Columnist Ron Kantowski: NHL player keeps head in the game with Gulls

Monday, Dec. 27, 2004 | 9:17 a.m.

Ron Kantowski is a Las Vegas Sun sports writer. Reach him at ron@lasvegassun.com or (702) 259-4088.

The next time the Wranglers drop the puck at an unusual time, you might want to head out to the Orleans Arena, because there's no telling who or what you might see.

Last Monday, Las Vegas played Fresno at the stroke of midnight and midway through the third period, an enthusiastic female fan lifted her top to give everybody who stayed up past their bedtime a full look at her Saskatoons on the giant video screen. The media covering the game immediately asked if they could revise their Three Stars ballots.

Then on Sunday when the Wranglers faced off against San Diego at 5 p.m., the hardcore hockey fans in attendance may have noticed a familiar face wearing No. 37 for the visiting Gulls.

Curtis Brown, who has played in 554 National Hockey League games -- all but 12 with the Buffalo Sabres and every one, I might add, with his jersey on -- centered San Diego's top line during a 1-0 victory over the Wranglers.

Like the 300-plus NHL veterans who are currently playing club hockey in Europe, Brown said the idea is to get into shape in the long shot the NHL lockout ends before the drop dead date in a couple of weeks.

He said he has received little guff upon joining the New Jersey Devils' Scott Gomez, who is spending the lockout with with his hometown Anchorage Aces, in the ECHL.

"Most guys understand you want to go and you want to play," said Brown, who will be 29 in February. "I don't think it's good for anybody to miss a whole year. I think if it was a strike, it would be different. I wouldn't play if it was a strike. But a lockout is a different situation. They're (NHL owners) not allowing you to play, so ... "

So Brown finds himself skating circles around what amounts to double-A competition. In the NHL, Brown is a defensive-minded forward, a guy who grinds in the corners and plays both ends of the ice. In the ECHL, he looks more like Bobby Orr, at least when the guys on the other side give him a little breathing room.

"It's tough, because they definitely pay attention to you," said Brown, who after Sunday's game knows how that flasher felt, as all eyes in the building -- especially the ones belonging to the guys in the white sweaters -- were on him.

"They make sure they've got a guy tight on you ... but it's still fun. You've got to work through that and hopefully it opens up my linemates at times, where they can have a little more (open) ice."

Coincidentally, when bad boy Billy Tibbetts wore out his welcome in San Diego, it opened a spot on the Gulls' roster for Brown, a native of Saskatchewan who has a young family. So it really wasn't feasible for him to play in Europe during the protracted lockout like so many of his NHL brethren.

Brown's wife hails from Orange County, about an hour's drive north of San Diego.

Although Brown took Tibbetts' roster spot and both are too good to be playing in the ECHL, that's about where the similarity ends. Using the movie "Slapshot" to form an analogy, Tibbetts plays like all three Hanson Brothers rolled into one while the sportsmanlike Brown is Ned Braden by comparison.

In eight games with the Wranglers, Tibbetts has no goals, two assists and 84 penalty minutes. In 12 games with the Gulls, Brown has two goals, three assists and just two penalty minutes. San Diego scored the only goal of the game Sunday when Tibbetts was sitting in the penalty box for roughing, negating what otherwise was a good effort by the serial high-sticker.

After being selected in the second round of the 1994 draft, Brown broke in with the Sabres two years later and spent seven full seasons in Buffalo before finishing last year with the San Jose Sharks. He signed a four-year, $6.8 million deal with the Chicago Blackhawks in July.

An expert penalty killer, Brown scored two shorthanded goals in the 2001 Stanley Cup playoffs. While not a huge goal-scorer -- Brown's best years in Buffalo were 22- and 20-goal seasons in 1999-00 and 2001-02 -- he has scored some clutch ones. He has four game-winning playoff goals and tied for the Sabres' lead with seven goals during the 1999 Stanley Cup playoffs.

While the Wranglers aren't exactly the New York Rangers -- heck, based on their current downward slide, they'd have trouble beating the Jellystone Park Rangers with Boo Boo on the disabled list -- hockey is hockey and Brown said he is just glad to be playing again.

"There's definitely a feeling of going back to your roots," he said about skating in pro hockey's hinterlands. "I think the guys here are playing because they really love the game -- not to say that doesn't happen at different levels.

"But really, the perks aren't that great in this league, other than you get to play the game you love."

Maybe that's not video board stuff. But it's more than enough to keep a guy like Curtis Brown digging hard in the corners.