Nicklas Lidstrom presents Marian Hossa with his Honoured Member plaque#HHOF2020 | ???? Dave Sandford/HHOF pic.twitter.com/nzlIau9e4U
— Hockey Hall of Fame (@HockeyHallFame) November 16, 2021
Marián Hossa has a photo stored in the family archive, in which, as a thirteen-year-old boy, he stands in the Hockey Hall of Fame building next to the Stanley Cup with his younger brother Marcel.
The Slovak hockey player has now returned to the Hall of Fame, but no longer as a regular visitor, but as a new member. His former teammate from Detroit and one of the most famous hockey defenders, Nicklas Lidström, presented him with a commemorative plaque at the ceremony.
The Swedish hockey player arrived in Toronto at Hoss’s request. “It means a lot to me, Nick,” Hossa told him on stage.
At the induction into the Hall of Fame, he read about fifteen minutes lasting speech, in which he returned to his hockey career and thanked the people who helped him during it.
Right at the beginning, he made the hall laugh when he made a joke about his father František, a former hockey defender and later a coach.
“My brother Marcel and I will always be grateful for the way you have led and supported us, Father,” Hossa said. “But we are also grateful – thank God – for our mother’s hands. We love you, but it’s true that you never scored more than one or two goals a season, “he said.
In his recollections of his beginnings, Hossa said that when he was growing up in Czechoslovakia, he didn’t know much about the NHL and his dream was to get into the national team.
“But everything changed when I got Wayne Gretzky’s VHS tape. I was kidnapped when I saw him skating easily around his opponents. It inspired me to try to imitate him on ice, “he recalled.
In addition to Gretzky, Marián Hossa also admired Mario Lemieux, whose final matches he and his brother Marcel got used to at night. However, he also mentioned Jaromír Jágr, who together with Lemieux played for the famous Pittsburgh team.
“Thanks to Jags (nickname – editor’s note) I realized that
