After the St. Louis Blues’ 5-3 loss to the Dallas Stars in a preseason game on Sept. 18, Cindy Sanford could tell how thrilled her son was to finally be back on the ice.

Zach Sanford, who had been traded to the Blues by the Washington Capitals as a rookie, sat out his first full season with the Blues after suffering a dislocated shoulder on the first day of the team’s 2017-18 training camp. He recovered with time left in the season, but after being assigned to the American Hockey League to get in game shape, a bruised lung sidelined him again and he never rejoined the parent club.

In his first game in a Blues uniform since May 2, 2017, Sanford had an assist and two hits in 15:34 of ice time in the loss to the Stars. He sounded happy on the phone when his mom hung up with him, and she had that on her mind when she awoke around midnight to news that her ex-husband and Zach’s dad, Michael, had suffered a heart attack.

“We didn’t call Zach right away,” Cindy said. “I knew he was having a good moment, so we waited until the morning. Once we got down (to Salem, Mass.) the next day, we knew things weren’t looking so great. I was trying to get a hold of Zach and he wasn’t answering, so I called his agent and said, ‘I don’t know what the protocol is …’ I know he was so excited to get to training camp and make the team this year because he worked so hard this summer. His agent said, ‘The Blues are going to be OK with this, don’t worry.’”

In an off-day for Sanford following the game in Dallas, his older sister, Melanie, was finally able to reach her brother and alert him about their dad’s condition. He hadn’t passed, and doctors were hopeful that therapeutic hypothermia — the lowering of a person’s body temperature to 89-93 degrees in order to get blood flowing to the brain and other organs — would help his chances of recovery. The treatment, which lasts 24 hours, has a track record of success.

“I talked to Zach and he said, ‘I’m going to sit here and think about do I want to rush home or not?'” Cindy remembers. “He was pretty distraught, but didn’t know what to do. He was like, ‘Dad would want me to make this team … even if he passes away, I know he’d be so mad at me if I didn’t make the best of it.’ It’s a parents’ dream come true, right? They were doing the (therapeutic hypothermia) procedure, and we were kind of hopeful, so Zach stretched it out as long as he could.”

The next day was Thursday, Sept. 20, and though Sanford was making plans to leave the Blues on Friday, he stayed in St. Louis on Thursday and practiced with the team.

“I still don’t know what to think, to be honest,” Sanford said. “Not being there, not being able to see him, it didn’t feel real. I think being able to get on the ice for even a half-hour, it was kind of nice to get to do something I love. I didn’t want to not think about him, but it was good for me to just step away for a minute, take a breather and try to recollect my thoughts.”

Cindy told Zach to call her immediately after practice and, while still in his gear, he did so in the early afternoon. But by then, Mike Sanford was gone, dead at age 54.

“He didn’t make it back in time to see him,” she said. “He passed away before they even brought his body temperature back up. As soon as I told him that news, he said, ‘Alright, I’m on my way.’ The team booked him a flight right away.”

Sanford met with Blues coach Mike Yeo and general manager and Doug Armstrong at Enterprise Center in what was an emotional encounter.

“I just remember the feeling in my stomach, your heart just drops,” Yeo recalled. “I can’t even really tell you what you feel except empathy. He’s a phenomenal kid, and you could see how shaken he was and how difficult it was for him. He’s there, he’s trying to make our team, he’s put everything into his summer, and that happens. I didn’t have words for him. I just felt terrible for him.

“We’re here to be coaches, but we’re dealing with human beings, and you care about all of your players. So to see one of them going through something like that, it’s gut-wrenching. I just told him, ‘Go home and take care of your family. You’re going to play in this league a long time, but you’ve got to take care of what you need to. Don’t get caught up in worrying about that right now. Things will take care of themselves.'”

As the Blues got set to host Columbus on Sept. 21, Sanford was on a plane, bound for the hardest road trip of his life.

“The whole staff and everyone was really great about it,” he said. “They let me go home for a while and spend some time with my family. It was really good for me to be able to be there for them and have them be able to be there for me. My dad was a huge part of my life and will surely be missed.”

