Uncle John's Bathroom Reader Shoots and Scores (38 page)

That Zamboni stayed in Boston for more than 30 years before it was donated to the Hockey Hall of Fame in Toronto, in 1988. In 2002 Zamboni became NHL's “official ice resurfacer.”

ENTERING THE GREAT HOCKEY HALL

Frank continued to redesign the Zamboni. Over the years, he added bigger snow buckets and water tanks. In 1960 the first Zambonis to sport electric engines premiered at the Olympics in Squaw Valley, California. And as late as 1983, Frank was improving on his invention—the last one was the addition of an automatic edger to clear the snow that builds up around the edges of the rink.

In 1988 Frank Zamboni passed away from lung cancer, but Zambonis are still made by the family company, now run by Frank's son and grandson. He never even wore a pair of skates, but Frank's great contribution to cleaning up the sport of hockey did not go unnoticed: in 2009, he was posthumously inducted into the U.S. Hockey Hall of Fame in Minnesota.

Tough and talented Toronto Maple Leaf Borje Salming established himself as the first legitimate NHL “star” from Europe.

K
iruna, Sweden, the hometown of Hockey Hall of Fame defencemen Borje (pronounced BOOR-YAY) Salming, is at one of the highest longitudes on Earth. Yet it was Salming's strange fate that, while he was at the top level of NHL defencemen during his playing days, he was never part of a team which reached the NHL's annual summit of honor. In other words, Salming was never a member of a team which won the Stanley Cup.

TOUGHING IT OUT IN TORONTO

With his invaluable combination of smooth-skating and aggressiveness, Salming proved himself as a formidable player right from his very first season (1973–1974) with the Toronto Maple Leafs. Playing in the media microscope of Toronto helped promote this reputation, but it also exacerbated the constant scrutiny from coaches, fans and opposing players who expected that Europeans couldn't handle the NHL's physical play. Borje Salming shattered this media-created stereotype. Blocking shots and not being afraid to deal out a check, and using his smarts to quickly pick up a puck and start a rush on the offence, Salming quickly developed into a fan favorite. Although he certainly had goal-scoring ability (tallying a career-high 19 for the Maple Leafs during the 1979–80 season), Salming's chief talent while on offence was as a pinpoint passer.

BUT FIRST IN OUR HEARTS

On the Maple Leaf teams of the 1970s, he had some talented players to pass the puck to—Lanny McDonald and Darryl Sittler being the most prominent. It also helped Salming that he played with the offensively talented defencemen Ian Turnbull. However, most of Salming's seasons with the Leafs—under the disastrous ownership of Harold Ballard—were disappointing. Whatever was missing from the team (and it was usually a lot), it wasn't hard work
from the stylish Swede Salming. He finished second to Montreal's Larry Robinson for the Norris Trophy for the 1976–77 campaign and tied for the league lead in assists (66) that same season. Salming again came in second to Robinson for the Norris Trophy for the 1979–80 season. This problem of forever coming in second plagued Salming all of his career. He was named an NHL Second Team All-Star five times, only in 1977 making it First Team. But these were simply amazing accomplishments for an unheralded free agent who quietly signed with the Leafs on May 12, 1973, and then gratefully and persistently showed up to play every day for one of the league's most miserable teams.

PIONEER OF BIZARRE FACE INJURIES

On June 12, 1989, Salming was signed as a free agent by the Detroit Red Wings. Salming's most memorable association with Detroit was when Red Wing Gerard Gallant accidentally stepped on the Toronto defenceman's face in a game in 1986. Over 200 stitches were required to close the deep gash trailing from above Salming's right eye all the way down to his chin. This was his third facial injury in the same season, but this is the one that impelled Salming to become one the first NHLers to experiment playing with a shield visor on his helmet.

After the 1989–90 season, Salming retired from NHL play, but did play three years for AIK Solna Stockholm, a team in his native Sweden. He was also a member of the 1992 Swedish Olympic hockey team. In 1996, Salming was selected for the Hockey Hall of Fame.

