Brilliance Routine for Mario Lemieux

PITTSBURGH —  Rob Brown, who resembles Benjamin Franklin and is almost as quotable, looked at the questioner as if he were some kind of heretic.

“Does ANYTHING Mario Lemieux do on the ice surprise me?” Brown, 20, a Pittsburgh Penguins winger, said, repeating the question. “People who only see him play once in a while may be shocked when they see Mario make some incredible move or score some unbelievable goal. But when you see him play all the time and he’s on your team, you are not surprised. You are just thankful that you can expect his greatness.”

What Brown is describing is routine brilliance.

Routine brilliance.

Those two words aren’t compatible, because there is nothing humdrum about greatness. But it is within the domain of night-in and night-out performance that Lemieux has risen to such a consistent level that even at 23 he is knocking on the door of immortality. It is difficult to describe this 6-foot-4, 215-pound skating octopus any other way. Lemieux’s combination of size, reach, skill and strength handling the puck are unique.

He’s a playmaker with a feathery touch and field of vision second only to Wayne Gretzky.

He can work free in front of the net and unleash a sniper’s bullet a la Phil Esposito in his prime.

And he uses what seems like 15-foot rubber arms to control the puck and the tempo of the game like no one else in NHL history.

“God only knows what’s going to come from Mario Lemieux next,” Edmonton’s Craig Simpson said of his former Penguins teammate.

“When Gretzky broke 200 points and went on to set the record (215 points in 1985-86), everybody wondered if it would ever be broken,” Hartford Whalers President and General Manager Emile Francis said. “Forget in Gretzky’s lifetime. Lemieux might do it while Wayne’s still in his prime.”

Earlier in his NHL career, the critics complained the kid didn’t care enough. He didn’t have enough heart. He was two zones away while his team was on defense. He turned it on and off as his mood hit and, like the Penguins, folded down the stretch. All that has changed the past two years.

“Wayne Gretzky taught Mario how to win,” said Mr. Hockey, Gordie Howe. “In my mind, Mario became a hockey player at last year’s Canada Cup. Before he was a talent, a great talent. But he was weak defensively and didn’t seem to be involved at all times. Now, he’s damn near as good a hockey player as Wayne is.

“And he can do things that Wayne isn’t physically able to do. The way he uses those arms and his strength to control the puck when it’s about five feet away from him is unbelievable. That big son of a gun is something else.”

As much as the Universal Gretzky Adoration Society does not want to admit it, the time has come when Lemieux perhaps should no longer be held in comparison to Gretzky. At this point, Gretzky probably should be compared to Lemieux.

After being limited to one assist in a 2-2 tie in New Jersey on Friday, Lemieux entered Monday night’s game against the Whalers at the Hartford Civic Center leading the NHL with 92 points (36 goals, 56 assists) in 33 games. If Lemieux doesn’t miss any more games to injury, his 2.79-points-a-game pace would give him an NHL record 217 points. His goal pace is headed for 85, which would be second only to Gretzky’s 92 goals in 1981-82. All those projections won’t mean a hill of beans if Lemieux rips off another 41-point barrage like he did in the first 12 games of this season before missing a few games with a wrist injury.

“I want to win the scoring title, with Gretzky (82 points), Bernie Nicholls (83) and myself there’s a challenge,” Lemieux said. “I want to be the best I can. But after a while all the Lemieux vs. Gretzky (comparisons) can get a little old. I’m sure Wayne feels the same way. I really admire him. But I want to be recognized as Mario Lemieux and judged on what I can do.”

“There’s got to be some friendly competition between the two,” Brown said. “But Mario hears it so much. Wouldn’t you get tired of it, too?”

The irony is that Gretzky served as a teacher in Lemieux’s maturation process. Gretzky showed Lemieux the door to immortality, but Lemieux had to be the one to open it.

At the 1987 Canada Cup, Lemieux played on Gretzky’s wing. They pushed each other to a higher level. As Team Canada Coach Jean Perron said at the time, “Buckle up because we’re going into hockey space.”

The two complemented each other. They challenged each other. Much of it was done not in words, but in the reflex actions of peerless talents. Lemieux scored 11 goals in nine games. Gretzky assisted on nine of them.

For purists, the three-game Canada Cup series against the Soviets may well have been the greatest hockey ever played. And the riveting overtime thriller in Game 2 at Hamilton may have been the greatest single game in hockey history. Lemieux won it. Gretzky assisted. In the final minute of the decisive third game, Canada broke the deadlock. Goal Lemieux. Assist Gretzky. Match to Canada.

“There is no denying how much winning at the Canada Cup meant to me,” Lemieux said, criticized in the past for turning down invitations to the world championships after Pittsburgh had failed to make the NHL playoffs. “Wayne was terrific. It gave me confidence that I could play with the best in the world.”

Howe is big buddies with Gretzky. It would be a major upset for him to admit publicly that Lemieux is better. But others have said it.

“Right now, Mario Lemieux is the best player in the world,” Detroit Coach Jacques Demers said.

A Lemieux vs. Gretzky poll in the Whalers’ locker room earlier this season showed that more players believed Lemieux’s talent was No. 1, but that they’d still want Gretzky when it mattered most.

Mike Liut said you don’t surpass Gretzky. You can only match him.

Brent Peterson said, “For the regular season, I’d take Lemieux. For the playoffs, I’d take Gretzky.”

Lemieux cannot be shocked by such talk. Even though Gretzky missed 16 games because of injury last season, Lemieux scored NHL highs of 70 goals and 168 points to break Gretzky’s run of eight Hart Trophies as league MVP. And his six-point performance in last year’s All-Star Game in St. Louis was frightening in its dominance.