Before there were more tears, a flood of memories poured through Sanford’s mind on his way back to Massachusetts — the gourmet breakfasts Mike used to make, the years he played for his father with the Manchester (N.H.) Flames and the “Dad’s Trip” the two took together with the Blues last season.

The elder Sanford was a cook, working at several restaurants when Zach and his sister were young, which meant a tasty bite for the two every morning.

“You name it,” Sanford said. “I’d be coming into school on a Wednesday morning after Eggs Benedict, French toast or eggs over easy and home fries, while other kids are grabbing Dunkin’ Donuts on the way in.”

Mike also had a passion for hockey. His father, Richard, helped build the youth hockey association, and Mike wanted to continue the family legacy with Zach.

“He was always buying me new equipment,” Sanford said. “The big thing with him was street hockey. Everyday I’d be on the driveway, just fooling around, and he’d come out and get me to work on certain shots. He was always there to shoot the puck around with me. That developed my love for the game and brought out the fun side of it to me.”

But restaurant hours are long and hard, especially on nights and weekends, and Mike missed a lot of his son’s practices and games.

“He was all about the kids, he was a great dad, but when Zach first started playing hockey, he was barely there for anything,” Cindy said.

So Mike changed that by switching careers. He wanted out of the food business anyway, but buying a Canadian franchise store called Fibrenew, which specialized in furniture repair, would allow him time to coach Zach’s team, the Flames.

“It was like his dream come true, to coach his boy,” Cindy said. “He was so happy and so proud to be a part of it all.”

Mike Sanford coached his son, Zach, with the Manchester Flames. (Photo courtesy of the Sanford family).

Mike remained behind the bench from the time his son was in the sixth grade until high school.

“He was a really good coach, and the guys loved him,” Zach said. “He let the guys play how they wanted. He was always the guy telling everyone, ‘If you want to do something, you can do it, it’s just the work you have to put in.’ He definitely pushed me and helped me learn how to put in that work.”

But after three or four years, the furniture store floundered and Mike returned to the restaurant business.

“He took a chance, and it didn’t work out,” Cindy said. “But he did get the opportunity to coach.”

Mike’s guidance, though, had already paved the way for Zach, who was Washington’s second-round selection in the 2013 draft. He had played 26 games with the Capitals in 2016-17 when the Blues, who were in the playoff hunt, traded free agent-to-be defenseman Kevin Shattenkirk for Sanford and a first-round pick.

Sanford played 13 games with the Blues down the stretch in 2016-17, posting two goals and three assists. It was a promising start that might have led to a spot on the opening-night roster last season, but an accidental collision with teammate Dmitrij Jaskin on the first day of training camp led to a dislocated shoulder that required surgery. He would be out a minimum of five months.

“He worked so hard that summer before to be sure that he was going to make that team, and when that happened, it was just so heartbreaking. Crushing,” Cindy said.

Mike tried to keep Zach positive.

“Obviously there are some tough times when you’re injured and having him there to coach me through it, telling me to put in the work everyday and I’d be back soon, he kept me motivated,” Sanford said.

The Blues were scheduled to take their “Dad’s Trip” in late January, but since Sanford wasn’t back from his injury and injured players don’t travel with the team, it wasn’t a guarantee that Mike and Zach would be asked to go. It would have been perfect, too, because one of the two cities the club was traveling to was Boston, near where Mike grew up.

“We were kind of questioning whether he was even going to be invited,” Cindy remembered.

The call from the Blues eventually came, and Sanford couldn’t have been more thrilled.

“They wanted me to be a part of that trip, which is pretty cool of them,” Sanford said.

It would be the only road trip of the season for the forward, and he was about to ask his dad to come along.

“At first he was like, ‘I don’t know if I can make it,’ because he works like a dog,” Sanford said. “I was like, ‘Alright, I’m going to have to call your boss then.’ He was, ‘Oh, no, no, no, I’ll talk to him.’ So he talked to him the next day and, of course, his boss was like, ‘Oh yeah, go, 100 percent.'”

Mike met the Blues in Boston, where Zach presented him with a white road jersey, stitched with “Sanford” and “No. 12.”

“I handed it to him and he was so jacked up,” Sanford said. “He was like, ‘This is for me? I get this?’ He was happy to see my name on the back of that jersey. That was pretty cool to be able to give him that.”

