By now, you’ve heard the news.

The hockey world suffered a tragic and unexpected loss on Thursday night when former Calgary Flames star Johnny Gaudreau and his brother, Matty, were killed by a drunk driver while riding their bikes on the side of a New Jersey freeway.

To fans in Calgary, Johnny was a shining light in the darkness who almost single-handedly dragged the Flames out of a period of irrelevance. Despite his small stature and relatively low draft pedigree, Gaudreau quickly emerged as one of the NHL’s top players and remained among the league’s elite over the entirety of his 10-year pro career.

Gaudreau defined an entire era of Flames hockey. He was an inspiration for a generation of young hockey players in Calgary. After six long seasons without playoff hockey, Flames fans flocked to the Saddledome in droves after Gaudreau arrived. He was the one they paid to see.

Although he left the Flames as an unrestricted free agent in 2022, Gaudreau remained one of the most popular players among fans in the city until his untimely passing on Thursday. It only hurt so much when he left because everyone wanted him to come back. It would’ve been truly special to see him reunite with Sean Monahan in Columbus this fall, as was intended.

Gaudreau departed Calgary in fifth place on the Flames’ all-time scoring leaderboard, behind only Jarome Iginla, Theo Fleury, Al MacInnis, and Joe Nieuwendyk. Three of those players already have their names and numbers enshrined in the rafters at the Scotiabank Saddledome.

Solely on the strength of his tenure in Calgary, Gaudreau deserves to join that group. He was a dazzlingly talented forward who consistently ranked among the very best in the league in every offensive category. In his final year with the club, he became the first Flame to reach the 100-point mark since Fleury in 1993 … and he just kept going, ultimately ending up with 115 points in 82 games.

There might never be another Flames forward line as dominant as Gaudreau, Matthew Tkachuk, and Elias Lindholm were in the 2021-22 campaign. In their 960 minutes of 5-on-5 ice time together that year, they posted a staggering plus-42 goal differential — by far the best mark of any forward line in the salary cap era. They were flat-out undeniable, and Gaudreau was their engine.

Some players just become synonymous with certain teams at certain times. You can’t mention the ’90s Mighty Ducks without talking about Paul Kariya. The same goes for the 2000s Red Wings and Nick Lidstrom. And for the 2010s Flames, that guy was Johnny Hockey. He transcended typical borders of fandom while in Calgary, becoming a beloved crowd favourite around the league. Fans of other teams desperately wanted him to be theirs, but for those eight years, he was ours.

There’s no denying that the manner in which Johnny left Calgary created hard feelings, as is human nature. But all of that drama feels very small now. He put his family first when making his decision in 2022, and he got to spend his final two years closer to home while raising his young children.

It isn’t fair that Johnny didn’t get his flowers during his lifetime. He deserved to be recognized in the present tense. All too often, it takes something truly horrible like this for a beloved athlete to be commemorated as they should.

The tradition of retiring numbers in North American professional sports was born from tragedy and remains inextricably linked with it. Toronto Maple Leafs forward Ace Bailey became the first player in any sport to have his number retired in 1934, after he suffered a career-ending head injury that briefly left him comatose. Shortly thereafter, the New York Yankees retired Lou Gehrig’s No. 4 after he was forced to retire due to his terminal ALS diagnosis. After Bill Barilko scored the Stanley Cup-winning goal in 1951, his plane went down in the wilderness that summer — and the Leafs retired his No. 5 soon after.

The Pittsburgh Penguins stopped issuing Michel Brière’s No. 21 after he died in a car crash following his rookie season and eventually retired it for good in 2001. No Carolina Hurricane has worn Steve Chiasson’s No. 3 since his untimely passing in 1999. The Atlanta Thrashers took Dan Snyder’s No. 37 out of circulation after his death in 2003, and the same went for Luc Bourdon in Vancouver after his fatal motorcycle crash in 2008.

Johnny Gaudreau was taken from us far too soon. He should’ve been able to play at a high level in the NHL for years to come. More importantly, he deserved to be able to raise his children, serve as a groomsman at his sister’s wedding, and live a full life. He accomplished a lot in his 31 years, but he could’ve done so much more, and it’s nothing short of infuriating to consider what one drunk driver took away from Johnny, Matty, and the entire Gaudreau family on Thursday night.

Monahan and the Blue Jackets will visit the Flames at the Scotiabank Saddledome for the only time in the 2024-25 season on Dec. 3. That night, or another in the future, the Flames should take the opportunity to raise a banner bearing Gaudreau’s name and number to the Saddledome rafters, where he can join McDonald, Iginla, Kiprusoff, Nieuwendyk, and MacInnis in permanent commemoration.