* * * * *

THE GEOMETRY OF HOCKEY

“People talk about skating, puck handling and shooting, but the whole sport is angles and caroms, forgetting the straight direction the puck is going, calculating where it will be directed, factoring in all the interruptions. Basically, my whole game is angles.”

—Wayne Gretzky

Gump Worsley is primarily remembered for his odd name and quick wit, but he was also one of the best goaltenders of his generation.

L
orne “Gump” Worsley got his nickname when some hockey folks noticed that he had a facial resemblance to an animated movie character named Andy Gump. Something must have clicked in Lorne's mind, for he proceeded to act much like a cartoon character all the way through his career. Yet within this friendly, portly (5'7" and 180 pounds) man beat the heart of a winner and the fury of a fierce competitor.

THE SAME AS YOUR PRE-GAME MEAL?

Worsley will always be remembered as a comic. How could you not be if you happened to be the man who told a sportswriter that his favorite postgame dinner was a beer and a cigarette? But by the time he had retired at age 45 (for a 21-year NHL career), he had collected 335 wins but also had 352 losses. Worsley's glory years were with his hometown Montreal Canadiens, 1963–1969. Twice he shared the Vezina Trophy with other Canadiens netminders: in 1966 with Charlie Hodge and in 1968 with Rogie Vachon. “Les Habs” won four Stanley Cups in Gump's Great Goaltending Days.

WHISKY BELLY

Montreal was his mid-career. He had already spent ten unremarkable years with the New York Rangers—except for the season he played in a league-leading 70 games (winning 32, losing 28 and tying 10). But there were always the quips…Once when he was asked, “What team gives you the most trouble?” Worsley quickly replied, “The Rangers.” And when Rangers coach Phil Watson called Worsley a “beer belly” in a newspaper interview, Gump was incensed: “As always, Watson doesn't have a clue what he's talking about. I never drink beer, only good Canadian whisky.” This was true—despite his remark quoted earlier, no teammate ever saw Worsley drink beer.

THE GUMP TECHNIQUE

His method of stopping the puck was to flop all over the place, simply keeping—as the radio announcers like to say—“the biscuit out of the basket.” Mercurial off the ice, he was a gladiator on it. When opposing players would get breakaways (this happened frequently during his tour of duty with the Rangers), Gump would often rush out of the net to meet the surprised would-be shooter, frequently knocking the puck away. After he got traded to the Canadiens, Worsley didn't have to act as a third defencemen as often as he had to while a New York Ranger. Worsley won 30 playoff games while a Canadiens goalie.

MINNESOTA MELLOW-OUT

Worsley was traded to the Minnesota North Stars during the 1968–69 campaign, and eased out of hockey over four years as a backup with the new expansion squad. He even played with a mask in his final season of 1973–74. Worsley ended up with a NHL regular-season total of 43 shutouts (a mind-bending fact when one considers all those years with the Rangers and North Stars) and a 2.88 goals-against average. Worsley shares the NHL mark with Terry Sawchuk, for most seasons played by a goalie, 21. He was elected to the Hockey Hall of Fame in 1980.

* * * * *

GRETZKY RULES!

“I don't like my hockey sticks touching other sticks, and I don't like them crossing one another, and I kind of have them hidden in the corner. I put baby powder on the ends. I think it's essentially a matter of taking care of what takes care of you.”

—Wayne Gretzky

“You'll never catch me bragging about goals, but I'll talk all you want about my assists.”

—Wayne Gretzky

Every fan of hockey history knows that Jacques Plante was the first to don a goalie mask, but what about the other equipment firsts?

