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‘NIAGARA FALLS GUY’: STANLEY CUP CHAMP TELLS HIS PLAYERS ‘THE OPPORTUNITIES ARE THERE’ IN THE OJHL

By Jim Mason/OJHL Communications

Frank Pietrangelo and his hockey club are a natural to be hosting the Ontario Junior Hockey League’s Governors’ Showcase presented by MilkUP this week.

The three-day, 24-game event began today in Niagara Falls, ON. All 24 teams in the OJHL will play two games each in front of 150-plus NHL, NCAA, U SPORTS and Canadian Hockey League scouts.

Pietrangelo is Co-owner,  Director of Hockey Operations and Head Coach of the OJHL’s Niagara Falls Canucks who play out of the host Gale Centre, a state-of-the-art four-rink complex.

He’s the local kid – a graduate of what’s now the OJHL – who made the big time and returned home to help others try and take the same journey.

Longtime fans will remember Pietrangelo as the maker of “The Save” during the 1991 Stanley Cup playoffs.  In Game 6 of the opening round, in his first-ever playoff start, he stopped Peter Statsny of the New Jersey Devils point blank in what is regarded as one of the most significant saves in Penguins’, if not Cup, history.

Pietrangelo then blanked the Devils with his first shutout as a pro in Game 7, propelling Pittsburgh to the next round and, ultimately, the franchise’s first of five Stanley Cups.

Click on the link from the NHL archives:

Memories: Pietrangelo makes ‘The Save’

Pietrangelo played 141 NHL games with Pittsburgh and Hartford followed by five seasons in Europe.

He retired to Niagara Falls in 2001 with his wife, Kim, and their children, Paige, Jessica and Dylan, and began coaching.  He coached youth hockey, both boys and girls, and varsity at The Hill Academy from 2001-2011, before joining the Canucks as general manager and assistant coach in 2011.

Pietrangelo purchased the then Jr. B Greater Ontario Junior Hockey League team in 2014. He welcomed another former Canuck, Niagara lawyer and award-winning minor hockey volunteer Brandon Boone, as a partner. They each own 50 percent of the team via not-for-profit corporations.

The Canucks jumped to Junior A in 2023, joining the OJHL along with the Leamington Flyers, another former GOHL franchise.

“I’m a hockey guy,” Pietrangelo told the OJHL. “It’s all I’ve done my whole life and I’ve been blessed obviously to be able to say that. From being able to go to school on a scholarship and being a pro for 15 years…

“Once I retired this opportunity came up. And then came the opportunity to get to the OJHL and Junior A hockey. It was something that I always aspired to do. With Brandon, who’s a good man and a hard worker, we tackled this and here we are.”

His advice to his Canucks players?

“The message I try to give them is that there’s a terrific opportunity here for them,” he said. “The OJHL is a fantastic league. The results speak for themselves: young men are being drafted into the NHL. They are going to the NCAA or the OHL. Whatever they aspire to do, the opportunities are there.”

“Look at guys like Noah Pak of Collingwood or even myself going right from the OJHL to the NCAA. This is a terrific league that prepares you for the next level that’s as good if not better than any other league.”

Pietrangelo played all of his minor hockey in the Niagara Falls Minor Hockey Association and one season of junior with the then Jr. B Canucks.

A third-round pick by Brantford in the 1981 Ontario Hockey League draft, Pietrangelo went the college route after playing two seasons for the Brampton Warriors in what is now the OJHL.

He was selected by Pittsburgh in the NHL Draft following his freshman season at NCAA Division I Minnesota. He’d graduate from Minneapolis school with a science degree.

Pietrangelo was inducted into the Niagara Falls Sports Wall of Fame in 1998.

“It’s my hometown and we all want to give back in any way we can,” he said. “The hockey part speaks for itself, trying to get these young men to the next level, to get them an education and hopefully pro or whatever one day. It’s just important to me. I’m a Niagara Falls guy, born and raised here. We give to the community the best we can.”

Frank was awarded the Tom Kelly Memorial Trophy as coach of the year in the GOJHL’s Golden Horseshoe Conference in 2016 and 2017.

But hoisting the Stanley Cup is his ultimate hockey memory.

“Everybody wants to lift that silver trophy over their head,” he said. “We grow up pretending that we’re doing that when we’re playing ball hockey on the street or hand hockey with your brothers. And to actually live the dream and have an opportunity to do that ….”

“In my situation, we had 12 Hall of Famers on the Pittsburgh Penguins. To be surrounded by these type of people. When you win, people say you’re close because of that. I say you won because you became a family before that. The Stanley Cup is the bond that keeps you together forever, but to get there you really have to buy in and have trust in each other.”