First, a fair notice: this blog entry has absolutely nothing to do with BYU sports. And yes, I know the BYU-Utah game is tonight. Trust me, you'll get plenty on the game from me tonight on KSL (pregame coverage starts at 7:00pm). However, I hope you will find what follows interesting.

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As some of you may be aware, I was born and raised in Canada, and still remember most fondly my upbringing and the special memories the sport of hockey created in my life. As a youngster, I played hockey, I watched hockey, I knew and read lots about hockey, and it continues to occupy a special place in my heart, even though football and basketball are the sports I watch most these days.

After living in the city of Saskatoon (home of the Western Hockey League's Saskatoon Blades) from infancy through 9th Grade, my family moved to Calgary before my 10th Grade year. I was ecstatic, mostly because I would finally be living in an NHL city! The Calgary Flames became "my team," and are still "my team" today. So, as a result, I have paid special attention their teams over the years, and have embraced the rare opportunities to watch them play (like last night, for example, as my Fox Sports regional channel from Arizona showed the Flames-Coyotes game. Flames won 4-1, and let me tell you, beating Wayne Gretzky just never gets old).

I follow the Flames like many of you follow the Cougars--from afar, via internet newspaper articles, and broadcasts when and where you can find them. So it was that the other day, I learned that the Flames' 5th round draft pick from last spring died at his home on Monday morning, in the town of Tecumseh, Ontario (just outside Windsor).

His name was Mickey Renaud, and as I have learned more about him and his story, the more impressed I am by him, and the more saddened I am by his loss at the age of 19. I encourage you to go to the website: windsorstar.com, and read about Renaud and his passing. The story has been on the front page of the Windsor Star site for three days now, so acutely has Renaud's death affected that community. If you are like me, as you read about Renaud's life and death, you will gain an appreciation for the sport of hockey, the role of family and the power of a team to unite a town. It's a remarkable story.

The death of Mickey Renaud brought to mind a similar story from Flames' history, and it leads me down a road that leads down another...

In spring of 1986, the Flames drafted an 18-year high school hockey player from Bemidji, Minnesota, named George Pelawa (16th overall in the 1st round). Pelawa was 6'3", 235 pounds (alarmingly similar in build to Mickey Renaud) and a Native American all-sport athlete who was destined to become a fan favorite as a Flame, but first, he was to attend the University of North Dakota as a freshman in the fall of 1986.

On Labor Day Weekend of 1986, only days before he was to start classes at UND, Pelawa was killed in a head-on car collision (alcohol was not involved). Even today, I remember living in Calgary that fall and following media coverage of his passing. He was seen as a "gentle giant" and even though he had yet to play a game in a Flames uniform, it was as if a member of the Flames family had been taken. The Flames established a scholarship in Pelawa's name at Bemidji High School that carries on today.

Here is the where the story takes a bit of a detour.

You may be familiar with the musician Tom Cochrane. He had a hit in 1992 called "Life is a Highway," a song recently re-recorded by Rascal Flatts and included in the soundtrack for the animated movie hit "Cars." Tom Cochrane is a well-respected Canadian songwriter and singer who started a band called "Red Rider" in the 1980s, and during this stage of his career, he had a number of successful hits in Canada, one of which was a song entitled "Big League" (recorded in 1988-- a year and a half after Pelawa's passing).

Here is what Tom Cochrane says about the song:

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"The song is based on a true story. I met a man in an arena when we were on tour just before sound check, a nice soft spoken guy, who told me that his son had aspirations to play pro hockey and had a scholarship in the States. He asked me if we were going to play "Boy Inside The Man" that night and said that his son had been a big fan. I asked him if his son would be there, not realizing the man had been using the past tense. That was when he told me his son had died in a car accident that past summer... I felt for that guy, his story hit me hard.

Some songs are hard labour, but the best songs are born ... I carried that story with me for quite some time. One day I woke up, picked up the guitar, turned on the tape recorder and played and sang "Big League" in one pass. One pass, and there it was ... born. I'm as proud of that song as anything I've ever written. It's Canadiana, and even though it rocks, it's written in a true Canadian folk narrative style. But most importantly, I hope it cuts to the heart of life, love, loss and family ... I think it says something about the hopes and dreams we put into our kids' heads, and the transience and preciousness of life.

This song's origins are culturally specific, but the story taps into something universal, into ideas and feelings that resonate through every culture." - Tom Cochrane

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Cochrane has never publicly confirmed that the song is specifically about George Pelawa and his father, but it is commonly believed that this song indeed memorializes the Pelawa story. Then when you realize Mickey Renaud's father also played in the NHL and must have been so proud to see his son drafted, you can imagine "Big League" applied to that father-son relationship, too, although under different circumstances.

Either way, I encourage you to put "Red Rider Big League" into Google or Yahoo or YouTube, and watch the video. I think you'll like both it and the song itself, and now that you know Cochrane's story behind the song, the lyrics will take on added meaning. For that matter, find the video for "Boy Inside the Man" (referred to in Cochrane's narrative), and you'll stumble upon another Red Rider gem.

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21-and-a-half years apart, two Calgary Flames draft picks die suddenly, too soon, before fulfilling their promise and potential. While stories of young athletes passing before their prime are not terribly uncommon, and while death is a fate more properly preserved until lives have been fully lived, I found these two tales poignant by virtue of both their subjects and the subtext of the sport that shaped my childhood.

I hope you enjoyed reading this departure from my BYU-related entries, but since this is my only online forum, I trust you'll forgive the liberty taken.