The Hockey News has been providing the most comprehensive coverage of the world of hockey since 1947. In each issue, you'll find news, features and opinions about the NHL and leagues across North America and the world.

March 27, 1981

The Hockey News March 27, 1981

<div class="byline">BY MIKE DENNIS</div><div class="image-hero"><img title="f0017-01" src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0017-01819/4439757-1-eng-US/f0017-012.jpg"><figcaption class="caption-body">Michel (Bunny) Larocque&rsquo;s first appearance as a Leaf came with jersey No 30 when he backed up Jiri Crha against Boston. In Larocque&rsquo;s first start, he switched to No.1, and he&rsquo;s played that way so far for the Leafs. <span class="photo-credit">(Photo by Graig Abel)</span></figcaption></div><p>TORONTO&mdash;Oh, the irony of it all.</p><p>It took the Maple Leafs 67 games of the 1980-81 season to figure out that they didn&rsquo;t have a goaltender in their organization capable of assuring them a berth in the playoffs, even though 16 of the 21 teams in the league qualify for the post-season party.</p><p>Neither Jiri Crha, Jim Rutherford, Curt Ridley, Vincent Tremblay, Paul Harrison (Dallas) nor Rod Dennis (Princeton) could give them the type of goaltending that they had received in the days when Mike Palmateer delighted in stopping pucks for the Leafs.</p><p>So it was truly ironic when the Leafs pulled off one of the major swaps on the last-minute trade deadline rush (March 10), acquiring 28-year-old Michel (Bunny) Larocque from the Montreal Canadiens for defenseman Robert Picard.</p><p>Everyone who follows the National Hockey League understands the ironical nature of the deal. For openers, there&rsquo;s Larocque, a Hull, Que., native who played his junior hockey for Ottawa. Bunny has been the perennial bridesmaid in Montreal for most of his eight-year career. He shared the net-minding with Wayne Thomas in 1973-74 when Ken Dryden was a holdout and then took a back seat to Dryden for the next five seasons. Then Dryden moved on and Larocque figured to be No. 1 except that Denis Herron joined the Habs in a trade and Bunny remained in the background. This season he was a starter for most of the first two months, was injured and found himself No. 3 man behind rookie Richard Sevigny and Herron and requested a trade.</p><p>That he would come to Toronto was pretty astounding because the Leafs and the Canadiens make a habit of not doing business with each other. The last trade, in fact, was a little bit of chicanery worked by the Canadiens when they took Doug Jarvis off Toronto&rsquo;s hands for Greg Hubick, a trade inspired by Roger Neilson, then a Canadiens&rsquo; scout and later, of course, the Maple Leafs&rsquo; coach. Jarvis has never missed a regular season game in six seasons with Montreal, while Hubick lasted just one season with the Leafs.</p><p>The plot thickens when you consider, that when the Leafs lost free agent Palmateer to the Washington Capitals they received Picard, along with Tim Coulis. in a trade for Palmy just before last June&rsquo;s entry draft. So in effect, the trade eventually became Palmateer for Larocque.</p><p>What better way, then, for Larocque to break in with the Leafs by facing the Washington Capitals, with Palmateer in goal, in his first start? Heading into the game, the Leafs were in 16th place, three points behind Washington and with a game in hand.</p><p>And Larocque turned out to be the winner in the battle of the goaltenders as he stopped 38 shots, including a couple of rapid-fire barrages early in the game as the Leafs skated to a 5-3 victory.</p><p>&ldquo;Bunny Larocque was unbelievable,&rdquo; said captain Darryl Sittler, who sparked the attack with three goals, making him the Leafs&rsquo; all-time goalscoring leader with 367, moving him past Dave Keon. &ldquo;He made the important saves when we needed them.&rdquo;</p><p>The next night in Philadelphia, Larocque had to be even more brilliant as he withstood 47 Flyers&rsquo; shots to help the Leafs to a 4-4 tie.</p><p>&ldquo;I was surprised when I found out I was going to Toronto,&rdquo; Larocque said. &ldquo;But you never know what&rsquo;s going to happen: that&rsquo;s what being a pro is all about.&rdquo;</p><p>Larocque, who had a 16-9-7 record for Montreal this war with a goals-against average of 3.03 to go along with 16 career shutouts and a 2.80 GAA, suffered a slashed tendon in his hand on Dec. 4. He returned to the lineup on Jan. 21 and gave up three goals in the first period before being pulled against Chicago. Ten days later he started again and lost to LA 4-1. Then he sat while Sevigny played at home and Herron played the road games. On Feb. 20 he asked to be traded and then was handed a starting assignment in St. Louis, where he was spectacular in holding the Blues to a 2-2 tie. The next day Larocque went public with his trade demands and said that he had played his last game with the Canadiens.</p><p>&ldquo;Management never said a word to me,&rdquo; Larocque said. Then he laughed, &ldquo;But 1 guess they tried hard to trade me.</p><p>&ldquo;I&rsquo;m ready for the challenge.&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;Toronto is a great city for sports and it&rsquo;s great people-wise, too. I&rsquo;m used to the pressure in Montreal; you just do your best.&rdquo;</p><p><b>LOOSE LEAFS -</b> The Leafs also acquired right winger Ron Zanussi, a 24-year-old Toronto native, from the Minnesota North Stars along with a third-round draft choice in exchange for Toronto&rsquo;s second round pick in the 1981 draft&hellip;Toronto dealt Rutherford to LA for future considerations, believed to be a fifth round draft choice&hellip;Zanussi, who missed more than 20 games with neck and rib injuries, had six goals and 11 assists in 41 games for the North Stars and killed penalties and worked on a fourth line for the Leafs in his debut, a 4-4 tie against Boston.<span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span></p>

