The story behind Tom and Jerry
A mask created out of whimsy lives on as a tribute
EDMONTON, Alberta — Consider the goalie mask.
At the most basic level, it’s protection. Pulled down over a goalie’s head, the mask guards against 95 mph shots and sticks slapping at loose pucks. But often, there’s something more behind it. Look at the way the mask simultaneously obscures the goaltender’s face, hiding his eyes and the emotions. At the same time, the ornate designs and creative themes also can reveal something unseen.
Perhaps, it’s here that we should start Tristan Jarry’s story.
For his entire pro career, he has worn a mask featuring cartoon characters Tom and Jerry. He’s done it through junior hockey, in the American Hockey League with Wilkes-Barre/
Scranton and now this season with the Penguins. As he’s climbed to the top of the NHL leaderboard in goals-against average and save percentage, Tom and Jerry have been there for all of it.
It started off simply. When Jarry was playing for the Edmonton Oil Kings of the
Western Hockey League, his international teammates Kristians Pelss and Martin Gernat didn’t speak much English. But when they heard “Jarry” their minds, for whatever reason, went to the cartoon Tom and Jerry. The nickname stuck.
Jarry painted his mask during that developmental season with Tom, the clumsy house cat, and Jerry, the cunning mouse who also seems to skirt trouble. It was a fitting way for Jarry, the quiet, happy-go-lucky goalie, to express his personality.
What he didn’t realize at the time was that what began as a fun and playful expression of self would soon take on much greater meaning.
On June 11, 2013, after a night of partying with friends at a night club in Riga, Latvia, Pelss walked alone to the Stone Bridge. He neatly folded his clothes and placed them on the railing. Then, he dove into the fast-flowing river below.
Before we tell you any more about the mask, first meet the man behind it.
Jarry was born in Surrey, British Columbia, and moved soon after to North Delta — a largely middle-class commuter town near Vancouver. In this hockey-obsessed corner of Western Canada, Jarry spent most nights sitting in the basement with his parents and younger brother watching “Hockey Night in Canada.” He naturally grew up rooting for the Canucks and idolizing stars such as Markus Naslund, Todd Bertuzzi and Brendan Morrison.
Goalie gear, fittingly and perhaps serendipitously, began to pave his way to the crease. Jarry’s father managed the equipment for the North Delta Minor Hockey Association, so he always had the goalie gear.
Once a week, a goaltending development program put on a clinic called “Magic in the Net.” Even though Jarry loved playing forward and would continue to unleash big, right-handed slap shots for years to come, the clinic was another chance to get on the ice. So. at 7 years old, he strapped on the pads and pulled the mask over his face for the first time.
“It was free. My dad said if you want to go skate, you just have to wear the goalie gear,” Jarry said. “So I went out as a goalie every Monday or Tuesday.”
Initially, the North Delta Minor Hockey Association didn’t have a glove for his left hand. So Jarry started out with the catching glove on his right hand and stick in left, the opposite of how he plays now. Being ambidextrous, it mattered little to Jarry. In soccer, he could kick with both feet equally. In baseball, he threw with his left and caught with his right. On the ice, he shot right-handed.
No matter which hand he used, Jarry was a natural.
“The one thing I’ve got to say about Tristan that’s scary is from a young age, this kid had the ability to read shots off the blade,” said Jarry’s youth goalie coach, Angelo Maggio, who still runs Magic Goalie Development. “That is a talent. That’s a God-given skill.”
“There were times in goalie training I had a tough time scoring on him because he can read the shot so well.”
Jarry continued to play forward in the winter and goalie in the summer for several more seasons. Eventually, those group lessons evolved into private instruction with Maggio. From ages 7 to 18, Jarry and Maggio worked together to fine-tune his skills and forge his style.
“With his puck-handling and multi-dimensional style, we really instilled it into him not to be a cookie cutter,” said Robbie Mattison, a coach, mentor and friend of Jarry’s.
By the time he got into junior high and high school, the student had progressed enough to become a teacher. Maggio and Mattison used to take him to Alaska to help with the instruction.
It was there, during pickup hockey games against college players and other high-level instructors, that Jarry’s potential began to flash. Years before he would seize his opportunity with the Penguins and set a franchise shutout record, he did the same on a smaller stage.
“When you play pickup hockey, you drop a puck, people change but nobody plays defense, right?” Mattison said. “I think he went three days without getting scored on. It was like 2-on-0 breakaways, and no one could score on him.
“That’s where it’s like oh, my gosh. Then you figure out he’s going to Edmonton. You’re like, he’s definitely going to play high-level pro.”
Jarry admits now that the zombies were a bad idea.
“It was really bad,” Jarry said.
But at just 16 years old, during his first season with Edmonton Oil Kings of the Western Hockey League, he really didn’t know what else to paint on his mask. That’s when he met Pelss, the fun-loving Latvian who was drafted by the Edmonton Oilers in 2010 and moved to the WHL to learn the North American game.
Though he was the son of a poet, Pelss was trying to learn a new language. When a reporter asked Pelss if he had grown in the offseason, he responded, “I get weighter and a little, uh, higher.”
Yet, somehow Pelss’ personality permeated through the language barrier. He’d bounce around the locker room singing to LMFAO’s 2011 hit song “Sexy and I Know It,” and dancing to the verse “wiggle, wiggle, wiggle, wiggle, yeah.” His typical pregame ritual featured an intense one-on-one handball competition with Gernat that left them both rolling with laughter.
