from Pierre LeBrun of ESPN,

You get jaded sometimes in this business, you forget how lucky you are to do what you do for a living.

But this time of year always rejuvenates my love for the game.

It always reminds me why when I was nine years old, I dreamed of covering the NHL while my pals wanted to play in it. I was the weird kid who did play-by-play during street hockey games (in French and English).

Being an NHL journalist has been my life’s sole journey for as long as I can remember. I have a Grade 8 scrapbook in which I wrote game recaps for each game of the 1986 Stanley Cup finals between Montreal and Calgary.

It was always going to be my living, one way or another.

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