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IN THIS ISSUE

Leafs Put All Their Eggs In Bunny Larocque’s Basket

<h2>New League?</h2><p>WATERVILLE - A new minor professional hockey league may be on the horizon for the 1981-82 season.</p><p>According to Bob Critelli of Waterville. N.Y., the formation of the Intercontinental Hockey League, with a likely starting field of six franchises, is in the works.</p><p>Critelli said the new league will operate mainly in southern Ontario and northern New York state. He said franchises are already being organized in Barrie. Ont., Syracuse, Utica and Tonawanda, all in New York. Cirtelli said he is looking for two more teams to play an 80-game schedule with regular season play to begin in late October. Training camps will be held in southern Ontario in late September.</p><p>Critelli said he hopes to operate a clean, fast-skating, &ldquo;no-nonsense&rdquo; league and he will try to minimize travel expenses and create closer city rivalries to assure the league&rsquo;s future.</p><p>Cirtelli, who is receptive to all interested parties, can be reached by writing to Route 12, Rural Delivery 1, Waterville, N.Y. 13480. You can also phone him at (315) 841-8443.</p><h2>Rangers Banned</h2><p>NEW YORK&mdash;The Rangers&rsquo; player suspensions to Nick Fotiu and Don Maloney will stand.</p><p>The NHL approved the sentences set down against the two for their part in leading the Rangers into the stands at Detroit&rsquo;s Joe Louis Arena in a gameending brawl on Feb. 19 involving Detroit fans. Fotiu was suspended for eight games and Maloney for two. The Rangers had launched an appeal with NHL president John Ziegler but the governors turned it down.</p><p>The Rangers were shocked at the length of the ban on Fotiu. But Ziegler said &ldquo;the league&rsquo;s policy has been firm and clear. The spectators&rsquo; area is out of bounds to the players regardless of the provocation.&rdquo; Fotiu will miss eight of the Rangers&rsquo; final 10 games, returning for the closing April 4-5 weekend.</p><h2>Ref Comes Back</h2><p>TORONTO&mdash;Veteran NHL referee John McAuley has launched his long-awaited comeback.</p><p>The 36-year-old official was assigned to the Boston-Toronto game at Maple Leaf Gardens the night of March 11, marking the first time he had worked an NHL game in more than two years.</p><p>McAuley is the NHL referee who was sucker-punched by an irate fan in a New York bar in February, 1979 after the Challenge Cup series between the Soviet Union and the NHL. McAuley developed double vision in one eye as a result of the punch and after three operations had failed to correct the situation, he had just about given up on returning to the ice.</p><p>McAuley received what he figures is the break of his life when the New York opthalmologist who performed the third operation on his eyes decided to give it one more try using a new procedure. It worked and McAuley was able to return to handle games in the American League this season and ultimately moved back into the NHL in the March 11 game.</p><p>To complete his comeback, the NHL assigned McAuley to a game in New York on the weekend of March 14-15. Jokingly, he said if he did go into a Manhattan bar this time, he would be sure to take along a couple of bodyguards.</p><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0018-01836/4439788-1-eng-US/f0018-012.jpg" title="f0018-01" width="602" height="1639"><figcaption class="caption-body">Bobby Clarke of the Philadelphia Flyers joined the NHL&rsquo;s elite goal scorers when he registered his 300th career goal during a 9-4 romp over Detroit.</figcaption></div><span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span>

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SLAPSHOTS

<p><b>MARCH</b></p><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0036-1637/4441491-1-eng-US/f0036-162.jpg" title="f0036-16" width="572" height="986"></div><span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span>

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NHL, COLLEGES ON U.S. TV

<div class="byline">BY FRANK FONTAINE</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0038-01368/4441601-1-eng-US/f0038-012.jpg" title="f0038-01" width="596" height="868"><figcaption class="caption-body">Mario Marois, who plays the physical style sought by Quebec coach Bergeron, returned to his native soil.</figcaption></div><p class="dropcap"><span>Q</span>UEBEC&mdash;&ldquo;I&rsquo;m glad to be coming home. I feel as if I were getting a new lease on life. I&rsquo;ve had a rough time this season. I&rsquo;m sure playing with a team that really wants me will help me snap out of it.&rdquo; So said defenseman Mario Marois, when he arrived in Quebec, after being traded to the Nordiques by the Vancouver Canucks. Marois is a native of I&rsquo;Ancienne Lorette, a Quebec City suburb, where he has continued to make his off-season home ever since graduating to the NHL, with the New York Rangers, four seasons ago. (He had been traded to the Canucks at the start of the current campaign.)</p><p>The Nordiques had been anxious to obtain Marois for some time, because, as coach Michel Bergeron said: &ldquo;We needed more muscle at the blueline; someone who could take the man out the way Andr&eacute; Dupont does.&rdquo; Marois promised he&rsquo;d do his best to fulfill Bergeron&rsquo;s expectations. &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve always been a bodychecker&hellip;and I intend to continue playing that way,&rdquo; he said.</p><p>While Bergeron was delighted with the acquisition of Marois, he was genuinely sorry to have had to give up Garry Lariviere in return. (Lariviere was then immediately traded to Edmonton, by the Canucks for B. J. MacDonald). Said Bergeron: &ldquo;Garry was always the same at home or on the road. I could always count on him. He was liked and respected by all his teammates. He never pressed the panic button in tight situations.&rdquo;</p><p>As for Lariviere, he took the trade like a pro. &ldquo;I was treated well and I was happy playing here. 1 have a lot of respect for coach Bergeron. My departure has nothing to do with the fact that I&rsquo;m an anglophone. I can tell you Bergeron is building with the future in mind and he couldn&rsquo;t care less about a player&rsquo;s race or color.&rdquo;</p><p>Lariviere added that he&rsquo;d been expecting to be traded. &ldquo;The Nordiques have three promising young defensemen; Dave Pichette, Normand Rochefort and Pierre Lacroix. They&rsquo;ve got two solid veterans in Andr&eacute; Dupont and Dale Hoganson. If they were going to trade a defenseman, it had to be me.&rdquo; The 26-year-old rearguard concluded by saying: &ldquo;These players are going places. Quebec is on the move. I wish all the guys good luck.&rdquo;</p><p>And with that, Larivi&egrave;re left to join the Oilers whom he will now try to help make the playoffs. Edmonton fans will see a true pro; a man which only broken bones can keep out of the lineup. They will also see a methodical player whose play can hardly be described as spectacular. Lariviere is not the flamboyant type; his presence often goes unnoticed; but if you do look for him on the ice, you&rsquo;ll see a defenseman who does a superior job of&hellip;defending.</p><p>All the Nordiques players were sorry to see Lariviere go, but none more than hard-working rookie Dale Hunter, generally a man of few words. Lariviere was one of Dale&rsquo;s best friends&hellip;as had been Jamie Hislop, (who was traded to the Calgary Flames a few weeks ago.) As the players sat dumbfounded when they heard about the trade, Dale hollered out: &ldquo;Anybody else want to be my buddy?&rdquo;<span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span></p>

f0038-01

Late Swap Returns Quebec City Native Marois

<div class="image-hero"><img title="Cover-01" src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/cover-01725/4441687-1-eng-US/cover-012.jpg"><figcaption class="caption-body">WAYNE GRETZKY <span class="photo-credit">(Photo By Robert Shaver)</span></figcaption></div><p><b>THE OHA:</b><br><b>A SPECIAL</b><br><b>SECTION</b></p><p><b>FOR WAYNE GRETZKY, THE SKY IS NOT NECESSARILY THE LIMIT</b></p><p><b><i>THE COLLEGES:</i></b></p><p><b>NMU COPS CCHA CROWN</b></p><p><b>PROVIDENCE ECAC TITLIST</b></p><p><b>LOWELL DIV. 2 ECAC WINNER</b></p><p><b>MONCTON IS CANADIAN CHAMP</b><span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span></p>