(Photo courtesy St. Louis Blues)

On the trip, the fathers and their sons have several meals together, and the dads also have their own time.

“I was a little nervous at first,” Sanford said. “He was cracking some jokes, making fun of some guys. A couple of the times I was like, ‘Oh no, don’t say that.’ But the guys ended up loving it. He fit right in.”

“Mike is a big bragger about Zach, of course, and Zach is very, very modest,” Cindy said. “He’s one honest person, you always know what he’s thinking, and sometimes you’re like, ‘Whoa!’ I heard from Zach quite a bit, and I remember him saying, ‘You won’t believe it, all the guys love Dad.'”

Bob Edmundson, father of Blues defenseman Joel Edmundson, recalled meeting Mike.

“The passion is basically what I remember,” Edmundson said. “He was proud of his son and excited to be with the group of dads because we were all there experiencing what our kids go through. We had such a short visit with him, but it was pretty clear that he was proud of his son, that’s for sure. I don’t remember anything that I would have felt embarrassed for anybody that he would have said. It was more like the guys that I know from home, just the down-to-earth, shoot-from-the-hip type comments. Not censored, not polished for anybody, just right from the heart this is what I’m getting at. There are times when you hear parents when they’re asked questions about their boys and polish up the answer. Nope, Mike was pretty much, ‘This is how I see it,’ which was awesome.

“We got to hang out when the pressure wasn’t on, and the dads got a little bit looser and Mike just had a presence about him. He was vocal and he wasn’t hiding behind anybody as a new guy to the group, and that really opened it up for us to find out who he was. And with his little accent he had when he was telling some stories, it just added to the character of the whole group.”

The Blues lost, 3-1, in Boston, but wrapped up the trip with a 1-0 win in Buffalo.

“I think for him it was just so awesome for him to experience that,” Sanford said. “He never got to live the pro hockey life that he probably dreamed of, like I did, when he was younger. For him to meet all of the guys and be part of the team was pretty awesome for him. I think it was pretty cool for him to be in Boston, too, at The Garden where he grew up watching hockey. Even though I wasn’t playing, that’s all he talked about for a month after that.”

This was supposed to be the year Mike would come see his son in St. Louis, but a week into training camp, Sanford was headed back to Massachusetts to attend his father’s funeral.

Over the few days, he would see many familiar faces, but it was the tales that were told that stood out the most.

“It was tough, but it was really nice to see how many people loved him and how many people he impacted,” Sanford said. “I talked to one of my dad’s best friend, Mark Putney, who coached me a little bit. He had a lot of good things to say about my dad, and it was just kind of nice to hear how my dad acted around his friends. He was a goofball, he liked to fool around, he liked to make jokes. I like to do that stuff, too, so it was reassuring. There were a lot of great stories coming out of there, stuff I didn’t even know, and it was really good to see how much they loved him and how much he loved them. He made everyone feel welcome.”

They came out in droves to Levesque Funeral Home in Salem for the visitation Monday, and among those paying their respects were many familiar faces from the Manchester Flames’ organization.

“His wake, there were so many people from the hockey community who thought that Michael was the greatest coach,” Cindy said. “He was very passionate, not just for Zach, but for all the kids on the team. He really could find something about every kid that was their shining contribution to the team, and he made that flourish.”

The next day was the funeral at Immaculate Conception Church, followed by the burial.

As he was getting ready, Sanford said, “I was gelling my hair and my sister thought I was slicking it back because my dad would always slick his hair back. I was like, ‘No, I always wear my hair like this.'”

That hair still shining hours later, Sanford, always the focus of his father’s pride, accepted the pallbearer duties and found it to be his own source of dignity.

“It’s an honor,” he said. “It’s his last ride, and to be able to put him to rest with his closest friends and family, it’s definitely emotional, but I don’t know if you’d want anyone else doing it.”

A week later, Sanford was back in St. Louis, receiving a warm welcome when he walked into the locker room.

“We were all happy to see him and for him to get back with the boys,” Blues forward Sammy Blais said. “Everyone was really happy to see him, and everyone went up to him to see how he was feeling. I think he was feeling pretty good.”

