Dave Scott went from backyard hockey to running the Flyers

Second of three parts.

On April 29, Dave Scott was with his wife, Marcia, at Restoration Hardware at the King of Prussia Mall, getting some things for the Philadelphia home they were about to purchase. His cell phone started to blow up.

The first call came from Paul Holmgren, the Flyers president who had just gotten back from memorial services for Ilkka Sinisalo, a former Flyers player and scout, in Finland. Holmgren was watching the draft lottery on TV and needed to share his excitement with someone.

"I'm sure you just saw we got the No. 2 pick," Holmgren said.

"Oh, my God!" said Scott, president and CEO of the Flyers' parent company, Comcast Spectacor. He then called Brian Roberts, the chairman and CEO of Comcast Corp., to share the team's good fortune.

A short time later, Flyers general manager Ron Hextall, who also had just returned from Finland, texted Scott.

"He said we're going to be in great shape, that we'll get a great center, or whatever we want out of this," Scott said.

Unless something unforeseen happens, the "great center" will be either Nolan Patrick or Nico Hischier - whichever of the two players the New Jersey Devils bypass with the No. 1 overall selection in the opening round on June 23.

"This could be a game-changer," Scott said. "I think if you look at what we've drafted the last few years, we've done very well with the [defensemen], and we have a lot of young goalies coming up. And, boy, to get an opportunity to get another forward or center in there, that's pretty special."

"It was an unexpected gift," Holmgren said. "When you think about the odds, it's incredible."

The Flyers had a little over a two percent chance of climbing from No. 13 to No. 2 in the first round.

Scott grew up in tiny Lyndhurst, Ohio, a Cleveland suburb. In the 1960s, an innocent and much slower-paced time, his days were filled with neighborhood baseball and football games. He casually followed Rocky Colavito and the Indians but was much more passionate about the Browns. It helped that the Browns had the game's best player, running back Jim Brown, and that their quarterback, Frank Ryan, happened to move onto Scott's street.

"We could never understand why he was slumming. It was like, 'What's he doing in our neighborhood?' " Scott said with a laugh.

Scott was a diehard Browns fan, and he also became a follower of the Cleveland Barons' AHL team.

"That's where I first became interested in hockey," he said. "My dad would take the whole family. We'd go watch in the early and mid '60s, and that's where I learned to ice skate. There would be family skates after the games. And Cleveland was cold, so we'd flood our backyard in February and skate there. My dad was always complaining about the water bill."

Scott attended Cleveland State and stayed in the Cleveland area until he and his wife moved to Coudersport, Pa., in 1987 because of his job in the cable TV industry.

Eight years later, Scott's boyhood NFL team fled Cleveland. "And I never really reconnected with the Browns," he said.

Scott joined Comcast as a regional vice president in 1993 - he was involved in financial and operational aspects of the booming cable company - so he and his family had to relocate to Jupiter, Fla. He would not be able to flood his backyard for skating purposes, but hockey was still part of his fabric.

After working in Florida and then a stint in Atlanta, Comcast sent Scott to Detroit in 1999.

Going to Detroit, known as Hockeytown, was the perfect fit for Scott and his family because they were closer to their roots.

"It was great. My wife was from Columbus, Ohio, and my parents were in Cleveland at the time and were older. It was nice because we could take the kids there because we weren't that far away, and we had been away from our families for a while."

Under Scott's leadership, Comcast consolidated the Detroit market. He became friends with Mike Ilitch, the owner of the Red Wings, Tigers and the Little Caesars pizza founder, and his wife, Marian. "We became big sponsors both at Comerica Park and The Joe," he said. Ilitch died three months ago.

"The Joe" was the Red Wings home, Joe Louis Arena.

"It was a great time for hockey there," Scott said. "I went to a lot of hockey games. Scotty Bowman was the coach, and the hockey intensified for me, and I've stayed with it ever since."

In 2005, Scott was shifted by Comcast to Philadelphia, where he became the company's CFO and had responsibility over the human resources, legal, and information-technology departments.

It wasn't as exciting as helping to run a hockey team, but that opportunity was on the horizon.

"I knew Ed [Snider] because we were involved for 20 years together," Scott said, referring to their relationship through Comcast ventures. "His son, Sam, actually went to school with my daughter Hannah, so they both rowed at one point, and I'd see him at these events down on the river."

When Peter Luukko stepped down as president of the Flyers' parent company, Comcast Spectacor, late in 2013, Snider set up a meeting with Scott.

"He told me he was looking for someone to run the company day to day," Scott said.

Scott, the former top official in Comcast's cable division, had been retired for 90 days before he accepted Snider's offer. He became the Comcast Spectacor president and COO, and, in essence, replaced Luukko.

"It was a little different," Scott said. "Peter was heavily, heavily involved with the Flyers. He probably spent 90 percent of his time on the Flyers. When I came in, we really redid things. Ed said, 'Look, the Flyers are my baby.' He wanted to be more involved with the day-to-day [operations], and he said you can have everything else. 'Everything else' was a pretty big deal. . . . In Spectra now, we have 350 clients serving almost 500 locations across North America."

Scott estimated he spends 50 to 60 percent of his time on Flyers matters, including business operations. Some of his time is spent with Spectra, the second-largest ticketing group (behind Ticketmaster) in North America, doing 120 million tickets a year, Scott said.

The Flyers didn't make the playoffs for the second time in three years, but they were a financial success this season, Scott said. Besides filling the seats, the Flyers, like all NHL teams, benefitted from a lucrative deal with the digital company BAMTech, which provides numerous mobile-app services and, for a fee, video-streams NHL games.

According to Forbes, BAMTech is paying the NHL $100 million a year for its content rights, and the league is a minority owner in the company.

During this season, the Flyers averaged 19,644 fans per home game, filling 100.5 percent of capacity, and they sold nearly 17,000 season tickets per game. On Comcast SportsNet, the Flyers had a 2.67 rating (compared to 1.78 for the 76ers and 3.17 for the Phillies), which translates to about 78,000 households that watched each of their games, placing them fifth among U.S. NHL teams this season.

The Flyers' viewership increased by 17 percent over the previous season, Scott said, adding that advertising for the team has been "wonderful."

Comcast Spectacor and the Cordish Companies each own 50 percent in Xfinity Live! - the eateries and bars next to the Wells Fargo Center. There are plans to add restaurants, retail stores, office space, a hotel, and possibly condos or apartments in the space near Xfinity Live!, Scott said, adding that a sports museum, which had been proposed, probably will not be erected on the site.

To some, the team's popularity is surprising when you consider the Flyers haven't won a Stanley Cup since Gerald Ford was in the White House.

"I think the Flyers still have a big personality," Scott said. "I mean, 50 years, and you look at how active our alums are and current players are."

The Flyers used to outspend teams for players, but that is no longer possible in a salary-cap world.

"We don't have that advantage," Scott said. "It's harder because you really have to be looking out two, three, four years at a time. You have to look at that time frame, and that's what Ron does every day. I mean, if you made a decision to do something today, it might look pretty good until Wayne Simmonds' contract comes up in two or three years and you're like, 'Oh, my gosh,' and you're looking at this cap [problem]. You do have to take a very disciplined approach, and you have to look long at how the pieces will fit together."

That's one reason Scott and his cohorts like the idea of interjecting more youth onto the team next season.

"These young kids are great," Scott said. "They come in, and they're energetic, and initially they're not making that much money," he said.

Next: Scott talks about the Flyers' future and his last meeting with Ed Snider.

scarchidi@phillynews.com

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