You need to know this. Powell River is a machine. A maker of champions. A little hamlet that churns out athletes the way Toyota churns out automobiles.

Some of the country’s best come from here. Soccer’s Drew Ferguson, who captained Canada’s national team, kicked balls in the professional ranks in Canada, the United States and England, and played alongside legendary players such as Pele and George Best. Connie Polman Tuin, one of Canada’s best runners, entered the world stage in the 1984 Olympic Games in Los Angeles. Roy Gerela was raised in Powell River and down the road became a star with the National Football League’s Pittsburgh Steelers where he became a three-time Super Bowl champion. Brad Bombardir rose through Powell River’s minor hockey ranks and became a classy rearguard for the New Jersey Devils, where he won a Stanley Cup, and played for the Minnesota Wild.

And fans throughout BC, especially in his hometown of Powell River, fans cheered Gary Lupul as he and his Vancouver Canucks battled the New York Islanders in the Stanley Cup final of 1982. Lupul later worked with the team as the Canucks’ scout in Ontario and the northern United States college circuit, was a close friend a mine, and sadly and shockingly, died of a heart attack just last year.

Former NHLers Micah Aivazoff and Dan Lucas are Powell Riverites, as is baseball’s Bobby Cripps, who came close to playing for the Toronto Blue Jays, and Brian Clark, who was within a rotator cuff of pitching for the New York Yankees. But Brian did get to sit beside Joe Dimaggio at the Yankees spring training camp.

Powell River’s Ted Gerela was a star with the Canadian Football League’s BC Lions, and now our eyes are on winger Cam Cunning, who is hoping to crack the Calgary Flames line-up.

And of course there’s the Powell River Regals, three-time Allan Cup champs, a powerhouse in Canadian senior hockey, who have become a modern day Canadian juggernaut, with the majority of it team members being Powell River natives. When they won the Allan Cup in 1997, there were 17 players born and raised in Powell River, whereas one of their competitors, Truro, NS had just two.

Gaston, although not from Powell River, was once called “the best all-round hockey player in the world” by the Russians. (Or was that Bob Gainey?)

Most of us know what he missed. The Russians, who were supposed to collapse like a cheap card table, ended up pummelling the overconfident Canadians 7-3 that night in Montreal, and we were all in a tizzy, which didn’t end until Paul Henderson scored with 34 seconds left in game eight in an army-filled arena a million miles away in Moscow.

So this guy missed the big game, but he kept his tickets, and 35 years later, put them on eBay. Those two $7 tickets sold last year for $950 and there’s a lesson to be learned here. Buy tickets for really big events, don’t go, and sell them later and help put your kids through college.

In 1972, Wrangler jeans sold for twelve bucks, popcorn was 75 cents, eggs were 50 cents and apartment rent averaged around $165. I know this because Google told me so. So $14 for standing room tickets was pretty good coin to fork out at the time.

But if he could’ve turned his $14 investment into $950 right then and there, sure he would have missed the Montreal game, but with 1972 gas prices at 36 cents a gallon, he could have easily driven to Toronto for game two, then settled nicely into some fancy digs like the Royal York Hotel and enjoyed games three and four from Winnipeg and Vancouver on television, with room service included. All from the profit made from his two standing room tickets at the Montreal Forum, which he didn’t, for some reason, go to.

Even better, travel agents at that time were offering charter packages to Moscow to take in the four games there, and the cost was around $1,000 for the plane, hotel, and game tickets. So we know what that means. The guy could have sold his Montreal tickets for $950 and taken the trip of a lifetime to dark and mysterious Russia in the midst of the Cold War. He could have seen the four games and witnessed firsthand Alan Eagleson being manhandled by Soviet soldiers, Phil Esposito falling on his rear end during player announcements, and of course, Paul Henderson’s historic goal, all from his profits from two lousy standing room tickets, if only eBay had existed at that time.

Hopefully the poor guy didn’t feel too bad for missing the big opening game way back then. Maybe he was called into work, in which case he had to go to help pay off that new $4,000 1972 Toyota. Possibly he had lots to do in his new home, which he’d just purchased prior to the series for $30,000, and didn’t have the time or the energy to head down to the Forum on St. Catherines Street in Montreal, and jockey his way into good standing room position.

Maybe he’s been kicking himself ever since for missing it, and the $950 only makes him feel slightly better. But, if he really wants to let it go, he should probably think about the poor ticket takers at the Forum. They handled more than 18,000 tickets that night and then threw all the stubs, which are almost as valuable as full tickets, in the garbage. And the cleaners must have swept up dozens of these beautiful little things from under seats and in the aisles.

If anyone should be kicking themselves, it should be them.