PITTSBURGH — The date was June 30, 2013. The site was the Prudential Center in Newark, N.J., and Penguins scout Scott Bell was in no position to brag about the third-round pick he’d just lobbied for.

Not yet, anyway.

That is because fellow Minnesotan Jake Guentzel, taken 77th overall, was roughly the size of a field mouse. Bell’s buddies around the league took a few shots at him that day, wondering where the other half of Guentzel was and why the Penguins had drafted a third-grader.

I learned of all this four years later, right after Bell took a couple of mighty sweet swigs from the Stanley Cup. Guentzel — Bell called him “Jakey” — had just set the NHL postseason rookie record with five game-winning goals, helping the Penguins win that championship in Nashville.

I wondered how it all came to be. Who had the foresight and smarts to recommend Guentzel? Turned out it was Bell, of course, but it was really Ray Shero who made it happen, and he did so in quintessentially Ray Shero fashion.

I’ll tell the full story in a moment. It was among the first things I thought of last Wednesday upon hearing the shocking news that Shero had passed away at the too-young age of 62, after a brief illness.

It’s not like I knew Shero well, but what I learned of him, from his eight years as Penguins general manager and thereafter, was this: He was universally respected and liked — not an easy combination to achieve — and was a man of conviction, intelligence and compassion. He had a quick, chop-busting sense of humor and a ferocious competitive streak, as one might expect from the son of iconic Philadelphia Flyers coach Fred Shero.

Oh, and Shero loved hockey as much as anyone I’ve met, always up for telling or hearing a good story and always conveying a special reverence for long-time Penguins luminaries such as Eddie Johnston and Jack Riley.

I remember Mike Lange, who we lost in February, telling me how much he liked and respected Shero shortly after the Penguins fired Shero in 2014.

"My experience with Ray, quite honestly, was as good as with any general manager I've ever been around," Lange said. "From top to bottom, to me, the staff he hired, the people he has in place and worked with, from the coaching staff to the training staff, to everybody involved in the scouting departments, top rate. Absolutely as professional as you want to be, and I can't say enough nice things about Ray Shero. I mean that.”

One attribute stood out, at least to me: Shero identified smart people and empowered them to do their jobs. He hired the likes of Tom Fitzgerald, Dan Bylsma, Jason Botterill, Bill Guerin, Sergei Gonchar, Todd Reirden, Tony Granato and Mike Yeo and scouts such as Bell, who in the aforementioned conversation laid out precisely how Guentzel came to be a Penguin.

As the third round progressed, Bell was sitting at the far end of the draft table when Shero summoned him for a come-to-Jakey moment.

“We locked eyes, and Ray said, ‘Scott, do you like Jake Guentzel?’ I said, ‘I do,’” Bell recalled. He said, ‘Are you willing to draft him?’ I said, ‘Yes, I’d like to draft him.’ He said, ‘Are you sure?’ I said, ‘Yes, I’m sure.’”

The conversation continued ...

Shero: “That’s your guy?”

Bell: “That’s my guy.”

Shero: “You take full responsibility for him?”

Bell: “I take full responsibility for him.”

The rest is history — and you can’t write Penguins history without a full chapter dedicated to Shero. He was the key architect in bringing the Penguins their first Stanley Cup in 17 years in 2009, acquiring winners such as Chris Kunitz, Matt Cooke, Guerin, Hal Gill, Mark Eaton, Craig Adams and Petr Sykora and drafting towering center Jordan Staal.

Shero kept a special relationship with Sidney Crosby, telling me years later of what a special leader Crosby was.

“Sidney was absolutely fantastic to deal with from the day I met him," Shero remembered. "Not once did he come to my office and ask about this guy or that guy, not once. He wasn't like that."

Shero wasn’t perfect here. He knew that. Several of his first-round picks busted. He probably stayed too long with Bylsma. The team could not finish the deal in Shero’s final five years, but it wasn’t because he didn’t swing big. People forget what a huge story it was when Shero traded for Jarome Iginla (and nobody was complaining when Iginla racked up 12 points in his first 11 playoff games), a deal that recalled his blockbuster for Marian Hossa.

What also might be forgotten is that Shero, contrary to popular belief, did not mortgage the future during his tenure here. He actually secured it. Several of his moves led to the championships of 2016 and 2017:

— He made sure a prospect defenseman named Brian Dumoulin was included in the Jordan Staal trade with Carolina.

— In addition to Guentzel, Shero’s staff drafted Matt Murray, Bryan Rust and Olli Maatta.

— The deal for Kunitz proved to be one of the best in Penguins history.

Two other quick stories spring to mind regarding Shero, who whenever I’d seek him out in his Mellon Arena office would have old-time hockey games, in black and white, playing on an endless reel in the background.

One happened shortly after he was fired. I was with my toddler daughter at “Bed, Bath and Beyond” in Bethel Park when I spotted Shero pushing a cart around.

All we could do was laugh.

“This is what happens when you get fired,” Shero said. “What’s your excuse?”

The other happened in the corridors of PPG Paints Arena in June of 2017. Patric Hornqvist had helped the Penguins win a Stanley Cup a year earlier and was about to play in another Cup Final, this one against his old team, the Nashville Predators. Shero had been the Predators’ assistant GM when they made Hornqvist the last pick of the 2005 NHL draft — the same one in which Crosby was taken first.

“Good trivia question,” Shero said. “Who’s the first pick overall and the last pick overall, drafted by different teams, to play on the same line and win a Cup? Pretty amazing story. I remember when Patric got good, saying, ‘Holy cow, who knew?’”

OK, one more: Johnston told me this one. He was a goalie in the Montreal Canadiens organization in 1957 when he introduced teammate and assistant coach Fred Shero to the sister of a woman he was dating. Shero fell in love at first sight.

“Fred told me after the first day, ‘I’ll marry that girl,’” Johnston recalled. “And it wasn’t long before he did.”

Five years later, Fred and Marietta Shero had a son they named Rejean, or Ray.

“If it wasn’t for me,” Johnston said with a wink, “Ray wouldn’t be here.”

Said Shero: “He never lets me forget it.”

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