Cover-01

The Hockey News THE INTERNATIONAL HOCKEY WEEKLY 64522 THE INTERNATIONAL HOCKEY WEEKLY MARCH 27, 1981 Vol. 34, No. 25

<div class="byline">FRANK ORR&#x2019;S</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0002-011101/4438784-1-eng-US/f0002-012.jpg" title="f0002-01" width="323" height="364"></div><h2>Some Trades Not Made</h2><p class="dropcap"><b><span>T</span>HE NATIONAL HOCKEY LEAGUE</b> folks had a wonderful old time on the day of the trading deadline for the 1980-81 season. In fact, it&rsquo;s difficult to remember when there was such a shake-up in the old league on the deal market.</p><p>Now while the deals that Were made were interesting, the ones that were discussed but not made for a variety of reasons would have rocked the sport back on its heels.</p><p>At great expense, research and consulting a huge variety of informed sources, easily recognized by dirty ears which they always keep to the ground, your humble correspondent has discovered some of the swaps which were discussed but not made. Here they are:</p><p>&bull; The Minnesota North Stars offered Bobby Smith, Craig Hartsburg and Don Beaupre to the Boston Bruins for the head of coach Gerry Cheevers and a basket to be named later. Bruins&rsquo; general manager Harry Sinden countered by offering a year&rsquo;s supply of chicken for the entire North Stars&rsquo; team.</p><p>&bull; New York Rangers&rsquo; head honcho Sonny Werblin, with the blessing of his bosses, the men who run the Gulf-Western conglomerate, tried to get Wayne Gretzky from the Edmonton Oilers. They offered seven oil wells in Saudi Arabia, two factories in New Jersey and an island of the Oilers&rsquo; choice&mdash;either Hawaii or Aruba.</p><p>Oilers&rsquo; owner Peter Pocklington didn&rsquo;t think the offer was enough. He also wanted the name of Ron Duguay&rsquo;s hairdresser - but the Rangers balked at that.</p><p>&bull; The Los Angeles Kings tried very hard to get Duguay from the Rangers The Kings offered one of owner Jerry Buss&rsquo; former playmate girlfriends. The Rangers turned down the deal, claiming that Duguay had been on more covers than she had.</p><p>&bull; The Rangers didn&rsquo;t make any major deals but they certainly tried. They offered Barry Beck to the Colorado Rockies in exchange for Mike McEwen, Lucien DeBlois, Pat Hickey, Dean Turner, a draft choice and $250,000.</p><p>&bull; Another team wanted Darryl Sittler and Borje Salming from the Toronto Maple Leafs and offered Leaf owner Harold Ballard a package for them - Babe Pratt, Aurel Joliat and the rights to Joe Malone. Ballard said he&rsquo;d make the deal if the other team could get him the rights to Lorne Chabot to solve Leafs&rsquo; goaltending problems, plus a first-round choice in the 1957 draft.</p><h2><b>The Prez On The Block, Too</b></h2><p>&bull; <b>A SECRET MEETING</b> of the NHL board of governors the night before the trading deadline resulted in the concoction of a potential precedent setting swap. The governors offered to trade league president John Ziegler to <i>Sports Illustrated for</i> their entire hockey writing staff and the editor who inspires the anti-NHL violence stories. The deal was turned down.</p><p>&bull; Leafs&rsquo; Ballard and GM Punch Imlach tried to trade three Toronto hockey writers to any taker for a ripped jock strap, one goal pad and a nude photograph of David Eisenhower.</p><p>&bull; Comment from an NHL general manager: &ldquo;I can&rsquo;t understand John Ferguson [Winnipeg Jets&rsquo; GM] and certainly not his sense of humor. I asked him what he would take for David Babych and the Jets&rsquo; No. 1 pick in the &lsquo;81 entry draft. Can you believe it? Fergy just chuckled.&rdquo;</p><p>&bull; St. Louis Blues&rsquo; general manager Emile (The Cat) Francis received a slight shock when Leafs&rsquo;, Punch Imlach called him, seeking Blues&rsquo; goalie Mike Liut. Imlach offered Carl Brewer, Darryl Maggs and Ron Ellis in exchange for Liut and tried to explain to Francis that the Blues would have a shot at the Stanley Cup if they had a little more experience.</p><p>&bull; The Blues already have Brian Sutter but they tried to acquire Darryl Sutter from the Chicago Black Hawks, Duane and Brent Sutter from the New York Islanders, plus the young Sutter twins who are playing junior hockey.</p><p>&ldquo;Not only are they good hockey players but tickets for our games are getting scarce,&rdquo; said Francis. &ldquo;If we had &lsquo;em all, we wouldn&rsquo;t need as many tickets for players&rsquo; parents and family and have more to sell at the gate.&rdquo;</p><h2><b>The Czech Said No</b></h2><p>&bull; <b>THE MAPLE LEAFS</b> offered Czech goalie Jiri Crha to a team in Czechoslovakia in exchange for Marian Stastny, the older brother of Peter and Anton of the Quebec Nordiques. The Leafs gave Crha, who defected in 1979, time to think about it because he faces a three-year jail sentence if he returns to his homeland.</p><p>Crha thought about it for three days, then said no. He needed the time because it was tough to decide if three years in a Czech jail or three years of playing behind the Leaf defense was the worst prospect.</p><p>&ldquo;I picked the Leafs because the food is better here than in a Czech jail,&rdquo; Crha said.</p><p>&bull; The Leafs did acquire goalie Michel Larocque from the Montreal Canadiens in exchange for defenseman Robert Picard and a draft choice. Because Larocque&rsquo; often up-chucks before a game, the Canadiens threw in a year&rsquo;s supply of air sickness bags.<span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span></p>

