate with the Pittsburgh Penguins from 2005-07. "He's always smiling, always having fun, but he's very professional, even on bad days and through tough times in his career. I'm not surprised a lot of people are cheering for him because he is one of the greatest teammates I've ever seen."
\[RELATED: Fleury gets 400th NHL win, Golden Knights top Flyers\]
It's a big statement from a goalie who played 14 NHL seasons on five teams, but Thibault's sentiments were echoed by other former teammates. Along with Fleury's willingness to evolve his style and reign in his incredible natural athleticism, they agreed his positive approach played a big role in being the 13th NHL goalie with 400 wins.
"He genuinely cared about everyone he plays with, which is rare in this day and age," said Jeff Zatkoff, who played with Fleury from 2013-16. "Even if he is not the one in the net, I always felt like he genuinely wanted me to do well, or wanted [Matt Murray] to do well. Genuine is a good way to describe him. It doesn't matter if you played in the League 10 years or one, he treats everyone the same and that goes a long way in the locker room."
Fleury's positive approach has come in handy dealing with adversity, whether playing behind an overmatched Penguins team at age 19, struggling through four straight Stanley Cup Playoff appearances after winning the Cup for the first time in 2009, or losing his job to Murray while the Penguins won the Cup in consecutive seasons before leaving him unprotected for the 2017 NHL Expansion Draft.
"The way he's wired, always so positive, gets him through down spots," Zatkoff said.
It rubbed off on teammates.

"Everyone deals with their inner demons differently and I struggled almost yearly with some kind of inconsistency," said Brent Johnson, who played his final three NHL seasons with Fleury from 2009-12. "And one of the main things was seeing Marc at the other end in practice, he has the hockey world by the tail and you see how much fun he is having, how he approaches it and then you try to do that and it comes through. It is important to have fun out on the ice."
A noted prankster, Fleury also liked to have fun messing with teammates, said Dany Sabourin, who appeared in one game for the Penguins in 2006 and 43 from 2007-09. But Fleury was good at mixing business with pleasure.
"When it's time to work, he works, but always with a smile," said Sabourin, who retired last summer and is a goaltending coach with Rouyn-Noranda of the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League. "He can work seven days a week and he's still going to have fun because he always does it with a smile on."
Fleury's willingness to adjust his game has been another constant in his career. It's no coincidence it took off again after adjusting his positioning and post play with then Penguins coach Mike Bales from 2013-17.
"His first couple of years he was very athletic and he'd challenge shooters, and he was diving all over making big SportsCenter saves every game, but I think he had to learn to play more of a controlled game," said Thibault, general manager for Sherbrooke of the QMJHL. "He's still very athletic but he plays with more control, his position is better and he doesn't waste as much energy as he did his first couple of seasons in the League."

Andy Chiodo said he got to see Fleury at his "most raw, talented state" in their first pro season, but it was his character that left a lasting impression. Fleury joined Chiodo with the Penguins' American Hockey League affiliate in Wilkes-Barre/Scranton for the 2004 Calder Cup Playoffs after his QMJHL season ended. He'd already played 22 NHL games to start that season, but never complained when he ended up watching almost all of Wilkes-Barre/Scranton's run to the Calder Cup Final from the press box.
"He was a first overall pick so he could have made waves sitting in the stands watching us go on a two-month playoff run and he didn't," said Chiodo, who finished his 14-year career in Austria last season and is a goalie coach for Ottawa of the Ontario Hockey League. "He was supportive. We'd talk shop, we supported one another, and fast forward 15 years and he carries himself the same way. The constant has been his amazing character. He's positive, he enjoys life, he works his [rear] off, he always has a smile on this face and deep down he knows he's good."
Those who know Fleury best believe those last two qualities are related, and big part of his first 400 NHL wins.