It’s nine years, now, since the incomparable Jean Béliveau died, in 2014 on a Tuesday of this date. He was 83. Eight days later, thousands paid him tribute at a funeral at Montreal’s Mary Queen of the World Cathedral.
there wasn’t much that didn’t happen
“There wasn’t much that didn’t happen.” That’s how the Associated Press summed up the game that the Detroit Red Wings played against New York’s Rangers at Madison Square Garden in front of 12,043 fans on the Sunday night of November 22, 1942. “The wildest fuss” Manhattan had seen all season: that was another description.
Where to begin? In the first period, New York’s Lynn Patrick loosed a shot that struck Detroit goaltender Johnny Mowers in the lower lip, loosening four of his teeth and adding eight stitches to his visage. Unless it was Bryan Hextall’s shot: several New York papers credited him with the damage. The Rangers subsequently claimed that another of Hextall’s had beaten Mowers, only to pass clean through the cords of the net, but referee King Clancy didn’t see or credit any such thing.
In the third period, Detroit’s Jimmy Orlando hit New York’s Grant Warwick over the head with his stick. “Clouted” was the word one Brooklyn reporter chose; another one called it “a free-handed chop.” Warwick was knocked to the ice and out cold; New York captain Ott Heller punched Orlando. Warwick revived and proceeded to the penalty bench with Orlando: that’s what passed for concussion protocol in those fractious years. Back together again, left to their own devices on the sidelines, Warwick and Orlando got back to fighting. That’s what we’re seeing here, the aftermath, I think, though the antagonists themselves aren’t in view. That’s Lynn Patrick beneath the upraised stick, with Detroit’s Alex Motter behind him, and teammate Gord Davidson just ahead.
That was all pretty much regular business for the NHL as it was then. Something more remarkable? Rangers’ left winger Hub Macey from Big River, Saskatchewan, was 21 that year season, playing in his second major-league season. In the first period, he assisted on Scotty Cameron’s goal for New York, then in the second beat Mowers to tie the game at 3-3. The game ended in a 4-4 tie (as per wartime strictures, there was no overtime).
Macey wasn’t around to see the finish, though: he left the game after the second period to catch a train to Toronto to enlist in the Canadian Army. He did that and was soon posted to Kingston — in fact, he was back on the ice within a week, suiting up as a soldier-in-training to play with the Kingston Frontenacs in the Ottawa City Senior league alongside the RCAF Flyers, among others, the team that Milt Schmidt, Bobby Bauer, and Woody Dumart had joined in 1941-42, winning the Allan Cup. Macey’s Kingston team was bolstered by others with NHL pedigree, including Gus Giesebrecht, a former Red Wing, former Leaf Gus Marker, and erstwhile Maroon Glenn Brydson.
Macey did make it back to the NHL eventually, after the war: in 1946-47, he caught on with the Montreal Canadiens.
royal rejects: the kings fly high in ’75
“There are some things you might enjoy knowing about the Los Angeles Kings,” Mark Mulvoy wrote in his memorable Sports Illustrated cover-story in February of 1975. “They are a hockey team. Goaltender Rogatien Vachon answers to the name “Bono” because of a strong resemblance to Cher’s ex. General Manager Jake Milford was once traded for a set of used goal nets. Centre Vic Venasky and right wing Mike Murphy are brothers-in-law. Centre Gene Carr’s father-in-law owns a Mercedes-Benz dealership. Carr and six teammates all drive Mercedes. Coach Bob Pulford drives a Mercedes, too. Murphy’s father operates a Volkswagen dealership. Murphy drives a new Corvette. Left wing Danny Maloney is the best pure puncher in hockey. Centre Butch Goring travels lightly, usually with only a toothbrush, and is called Seed, short for seedy. Defenceman Terry Harper flies his own six-seat Beechcraft V-35A and is installing a sauna, complete with Tiffany lamps and terrariums, in his oceanfront residence. Defenceman Bob Murdoch built a corral behind his house for his horse. And defenceman Sheldon Kannegiesser wants to buy up the world’s gold supply.”
The Los Angeles Kings were on the up-and-upon in the winter of ’75, consorting with the Philadelphia Flyers, Montreal Canadiens, and Buffalo Sabres at the top of the NHL standings. Team Castoff they called themselves: as Mulvoy put it, no fewer than 20 players on Milford’s roster had “arrived on the West Coast with ‘reject’ stamped on their foreheads,” having been discarded by another team in the league.
Coached by a former King, Bob Pulford, the team got its offensive thrust from veteran winger Bob Nevin alongside Murphy, Maloney, and Goring, Rogie Vachon held the fort in goal. The latter had played on three Stanley Cup championship teams in Montreal before losing the Canadiens crease to Ken Dryden and joining the Kings in 1971. California goaling agreed with him. “One thing about playing out here,” Vachon told Mulvoy, “is that you can leave the game at the rink. If I had a bad game in Montreal, I couldn’t stop for a cup of coffee without a couple of people telling me how terrible I was.”
