Sidney Crosby's career before the NHL, was full of challenges. But everything had a purpose. To be the best hockey player he could be.
Sidney Crosby: A Hockey Story (Nimbus Publishing) by Paul Arseneault illustrates two themes. One, this book provides an interesting perspective to Sidney Crosby’s amateur hockey career, before he was drafted first over-all in the 2005 NHL entry draft by the Pittsburgh Penguins.
This Sidney Crosby biography begins with the 2002 Air Canada Cup which the author states “Sidney Crosby used the 2002 Air Canada Cup, hosted in the city of Bathurst, New Brunswick, to explode onto the North American hockey scene. The tournament marked the beginning of a journey that would see him become the eventual Number One pick in the 2005 NHL Entry Draft…” and concludes with his junior club’s loss in the final game of the 2005 Memorial Cup
Secondly, Sidney Crosby: A Hockey Story provides a brief overview of the history of hockey in Canada’s Maritime provinces.
The Introduction provides a snapshot of Maritime hockey experiences, including some early Stanley Cup challenges by east coast teams. The theme of the Maritime hockey experience is woven throughout the book in terms of successes tied to Sidney Crosby: teenage hockey star, both as a youngster representing his region in national tournaments and as a successful junior player both on the national and international stage.
The first six chapters provide the reader with an in-depth perspective on Crosby as a teenage hockey phenomenon, first in Nova Scotia, then in Minnesota playing for Shattuck-St. Mary’s prep school, and finally in Rimouski where he led the Oceanic to junior hockey prominence both in the Quebec Major Junior League and the Canadian Hockey League.
As well as the above-mentioned themes there is another major over-riding theme of the book that is illustrated by the following caption at the beginning of Chapter 7:
Sidney Crosby will be among the best and most important players in the history of the National Hockey League. Baring injury, number 87 may even surpass the records and achievements of Wayne Gretzky to take his place atop the list of the greatest players the game has ever produced. Making such a statement previous to the events of July 2005 would have been impossible, but groundbreaking circumstances, perhaps the most important in eighty years of hockey, have put Sidney Crosby in the perfect position to fulfill his destiny as the next hockey great.
In the first paragraph of Chapter 7, the author further states that Crosby might not be able to make these achievements, mentioned in the quotation above, if he had started to play professional hockey at an earlier time in history except for a “fortuitous draft lottery, groundbreaking rule changes…” which changed the face of the National Hockey League.
Sidney Crosby: A Hockey Story facilitates easy and relaxed, but informed reading. There are plenty of sidebars with interesting captions featuring facts and other information about Sidney Crosby’s career. But, many readers will discover another great attribute to this book. There are many Sidney Crosby pictures featuring his life as a youngster. These pictures provide some great shots of the young hockey player and his family.
The book concludes with two interesting features. First of all, Crosby’s Ten Most Memorable Games are listed. None of these landmark events occur in the NHL, instead, they represent a broad cross-section of Crosby’s amateur career in many different local, national and international venues. The final section of the book contains a Q&A session with three hockey mentors, two coaches and one director of hockey of hockey operations, from Sidney’s amateur career.
Sidney Crosby: A Hockey Story is not only a good read, but also provides some very interesting, and perhaps new information about the next great hockey star.
