Double trouble awaits in Sedin twins
May 29, 2011Kevin McGran
Henrik, left, and Daniel Sedin are the main reason the Canucks find themselves in the Stanley Cup final. The only other twins to enjoy similar sporting success are Paul and Gary Gait, once considered the greatest lacrosse players in the world.
DARRYL DYCK/THE CANADIAN PRESS They are identical twins, with identical elite athletic prowess, an uncanny ability to find each other on the ice.
They are Henrik and Daniel Sedin of the Vancouver Canucks — the Swedish face of the first Canadian team to challenge for the Stanley Cup in four years.
And although twins have played in the NHL before, the Sedin “twin-ness” is an advantage no team has ever had. They’re unique among athletic twins in that they are at the very top of the game in a team sport, where chemistry matters.
“They’ve got a sixth sense, or a radar, or some type of communication with each other that I’ve never seen with any two players in my life,” says Maple Leafs GM Brian Burke, who moved hell and high water to draft the Sedins second and third overall in 1999 when he was GM of the Canucks.
“These two players together are worth more together than they are standing alone. They bring a magic, a sixth sense. They’re clearly better together.”
And they play, not just on the same team, but on the same line. Hockey has never really seen anything like it. Twins Patrik and Peter Sundstrom played briefly together with the New Jersey Devils. Rich and Ron Sutter played a few seasons together with Philadelphia and St. Louis.
But to find a comparison of twins at the elite level of a team sport, you have to look at Canada’s other national sport, lacrosse, where Gary and Paul Gait of Victoria were to that sport in the 1990s what the Sedins are to hockey today. Both were champions at the collegiate and professional level, with a litany of achievements and awards to their names.
“Anytime you talk about athletes (in a team sport), you talk about chemistry and how well they play together,” says Hall of Famer Gary Gait, now a coach at Syracuse University. “There’s a definite advantage in chemistry in knowing each other and how to play to each other’s strengths and weaknesses.”
Gary Gait is widely accepted as the greatest lacrosse player ever. Paul is widely accepted as the second best ever. They, like the Sedins, were better when they played together.
“It was more consistency on things,” says Gary. “Everything from a behind-the-back pass, a no-look pass, just communicating without doing it verbally. That was definitely an advantage.”
For the Sedins, playing together wasn’t just important, it was crucial. They’ve been in hockey since they were 8, and started playing on the same line at 14, when Daniel became a winger. In fact, they might not have come to the NHL had they not been picked by the same team. One might have tried to force a trade to the other’s team.
Burke engineered perhaps the trade of a lifetime. Burke’s Canucks had the third overall pick. Burke traded defenceman Bryan McCabe and a 2000 first-round pick to Chicago for the fourth overall pick. Burke then sent the fourth pick and a couple of third-round picks to Tampa for No. 1 overall. Then he sent No. 1 overall to Atlanta for No. 2 overall, a 2000 third-rounder and a promise the Thrashers would take Patrik Stefan and not either of the Sedins.
“I saw them at the world championships,” said Burke. “It’s unusual for 18-year-olds to go to that tournament and play well. That’s where I said, ‘We’ve got to get these guys.’”
The similarities in their career numbers and achievements are uncanny.
Henrik was named the league’s most valuable player last year. Daniel is up for the award this year.
Henrik has 666 points in 810 regular-season games (.822 points per game). Daniel has 651 points in 787 games (.827 points per game).
They’re in the midst of identical five-year, $30.5 million (U.S.) contracts.
Henrik leads the Canucks in points. Daniel leads the Canucks in goals.
They probably both lead the league in no-look passes — to each other.
“Because they are identical twins, people often say twins have a bond, that they can kind of read each other’s mind,” says Kerry Jang, a psychologist and professor at the University of British Columbia conducting research on adult twins.
“In a sense, it’s not reading each other’s mind, because they are virtually identical copies of themselves,” Jang says. “They can anticipate what the other is going to do by figuring what they themselves would do. That’s why they play the way they do. It’s almost intuitive to them: ‘I would be doing this, therefore my brother would be doing this.’ But it’s all happening instantaneously.”
It’s almost not fair. They play better because they play together.
“That’s always been my take on the twin thing,” says Gait. “I don’t read his mind. I know. He’s had the exact same experiences in life. I’ve seen how he reacts. I’m not reading his mind. I just understand him well.”
How do you tell them apart? Well, if they’re in uniform, Daniel wears 22, Henrik 33. (Daniel was officially the second overall pick in 1999, Henrik the third overall). Henrik wears the C on the front of his jersey, Daniel an A. That is, unless they switch, as they did earlier this spring when one came out as the other for a TV interview.
Henrik is six minutes older. Daniel is a dad.
And if you get real close, look at Henrik’s left hand. A small bit of the tip of his baby finger was amputated in 2004.
Reporters, if they want one of them, generally call out “Daniel” or “Henrik” to see which one turns around.
But what makes them so good? Gait says there might be something else at work — a healthy sibling rivalry.
“That’s a behind-the-scenes piece that drives twins to be successful, or certain twins,” says Gait. “Growing up, my brother and I always wanted to outdo each other and that drove us to be more successful.
“Having seen what the other could do, that pushes you and when you come to play together, you know the player inside and out.”