(Photo by Jeff Chevrier/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images)

Sanford practiced that day, but didn’t play in the club’s preseason game against Dallas that night.

“It was tough and kind of weird, just missing everything for a week and then jumping right back into it,” he said. “At the same time, that’s what my dad would have wanted me to do. He knows how much I love this game, and he loved it just as much. I thought him watching me back out on the ice made him pretty happy up there.”

After missing four exhibition games, Sanford had two practices before returning to the lineup in Washington on Sept. 30. In a 5-2 loss to the Capitals, he had just one shot on goal and was a minus-2 in 18:45 of ice time.

“We put him in the game in Washington and I don’t know if it was necessarily fair, but it was not one that we were going to judge him too harshly on,” Yeo said.

But during Sanford’s absence, Blais and fellow Blues prospect Jordan Kyrou had been so impressive that the club chose to keep them on the opening-night roster and assign him to San Antonio.

“We had some tough decisions, and circumstances probably put some guys ahead of Zach,” Yeo said. “But we told him that things change in a hurry, so go down, take care of your game, make sure you’re ready to go, and he did that.”

Sanford played four games with the Rampage, scoring two goals and notching one assist, and was recalled by the Blues on Oct. 16.

In his first game, he centered Ivan Barbashev and Blais on the fourth line in Montreal, then was promoted to play left wing on the second line with Ryan O’Reilly and David Perron in Toronto. With just 40 career games, he was looking forward to joining two veterans with a combined 1,385 career games.

“O’Ry and Perron, they’re two pretty good players. Not just pretty good, really good,” Sanford said. “It helps every young player to get to play with some great players.”

The 6-foot-4, 207-pound former Boston College Eagle always believed that his skill could translate into top-six potential in the NHL, and in the second period of that game against the Maple Leafs, we saw the signs.

The Blues were leading, 1-0, when Perron scooped up a loose puck and slid it to over Sanford, who was cutting to the net and beat goaltender Frederik Andersen with a quick wrist shot from the face-off dot.

Sanford’s first goal of the season was the fifth of his NHL career.

“That’s something I’ve been working on, trying to find that soft area, especially when we get it on the forecheck, and (Perron) found me very nicely there,” he said.

“It was a great shot, and it was nice to see him get rewarded,” O’Reilly said.

Looking at the video clip, you can see that Sanford might not have scored if not for the fact that he had his stick on the ice, anticipating Perron’s pass and ready to release. That detail in his game was one embedded him in by his dad.

“Yeah, he was a big ‘stick on the ice’ guy,” Sanford said.

You also see Sanford pump his fist, and as he’s being congratulated by Perron, O’Reilly and Alex Pietrangelo, a smile spread across his face.

On the other side of Canada, Bob Edmundson grinned after the goal, thinking about Mike and what the moment must have felt like for Zach.

“I definitely did think about that,” Edmundson said. “That’s the beauty of today’s game from a spectator’s perspective is the camera can zoom right in, so you get the player’s expression right away. As a dad, you just sort of think, ‘Wow, good for the kid.’ I know Mike would be very proud of him at that point.”

A teammate retrieved the puck for Sanford, who posed with it after the game.

(Photo: Jeremy Rutherford/The Athletic)

“It was pretty emotional,” Sanford said that night. “I know he’s up there watching. He saw that one for sure, and he’s proud of me tonight. Hopefully I can keep making him proud. It wasn’t my greatest game, but getting that goal is something to build off of.”

Sanford did exactly that, following up his goal in Toronto with an assist and a plus-2 performance in Winnipeg last Monday. On his assist, he took a cross-ice pass from O’Reilly, and with Jets defenseman Tyler Myers between him and the net, he touch-passed to Perron for a clearer shot that beat netminder Connor Hellebuyck.

“That was a great play by O’Ry,” Sanford said. “(Myers) was starting to gap up on me, so I peeked back real quick and saw (Perron) wide open in the middle. I figured he had a better shot coming than I did, so I had to get it to him. When you’re out there, you’re always trying to survey the ice and see what’s going to happen and anticipate and (Perron) was in a good spot there.”