f0002-01

HOCKEY VIEWPOINT

<div class="byline">BY JIM MATHESON</div><div class="image-hero"><img title="f0003-01" src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0003-011110/4438815-1-eng-US/f0003-012.jpg"><figcaption class="caption-body"><b>Averaging two points a game over an 80-game schedule is a feat which intrigues Wayne Gretzky, who doesn&rsquo;t know the meaning of the word impossible.</b> <span class="photo-credit">(Photo by Robert Shaver)</span></figcaption></div><p class="dropcap"><span>T</span>he middle-aged man in the three-piece suit, blue serge with stripes, leafed through the magazine as he sat in the Pittsburgh airport. Halfway through the hockey article, he nervously glanced up from the pages. He started comparing the picture in the story with the face in the comer of the waiting room.</p><p>After about two minutes, he rather timidly shuffled over to the blond-haired kid in the trench-coat. &ldquo;Is this you?&rdquo; queried the 40ish man, showing the kid a glossy picture. &ldquo;Yeah&hellip;1 guess it is,&rdquo; said 20-year-old Wayne Gretzky.</p><p>&ldquo;Um, uh, what&rsquo;s your secret anyway?&rdquo;</p><p>Good question. It&rsquo;s been well-chronicled that the Edmonton Oiler center can&rsquo;t skate fast enough, can&rsquo;t shoot hard enough and he&rsquo;s awfully slight. But, they&rsquo;re only minor handicaps, obviously. Kind of like warts. Nothing to worry about. Certainly not for Agent 99.</p><p>With his second National Hockey League season winding down, Gretzky is scoring points at a stratospheric rate. One hundred and 31 as of March 12. One hundred and 37 last season. He&rsquo;s going to give Phil Esposito&rsquo;s 10-year-old record of 152 points a serious run, odds are 60-40 he gets it, considering he&rsquo;s averaging 1.96 points a game.</p><p>So what&rsquo;s the kid&rsquo;s secret? What sets him apart from the legion of other skaters in the NHL? If anything, it might be raw determination. Impossible isn&rsquo;t in his vocabularly. You can see the doggedness in his eyes. They flash. You can see the will to succeed in his face. He gets beet-red when he&rsquo;s wound up. You can see the results in the scoring summary. It&rsquo;s usually a goal and an assist a game. Sometimes four or five goals a game. Sometimes seven assists. The kid has off-nights, nights when he&rsquo;s got two left feet, but they&rsquo;re fewer than just about anybody else&rsquo;s in the game. Through March 12. he had a dozen games when he didn&rsquo;t get a point, only six games when he didn&rsquo;t get a shot. His highs are very high, his lows are almost non-existent.</p><p>&ldquo;There are times,&rdquo; says Winnipeg Jets&rsquo; defenseman Dave Babych, &ldquo;when you sit on the bench and you almost want to clap your hands at some of the things he does. One day I&rsquo;m going to shake his hand and hope some of his magic rubs off on me.&rdquo;</p><p>And he does pull rabbits out of various hats. Since the New Year he&rsquo;s had eight games in which he&rsquo;s picked up four or more points in a game. He had five against the Montreal Canadiens, six against the Jets, seven against St. Louis (including four goals in a row in one period). The only team that&rsquo;s held him under wraps is the Boston Bruins, who always put a ghost on the kid. A not-so-friendly ghost named (Steve) Kasper. It&rsquo;s the only team in the league he hasn&rsquo;t done something special against, in two years of Gretzky magic. He&rsquo;s even got the ruffians in Philly believing now. He had four points in a 6-2 Oiler win in Edmonton Feb. 25 and four goals in a 5-3 victory in Philadelphia March 7. The last one, into an empty net, was his 100th in only 145 NHL games.</p><p>&ldquo;I&rsquo;ve never seen anything like the show he put on in Philadelphia,&rdquo; said Pittsburgh assistant coach Mike Corrigan. &ldquo;I couldn&rsquo;t believe some of the things he was doing, he gave it to them and took it away repeatedly. It almost brought tears to my eyes.&rdquo;</p><p>Corrigan may have been a little melodramatic. But the child prodigy did put on a helluva show, not as good a game as the five-goal, two-assist night against St. Louis. But sharp, under the circumstances. Following the Oilers&rsquo; 5-5 tie in New York March 4. Gretzky was up at 5 a.m. and off to Toronto to collect the Vanier award as outstanding Canadian from the Junior Chamber of Commerce. Friday has was out of the sack at six in the morning to rejoin the Oilers in Philly for a workout. &ldquo;I slept from four that afternoon until 10 the next morning,&rdquo; said Gretzky. &ldquo;I only got up for an hour and a half to eat something.&rdquo; The kid&rsquo;s two favorite off-ice past-times are sleeping (sometimes with his eyes open) and eating (his nickname is Jaws). &ldquo;When I got up the next morning I felt awfully sluggish and when I blew the first breakaway, I figured it was going to be another one of those games,&rdquo; shrugged the kid.</p><p>Instead, he became the first visiting player to pop four goals in the Spectrum since Jimmy Pappin pulled it off Jan. 30, 1969 in a 12-0 Black Hawks&rsquo; victory. His 100th goal went into a yawning net. as though drawn in by a magnet. &ldquo;It was going about 10 feet wide and just curved in,&rdquo; said Gretzky, who gets those kind of breaks. &ldquo;The only thing I forgot to do was get my puck. [Risto] Siltanen got it for me though. My dad would have killed me if I&rsquo;d missed it. He collects that sort of stuff.