Paille one to remember

Taking a look back through Dan Paille’s four-year OHL career with the Guelph Storm, an easy reminder of one of the best. 

Steph Coratti, GuelphStorm.com — 

570 NHL games. 172 points. One Stanley Cup. 

Those are just a few of Dan Paille’s accomplishments through his 11-season National Hockey League career.

Before all of that could be added to the list, however, the Welland, Ontario native was just a 16-year-old breaking into the Guelph Storm line up as a rookie for the 2000-01 campaign.

As a freshman, the six-foot-one, 195-pound winger wasted no time making a name for himself, registering 53 points (22 goals, 31 assists) through 64 games. Paille would also be selected to represent Canada at the Under-17 tournament, averaging a point-per-game production in red-and-white with one goal and three assists in four games played.

Paille would wear the maple leaf again that season, this time for Canada’s Under-18 squad, adding three assists in five games to his national point totals.

The next season in 2001-02, Paille only improved, tallying the first of back-to-back 57-point seasons in 62 games played. As a sophomore, the 1984-born Storm forward recorded 27 goals and 30 assists, only to reverse the numbers the very next year in 2002-03 with 30 goals and 27 assists totaled in 54 games. 

Additionally, as a third year OHL veteran, Paille would be called upon to represent Canada for a third time, this time at the World Junior Championships.

Despite an early exit in the 2002 OHL Playoffs for the Storm (who would see their season end after nine postseason contests), the 2002-03 season concluded on a high note for Paille. In the 2002 NHL Entry Draft, the Buffalo Sabres would select the Storm forward in the first round (20^th overall), marking the very beginning of a long professional hockey career.

Things would only continue to travel upwards for Paille with his fourth and final OHL season marking an impressive championship run for the Storm. Through 59 games in 2003-04, Paille pocketed 37 goals and 43 assists for 80 points, only to top off his numbers with a plus-27, more than proving to be an instrumental part of the to-be 2004 OHL championship roster.

Before embarking on a long postseason run with the Storm, however, Paille would represent Canada a fourth time at the World Junior Championships, recording four goals through six contests in the tournament.

Following that, and the conclusion of the regular season, 22 postseason games would be the magic number for the Storm to earn the franchise’s second of three J. Ross Robertson Cup titles, with Paille compiling 18 points (nine goals, nine assists) and a plus-14 as a vital member of the line up. 

With that, Paille would cement himself as one of the Storm’s greatest forwards through the organization’s 25 years with 247 total points in the OHL, with 116 goals and 131 assists through 239 games played. 

Notably, numbers never faltered in the postseason, the true mark of a historic player, with Paille posting a total of 41 points (24 goals, 17 assists) through 46 playoff contests in four appearances.

The following season prompted Paille’s graduation from the major junior ranks, only to see the former Storm winger more than excel in his first professional season with the AHL’s Rochester Americans, recording 29 points (14 goals, 15 assists) through 79 games. 

That would be just the beginning of Dan Paille’s road through 15 professional hockey seasons, and, to becoming a Stanley Cup Champion with the Boston Bruins in 2011.

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Dan Paille

• Guelph Storm, 2000-2004
• OHL Champion, 2004
• OHL Totals: 239 games played, 116 goals, 131 assists, 247 points
• Playoffs 46 games played, 24 goals, 17 assists, 41 points
• Named seventh all-time forward in Guelph Storm history
• Selected in the first round (20^th overall) by the Buffalo Sabres in the 2002 NHL Entry Draft
• 11 NHL seasons
• NHL Totals: 570 games played, 85 goals, 87 assists, 172 points
• NHL Teams: Buffalo Sabres, Boston Bruins
• Stanley Cup Champion (2011)
• Represented Canada four times; 2000-01 Under-17 (four games played, one goal, four points), 2000-01 Under-18 (five games played, three points), 2003 World Junior Championships (six games played), 2004 World Junior Championships (six games played, four goals)