“He was someone that I looked up to and someone who helped me,” Jarry said. “He always loved being on the ice. He was someone I always hung around because he was a good influence and awesome to be around.”
Pelss and Gernat were the ones who came up with the Tom and Jerry nickname. Tristan Jarry. Tom and Jerry. For whatever reason, it stuck.
New friends and new-found inspiration defined Jarry’s first two seasons in the WHL. But during those 2011-12 and 2012-13 seasons, his playing time was limited. He was essentially the understudy to Laurent Brossoit, who coincidentally also trained with Maggio and is now a backup goalie for the Winnipeg Jets.
Jarry played in 14 games behind Brossoit during the Oil Kings’ run to the 2012 Western Hockey League title. In 2013, when the Oil Kings advanced to the WHL final for a second consecutive year, Jarry appeared in 27 games, recording a remarkable 1.61 goalsagainst average.
“Tristan is a great teammate,” said Derek Laxdal, the former head coach of the Edmonton Oil Kings and current assistant for the Dallas Stars. “If he’s the second goalie, he’s very supportive of the No. 1. But he’s a little bit of a silent assassin. If you get a chance to be the No. 1, you have to take it.”
With Brossoit set to make the jump to pro hockey, Jarry knew that 2013-14 season would be his opportunity to take command of the No. 1 goaltender job.
But first, a life-altering offseason awaited.
The flight was booked. The hotel reserved. Jarry was set to travel to Newark, N.J., for the 2013 NHL draft.
But just two weeks before Jarry was set to take the next huge step in his journey, tragedy led the Edmonton news.
At first, all anybody knew was that Pelss had died, leaving everyone with questions. How did it happen? What could have been done differently? Why did this have to happen?
Reluctantly, friends of Pelss came forward. They painted a picture of a night of partying. Pelss had just returned to Latvia after playing with the Oilers’ minor league teams, the Stockton Thunder and Oklahoma City Barons. He had been talking throughout the night about swimming in the Daugava River. His friends initially dissuaded him. But around 1 a.m., he went to the bridge himself and dove in. The river took his life.
It was an accident — a horrible accident. Pelss was only 20.
“It hit everyone really hard,” said Bob Green, who served as the general manager of the Edmonton Oil Kings and is now chief amateur scout for the NHL’s Edmonton Oilers. “I really believe Kristians would be playing for us today if that hadn’t happened.”
Days later, the Penguins made Jarry their secondround pick. Although Jarry’s raw talent made him one of the highest-rated goalies in his class, it was still a gamble considering he was just a backup in the WHL to that point. Jarry admitted he was surprised to be drafted so early.
With new expectations on his shoulders and a heavy heart, Jarry and his teammates took the ice for a 2013-14 season.
Today, Laxdal, the coach of that Edmonton Oil Kings, searches for the right words to describe how the year unfolded. There’s a word on the tip of his tongue. He can’t find it. It’s, um, you know… “Destiny,” he said, finally. “The young kids really dedicated that year to Kristians Pelss, playing for one of their fallen teammates,” Laxdal said. “They rallied around it. We weren’t the most skilled hockey club. But we were a family and we lost a family member.”
With the Tom and Jerry mask pulled down over his face, Jarry backstopped the Oil Kings on the way to their third consecutive appearance in the WHL final, a sevengame series that swung back and forth. In Game 6, Edmonton was enjoying a comfortable, three-goal lead in its home arena.
Unexpectedly, the opportunity crumbled. The Portland Winterhawks stormed back to force overtime and beat the Oil Kings. The team was shocked and devastated. Just 24 hours later, they would have to play a decisive Game 7 in Oregon.
With Pelss’ jersey on the bench and in the locker room, they persevered and advanced to the Memorial Cup, a prestigious tournament that determines Canada’s junior hockey champions. It’s essentially the national championship of junior hockey, that brings together the three main leagues — the WHL, Quebec Major Junior Hockey League and the Ontario Hockey League. It’s been a Canadian tradition since 1919 in memory of those who died in World War I.
Laxdal said the Oil Kings entered the tournament as the underdog. But in the semifinal, a triple-overtime game that was the longest in Memorial Cup history, they were up against the OHL champs Guelph Storm, a team that would eventually produce at least eight NHL players and is considered by some to be the best Guelph team ever.
Down, 2-0 early, the Oil Kings prayed throughout the game to Pelss, looking to summon every ounce of inspiration and motivation. With that No. 26 jersey hanging on the bench, the Oil Kings mounted a comeback and won, 6-3. A season that had begun with tragedy ended in triumph.
As the final horn sounded, the celebration spilled onto the ice. Players hugged and cried and screamed. Then, they came together at center ice. The players raised their fingers, signaling No.1, as cameramen snapped photos.
More than half a decade has passed since that season of “destiny.” Today that photo hangs in the bowels of Rogers Arena in Edmonton, home of the Oil Kings and Oilers. Look closely. There, in the middle, sprawled across the center of the ice is Jarry.
His mask was thrown into the air in jubilation during the celebration on the ice. But today, no matter where he plays, Tom and Jerry are with him.
“It’s something that goes along with me,” Jarry said. “It’s something that I’ve continued and will continue for the rest of my career.”