&rdquo;</p><p>And there&rsquo;s a lot of memorabilia in Walter Gretzky&rsquo;s house in Brantford, Ont. Among the hundreds of plaques and trophies and movie reels and scrapbooks are the Hart trophy for the &lsquo;79-80 NHL MVP. The Lady Byng for most gentlemanly player. There&rsquo;s still room, however, for the Art Ross trophy, symbolizing the league scoring title. Who knows maybe the all-time, single season scoring champ?</p><p>Gretzky got aced out last season when he tied LA&rsquo;s Marcel Dionne for points but lost out on fewer goals. The same thing happened at mid-point this season; both players had 70 points but Dionne had 10 more goals. With 61 points over a 25-game stretch from Jan. 1-March 12, Gretzky made it a non-race. &ldquo;I&rsquo;d really like to be the first player in a season to average two points a game,&rdquo; said Gretzky, who&rsquo;s currently just shy of that. &ldquo;My dad is never satisfied though. He probably feels I can get three points a game,&rdquo; joked The Kid.</p><p>Dionne has pretty much given up on winning his second straight scoring title, after being a bridesmaid himself a few times. &ldquo;It&rsquo;s no big deal,&rdquo; said Dionne, after Gretzky moved past him in late February. &ldquo;If Wayne wins I&rsquo;m pulling for him. We admire the guy.&rdquo; You could say that. Last time the Oilers were in LA. the blackboard in the Kings&rsquo; dressing room was 99 percent devoted to the kid&rsquo;s strengths and tendencies. There was a little notation at the bottom: the Oilers team works hard. But it was almost all Gretzky. &ldquo;Nobody can get points like him.&rdquo; said Dionne to Edmonton <i>Sun</i> reporter Dick Chubey. &ldquo;Heck, he&rsquo;s had two seven-point nights in two years&hellip;that&rsquo;s incredible. Me? I can get two or three, but I can&rsquo;t get points like he does. Plus 1 don&rsquo;t want to put myself into a position where I&rsquo;ve got to beat The Kid. He makes me feel like an old man.&rdquo;</p><p>If Gretzky makes the 29-year-old Dionne feel old, wonder how Esposito feels. Gretzky was only 10 when the recently retired Esposito notched his incredible 152 points in 1970-71. It was a Ruthian achievement then and it remains a gigantic feat even today. Gretzky, who had 378 goals and 120 assists in atom the year Espo&rsquo; wreaked havoc on NHL goalies, tries to not think too much about Espo&rsquo;s feat. &ldquo;Anytime you come near to a record it&rsquo;s nice,&rdquo; said Gretzky. &ldquo;Esposito is a big name, though, and I guess it would be quite a thing to beat-his mark. Fortunately, we&rsquo;re fighting for a playoff spot and that takes my mind off individual records. If we weren&rsquo;t, I would be worrying about it and it might affect my play.&rdquo;</p><p>To Gretzky, just winning the scoring title is probably enough. Overcoming Dionne was his main thrust this season. &ldquo;Any time you get close to winning like I did last year, you feel you might not get that close again. Who knows, I could break a leg!&rdquo; laughed The Kid. Just kidding, Peter Pocklington.</p><p>Bobby Orr&rsquo;s record 102 assists remains in the back of Gretzky&rsquo;s mind, too, although it&rsquo;s growing fainter every day. &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve always considered myself more of a passer than a scorer,&rdquo; said Gretzky, who has only 235 shots this season. &ldquo;The thing is, in the first 40 games, teams were watching me so closely, I picked up a lot of assists. The last little while, they&rsquo;ve laid off me and started checking my wingers [Jari Kurri, Brett Callighen], so I&rsquo;ve shot more&rdquo; And his goals have shot up from 21 at mid-season, to more than 50.</p><p>While Gretzky has virtually carried the Oilers on his back for two years, he&rsquo;s smart enough to know that one man can&rsquo;t carry a team very far. &lsquo;If that was the case, Boston would have won the Stanley Cup every year from 1968 to 1975,&rdquo; said Gretzky. &ldquo;Orr was tremendous, but he couldn&rsquo;t do it alone.&rdquo;</p><p>The Kid genuinely believes in the all-for-one, one-for-all theory. The sum is more important than one of the parts. &ldquo;I&rsquo;d trade all my trophies just to win a Stanley Cup.&rdquo; said Gretzky. &ldquo;That&rsquo;s what the game&rsquo;s all about. They judge winners and losers on Stanley Cups, not individual awards.&rdquo;</p><p>Gretzky isn&rsquo;t happy just to make the playoffs either. Sneaking into 16th or 15th isn&rsquo;t much of an accomplishment when you made that grade last year. &ldquo;I don&rsquo;t think we&rsquo;ll be happy unless we finish 12th or 13th and show some improvement.&rdquo; said Gretzky. &ldquo;You have to move up every year.&rdquo;</p><p>Gretzky is doing his bit to make things better. &ldquo;Wayne is changing the whole game of hockey around,&rdquo; said Dionne. &ldquo;Watch kids coming up. they&rsquo;ll be playing a different game. They&rsquo;ll be trying to move the puck like he does. I think it&rsquo;s great.&rdquo;<span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span></p>