It handed the Blues a 4-3 lead with 5:11 left in regulation, but they eventually fell, 5-4, in overtime.

Sanford, however, has remained on the second line and continued to produce, scoring in Thursday’s 7-4 loss to Columbus, and netting a goal and two assists for his first career three-point game in Saturday’s 7-3 win over Chicago.

He set up the Blues’ first goal just 18 seconds into Saturday’s game, his pass somehow eluding the sticks of three Blackhawks — Duncan Keith, Henri Jokiharju and Dominik Kahun — before O’Reilly pushed the puck past goalie Corey Crawford.

“Getting to play with him, he’s helping me create a lot,” O’Reilly said. “Just big plays, huge plays that give us the spark that we need to feel confident. He’s just so smart, and (despite) his size, he kind of gets lost and the pucks always seem to find him. I don’t think it’s something you can teach, it’s just kind of a gift that he has. It’s impressive, and for me, he’s very nice to play with.”

Later in the first period, it was Sanford, from O’Reilly and Perron, scoring his third goal of the season for a 2-1 lead over the Blackhawks.

“That was a nice little backdoor pass there,” Sanford said. “I was glad to tap that one in.”

Then early in the second period, a heads-up play by Sanford led to a penalty against the Hawks, resulting in a power-play goal by Vladimir Tarasenko and a 3-2 Blues lead.

Sanford shadowed Chicago veteran defenseman Brent Seabrook, picked off his zone-exit pass, then fed ahead to O’Reilly, who was hooked by Erik Gustafsson on a breakaway.

“I knew he was going to try to pinch me off, so I figured I’d try to cut back,” said Sanford, who came up with the steal. “I didn’t have as much speed as O’Ry, so it was great support from him and a great (scoring) chance. A penalty was called, and we end up scoring, which was huge for us.”

So since joining the O’Reilly line, Sanford has a four-game point-streak, in which he has six points total (three goals and three assists).

“I’m not surprised,” Yeo said. “This goes back, for me, to training camp last year. … I thought that he had a good chance to make our team. He’s shown that he can play up and down our lineup, he’s shown that he can play with different players, and he’s a smart player. Last year was a tough injury for him. It was a tough injury for our team, to be honest with you, because we thought he had a really good chance to be a contributing factor for us. He lost a little bit of time development-wise there and obviously with what happened in training camp this year, it was another tough situation for him. But with all this, he’s just kept pushing forward.

“He’s got the right attitude, the right demeanor. He’s a little bit older, which probably helps a little. But more than anything for me, it’s his hockey sense. To play with good players, you need a skill level, you need to be able to skate, but you need to be able to read off them and you need to be responsible, because quite often you’re on the ice against the other team’s best players. There’s a lot more to the game than just scoring goals. Every time you step on the ice you’re faced with something different. It could be a D-zone shift, neutral-zone shift, and you’ve got to be ready to do your job. He takes pride in doing those things very well.”

Tarasenko also has high praise for Sanford. After his two goals in Saturday’s win, Tarasenko redirected an interview with reporters to talk about him.

“I really want to mention Zach Sanford, the way he plays,” said Tarasenko. “It was a tough injury, what he had last year. It’s impressed all of us, given us a lot of emotion to see what kind of stuff he can do on the ice, and it’s a really big thing for him I’m sure, too. The way he talks, the way he’s smiling all the time, being positive. It’s a big thing for our organization, the way he’s playing right now. That’s why I want to mention him.”

This season, the Blues are using pair of Bobby Plager’s gloves circa 1967 as a symbol of their “Player of the Game,” and on Saturday, they were presented to Sanford.

“It’s pretty cool to get,” he said. “I didn’t know exactly how it would go (this season). I think I came in and tried to play with confidence, and I got a great opportunity. I’ve done a pretty good job of taking advantage of it for now. My linemates have been great help, the whole team as well, and hopefully I can keep playing this way.

“My dad is definitely watching over me really closely. He is the one that got me into hockey, he’s the one that coached me growing up, and taught me so many things. It’s tough to say, but I think he’s proud. All the work that he put in over his life and throughout my life, it’s all starting to come together now.”

(Top photo: David Kirouac/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images)