Islanders honor Denis Potvin, who cites past glory and current excitement

Denis Potvin took the same route Saturday night that he did nearly 40 years ago, around the same time he became busy building a dynasty: through the same doorway, through the circle and down the same stairs. Hours later, he stepped onto center ice at Nassau Coliseum to drop the puck and say goodbye.

Around him the fans, some wearing their No. 5 jerseys, stood and chanted his name. For a moment, it was 1980. Or, as Potvin believes, 1975.

"This is probably 1975 for this team and it doesn't get any better than that," the famed Islanders defenseman said. "Five years later, we were winning the Cup and truly dominating, and I hope that happens here . . . I'm really excited about how this team is developing and the fact that they're going to be respectable and could be in the playoffs a long time. I don't know that the Devils had better equipment on the ice than the Islanders do right now."

Potvin was honored by the Islanders at the Coliseum before Saturday night's 3-1 victory over the Devils as the team celebrates its legends during its last season in Uniondale.

Before the game, Potvin reminisced about his team's glory days: the crackling excitement that came with that young 1975 team the reached the playoff semifinals, Bobby Nystrom's overtime goal that brought the first of four Stanley Cups in 1980, Thanksgivings spent with Islanders fans who, he said, became like family, and the 1983 Cup, their most unlikely, he said.

He remembered the exhaustion of Game 6 of the first Final against the Flyers and the relief that came with Nystrom's winning goal. "In the end,'' he said, "that was the greatest moment.

"I was on the bench, and the first thing I did, my helmet went down, boom, just clunked on the boards," he said. "I was exhausted and it was like a relief that we had scored and it was great that Bobby did. I couldn't understand how he had the energy at that point and then I went back and took a look at the game, and this is not too long ago, and I realized that Bobby had a 10-minute misconduct, he had two fights -- that's why I was so tired. I had to kill off all those penalties."

He offered up other tidbits:

Everyone on the Islanders had a place to eat during the holidays as Long Island's adopted sons.

The Islanders weren't nearly as tense for their next two Cups. They beat Minnesota in five in 1981. They went salmon fishing in Vancouver between Games 3 and 4 during a sweep of the Canucks in 1982.

Things were different in 1983, when they took on Wayne Gretzky and the Oilers, forced to play without the injured Mike Bossy in Game 1.

"Billy Smith played probably the best game that he played in his life," Potvin said. "We beat them four in a row."

Potvin drew parallels to the current Islanders team. He cited the mix of young players and proven talent after trades for Nick Leddy and Johnny Boychuk, and there is an energy that is very familiar.

"The team right now has made such a spectacular jump in terms of respectability around the league," he said. "I think you know you're good, but you don't know how good until your back is up against the wall. This team has to go to the playoffs, stay in the playoffs, win in the playoffs and even lose in the playoffs."

Past Islanders teams have lived in the shadow of the dynasty that came before them, and "with moving to another building, it's like that torch is being passed to them. Now they've got a chance to do something," Potvin said.

"You don't have to prove yourself to us or to the 1980 team, or '82 or '83. You have the opportunity now to write your own history, and now it's real and you can see that, the way they're playing hockey."

That doesn't mean it's not bittersweet, all these goodbyes.

"I did the same walk, going down the same stairs, getting pumped up for the game, getting ready," he said, "so I'm going to miss that, because I know this will be the last time."

By Laura Albanese

laura.albanese@newsday.com@AlbaneseLaura

Laura Albanese is a reporter, feature writer and columnist covering local professional sports teams; she began at Newsday in 2007 as an intern.