f0003-01

Determination Secret Behind Gretzky’s Magic

<div class="byline">BY BOB VERDI</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0004-011160/4438846-1-eng-US/f0004-012.jpg" title="f0004-01" width="325" height="366"></div><h2>Venerable But Ebullient</h2><p><b>IF YOU&rsquo;RE A HOCKEY</b> fan, and you haven&rsquo;t heard Dan Kelly, then it&rsquo;s because you don&rsquo;t have a radio.</p><p>The team for which Kelly broadcasts is the St. Louis Blues. From October until this very minute, they have been the best, most consistent club in, the National Hockey League.</p><p>The station for which Kelly broadcasts is KMOX in St. Louis. Not only is its signal extremely sharp, so is its programming. If two guys get together to pitch quarters on a street corner in that city, chances are KMOX will cover it. It is the finest sports station in North America.</p><p>And what about Dan Kelly himself? Well, he&rsquo;s entering his 40th year hanging around radio stations. Considering that the man is only 44, color him venerable enough to be expert, but still youthful enough to be ebullient.</p><p>&ldquo;I love the job,&rdquo; he says. &ldquo;The only drawback is the constant travel. That&rsquo;s the drag, the airports, the hotels, the time away from the family. But there isn&rsquo;t a time, I don&rsquo;t think, that 1 don&rsquo;t get pumped up whenever I walk into an arena or a ballpark before an event, no matter what it is that I&rsquo;m doing.&rdquo;</p><p>What Dan Kelly does, of course, is more than hockey. That&rsquo;s what happens when you&rsquo;re both good and energetic. Besides the men in short pants and skates, Kelly handles University of Missouri football, and the St. Louis football Cardinals. Then, when comes time to rest during the summer, Kelly broadcasts some 50 or so games of the baseball Cardinals.</p><p>&ldquo;How many miles do I travel in a year?&rdquo; he muses. &ldquo;I don&rsquo;t know. I&rsquo;ve never kept track. I&rsquo;m not sure I&rsquo;d want to. The really difficult times are when, say, you have a college game on a Saturday afternoon, a Blues game that night, then pro football on Sunday.&rdquo;</p><p>Kelly literally grew up around a microphone in Ottawa, Ont. His brother Hal&mdash;now retired in Florida&mdash;was a sportscaster, and one of the better ones in his time, in Canada. Dan&rsquo;s father died when he was two, so Hal, 16 years his senior, became Dan&rsquo;s guiding light.</p><p>&ldquo;As a result, I would follow him around at the radio station,&rdquo; Dan says. &ldquo;By the time I was four or five, I was hanging around almost every day. Then, when I was old enough, I started spotting for Hal on his football broadcasts.&rdquo;</p><h2>Decision Wasn&rsquo;t Hard</h2><p><b>DAN MADE IT HIS</b> fulltime occupation in 1955, when he became the night sports voice of station CKOY in Ottawa. He jumped around somewhat after that, to Smiths Falls and Sudbury. Gradually, he gained play-by-play polish, enough to do a Grey Cup in 1965, and enough to join the CBC for weekly NHL radio broadcasts, then <i>Hockey Night in Canada</i> on television.</p><p>&ldquo;The first year of the NHL expansion, 1 had a couple of chances to go to a team, but I decided to see what happened,&rdquo; recalled Kelly. &ldquo;Then, toward the end of that season, the Stanley Cup finals were in St. Louis. I was broadcasting with the Montreal Canadiens&rsquo; team, so I was there for the finals.</p><p>&ldquo;Scotty Bowman, who was then in St. Louis, and other people with the Blues asked whether I&rsquo;d be interested in coming there. I didn&rsquo;t give them an answer. I sort of hemmed and hawed for <i>a</i> lot of the summer. Here I was, with a great job on a <i>Hockey Night in Canada</i> show which had the highest ratings in Canada.</p><p>&ldquo;Finally, one night, I was sitting with my wife in our cottage near Ottawa, and she said to me, &lsquo;I don&rsquo;t know what&rsquo;s so hard about the decision. You&rsquo;ve always wanted to do play-by-play for a club in the NHL. She was right. And that was the chance. What kind of move did it turn out to be for me? Great.&rdquo;</p><p>Kelly not only possesses a booming voice, but the ability to concentrate and work hard. Hang around the rinks and you&rsquo;ll notice that&mdash;despite his heavy schedule&mdash;Kelly does not merely fall into the booth five minutes before faceoff. He&rsquo;s at the arena two hours early, collecting information, anecdotes, interviews&mdash;whatever it will take to make his broadcast more interesting.</p><h2>They Turn To Kelly</h2><p><b>THAT KNACK HAS ENDEARED</b> him to more employers than KMOX. In years past, Kelly has been the heavyweight on NHL weekly telecasts in the United States, whether it be on network or cable, or what have you. Last May, when CBS took a flyer at the Philadelphia-Islanders final game for national exposure they went to Kelly. Naturally.</p><p>&ldquo;With everything,&rdquo; Kelly says, &ldquo;I did 109 hockey games, 21 football games, and 40-odd baseball games.&rdquo;</p><p>Kelly is the consummate pro. You know when you listen to him who is playing well, and who isn&rsquo;t. But he is not one to belabor mistakes, nor is he beyond having a good chuckle on the air.</p><p>&ldquo;With all the games I do, the toughest problem I have is that 1 get tired of hearing myself,&rdquo; he says. &ldquo;And when I go through that, I wonder, if I&rsquo;m tired of my voice, what about the guy on the other end? How many different ways can you say &lsquo;icing?&rsquo;</p><p>&ldquo;There have been some tough times. When the Blues were struggling, there were nights when the team is down 7-1 entering the third period. That&rsquo;s when you work your hardest. To keep it entertaining. This year, the way the Blues have played, has been a breath of fresh air.</p><p>&ldquo;It&rsquo;s a hell of a hockey team, and it&rsquo;s not just Mike Liut. I see the whole sport improving, though, since the merger. Good things are happening, although if I never saw another fight, it wouldn&rsquo;t bother me. I&rsquo;m one of these people who like hard, tough-nosed hockey, but the sport can do very well enough on skills alone. You don&rsquo;t need linesmen grabbing onto players and players grabbing linesmen.&rdquo;<span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span></p>

f0004-01

HOCKEY TALK

<p>THF INTERNATIONAL HOCKEY WEEKLY &bull; FOUNDED 1947</p><p>Founded in 1947 by Kenneth W. McKenzie</p><p><b>DONALD R. WALL</b><br><i>Chairman and Publisher</i></p><p><b>TOM MURRAY</b><br><i>Editor in Chief</i></p><p>Advertising and Editorial Offices<br>214 King Street West - Suite 314<br>Toronto. Ontario. Canada M5H 1K4<br>(416)598-1753</p><p><b>TOM WORSLEY</b><br><i>Business Manager</i></p><p>Executive Office<br>850 Third Ave.<br>New York. New York. 10022<br>(212) 593-2100</p><p>EDITORIAL STAFF</p><p>Charlie Halpin<br><i>Editorial Director</i></p><p>Mike Dennis. <i>Assistant Editor</i></p><p>Bob Hanley <i>Editorial Consultant</i></p><p><i>Contributing Editors</i></p><p>Stan Fischler, Frank Orr, Bob Verdi</p><p>ADVERTISING SALES OFFICES</p><p><b>Toronto:</b></p><p>Randy Green</p><p>214 King Street West - Suite 314</p><p>Toronto. Ontario. Canada M5H 1K4</p><p>(416) 598-1753</p><p><b>New York:</b></p><p>Bob Bassinette</p><p>Bassmette/White</p><p>50 East 42nd Street</p><p>New York. N.Y 10017</p><p>Tel (212)986-6210</p><p><b>Chicago:</b></p><p>Hooper. Jones & Associates</p><p>3322 W. Peterson Avenue</p><p>Chicago. Illinois 60659</p><p>(312) 478-5544</p><p><b>Boston:</b></p><p>Steve Ganak - Steve Ganak Ad Reps</p><p>Statler Office Building</p><p>Boston. Mass. 02116 (617)542-6913</p><p><b>Esther Sumka.</b></p><p>Advertising Service Manager (416) 598-1753</p><p>THE HOCKEY NEWS. (ISSN 0018 3016). is published weekly except monthly June through September by W.C.C. Publishing Ltd. 214 King Street West-Suite 314. Toronto Ontario M5H 1K4 (416| 598 1753. In U.S. c/o W.C.C Publishing Corp 850 Third Ave New York. N.Y. 10022.</p><p>YEARLY SUBSCRIPTION RATES: S16.95 in the U.S.A. $16.95 in Canada. S20.95 in Foreign Countries. Send all Canadian and Foreign subscription orders to THE HOCKEY NEWS. P.O. Box 13035. Postal Station A.&rsquo; Toronto. Ont M5W IV7 U.S. subscription requests should be mailed Io Box 112. Martinsville. N.J. 08836 Please allow 4-6 weeks for processing.</p><p>IN CANADA SEND ADDRESS CHANGES TO THE HOCKEY NEWS. Box 112. Martinsville. N.J 08836 Second Class mail Registration No 1327 All inquiries pertaining to subscriptions should be addressed to Subscription Dept. The Hockey News. 214 King SI. W., Suite 314. Toronto. Ont M5H 1K4. Canada</p><p>IN THE UNITED STATES: Second class postage paid al New York. N.Y. and at additional mailing offices. U.S. POSTMASTER send address changes to: The Hockey News. Box 112. Martinsville. N.J. 08836</p><p>ABC <i>Member of the Audit Bureau of Circulations</i><span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span></p>

