When the Toronto Maple Leafs traded Grant Fuhr to the Buffalo Sabres midway through the 1992-93 season, the five-time Stanley Cup champion goaltender found himself battling the superstar goalie of the future for the crease.
Dominik Hasek, three years younger than Fuhr, had been traded from Chicago and was on the come-up. The two star goaltenders wielded contrasting styles and crossed paths at vastly different stages of their NHL careers.
We asked Fuhr, a Sabre for parts of three seasons, to break down his relationship in Buffalo with a young Dominator, with whom he shared a William Jennings Trophy in 1993-94. Here’s what he told us about the man who now joins him in the Hockey Hall of Fame:
GRANT FUHR: “I’d seen Dom in Canada Cups, because he always played for the Czech team. So you knew he was talented. I was surprised when Chicago let him go to Buffalo. I know they had Eddie [Belfour], but Dom was a great goalie. Dom is very analytical — a smart, smart gentleman. Different style.
“When I got traded to Buffalo, I was surprised [I did] because they already had Dom there. More than anything it was a shock when I went to Buffalo, but I figured it was because [GM John Muckler] was there. And we had history with Muck in Edmonton. But to go in there with Dom there, you knew you had to be good – because Dom was good.
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“I assumed we’d be 50/50 and push each other. That’s the way it was in Edmonton with Andy [Moog]. When Edmonton brought in Billy Ranford, it was the same thing. We pushed each other. When I got to Toronto, they drafted Felix [Potvin] for us to push each other. Go there, Dom’s there, you think the same thing. Dom was just coming into his own at that time, and I was kind of in a stale spot.
“You’re teammates. You want to push each other to make each other better. Dom worked harder in practice than anybody I’ve ever seen, which made you work harder. So for me it was a good thing.
“We were probably complete opposites. I was probably more technical. Dom’s good technically, but at the same time he’s a little more… what would you call it? Helter skelter. It was fun to watch because it was different. Nobody over here in North America played that way. The closest thing to it was probably Tony Esposito in the ’70s. It was fun to watch Dom play. He was never dull.
“The year we played Jersey in the [1994] playoffs, he was unbelievable. Jersey was a much better hockey team than we were, but Dom was fantastic. It was the second and third saves he was making that most guys wouldn’t get. We figured it was just Dom.
“After I got traded out of there [to L.A. early in the 1994-95 season], the team got worse, but they never finished any worse because Dom kept them in every game. He was getting a lot of work at that time, so it made it even more fun to watch.”