Peter Šťastný

NHL career

Peter Šťastný was a prolific scorer in the NHL in the 1980s. He started his career in the NHL with the Quebec Nordiques in 1980 and was traded in 1990 to the New Jersey Devils. As a star member of a team playing in a francophone city, Stastny endeared himself to the Quebec fans by learning to speak French, and later learned to speak English. He retired as a member of the St. Louis Blues in 1995.

When the startling news broke in 1980 that Czechoslovakia player of the year, Peter Šťastný, and his brother Anton, had defected to Canada to play with the Quebec Nordiques, it represented a watershed moment in professional hockey as one of the first major stars of Eastern bloc hockey to join the NHL. The following year, his brother Marián joined them to become the third trio of brothers to play on the same professional hockey team (the first being the Bentley brothers of the Chicago Blackhawks in the 1940s and the second being the Plager brothers of the St. Louis Blues in the 1970s).

The trickle of Czechoslovak and Soviet hockey players rapidly became a flood following his footsteps. According to Peter, his defection "was the best decision I ever made. It has given my family the choices and options that people behind the Iron Curtain could only dream of. Then, to play pro hockey with my two brothers was like icing on the cake."

On the ice, Peter proved to be both consistent and productive. He scored 450 goals and added 789 assists for a total of 1239 points in the regular season. After retiring as a player, he captained the Slovak national team in various international tournaments and still enjoys huge popularity among Slovaks.

NHL milestones and records

Personal life

Peter was born in Bratislava, the fourth son of Stanislav and Frantiska. His two older brothers, Vlarimir (born 1945) and Bohumil (born 1947) were born when the family still lived in the village of Pružina, about 170 kilometres northeast of Bratislava. They moved to Bratislava before the birth of Marián (1953), Peter (1956), Anton (1959), and Eva (1966). Stanislav worked for a state-run company that built hydro-electric dams until 1980 when he retired, and mainly dealt with managing inventory. Frantiska stayed at home and raised the children. Vladimir served as an assistant coach of the Slovak national ice hockey team. He is the only coach with all three medals in Slovak ice hockey history.

Peter is the father of Yan Stastny, who made his NHL debut in 2005–06 with the Edmonton Oilers and is currently playing in Nuremberg, Germany, and Paul Stastny, who began his career with the Colorado Avalanche (the same franchise as the Quebec Nordiques, Peter's first NHL team) in 2006–07 and now plays for the St. Louis Blues, for whom Peter also played. Paul wears the same number (#26) that Peter did. Born in Quebec City but raised in St. Louis, Yan played for Team USA in the 2005 and 2006 IIHF World Championships. Paul would represent Team USA in the 2010 Winter Olympics and 2014 Winter Olympics. The family is thus the first hockey family known to have represented four different countries in international play (Czechoslovakia, Canada, Slovakia, USA). Paul broke the record for a scoring streak in a rookie season in the NHL and was a finalist for the 2006–2007 Calder Trophy—the NHL honour for "Rookie of the Year" won by his father in 1980–81.

Career in politics

Šťastný has always been known for his resentment of the Communist regime in Czechoslovakia. He joined the party SDKÚ-DS of the former Prime-minister Mikuláš Dzurinda to pursue a career in the European Parliament since he is fluent in both English and French. He was elected as leader of the 2004 European Parliament candidate list for the SDKU.

In the June 2009 election he was re-elected as the second of his party's MEPs. His campaign slogan was "With Courage and Determination for a Strong Slovakia" (Slovak: S odvahou a nasadením pre silné Slovensko). He was MEP until 2014.

He is a signatory of the Prague Declaration on European Conscience and Communism.

Široký controversy

Šťastný has called for Juraj Široký to step-down as the President of Slovak Ice Hockey Federation, stating poor performance, pursuing own financial interests over the welfare of Slovak Hockey as well as moral incredibility after it was revealed that Mr Široký was former ŠtB officer and he still has not sufficiently explained his friendship and involvement with Viktor Kožený and his fraudulent financial manoeuvres regarding so-called Harvard Funds. These grievances were penned in a letter to René Fasel in a letter describing Široký as a threat to democracy and integrity of the game in March 2008, as a result of Široký's actions in the 1980s (during which time Peter and two of his brothers had defected to Canada). Three months later, with Široký having not resigned from HC Slovan Bratislava, for whom Šťastný had played prior to his defection to Canada, or the Slovak Ice Hockey Federation, Šťastný resigned from the Slovak Hockey Hall of Fame as a result, and had all references to him pulled from Samsung Arena, the home arena of Slovan at the time.

Awards

International play

Šťastný was the first player in ice hockey history to represent three different countries in three different international tournaments.