By the end of the 1975 regular season, the Kings were solidly ensconced in second place in Norris Division standings behind the Canadiens. Things didn’t work out in the playoffs: the Kings fell to the Toronto Maple Leafs in the first round. The Flyers went on to defeat the Sabres in the Finals.
full forum fuss
Here’s To Habs: The result was a good one on the night of Saturday, March 11, 1944, for these Montreal fans as their beloved Canadiens beat the visiting Detroit Red Wings at the Forum. The score was 4-3, with Elmer Lach scoring a pair, the winner included, with 25 seconds left in the game. Buddy O’Connor and Ray Getliffe added to the home team’s account as well. Syd Howe (with two) and Hal Jackson scored for Detroit, who had Connie Dion in net facing Montreal’s Bill Durnan at the far end. With the win, their tenth in a row, the high-flying Habs tied the NHL record for most points accumulated in a season, 77, set by the 1929-30 Boston Bruins. Five nights later they set a new mark with a 3-2 win over the Chicago Black Hawks. Canadiens went on to win the Stanley Cup that season, beating Chicago in four straight in the Finals. (Image: Fonds Conrad Poirier, BAnQ Vieux-Montréal)
gardens party, 1931: a game of the higgledy piggledy variety, prolific in wild haphazard passing
Wordy Welcomers: Dignitaries on ice at the opening of Maple Leaf Gardens on Thursday, November 12, 1931. From left, they are Maple Leafs majority owner J.P. Bickell, Ontario Premier George Henry, Maple Leafs President Ed Bickle, Toronto Mayor William J. Stewart, Canadian Bank of Commerce Vice-President George Cottrell, broadcaster Foster Hewitt, and NHL president Frank Calder. (Image: City of Toronto Archives, Fonds 1266, Item 25805)
“The new Maple Leaf Gardens proved a revelation to the hockey public last night,”” was what the Toronto Daily Star’s W.A. Hewitt wrote the morning after the night before. “everybody expressed amazement and pleasure at its spaciousness, its tremendous capacity, its comfort, its beautiful colour scheme, and its adaptability for hockey, and all the other indoor sports, with the spectators right on top of the play.”
It was on a Thursday of this date 92 years ago today — November 12, 1931 — that Conn Smythe’s Maple Leafs left behind the confines of the Arena Gardens on Mutual Street to kick off a new NHL season in new (and speedily built) digs, opening Conn Smythe’s gleaming Gardens with a night of pomp and ceremony … and a 2-1 loss to the visiting Chicago Black Hawks.
The Hawks’ Mush March scored the first goal in MLG history before Charlie Conacher tied it up. It was left to Vic Ripley to decide things in the third period. Charlie Gardiner was the winning goaltender, with Lorne Chabot taking the loss. Despite the inaugurating disappointment, it should be noted, the Leafs did turn it around in ’31-32, going on to sweep the New York Rangers to win the Stanley Cup the following April, the franchise’s first since 1922.
The game on November 12 was not high in hockey quality, according to another Star witness, C.H. Good. “The play generally was of the higgledy piggledy variety, prolific in wild haphazard passing and the marksmanship of the weirdest description. In the latter respect the Leafs were the worst offenders. They had chances galore, many more than their opponents, to score, but instead of picking out a nice little corner when in close, they invariably shot into Gardiner’s pads or did something else fully as dire.”
Highlanders Reel: The 48th Highlanders serenade the first MLG crowd as the two teams line up pre-game, Maple Leafs in the foreground, Hawks beyond. (Image: City of Toronto Archives, Fonds 1266, Item 25804)
crease counsellor
Focus: Born in Calgary in 1963, 60-year-old Mike Vernon heads into the Hockey Hall of Fame tomorrow, joining Tom Barrasso and Henrik Lundqvist in 2023’s rush of distinguished goaltenders. (Caroline Ouellette, Pierre Turgeon, Pierre Lacroix, and Ken Hitchcock are also going in.) Vernon played parts of 13 seasons with the Calgary Flames, winning a Stanley Cup championship with the team in 1989. He won a second Cup with the Detroit Red Wings in 1997, along with a Conn Smythe as playoff MVP. Vernon was a San Jose Shark and a Florida Panther, too, in his time, before finishing his career back in Calgary in 2002.
