with his survivors except in name, but it has mushroomed into a billion-dollar corporation that employs more than 70,000 people in Canada and the United States.
What NHL superstar was offered the position of governor general of Canada?
After Jean Béliveau retired from the front office of the Montreal Canadiens in 1993, he was offered the post of governor general the next year. However, he declined the honour, citing family obligations. Although never idolized the way his Canadiens teammate Maurice Richard was, Béliveau was one of the greatest hockey players ever to lace on a pair of skates. Born in Trois-Rivières, Quebec, the gentlemanly centre played 20 seasons (18 full) for the Canadiens and scored 507 goals and 712 assists for 1,219 points. In the Stanley Cup playoffs he added another 79 goals and 97 assists in 17 competitions, helping the Habs win 10 Cups. Béliveau won the Art Ross Trophy in 1956, the Conn Smythe Trophy in 1965, and the Hart Trophy in 1956 and 1964. Le Gros Bill, as he was nicknamed, retired as a player in 1971 and was employed by Montreal as vice-president of corporate affairs for 22 years.
Quickies
Did you know …
that the first NHL shutout was recorded by the Montreal Canadiens’ great goaltender Georges Vézina? Appropriately, given the teams’ latter-day rivalry, he achieved this milestone on February 18, 1918, in a game against the Toronto Arenas (later to change their name to the St. Patricks, then to the Maple Leafs). Vézina and the Habs won the match 9–0 in the league’s 29th game in its first season.
When and where was the first official NHL All-Star Game played?
Great hockey isn’t something usually associated with an NHL All-Star Game, but fans do get to see the year’s best players assembled in one spot, the players selected get to have a bit of fun (and grab some more money), and players who aren’t picked get a rest. The league began choosing All-Star teams in 1930–31 and staged a few All-Star benefit games for the survivors of dead players (Ace Bailey in 1933, Howie Morenz in 1937, and Babe Siebert in 1939). However, the first official All-Star Game was played on October 13, 1947, at Maple Leaf Gardens. The initial format had the Stanley Cup champions from the previous season play a team of All-Stars picked from the league’s other five clubs. In 1947 the All-Stars beat the Cup-winning Toronto Maple Leafs 4–3. Since that first official match, the All-Star Game has been moved from the beginning of the season to the middle and now the Eastern Conference All-Stars play the Western Conference All-Stars.
Why is Kingston, Ontario, thought by many to be the birthplace of hockey?
The first recorded games of shinny on ice were played in Kingston, Upper Canada, in 1839. A British Army officer, Arthur Freeling, said he and fellow soldiers played “hockey on the ice” in January 1843 in Kingston. Edward Horsey, in his diary, noted that shinny was played on the ice of Kingston’s harbour in the 1860s by soldiers. However, an organized game with some rules wasn’t played in Kingston until 1886. That match pitted Queen’s College students against Royal Military College cadets and occurred 11 years after the first recorded indoor game in Montreal.
What is the Frozen Four?
Since 1948 the U.S. National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) has crowned the Men’s Division I champion in American college hockey. Today, through an extremely complex system, college teams across the country are winnowed down to 12 clubs that play one another in the annual NCAA Tournament. The quartet of semi-finalists that comes out on top is called the Frozen Four (so-called to differentiate it from basketball’s Final Four), and from the playoffs in this group the year’s best college team is determined. The Frozen Four playoffs are held in a different city each year, usually one associated with college hockey (such as Detroit, St. Paul, Minnesota, or Albany, New York), but not always. In 2008 the Boston College Eagles were crowned Men’s Division I champions after defeating the Fighting Irish of Notre Dame 4–1 in Denver, Colorado. The NCAA started a Women’s Frozen Four in 2001. The women’s champion in 2008 was the University of Minnesota at Duluth.
Five Outstanding NHL Head Coaches
• Scotty Bowman: There’s no argument that Bowman is the best NHL coach of all time. He’s the all-time victory champ with 1,244 regular-season and 223 playoff wins as head coach of the St. Louis Blues, Montreal Canadiens, Buffalo Sabres, Pittsburgh Penguins, and Detroit Red Wings from 1967–68 to 2001–02. During that time, he won a record nine Stanley Cups.
• Al Arbour: A solid defenceman in the 1950s and 1960s for various NHL teams, including the Detroit Red Wings, Toronto Maple Leafs, and St. Louis Blues, Arbour turned to coaching with the Blues in 1970–71 and became a huge success. His most famous coaching stint was with the New York Islanders, who he backbenched from 1973–74 to 1993–94. In order to give him his 1,500th Islanders game coached, New York had him helm one game in 2007–08. Naturally, Arbour won, bringing his total coaching victories to 782, second only to Bowman. He also became the oldest man, at 75, ever to coach an NHL game. And let’s not forget the four Stanley Cups he won in a row during the Islanders’ salad days in the early 1980s.
• James Dickinson “Dick” Irvin: Few coaches can boast the longevity that Hamilton, Ontarioborn Dick Irvin could. The plucky backbencher began his life in hockey as a player, breaking into the professional game with the Pacific Coast Hockey Association’s Portland Rosebuds in 1916– 17, but turned amateur again the following season. After the Second World War, he resumed his pro career with leagues other than the NHL until finally playing for the Chicago Black Hawks briefly in the late 1920s. He began his coaching career with the Hawks in 1928–29 but only stayed there for a couple of seasons, eventually moving to the Toronto Maple Leafs as coach in 1931–32 and winning his first Stanley Cup there in 1932. By 1940–41 he was backbenching the Montreal Canadiens, winning three more Cups with the Habs (1944, 1946, 1953) before leaving to coach his final season (1955–56) in Chicago, where he had started. Irvin won 692 regularseason NHL games, lost 527, and tied 230, winning 100 games and losing 88 in the playoffs.
• Hector “Toe” Blake: Few hockey personalities have excelled as both player and coach and become legends, as well. Blake did all of that with only one team — the Montreal Canadiens. During the 1930s and 1940s, Blake, a left winger, was part of the explosive Punch Line with Maurice Richard and Elmer Lach, scoring the winning goals that gave the Habs Stanley Cups in 1944 and 1946. Earlier, in his rookie season with the Montreal Maroons, Blake won his first Cup in 1935. After breaking his ankle in 1948, he left the Canadiens and played some minor-league hockey for a few seasons until retiring from the game as a player in 1951. Blake debuted as a coach with the Habs in 1955–56 and went on to lead Montreal to eight Stanley Cups, five of them in a row from 1956 to 1960. His other three were in 1965, 1966, and 1968. As a coach, he won 500 regular-season games and 82 playoff matches.
• Glen Sather: Some might say the formidable Edmonton Oilers of the 1980s didn’t need a coach, but credit should be given to Sather as their backbencher. As a player in the 1960s and 1970s, he was a journeyman left winger, but he found his true calling as a coach, debuting behind the bench with the Oilers (when they were in the World Hockey Association) in 1977–78. He helmed Edmonton for four Stanley Cups in the 1980s and added a fifth as general manager in 1990. In his coaching career he won 497 regular-season games and 89 playoff contests.
When were the fastest three goals in NHL history scored?
In 1951–52 the Chicago Black Hawks were bottom feeders in the NHL. The club had the worst record in the league, and scores of empty seats in Chicago Stadium