The Hockey News

<div class="byline">BY CHUCK MOODY</div><p>PITTSBURGH&mdash;Things are starting to look up for the Penguins.</p><p>The club shattered its own winning streak of four games and the Edward J. DeBartolo Corporation, owner of the franchise, moved closer to signing a long-term lease to operate the Civic Arena.</p><p>&ldquo;There&rsquo;s no question without control of this building and the concomitant revenue you get from the concessions&rsquo; etc., the team can&rsquo;t make it here,&rdquo; said Paul Martha, vice president and general counsel of the team, last November.</p><p>The Pittsburgh Urban Redevelopment Authority has approved plans to sublease the arena to the DeBartolo Corp. While other legal entanglements are still to be worked out, it appears that the Penguins will gain control of their building.</p><p>&ldquo;To really build a contending team we have to build a minor league system,&rdquo; Martha said. &ldquo;We need an American League team and we may need a team in the Eastern League. But before we make that commitment we have to reach an agreement on the arena.&rdquo;</p><p>Martha went on to say that the takeover of the arena will allow the Penguins to expand their scouting staff. Pittsburgh now employs three full-time and one part-time scout. The club hopes to add another full-time scout and a part-timer to observe potential talent in Canada, the United States and Europe, a place the Penguins virtually have ignored.</p><p>If all goes according to plans, within three years the Penguins would be a legitimate contender for the Stanley Cup, Martha said.</p><p>&ldquo;It could happen sooner,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;We might get luckly and do it faster the way St. Louis did, but they were more the exception than the rule. The factor that is really hard to predict is how the draft goes. It takes time to build and there aren&rsquo;t any short cuts. You have to work like crazy, but I feel very positive. The basics are now almost in hand. We&rsquo;re accomplishing what we set out to do.&rdquo;</p><p>Martha said the Penguins own the rights to only 42 players, the fewest in the National Hockey League. However, he added that four draft choices played in the Ontario Major Junior League All Star game&mdash;Randy Boyd, Mike Bullard, Pat Graham and Doug Shedden.</p><p>Meanwhile, while management was trying to finalize the deal on the arena, the Penguin players were more than holding their own.</p><p>Pittsburgh broke a team record it had tied nine times in its 14 NHL seasons when it won its fifth straight game. The only other time a Penguin team won five games in a row was the first five games of the 1975 Stanley Gup playoffs. The Penguins then added a sixth straight win before bowing to Minnesota, 8-5.</p><p><b>PENGUIN TRACKS -</b> Rick Kehoe has to be considered a leading candidate for the Lady Byng Memorial Trophy, which is awarded &ldquo;to the player adjudged to have exhibited the best type of sportsmanship and gentlemanly conduct combined with a high standard of playing ability.&rdquo; In his first 67 games Kehoe scored 49 goals and picked up only six penalty minutes on three (ripping minors&hellip;Randy Carlyle is adding to his new club records for most points by a defenseman (76) and most assists by a defenseman (64) in a season. Ron Stackhouse held the previous marks (71 points. 60 assists) in 1975-76&hellip;Russ Anderson is expected to be out the rest of the season after breaking the same finger for the third time this season. The Penguins signed defenseman Pete Scamurra for the rest of the season to take his place. Scamurra, Washington&rsquo;s second choice in the 1975 amateur draft, had been playing in Europe this season.</p><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0004-021111/4438901-1-eng-US/f0004-022.jpg" title="f0004-02" width="609" height="874"><figcaption class="caption-body"><b>With 49 goals and only six penalty minutes in 67 games, Rick Kehoe is a Lady Byng contender.</b></figcaption></div><span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span>

