'It's bittersweet': Weekly Golden Knights-inspired pizza parties come to an end at Boyle Street

EDMONTON -

A charitable legacy left over from last year's NHL Stanley Cup playoffs bubble in Edmonton seems to be drawing to a close.

It's been over eight months since the Las Vegas Golden Knights were defeated by the Dallas Stars in Game 5 of the Western Conference Finals. 

After that game, the Golden Knights players left the Edmonton playoff bubble, and the city – but they also left behind the beginnings of a movement.

While the team from Vegas had still been vying for professional hockey's top prize, CTV News Edmonton learned it was also flexing its charitable muscles.

The gesture started off modestly enough. Golden Knights players treated clients of Rogers Place's neighbouring Boyle Street Community Services to a pizza party.

That happened five times – but then the idea caught on.

"Twenty-four a week, so we’re at about 840 pizzas right now," Panini's Italian Cucina's Robert Caruso told CTV News Edmonton. "I think it works out to about 6,000 slices."

Thanks to the generous pro-activeness of a Golden Knights fan in Reno, Nev., the pizzeria the professional hockey players originally used to supply those first five weekly pizza parties kept on going with them.

“A lot of the time they’re doing cool things for the fans, but it’s not often that the fans get to do a cool thing for the team,” Scott Jividen told CTV News Edmonton from Reno back in September of 2020.

• Weekly pizzas for Edmonton's homeless continue beyond Vegas Knights' playoff exit 

Jividen had the idea to continue providing Boyle Street with those weekly pizzas for Edmonton's Boyle Street for as long as possible – even after his favourite hockey team had made its playoffs exit.

He contacted Panini's to hash out a plan, and the restaurant responded by creating a page on its website dedicated to the pizza donations.

Panini's added its own discount for the charitable pies and from there the orders began to pile up - coming in from all over the world. 

"It’s such a cool thing to see that people from all around the world wanted to support our little community here in Edmonton," Boyle Street's Dan Zimmerman told CTV News Edmonton, "so it means a lot, and it makes us feel seen and our community members definitely feel the love."

Flash forward to Monday – and it seems the last of those Vegas Knights-inspired pies has been delivered. 

"It’s bittersweet," said Zimmerman. "We’re grateful for it lasting as long as it did."

The money from those September donations has run out, but the partnership those hockey players started between Panini's and Boyle Street could continue. 

The "donate a pie" page is still on the restaurant's website, and pizza's purchased for Boyle Street are 25 per cent off. 

So perhaps that Golden Knights legacy will live on in Edmonton after all.