Ken Dryden stood in the Canada Games Centre signing autographs for at least two hours.

It seemed like quite the feat of endurance, even for a member of the Hockey Hall of Fame, Conn Smythe Trophy, Calder Memorial Trophy, Vesina Trophy and seven-time Stanley Cup champion.

But the former Montreal Canadiens goaltender doesn't see it that way.

"It's not endurance. It's people who are nice people, who have been hockey fans for a long time, most of them have stories about being a fan when they were a kid and favourite teams and rivalries, so it's fun,” said Dryden, who joined the Liberal Party of Canada in 2004.

His recent trip to Whitehorse for Scotiabank's Hockey Day in Canada on Feb. 12 was the third time he's attended the national celebration of the game.

"Everybody's looking for the chance to gather, to do something with a lot of other people, and you don't get many chances at that. Events like this, even people who aren't interested in hockey, never played hockey, don't watch hockey, don't even like hockey, they gather, they get attracted to it, they see their friends, and so it's something that really works,” Dryden said.

Dryden knows how thrilling it is to catch sight of big hockey stars, as Yukoners did during the Hockey Day celebrations.

Lanny McDonald, Trevor Linden, Pat Quinn, Brad May, Wendel Clark, Mark Napier and Dryden were a few of the former NHLers on hand at the Canada Games Centre on Saturday, when Hockey Night in Canada host Ron MacLean taped clips

to air on CBC during a day which included NHL games between the six Canadian teams.

"People who played a long time ago, their names still hang around in a way in which they never would when I was a kid,” Dryden said, adding that he's recognized thanks to television and hockey cards.

But the players he admired were a little more difficult to watch.

When he was a young kid, Dryden got six-time Stanley Cup champion and Hockey Hall of Fame member Frank Mahovlich's autograph.

"I just kept going back in line and back in line,” Dryden said. "I think I got his autograph five times, and I still got them somewhere. It was exciting. Frank Mahovlich was somebody in my life from the television screen, and that's as close as I would ever come, that's what any of us knew at that time, that on the television screen were people we'd never know and never be like, and all of a sudden Frank is off that television screen and right in front of me. It's all the part of the fantasy of following sports.”

Lanny McDonald, who won the Stanley Cup in 1989 and has been inducted into the Hall of Fame, said he adhored Mahovlich and players like Johnny Bower, a Hall of Fame goalie, when he was young.

When McDonald was first drafted by the Leafs in the 1973 NHL Amateur Draft, he met Bower.

"I just thought that was one of the coolest things that could have ever happened,” McDonald said. "And then I get drafted by Toronto and go to Toronto and run into Johnny Bower right away. Boy, how things come full circle. It's pretty cool.”

McDonald first visited Whitehorse in 1990 during a fund-raiser for the Special Olympics.

"It's so much fun seeing the smiles both on the faces of the kids and the adults,” McDonald said. "And what a great way to, not only give back to the game, but to see a different city that I haven't seen in 22 years. It's great to be back.”

No doubt McDonald would have crossed paths with former head coach in the NHL Pat Quinn.

Quinn coached the Vancouver Canucks to their Stanley Cup playoff run in 1994 and eventually the Leafs.

"We are believers that hockey is the greatest team game in the world, and it does so many things for the youth, whether you make the National Hockey League or not is probably less important, that's not what you should be striving for, you should be striving to be learning the principles of team work, commoraderie, having fun and enjoyment and learning how to work at the same time,” Quinn said.

"There's so many things that sports and the game of hockey can do for young people, so we're here to say that we want our kids to be involved, we want our Canadian boys and girls to know about this great game and to enjoy it as we have.”

Quinn coached former Vancouver Canucks captain Trevor Linden in '94.

Playing in the NHL and meeting some of the greats is always thrilling, Linden said.

"For me, it was such a big thrill, and it's not lost on me now, for me it was very special,” Linden said.

"For the little guys, it's just about having fun. I think with the older kids it gets to be more about trying to instill some leadership and some sense of responsibility and some life skills, things that they'll have for the rest of their lives.”

Seems the hockey world isn't so big afterall.