38 jours avant la soirée d’ouverture : Rick Lanz (38e meilleur marqueur de tous les temps)
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38 jours avant la soirée d’ouverture : Rick Lanz (38e meilleur marqueur de tous les temps)
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38. Rick Lanz — 417GP | 56G | 171A | 227P | 1981-1987
Richard Roman Lanz was born in Czechoslovakia in 1961. His family defected to Canada in 1968 after the Soviet Union invasion. Rick grew up playing hockey in Ontario as a right-shot defenseman. Lanz got the opportunity to play for the Oshawa Generals and excelled. He was named the team’s best defenseman in 3-consecutive seasons. Lanz was also named to Canada’s World Junior Championship team in 1980.
Considered to be a top prospect in the 1980 draft, Lanz was selected by the Canucks 7th overall in 1980. At 19-years old, he joined the team for 76-games in his rookie season. He scored a game-winning-goal in his first career game against Detroit. Lanz had 29-points that year and was off to a great start to his NHL career.
Being fluent in Czech, Lanz served as an interpreter for the team when they brought Ivan Hlinka and Jiri Bubla to Vancouver in 1981
In 1981-82, Vancouver went on an unprecedented run to the Stanley Cup Finals where they were swept by the New York Islanders, but Lanz had torn knee ligaments in January that caused him to miss the entire playoffs that year. He only played in 39-games during the regular season.
His next two seasons in Vancouver were some of his best. He managed to stay healthy and went back to producing solid point totals for a defenseman. He also represented Canada in the 1983 World Championship where he won a bronze medal.
In 1983-84, Lanz scored 18-goals with 14 of them coming on the power play (T-1st in the NHL with Paul Coffey). He also had 23-assists on the power play that year. He finished the season with 57-points and was voted as Vancouver’s best defenseman.
The next year he missed training camp and part of the regular season with a swollen disc in his neck. He only scored 2-goals in 1984-85, but bounced back in 1985-86 with a 15-goal 53-point campaign.
In 1986-87, Lanz suffered a broken jaw on October 16th. He only played 17-games with Vancouver before he was traded on December 2nd to the Toronto Maple Laughs for Dan Hodgson and defenseman Jim Benning…
Lanz played 2.5 seasons with Toronto, but injuries began to pile up and derail his career. He left the NHL for Switzerland in 1989 playing for HC Ambrì-Piotta. The following year, he returned to North America and played for the Indianapolis Ice but only managed to play in 8-games. He made an NHL comeback in 1991-92 with the Chicago Blackhawks but only managed to play one game before being traded to the LA Kings in November. He never played for LA and proceeded to play two more seasons in the IHL with Phoenix and Atlanta before officially retiring in 1993.
In retirement, Lanz returned to BC and began his coaching career in the BCHL with Penticton as an assistant. His first head coaching gig was with the Langley Thunder in 1995. He had a brief stint with the Tri-City Americans as assistant and head coach in 1997-98 before returning to Langley the next season.
In 2004 he became head coach of the Burnaby Express and won the Royal Bank Cup in 2006 (Canadian Junior A Champions). He then went on to coach the Victoria Grizzlies—which was brief because the Colorado Avalanche offered him a head scouting role for western Canada & the US.
He stayed with the Avalanche for many years, but eventually joined the Blues in 2018-2019 and was a part of their Stanley Cup winning season. He currently coaches in the Delta Hockey Academy.
Fun fact: they named Lanzdowne mall after him