T
HE TRAPPER

Before 1946 goalies wore on their catching hand a regular hockey glove modified slightly to include a small piece of leather sewn between the thumb and forefinger. But Chicago netminder Emile “the Cat” Francis got tired of stopping pucks with the palm of his hand…and all the stinging pain that went along with it. So Francis, who played baseball in the off-season, took a first baseman's mitt and had a shoemaker sew an elongated leather cuff onto it. Francis wore the modified mitt during an NHL game and everyone took notice of it: “Within a month, all the sporting goods companies were making those goal gloves,” Francis said. “I should have copyrighted the idea! All I wanted was to be a better goalkeeper.” Today, the goalie's catching glove, or “trapper,” is as fundamental a part of the equipment as a facemask.

LEG PADS

Until the 1980s, a goalie's leg pads were usually made of leather and stuffed with horse or deer hair. Sure, they were effective, but they were also extremely heavy. The first synthetic pads to appear in an NHL game were worn by Reggie Lemelin of the Calgary Flames during the 1986–87 season and were about half the weight of the leather pads. Designed by Jim Lowson, a cabinetmaker from California who did some goaltending during high school, these pads revolutionized the game, giving goalies greater mobility on ice. Bonus: Lemelin noticed that playing with lighter pads eased the back problems that plagued him in previous seasons.

THE STICK

Ask most casual sports fans what they think a hockey stick is made of, and the answer will probably be “wood.” Since the 1980s, though, the stick manufacturers that supply the NHL have experimented with a variety of materials that are lighter and stronger than traditional hardwoods. Most sticks used in the NHL today are
composites of fiberglass, carbon fiber, and even Kevlar. But it was the aluminum-shafted sticks, which first appeared during the 1980s, that represented the biggest innovation. The most famous—and most publicized—supporter of the aluminum-shafted stick was Wayne Gretzky, but he wasn't the first NHLer to brandish one. That honor belongs to defenceman Brad Park. In 1979, while with the Boston Bruins, Park began using an aluminum shaft with a detachable wooden blade during practice. By 1982 he was using it in games.

WATER BOTTLES

In the old days, goalies had to play thirsty. While defencemen and forwards could drink water on the bench between shifts, goalies had to remain on the ice during games and had to wait until the intermissions to rehydrate. In 1984 the Philadelphia Flyers netminding tandem of Bob Froese and Pelle Lindbergh became the first NHL goalies to keep a water bottle on top of the net, held in place by a strip of Velcro. The simple innovation broke no rules, so league officials allowed the water bottles to stay. There was one complaint, though. Glen Sather, coach of the Edmonton Oilers, griped, “What are they going to want up there next, a bucket of chicken?”

SHORT PANTS

One equipment innovation that didn't catch on in pro hockey was long pants. In 1981–82, the Philadelphia Flyers unveiled a new team uniform that included full-length pants, instead of the traditional shorts-and-long-socks combo. Dubbed “Cooperalls”—a riff on “overalls” and “Cooper,” the company that made them—these pants contained padding that ran from waist to ankle and were supposed to give players greater mobility and protection. The following season the Hartford Whalers followed suit and added Cooperalls to their on-ice ensemble. But the new fashion didn't take. Fans ridiculed them—they looked like children's snow pants—and many of the players noticed that Cooperalls didn't offer much friction when sliding on the ice, sending players sliding out of control when they fell. After the 1982–83 season, the NHL banned Cooperalls citing player safety as a concern, and the classic hockey uniform was reinstated as the league standard. Whew.

When he retired from hockey in 1999, Wayne Gretzky had set more than 50 NHL records and won 10 scoring titles, 9 MVP awards, and 4 Stanley Cups. Here's what it was like to be around that kind of greatness.

“Every time he gets the puck, something exciting happens.”

—
Islanders G.M.
Mike Milbury

“The only way you can check Gretzky is to hit him when he is standing still singing the national anthem.”

—
Boston G.M.
Harry Sinden

“The NHL needs something to hang its hat on, and Gretzky looks like a hat tree.

—
Gordie Howe

“Gretzky's got more friends in the media than the guy running the free buffet.”

—
journalist Dan Bickley

“Wayne's like having your own Fantasy Island. It's so much fun to play with him. I had no goals and no assists before getting on his line, and then I almost made the record book.”