USA DAWN: NEWS AND UPDATES

G ordie Howe passed away this morning, surrounded by family at his son’s home. He was a Hall of Famer and four-times Stanley Cup champion who dominated the record book over the course of a 32-year career, and he was known as Mr Hockey because nobody else could have been. Howe’s death doesn’t come as a shock – he’d been battling serious health problems for several years – and over the next few days, you’re going to see a flood of tributes to him from around the sports world. Some of those will be written by those who watched him play, and others by those who were lucky enough to have known him. They’ll be touching and heart-felt, and I encourage you to read every one of them. I’m young enough that I never saw Howe play. Even his later years, when he was putting up 41 points for the Whalers as a 51-year-old, were before my time. And yet Howe was one of the most important players of my lifetime; he did as much to shape my identity as a hockey fan as any player I could name. H...