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It ain't easy being an LCS Hockey hero and idol of millions from eight to eighty, but then nothing has been easy for Johnny Cullen the past couple of years.

Cullen's road to recovery from non-Hodgkin's lymphoma finds him in Cleveland, Ohio, these days, plying his trade with the IHL's Cleveland Lumberjacks. The 34-year-old veteran forward was assigned to the Jacks on Oct. 26 by the evil Tampa Bay Lightning - a team that obviously wouldn't recognize talent and heroism if it slapped them across their sun-tanned faces.

The 34-year-old veteran center started slowly but made a definite impact in his fourth game with Cleveland. He tied a team record with seven points in one contest, leading the Jacks to a 7-3 blowout of the defending Turner Cup champion Chicago Wolves on Nov. 7. Playing a regular shift and seeing plenty of power-play time, Cullen recorded two goals and five assists.

That matched Dave Michayluk's team record set on Feb. 27, 1988. Ironically, Michayluk accomplished the feat against the Flint Generals, for whom Cullen was playing at the time. In fact, Cullen established a still-standing IHL record of 157 points that season.

"I guess the hockey gods were on my side tonight," Cullen said after his seven-point outburst. "It was the kind of game where every bounce seemed to go in."

Cullen's goal in Cleveland is obviously to work his way back to the NHL, but the question is, with which team? It probably won't be Tampa Bay.

"Do I have a chance of going back up to Tampa again? No, I don't think so," he said. "But if I come down here and play well, maybe some other team will give me a shot."

Cullen missed all of the 1997-98 season after a softball-sized tumor was discovered in his chest. A course of chemotherapy, a bone marrow transplant, and some excruciating rehab later, he was pronounced cancer-free last summer. Tampa invited him to training camp, eventually signing him to a two-way contract, and he made the Lightning roster to start the season. But Tampa struggled early on, and Cullen was to pay the price for it.

Tampa Bay coach and GM Jacques Demers gave Cullen a choice. He could either retire and take an assistant coaching position, or he could accept a demotion to Cleveland. When push came to shove, Cullen took the trip to the minors.

"I think they were pretty well shocked when I did that," said Cullen. "They never thought I'd come down here. But I told Jacques that I've come too far and I wasn't going to give up my comeback after only two weeks.

"But if I'm down here and I realize it's not gonna happen, then I'll hang 'em up. But right now, I'm having fun. I went through hell for a year-and-a-half, and coming to the locker room now and being with the guys - even at this level - is fun."

Cullen's biggest problem is conditioning. He was getting only about eight minutes of ice time per game in Tampa Bay, and it's been two years since he's played a full season. But with the Lumberjacks running three forward lines (instead of the NHL standard four), he is getting ample opportunity to get himself in shape.

No matter what happens with his hockey career, though, his battle back from cancer has changed his life in more ways than one, and it's all for the better, he says.

"One day my life was going along great," said Cullen. "I had a beautiful wife and a beautiful daughter, and then they tell me I had cancer. So do I wake up everyday now and thank God I'm healthy? Sure I do. It could come back at any moment, for all I know. There are times when my wife and I get stressed out these days, and then say, 'Hey, what are we stressed out about? Look what we just went through.' If nothing else, an experience like this gives you perspective."

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