CANESEQUIP.9.SP.121500.SAS — While sharpening all of the Hurricanes’ skates before a game with the Boston Bruins, equipment manager Wally Tatmir checks to see if the blades on the skates are straight .Staff/Shah Stoneman
2000 N&O file photo
In the impending celebration of the 25th anniversary of the Carolina Hurricanes’ move to North Carolina, it’s easy to forget just how chaotic the first season in Greensboro was, not just on the ice and in the empty stands, but behind the scenes. .
With the team basically on the move from home, equipment manager Wally Tatmir and his two longtime partners Bob Gorman and Skip Cunningham have been hit harder than anyone else. Tatmir, who passed away on Sunday at the age of 76, has gone to great lengths to keep none of his players from noticing.
“He was so proud of it,” said stepdaughter Mike Beneteau. “It was his show now and he was in charge. Everything was going to be perfect, all the towels folded properly, all the tapes in place, professional atmosphere.” .”
For then-Hurricanes general manager Jim Rutherford, having Tatmir nearby meant one less thing to worry about, both on the move and off.
“He was always ahead of the curve,” said Rutherford. “He was very ready for what the players wanted and what the team needed. He forgot to do something or had to shout to get it done. , or really no talk of having to order anything.Last minute.He was very well prepared.He knew his job inside and out and was always ahead .”
Growing up in Windsor, Ontario, Tatmir first met Rutherford when he played for the Detroit Red Wings and Tatmir worked for a transportation company while helping out at home games. When Peter Karmanos hired Rutherford to run the junior hockey team, Rutherford brought Tatomir with him. When Karmanos acquired his Whalers in Hartford in 1994, they worked their way up the ladder together, and Tatomir remained there until his retirement from the Hurricanes in 2012.
“Windsor is a small town, not very big, but steeped in hockey tradition,” Karmanos said. “Wally was really good at what he did. Really good, very supportive, could be critical when needed. Just a nice guy to work with. Very talented. Every step, he was able to handle it.”
He was an early regular on the team here and an innovator in his profession with over 20 patents. Even after retiring, he never left the game. On the day he died, his home in Boone had an order for custom his skates his blades from an NHL team.
Pioneer in sharpening and balancing skate bladesplayers will come to the Hurricanes from other teams and find new life in their feet. I found someone who could make the nuances that make it possible.Matt Cullen is such a believer that he bought one of Tatomir’s balancing machines to work on skating his own kids.
In 2020, Hedican said, “Wally could recreate that feeling and feel that way every day. I wanted to kiss him on the forehead.”
Tatmir wouldn’t have minded. He had a bubbly personality, he knew everyone and he was not shy about letting me know what he thought. Often he hid the pack somewhere in his suit in the truck and threw it at an unsuspecting child. Adults too: His NHL type who always hung out in the corridors of Toronto’s Air Canada Center, outside his room where Tatmir and other equipment managers worked, visiting lockers, asked for his advice. I was on a pilgrimage.
“And it’s not just Toronto,” said Rutherford. “It was everywhere.”
His four sons served as his informal assistants over the years, meeting Tatmir, Cunningham and Gorman at the arena early in the morning, helping unload trucks of equipment after road games, I brewed my first coffee at 6:30. On the morning of a home game, long before the players and coaches showed up.
“He was a bigger-than-life character,” said son Shane Tatmir. “When we went to the rink, he would stop and talk to everybody on the way and everybody on the way.”
He bought a home in suburban Boone in 2007 and added to it over the years. Four years ago, he left Raleigh for Florida as he had long wanted, spending time between the sun and the mountains. After years of driving equipment trucks, he refused to let anyone move his stuff. Shane flew in from Canada to help the Hurricanes move in a rented truck from the same company that has been leasing trucks to the Hurricanes for years.
Tatomir suffered a heart attack in Florida this summer and recovered quickly, but finally caught up with him this month and the family was able to get together with him in Boone on Sunday. They have Shane and Ty, daughter Kim, stepsons Derek and Mike Beneteau, and 10 grandchildren. Funeral arrangements are pending.
“Hockey was really his passion,” said his widow, Constance. “No doubt. He loved his family and, as he says, had a million friends, companions. Everyone was his sidekick. He was just such a happy, lucky kind of man.” was.”
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This story was originally published September 18, 2022 at 11:31 AM.
Sports columnist Luke DeCock joined The News & Observer in 2000 and has covered six Final Fours, the Summer Olympics, the Super Bowl, and the Carolina Hurricanes’ Stanley Cup. He currently serves as president of the Basketball Writers Association of America, and in 2020 he won the National Headliner Award as a top sports columnist in the country, and he has been named North Carolina Sportswriter of the Year twice.
