Seals Plagued By Weak Middle Men

OAKLAND, Calif. - When the Oakland Seals opened their training camp last September, coach Bert Olmstead knew he would have a building job to do, but he had confidence that at least two areas would take care of themselves - centers and defense. Here It is now, nearly a third of the way through the National Hockey League season and from game one, the biggest problem plaguing the Seals has been the play of the centers, even the defense has had its flaws. Billy Harris, Wally Boyer, and Joe Szura, figured to give the Oaklanders a strong suit right down the middle, the place where offenses succeed or fail. But among them, they have scored only four goals and 13 assists in 20 games! In desperation, Seal boss Bert Olmstead reached down into the ranks…

Jean Gauthier Latest To Arrive With Club

PHILADELPHIA, Pa.- If Flyers’ opponents have begun passing around the crying towel after testing the club’s defense, they’ve got another tear coming. The Flyers have come up with another crackerjack defenseman in the recent performance of Jean Gauthier. For a good many of the Flyers’ early games, Gauthier was lost in the shuffle of such standouts as Ed Van Impe, Joe Watson, John Miszuk and Larry Zeidel. But now he has come into his own. “I’ve always been a slow starter,” explained Gauthier. “That’s the reason I wasn’t playing too much there for awhile. But now that I’m in good shape, I’m playing a lot.” It was big Jean, drafted out of the Montreal Canadiens’ system, who played a major role in the Flyers’ 7-2 victory over Los Angeles which gave Philadelphia the lead in…

Movements of Players

Dreary Play Turns Hobs Into ‘Hab-Nots’

MONTREAL, Que. - It’s going to be a long season for Canadiens and for the poor wretches whose duty it is to write about them in the public prints. The team that Is fast becoming known as the “Hab-Nots” of hockey, have entered the month of December clinging to their share of last place despite the best efforts of the New York Rangers to dislodge them from the basement. There was one area where the Hab-Nots were in a class by themselves, however, and that was in the scoring column. They had scored the least number of goals, — 51 in 22 games — of any team in the old division. In 14 games through the month of November, Canadiens won three, lost eight and tied three others. Half of the games were…