Lindros expects ‘fun’ in Montreal

Retired NHL player routinely booed there during career

MONTREAL • Nearly three dozen former National Hockey League players will lace up their skates at the Bell Centre on Sunday for a game pitting stars from the 1980s and ’ 90s against a Canadiens alumni team.

Ironically, Canadiens general manager Marc Bergevin will play against the team made up of former Habs. He’ll be wearing a Chicago Blackhawks jersey as part of the NHL AllStars team.

Drafted by the Blackhawks in 1983, Bergevin played 20 seasons as a defenceman in the NHL. His teammates on Sunday will include former Boston Bruins defenceman Raymond Bourque, Los Angeles Kings alumni Luc Robitaille and Marcel Dionne, and former Philadelphia Flyer Eric Lindros, who retired in 2007.

Fans at the Bell Centre routinely booed Lindros when he played there with visiting teams, no doubt over his refusal to play for the Quebec Nordiques, the team that drafted him with the No. 1 pick in 1991. Asked what kind of reception he was expecting on Sunday, Lindros said: “I’m going to have some fun. I mean, essentially we’re there for charity, are we not?”

Part of the proceeds from the game, which starts at 1 p.m., will go to the Canadiens Alumni and the Montreal Canadiens Children’s Foundation.

Lindros, who married Montreal native Kina Lamarche last November at a church in Outremont, is also planning to tie a family visit into the occasion.

Lindros still plays hockey in Toronto with a group that tries to hit the ice once a week.

“It depends how the back is feeling,” he laughed in a telephone interview on Thursday.

“I have a great time,” he said. “Being around the game is the part that I miss the most.”

Lindros’s struggles with concussions were well-documented during his NHL career. He said he believes the culture in the league about hits to the head has changed a bit from the 1990s in terms of addressing the issue and talking freely about it to a larger degree.

“Has it come the whole way? I don’t think so,” Lindros said.

“I’m not so sure that it doesn’t make sense to put the red line back in,” he added. “I don’t think it’s going to take away from the scoring. ... It would slow the game down, just enough, just a fraction where people would have a little bit more time to make decisions, both when you have the puck and when you’re going in to forecheck.”

It’s not the new, bigger shoulder pads, he added, saying: “it’s the speed of everything.”

“And when you have two people going in opposite directions or at high speeds and collisions are going to happen, it’s part of the game. Inevitably, the weakest link is going to give, and in many cases that ends up being above your shoulders.”

Lindros also knows what it’s like playing in a shortened NHL season due to a lockout. He tied Jaromir Jagr for the league lead with 70 points in the abbreviated 1994-95 season, which was 48 games, and won the Hart Trophy and Ted Lindsay Award.

“I think you’re going to notice this a lot more this year in terms of depth of a team,” he said. “You go from playing generally, I think, it’s 2.2 games a week to 2.6, 2.7. It might not seem like a lot, but that — over time — is a big difference. It is a huge difference.

“Rolling four lines when you have the chance to do so, those teams that can do that are going to have such an advantage because their guys are going to be fresh down the pipe and into the playoffs.”

The Canadiens’ alumni roster for Sunday’s game includes Chris Chelios, Chris Nilan, Patrice Brisebois, Guy Carbonneau and Steve Shutt. Canadiens assistant coach Jean-Jacques Daigneault and Hamilton Bulldogs coach Sylvain Lefebvre will also suit up for the team. Habs legend Guy Lafleur will be behind the bench, helped by Yvon Lambert. Jacques Demers and Michel Bergeron will coach the NHL ALL-Stars.