NHL champions remember Texarkana, Kim Cannon
TEXARKANA — Pat Maroon, a journeyman in the National Hockey League, joined with his former junior hockey league head coach this season and together Jon Cooper, Maroon and the Tampa Bay Lightning won the Stanley Cup earlier this week.
Maroon is a back-to-back Stanley Cup champion after winning the NHL title with his hometown St. Louis Blues last season.
Maroon also played for Cooper in St. Louis for the St. Louis Bandits, after the team was founded as the Texarkana Bandits, a member of the NAHL from 20032006. Maroon was 17 when he joined the Texarkana Bandits, attending school at Texarkana College and preparing for what he hoped would be a career in the National Hockey League.
I can remember covering Maroon and Cooper for the Texarkana Gazette early in my career and even interviewing Maroon, as a fellow student, for the TC News. A member of the Bandits from 2005-07, Maroon stood out; he had a quiet nature among his peers but had the frame that he would eventually grow into at 6-foot-3 and 225 pounds.
This was Cooper’s second time coaching the Lightning in the Stanley Cup Finals, losing to the Chicago Blackhawks in the 2015 series.
On Sept. 10, 2020, a car crash in Webster Parish took the life of 35-year-old Kim Cannon. Cannon had a huge impact in Cooper and Maroon during their time with the Bandits, both in Texarkana and St. Louis.
Cannon joined the Texarkana Bandits when she was only 19, selling team merchandise at home games at the Four States Fair and Rodeo Arena. The more Cooper worked with Cannon, the more responsibility he entrusted her with, and she eventually became the Bandits’ director of team operations.
“We’re playing in the Four States Fairgrounds and we’re trying to sell Tier II Jr. A hockey to people in the south,” Cooper said in a Sports Illustrated article about Cannon’s death. “And here is this 19-year-old girl who we bring on to be the part-time merchandise-selling girl who, little do we know at the time, is going to touch our lives forever. She was the best.
“She did all the things that would never get you in the newspaper,” Cooper added. “She always put everyone else in front of her. By the time we got to St. Louis, she was basically running the team outside of the hockey and I was getting all the credit for it. I couldn’t live without her, that’s how important she was. If we were ever fortunate enough to win a Stanley Cup, she would have been one of the first people to drink out of it.”
Twice during the Stanley Cup Playoffs, Maroon memorialized someone by writing R.I.P and their name on his hockey stick during the game. The first was a high school teammate of his, Tamarris Bohannon, a St. Louis police officer killed in the line of duty during the NHL postseason. The second was Kim Cannon, who lived in Shreveport, La.
“She was born an angel,” Maroon said. “And she left
this world as an angel. She was like another sister to me. You could talk to her about anything and she always had your back. She had the most beautiful smile ever and she loved taking care of everyone.
“She’s going to be smiling down on me and ‘Coop’ with that big smile of hers. We’re going to miss that smile.”
Texarkana residents who remain hockey fans congratulate Cooper, Maroon and his teammates and respect the job a young woman did to help the organization that ties them to our hometown. Rest in peace, Kim Cannon.