Athletes often have unique ways to get involved with the sports that they love.

Nick Evlampios Fotiu got plenty of enjoyment from football, soccer and boxing while growing up in Staten Island, but a bit of divine intervention helped the rugged New Yorker develop a desire to play hockey.

Fotiu loved the New York Rangers so much that he would follow their every move and spend more than an hour each way taking a bus, a ferry and a train from his home to Madison Square Garden, where he would sit in the cheap “blue seats” in the upper reaches of The World’s Most Famous Arena.

And on Sundays, Fotiu would stop in Greenwich Village to visit his grandfather for a pasta dinner and then travel to MSG to watch a team that occasionally challenged for the Stanley Cup but didn’t win pro hockey’s most cherished prize for more than half a century.

Ironically, a few years later, Fotiu would ride the same train for a totally different reason.

“It’s ironic how I was taking that train as a kid to watch the Rangers and ended up taking it to play for the Rangers,” Fotiu said.

But not before that night while entering MSG at 15 when Fotiu’s journey through life changed dramatically in the start of a quest to defy all odds to reach the pinnacle of hockey.

TORONTO STAR:  April 7, 2011: 

Leafs goalie Jean-Sebastien Giguere realized something in jest when it was mentioned to him this week that he was one of two surviving Hartford Whalers playing in the NHL today.

“Must mean I’m pretty old,” Giguere said laughing.

Giguere and Flyers’ defenceman Chris Pronger are the only two players left from a Whalers team that moved to Carolina to become the Hurricanes in 1997.

That ended a colourful history of the relatively short life of the Whalers, which had begun life as a WHA team in 1972 before making the jump to the NHL in 1979.

Current Leafs GM Brian Burke got his start as a high level executive as the Whalers GM in 1992, and current TSN hockey analyst Pierre McGuire coached there in the 1990s.

The “Whale” were known for their green and white uniforms and bizarre tales, including the near disaster of Stormy, the pig mascot who reportedly was supposed to appear from inside a Zamboni at the call of a professional hog caller, but apparently had a seizure and was nearly asphyxiated from the fumes under the cowl of the vehicle.

Giguere looks back fondly on his time with the Whalers.

1972/73: Led by former Boston University Coach Jack Kelley, and playing in the historic Boston Garden the New England Whalers hit the ice for the first time playing in the upstart World Hockey Association, on October 12th, rallying from a 2-0 deficit to beat the Philadelphia Blazers 4-3. While other WHA teams spent their money on NHL stars the Whalers decided to go after solid steadier players, and it paid off as they would go on to finish with a league best 46-30-2 record. In the playoffs the Whalers would make quick work of the Ottawa Nationals advancing to the semifinals in 5 games. In the semifinals the Whalers would dominate again as they beat the Cleveland Crusaders in 5 games to advance to the very first AVCO Cup Finals. In the finals the Whalers would shut down the highflying Winnipeg Jets in 5 games to emerge as the first champions of the WHA.

He could have been in pictures - with Paul Newman no less.

In 1976, professional hockey player Jack Carlson received a call from his older brother Jeff informing him that they, along with their younger brother Steve, had been offered a supporting role in Slap Shot, a hockey movie starring Paul Newman.

  It wasn't that the brothers were particularly great hockey players or actors. They were unique, however. Besides the fact they played on the same line together and wore long hair and heavy-framed sports glasses - while playing - the brothers were known for scoring punches, not goals. Forget about not hitting a guy wearing glasses - these guys were tough.

  "Jeff was the toughest,"