NEW YORK — Dan De Palma looked at his buzzing phone last week and was pleased to see it was one of his favorite former players, Dylan Garand, on the other line.
He soon realized this wasn’t an ordinary catch-up conversation. Garand was “quick and to the point,” as the Kamloops Blazers goalie coach recalled.
“Hey, I’m playing in New York on Sunday,” Garand blurted in advance of his NHL debut with the Rangers.
“That’s amazing!” De Palma replied.
Before he could react any further, Garand came right out with the main purpose of the call: “Can you come?” he asked.
“Let me see what I can do,” said De Palma, setting off a chain of events that neither will soon forget.
De Palma knew it would be difficult to find flights for him and his daughter, Britney, out of tiny Kamloops Airport in British Columbia, but there was one out of Vancouver on Saturday morning. They booked it on Friday afternoon, then hit the road to begin their journey with a four-hour drive southwest.
The outgoing trip required only one layover in Chicago — Monday’s return would feature three, bouncing from Newark to Chicago to Dallas before finally landing back in Vancouver — but the three-hour time difference had them arriving at Newark Liberty International Airport around 1 a.m. ET on Sunday morning. Garand’s debut was scheduled for noon that day, but they were too wired to go straight to bed.
“We got to our hotel downtown around 2 a.m., and we thought, ‘Oh, let’s go walk Times Square for an hour. Why not?’” De Palma said. “We don’t get to do this very often, so we did that ’til about 3 in the morning or so, and then set the alarms for 6 and got up and tried to do a bunch of sightseeing in the morning before the game.”
This being Britney’s first visit to New York, the father and daughter bopped around the city — from Grand Central Station to Radio City Music Hall to Rockefeller Center and NBC Studios.
“Growing up in western Canada, those are all things that are iconic to us,” De Palma said. “You watch them on television or movies.”
Eventually, they made their way to Madison Square Garden to meet up with Garand’s parents, Gina and Loren, and stepmother, Kim. Upon entering the arena — a first for both Dan and Britney — De Palma was drawn to the pinwheel ceiling and legendary jerseys hanging from the rafters.
“That’s when it really starts to hit you,” he said.
MSG security made sure they got right up against the glass for warmups, with De Palma — who spent five seasons coaching Garand in the WHL and still hits the ice with him every summer — sensing good vibes from Garand’s demeanor.
“You can never put too much stock in warmups, but he looked pretty sharp,” De Palma said. “He looked comfortable.”
That hunch was reinforced once the game began against the visiting Winnipeg Jets.
De Palma described the goalie’s family as “pretty calm,” with that feeling washing over the entire group once Garand racked up a few saves by the 10-minute mark.
“Early in the game, you could see he was tracking pucks really well,” De Palma said. “When he’s seeing pucks and truly tracking them all the way in, all the way out, typically everything then follows — his movements, he’s in control, he’s in the right spots, he’s seeing the other threats. … From my experience, that’s when he’s at his best. And also, he’s mentally strong in there. He’s confident in himself, and you can see it in the body language.”
Nearly six years after he was selected in the fourth round (No. 103) in the 2020 draft, Garand was able to meet the moment. He allowed only two goals while making 35 saves across regulation and overtime (good for a .946 save percentage) before the struggling New York Rangers succumbed in the shootout.
“I feel like I gave the guys a chance to win and just worked hard in there,” Garand said. “It sucks I didn’t do my job in the shootout, but ultimately, it was a good game, and I had a lot of fun out there.”
Once the interviews were done and Garand showered, he met up with his five-person traveling party. It was a scene De Palma found himself thinking about in advance, wondering what it would be like. But once the moment arrived, it all felt familiar.
“You don’t know what to expect,” De Palma said. “But it was just Dylan. It was the same Dylan. We were just in Madison Square Garden instead of Sandman Centre for the Blazers in Kamloops.”
“We chuckled about a few things, and obviously told him how proud we were,” he recalled. “He said he was grateful we came out, and then it was just normal. It was normal time with Dylan. The game, after that, became secondary. It was just about spending time together.”
At some point, they realized they were hungry — “Dylan burned a lot of calories,” De Palma said — so all six headed across the street to Roberta’s for a bite to eat. The restaurant staff caught wind and “were pretty kind to us,” De Palma said, and the conversation was free-flowing.
“That says a lot about him,” De Palma said of Garand. “He could have been on a cloud and couldn’t stop talking about it, and who would blame him? But once you get to know him a little bit deeper, it’s hard not to root for him.”
De Palma has come to appreciate that humility, as well as what he described as Garand’s “stubbornness.” He’s observed it during countless training sessions in which the 23-year-old netminder worked himself to a state of exhaustion, but he’s also seen it manifest in frustration when Garand has been passed over for previous NHL opportunities. The key has been channeling that into proper motivation.
It finally paid off, with Garand remarking, “Hopefully it’s just the beginning.” His future with the Rangers — who have Igor Shesterkin entrenched as their No. 1 goalie — is unclear as he heads toward restricted free agency this summer, but Sunday’s taste added fuel to keep going.
“He’s so driven with this thing that he’s stubborn — and that’s stubborn in a good way,” De Palma said. “It just keeps pushing him that he’s gonna get there. When it’s not going your way, and you want to get there, and you’re not quite there, that stubbornness can be tough, right? But you take that any day. You’d rather have somebody be stubborn and push than not have that resilience.”
“It’s been a long road for him, for sure, but sometimes that’s the road you’ve got to walk,” he added. “So, just keep walking.”
Once dinner was through and they said their goodbyes, Dan and Britney decided to take another walk. They trekked up Fifth Avenue and made their way to Central Park before their own exhaustion set in. After a few more hours of sleep, it was time to head back to Newark Airport to begin the long journey home.
They spent 27 total hours in New York and packed as much as they could into them, making for an experience they’ll always cherish.
“He’s such a good young man, and we just didn’t want to let him down,” De Palma said. “It’s a special relationship. Yeah, it’s on ice, but it’s deeper. It’s family.”