A moment of Schenn

OTTAWA -- As a euphoric Luke (The Human Eraser) Schenn was making his way up to the podium just moments after being selected fifth overall in the 2008 NHL entry draft Friday night, a text message appeared on the cell phone belonging to a member of the Maple Leafs' PR staff.
"Tell Luke he can thank me," it said.

The author of the message?

None other than former Leafs pugilist/quipster Wade Belak.

The reason Belak wants to be partially credited for the development of Schenn into a top-five NHL prospect is a simple one.

Back when Schenn and his younger brother, Brayden, were hockey-crazed kids, they would spend time at a cottage in northern Saskatchewan. Next door was a place belonging to a hulking NHLer who had a hockey net at the end of the driveway and would let the Schenn boys fire pucks into it for hours on end.

The NHLer's name was Wade Belak, who jokingly figures it was his net that helped young Luke grow up into the player he is today.

"(Brayden and I) were just kids then," Luke Schenn said. "(Belak) was with Toronto at the time and he allowed us to use the net.

"I didn't even think he knew who I was back then. I was really young."

No worries. Belak knows who Luke Schenn is.

And, after Friday, so do Leafs fans across North America.

* * *
Belak was not the only one glued to the tube, watching Schenn's NHL dream come true Friday night.

Out in picturesque Kelowna, B.C., home of the Western Hockey League's Rockets, a number of former Rockets players gathered at a local residence to watch Luke and his teammate, 6-foot-7 defenceman Tyler Myers, get drafted. Among those in attendance: Nashville Predators defenceman Shea Weber, Montreal Canadiens defenceman Josh Gorges and New York Islanders forward Blake Comeau.

"A bunch of us were there and it was really cool to see him picked," Weber said yesterday in a phone interview from Kelowna.

"I felt so good for him. He worked so hard to get to this point. "I'm sure it was special for him."
Especially when Weber and his buddies called him after he was picked.

"I talked to about 10 of them," Schenn said. "They passed the phone around."

In 2004-05, Schenn, then just 15, was a Rockets draft pick who had been summoned to the team late in the season.

While he did not play, Schenn experienced what life in major junior hockey was like.

During his visit with the Rockets, which lasted all the way through to the Memorial Cup in London, young Luke billeted with the same Kelowna family as Weber, a hard-nosed defenceman who possessed a cannon from the point.

"The first thing I thought when I saw this 15-year-old kid was: 'Man, he's big!' " Weber said. "He was a quiet kid. He didn't say a lot. He spent a lot of time by himself."

Three years later, Schenn, a 6-foot-2, 212-pound wrecking ball on blades, is the type of physical leader teams were clamouring to pick Friday.

"It's almost hard to believe he has come this far," said Weber, a player Schenn considers to be one of his hockey mentors. "He is going to have a great career."

* * *

Mention Schenn's name to recently hired Florida Panthers coach Peter DeBoer and the former Kitchener Ranger bench boss breaks into a huge smile.

"I love that kid," DeBoer said. "He is such a competitor. People in Toronto love the physical, meat-and-potatoes type of player like him.

"He'll be a captain in this league some day."

One of DeBoer's favourite Luke Schenn moments came during the 2007 Super Series last summer featuring the best junior players from Canada and Russia.

With DeBoer serving as one of Team Canada's coaches, the Canadians were up 6-1 late in the eighth and final game when a Russian player took a cheap shot at Team Canada's Claude Giroux several seconds after the whistle had tooted.

"(Schenn) got in there and beat the snot out of the (Russian) guy," DeBoer recalled. "I know you're really not supposed to do that stuff in those games, but, to be truthful, it really sent a strong message to his teammates."

Said Schenn: "You have to stick up for your guys."

That philosophy has earned him respect from teammates and opponents alike.
"When we were at the world juniors, Luke was a real leader," said Steven Stamkos, picked first overall by the Tampa Bay Lightning Friday.

"He's a physical competitor out there. And man, can he smoke people."

* * *

The Human Eraser.

That nickname was given to Schenn during Canada's gold medal run at the world junior in January by TSN analyst Pierre McGuire, who loves the way the Saskatoon native can rub out opposing forwards, both on the ice and on the scoreboard.

Is it a label that will accompany him to Toronto?

"It's fine," Schenn said. "It's more Pierre's thing. He went with it."

When The Human Eraser is out for punishment, no one can escape. Not even younger brother Brayden, a forward with the Brandon Wheat Kings who is projected as a top-10 pick in the 2009 entry draft.

When Luke faced then-WHL rookie Brayden and the Wheat Kings for the first time this past season, it didn't take long for the brothers to get feisty, a moment Luke documented on his NHL.com blog.

"In fact, my first shift -- his, too -- I was able to line him up with his head down and caught him with a pretty solid check," Luke wrote. "Then while we skated back up the ice he gave me a couple of hooks and slashes and was yelling at me. In a couple of scrums as well, we gave each other a couple face-washes."

Brotherly love at its best.

"The boys have always been hockey crazy," Jeff Schenn, Luke's dad, said last night.
"He has wanted to be a pro hockey player since he was 10."

Now Luke Schenn's dream has finally come true.

With a little help from Wade Belak's net, of course.