front-door mats
Denied: Buffalo Sabres’ rookie backstop Tom Barrasso keeps Canadiens’ Mats Naslund at bay on the Tuesday night of March 6, 1984, at the Montreal Forum. Buffalo prevailed that night by a score of 8-3. Barrasso was 18 at the time, and outstanding, going on to win the Calder Trophy as the NHL’s primo rookie that year, and the Vézina, too, as top goaltender. He played six seasons in Buffalo before a trade took him to Pittsburgh in 1988, and he won two Stanley Cup championships with the Penguins, in 1991 and ’92. He was the first American goaltender to win 300 games in the NHL and remains the leading all-time scorer among goalkeeps, having accumulated 48 assists over the course of his career, which also included stints with Ottawa, Toronto, Carolina, and St. Louis. On Monday, Tom Barrasso will be one of the seven 2023 inductees ascending to the Hockey Hall of Fame. (Image: Fonds La Presse, BAnQ Vieux-Montréal)
toronto’s new king
Let’s Be Frank: This week in 1930, the Toronto Maple Leafs were taking care of pre-season business, re-electing Hap Day as their captain and beating the IHL London Tecumsehs 6-2 in a tune-up game that featured a Charlie Conacher hattrick. The Leafs had a new superstar defenceman in the line-up that week as they prepared to open a new NHL campaign. King Clancy, 28, was the incumbent captain of the (formerly mighty) Ottawa Senators when Conn Smythe brought him to Toronto early that October in a blockbuster trade that sent two players and $35,000 the other way. Clancy would help the Leafs win a Stanley Cup championship in 1932. By the time he retired as a player in 1936, he was the highest-scoring defenceman in NHL history. King Clancy died on a Saturday of this date in 1986. He was 84.
beware the ides of november
That Sunken Feeling: Cesare Maniago of the Minnesota North Stars contemplates life’s eternal questions at the Montreal Forum on the Tuesday night of November 11, 1975. The hometown Canadiens
went on to win 6-0 that night, with Ken Dryden shutting the proverbial door in the Montreal goal. Guy Lafleur and Mario Tremblay each scored a pair of goals that night, with singles going to John Van Boxmeer and Steve Shutt. While Minnesota missed the playoffs that season, Canadiens finished their all-round stellar campaign the following May by claiming the Stanley Cup, the first of four championships in a row they’d win in the latter 1970s. (Image: Jean Goupil, Fonds La Presse, BAnQ Vieux-Montréal)
the way we were
“In his heyday,” the Montreal Star enthused in 1940, “he received plaudits from many NHL forwards as the hardest man to pass in the league.” That’s what defenceman Walt Buswell did, steadily, over the course of his career: he didn’t score much, or set up his teammates, he got in the way, stymied, impeded his rivals. He started his career as a major-league obstacle with the Detroit Red Wings in 1932 before joining the Montreal Canadiens in 1935 for a run of five seasons culminating with his appointment as Habs captain on November 5, 1939, on the eve of his 32nd birthday.
Born in Montreal on a Wednesday of this date in 1907, Buswell did his best that ’39-40 season to lead Montreal through the difficult time that followed the drowning death, in August of ’39, of his predecessor as captain, Babe Siebert. The team struggled on the ice that year, languishing to a last-place finish in the seven-team league in the spring of 1940. Buswell was released at the end of the season and though he was invited back to Montreal’s training camp later that same fall, he ended up refusing GM Tommy Gorman’s offer to stay with the team but take a pay cut of $250.
“I told him that after ten years in the National League, I preferred to pick up a shovel rather than accept a reduction in salary. I left and made a living with my ten fingers.” That was a 59-year-old Buswell reminiscing in the fall of 1967, when (as seen above) he got together with a couple of old Montreal teammates, wingers Armand Mondou (left) and Aurèle Joliat (middle). That’s Buswell on the right, and in the photo in the photo.
Buswell went on to coach junior hockey after his playing days ended; later, he ran into some health challenges. He died in 1991 at the age of 83 in the off-island Montreal suburb of Saint-Eustache, where today a local arena bears his name.
“In our time, we played hockey because we loved hockey,” Buswell said in 1967, visiting with Mondou and Joliat. “I particularly remember a match against Toronto. Two days before, I had fallen headfirst against the boards. I was sent to the hospital. I suffered from a concussion. In a morning newspaper, I read that Babe Siebert and another defenceman were injured. Canadiens were playing a game against Toronto in the evening. I left the hospital at five in the afternoon and played. It was a very tough game, but we won, 2 to 1.”
(Image: Réal St. Jean, Fonds La Presse, BAnQ Vieux-Montréal)
the show on the road
Right Of Way: A gaggle of Boston boys shows off for photographer Leslie Jones in this undated photograph. Circa the late 1940s is a guess of mine. (Image: Leslie Jones, Boston Public Library)
hockey huddle
Cluster Of the Clans: Maybe they were picking teams, maybe disputing a goal. Reading the riot act? Reviewing an offside? Picking the game’s three stars? Your guess is as good as anyone’s. What we know is that this was the scene on the ice in Saguenay, Quebec, on Sunday, February 5, 1922. In the archives the photograph is titled “Caucus au hockey.” (Image: Fonds Famille Dubuc, BAnQ Saguenay)
puckstruck 