The longest serving general manager in professional sport stepped aside the other day: The Era of Lou is officially over after 28 years of directing, nurturing, bossing, controlling, shaping the part-hockey team, part-hockey cult that has been the New Jersey Devils.

It has been all Lou Lamoriello, all the time in New Jersey. His team. His way. His brilliance. His penchant for victory.

Three times the Devils won the Stanley Cup. Twice they lost in the Stanley Cup final. Only the Detroit Red Wings have had more Stanley Cup success in Lamoriello’s time on the job.

“I’ve been a lucky man to have been associated with the many great people and professionals we’ve had here over the years,” said Lamoriello in a rare, wide-ranging interview.

“They all knew what they were getting into here, where we value loyalty, confidentiality, commitment, having success, but paying the price to have success. Look at the people who have been through here — the Jacques Lemaires, Larry Robinsons, Pat Burns, Scott Stevens, Martin Brodeurs, Scott Niedermayers — a lot of them are gone, but still part of the fabric of who we are. The (Brendan) Shanahans, the (Slava) Fetisovs, they’re still part of the Devils family. I don’t apologize for what we’ve built here. But it was time, time to move on.”

It was time after three straight seasons out of the playoffs.

It was time when ownership changed.

It wasn’t just about him stepping out of his GM role and into the presidency job full-time. It was about doing something they’d never considered before.

“They wanted a view outside the organization,” said Lamoriello. “They wanted a fresh view.”

So the old college coach went old-school in his hire. Lamoriello has known Ray Shero since he played at St. Lawrence University. He was friends with his dad, Freddie Shero.

“I’ve known Ray and his family for a long time,” said Lamoriello. “It wasn’t hard to hire him. I interviewed him. I know of his past work. The availability of Ray Shero was something I was very comfortable with.

“I’m 72 and my health is good so I could still be doing this, but the time was right to make a change. I like Ray’s humility, his lack of ego, the way he cares for people, the way he handled winning and the way he handled losing his job. I thought he was a prototype Devil.”

Most NHL teams shuffle their identity year to year, coach to coach — just not Lamoriello’s Devils. The Devils have always been about person and player, about different rules, about defence first.

“The players are all like your children,” said Lamoriello. “You treat them the same, but they’re all different. When you talk about the player, you’re not always talking about the person and when you think about the person, you can’t always be thinking about the player.”

Maybe the best trade Lamoriello ever made was managed from a telephone booth in Hartford. He was on the line with a rather desperate Floyd Smith, then general manager of the Maple Leafs, who needed help on his blue line.

Lamoriello offered up Tom Kurvers in October 1989, “who was a pretty good NHL defenceman at the time.”

He got back the Leafs first pick in the 1991 draft.

“We thought we were taking a shot at getting Eric Lindros,” said Lamoriello. “That was the intention of the deal. And lo and behold, it didn’t work out that way.”

He did better. They got Scott Niedermayer, the most decorated winner in modern hockey history. “He was a terrific player for us.”

The other story Lamoriello likes to reminisce about was NHL draft day in Vancouver 1990 — and a deal he made with Flames general manager Cliff Fletcher on the floor of the draft.

“This is where your scouts come in,” said Lamoriello. “We needed goalies in that draft. By our information, we knew Calgary really wanted Trevor Kidd, who most people rated as the No. 1 goalie. We wound up trading them our pick (11th overall) and moved back to 20 and got another pick to go with it.”

At 20, he selected Martin Brodeur. Next stop: Hall of Fame.

Lamoriello was the front man for all of that — the decision maker, the franchise shaper, the leader of the band. No one in NHL history has operated such a unique club. He made the rules, wrote the rule book, and enforced them.

“I get credit, but a lot of other people did the work,” he said.

He told the story of acquiring Brian Rafalski, one of the better Devils players in their history.

“We needed an offensive defenceman and we couldn’t find one,” Lamoriello said. “I wanted to know: Who is the best offensive defenceman in Europe? Our scout Dan Labraaten came back with Rafalski’s name. We didn’t have great reports on him before. But we went and got him.”

Rafalski played seven seasons on defence in New Jersey, won two Stanley Cups and led the team in scoring from the blue line in five of those years.

Those were the great times. Like anyone who has been around through four decades, Lamoriello can’t escape the moments he’d rather forget. The losses are often harder to deal with.

“I remember Peter Stastny scored a goal for us that would have eliminated Pittsburgh, who went on to win the Cup (in 1991). They didn’t have replay back then. There was no way of challenging the play. We had a great team. That kind of thing stays with you. You think, ‘What would have happened if that goal counted?’ You don’t ever get over those.”

And the worst part of his time with the Devils? The signing of Ilya Kovalchuk to the richest contract in Devils history and his subsequent departure. One minute he was the highest-paid forward in the NHL, almost the next minute he was gone, back to Russia. The Devils have not made the playoffs since Kovalchuk departed.

Would he like to revisit the Kovalchuk story?

“I’d rather not,” said Lamoriello.

And with that, the conversation, like his 28 years as general manager, abruptly comes to an end.

steve.simmons@sunmedia.ca

@simmonssteve

A DEVIL PAYS HIS DUES

When Brendan Shahanan played his 1,000th NHL game for the Detroit Red Wings, it happened to be against the team that drafted him, the New Jersey Devils.

“He did something that night I’ll never forget,” said Lou Lamoriello, outgoing GM of the Devils. “He took his jersey off after the game, signed it to me, and had it sent up to the office. That tells you a lot about Brendan.”

And it tells you a lot about how Devils somehow remain Devils long after they’ve changed uniforms and cities. The relationship between Shanahan and Lamoriello has been close from playing days to now.

Shanahan was the first player selected by Lamoriello when he became Devils general manager in 1987.

“I learned an awful lot from him,” said Shanahan. “But more than anything else, I learned about being a pro and what it means to be a pro.”

“I’m proud of Brendan and all he’s accomplished,” said Lamoriello. “He came through our organization at a pretty early stage. He had a great career as a player and great career since then. Look at the job he did for the league. I thought he was sensational. And I have no doubt he’ll do the same kind of job for the Leafs.”