f0004-02

Penguins Starting To Roll Towards Building A Winner

<div class="byline">BY PAT CALABRIA</div><p class="dropcap"><span>L</span>ONG ISLAND&mdash;No one pretended to be flabbergasted. It always was a possibility that Glenn Resch might be traded, but when the deal was made at the stroke of the deadline the Islanders&mdash;and Resch&mdash;still were stunned.</p><p>&ldquo;I was shocked,&rsquo;&rsquo; Resch said.</p><p>The deal that shipped Resch and Steve Tambellini to the Colorado Rockies for Mike McEwen and Jari Kaarela closed a chapter in Islander history and, maybe, began a new chapter for Resch. After seven years as the most popular player&mdash;Chico to everyone&mdash;the end came with some bitterness.</p><p>He had been exiled to the bench during the Stanley Cup playoffs last season and was convinced he would never get another chance to help the Islanders win a championship. Even though he had enjoyed a better season than partner Bill Smith this season, coach Al Arbour was convinced that Smith&rsquo;s reputation as a playoff goalie made him the better choice.</p><p>So Resch was preparing to play out his option, although he wanted to remain an Islander. What he did not want to do was remain in the shadows. He thought he would finish the season as an observer again and go shopping on the free agent market next season.</p><p>Resch said: &ldquo;I couldn&rsquo;t understand the timing of it.&rdquo;</p><p>The Rockies will still have to convince him not to play out his option while the Islanders were prodded into recalling goalie Roland Melanson from Indianapolis more quickly than they would have preferred. Kaarela took Melanson&rsquo;s place in Indianapolis.</p><p>Resch received the jarring news as the team bus was idling outside the practice rink in Hicksville, waiting to take the team to the airport for a brief road trip to Winnipeg and Edmonton. When the bus was delayed more than a half-hour, the players grew restless and suspicious.</p><p>&ldquo;I was casual,&rdquo; Resch said. &ldquo;Everyone was joking.&rdquo;</p><p>Then assistant coach Lorne Henning stepped on the bus, turned to Resch and said, &ldquo;Chico, Al wants to see you.&rdquo; Henning also fetched Tambellini, the young, swift center, and took them to Arbour&rsquo;s office.</p><p>&ldquo;This isn&rsquo;t a nice thing I have to tell you,&rdquo; Arbour said. &ldquo;You&rsquo;ve been traded to Colorado.&rdquo;</p><p>Resch was calm, but Tambellini was shaken. The two players returned to the team bus in the parking lot for a quick farewell, the rest of the Islanders spilling out of the bus to console Resch and Tambellini. &ldquo;It was touching,&rdquo; Resch said.</p><p>But the sentiment had not even begun for Resch&mdash;the witty, talkative goalie who had tugged the Islanders to within one game of the Stanley Cup finals in the team&rsquo;s third year of existence, then was the losing goalie five straight years when the team was eliminated.</p><p>Resch played the next night for the Rockies against the Rangers in Madison Square Garden. The Rockies won, 4-3. with Tambellini scoring the winning goal with 61 second left. &ldquo;It was a storybook,&rdquo; Resch said.</p><p>Tambellini said: &ldquo;I was shocked, but maybe in the long run this will work out for me. I&rsquo;ll get more ice time.&rdquo;</p><p>Meanwhile, the newest Islanders were joining the team on the road. McEwen, the former Ranger, was needed to help plug a gap in a leaking defense. Although he is offensive-minded. Arbour was convinced his skating and passing would help the team resist forechecking. He also said he would help McEwen adjust defensively.</p><p>McEwen had an assist in each of his first two games as an Islander as the team beat Winnipeg, 5-3, and Edmonton, 5-0. Smith was the winning goalie in both those games, helping the Islanders to run their unbeaten streak to 5-0-1. Melanson had started in Winnipeg, but three games in four nights in addition to a day of traveling had tired him. After a sound first period, he was replaced by Smith with the score tied at 2.</p><p>General manager Bill Torrey is convinced he had to make the trade. Still, fans flooded the Islanders&rsquo; switchboard in protest. Even Arbour, who did not always get along with Resch, said: &ldquo;How could I not feel bad? We had seven years together and that&rsquo;s a long time.&rdquo;</p><p>It was a good time.</p><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0005-011010/4438939-1-eng-US/f0005-012.jpg" title="f0005-01" width="608" height="900"><figcaption class="caption-body"><b>Being traded to Colorado was a bit of a shock to both Chico Resch, Above and Steve Tambellini. below, but it will give each of them a chance for more ice time.</b> <span class="photo-credit">(-Photo By Ian MacAlpine)</span></figcaption><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0005-02771/4438932-1-eng-US/f0005-022.jpg" title="f0005-02" width="614" height="932"></div><span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span>

f0005-01

Resch Trade Ends Chapter Of Isles’ History

<div class="byline">BY NEIL MILBERT</div><p class="dropcap"><span>C</span>HICAGO&mdash;Darryl Sutter of the Black Hawks hasn&rsquo;t been getting as much ink as Quebec&rsquo;s Peter Stastny and Larry Murphy of Los Angeles in Rookie of the Year conjecture.</p><p>Yet Sutter&rsquo;s actions spoke louder than words in recent close encounters of a NHL kind with the Nordiques and Kings.</p><p>Sutter scored two goals within a span of 15 seconds in the second period in Quebec, pacing the Hawks to a come-from-behind 3-2 triumph that arrested a nine-game (0-5-4) winless streak.</p><p>The first of the goals was his 33rd this season and it enabled Sutter to shatter the Chicago rookie record established by Hall of Famer Bill Mosienko in 1943-44.</p><p>Then, the Hawks journeyed to Los Angeles, where Sutter tallied his 35th and 36th goals to stand out in a 4-4 stalemate that saw Chicago squander a three-goal lead.</p><p>According to Sutter, a brawl in the Quebec game that produced 164 penalty minutes stoked the Hawks&rsquo; successful comeback.</p><p>&ldquo;Something like that pulls a team back together when you&rsquo;re in a slump,&rdquo; said Sutter, whose first of the rapid-fire goals came just 34 second after law and order was restored. &ldquo;The fight wasn&rsquo;t planned or anything but it had to help.</p><p>&ldquo;In my opinion, the biggest factor in our winning was killing the five-minute penalty [a major for high-sticking against Rich Preston] at the end of the second period. If they&rsquo;d have scored then, they could have gotten the momentum back.&rdquo;</p><p>The earlier brawl started when captain Terry Ruskowski and the Nordiques&rsquo; Kim Clackson (a close friend and former teammate in Winnipeg) got into a stick-swinging duel. Then, Quebec&rsquo;s Robbie Ftorek and the Hawks&rsquo; Al Secord entered the fray. The climax came when Secord slugged it out with Clackson. inflicting a gash over the defenseman&rsquo;s right eye.</p><p>While Ruskowski was in the penalty box one of the 14,467 fans took a poke at him, striking his shoulder and he swung back but failed to connect.</p><p>Both Secord and Clackson received a host of penalties, including double game-misconducts for each and Ruskowski served 27 minutes.</p><p>&ldquo;I really think it (the brawl] sparked our team to winning,&rdquo; said coach Keith Magnuson of the Hawks, who still holds the team record for penalty minutes with 291 in 1970-71. &ldquo;I think Al handled himself well. He won both fights. Then, right after that we got two goals.&rdquo;</p><p>&ldquo;The fight stopped the tempo that we had established,&rdquo; agreed Quebec coach Michel Bergeron. &ldquo;We never were able to get going again. Tony Esposito (in goal for Chicago] made a very big difference as well. He was superb.&rdquo;</p><p>But the spark ignited in Quebec went out in LA with 35 seconds to play, Murphy&rsquo;s 50-foot shot richocheted off Hawk defenseman Bob Murray&rsquo;s stick and past Esposito, enabling the Kings to earn the tie. (Coach Bob Berry of the Kings had pulled his goalie, Mario Lessard, for a sixth attacker.).</p><p>&ldquo;I thought we played two good periods,&rdquo; said Magnuson. &ldquo;In the second period [when LA scored three goals] we didn&rsquo;t play well.&rdquo;</p><p>Two nights later in Vancouver the Hawks had an even worse second period. Their offense evaporated, their defense disintegrated and Vancouver scored four unanswered goals en route to a 5-3 victory.<span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span></p>

Hawks’ Sutter A Standout In Duel Of Best Rookies

<div class="byline">BY TOM RATSCHUNAS</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0006-011192/4438994-1-eng-US/f0006-012.jpg" title="f0006-01" width="320" height="374"></div><h2>SOVIET UNION</h2><h3>Layoff May Hurt Tretyak</h3><p class="dropcap"><span>S</span>oviet National Team goaltender <b>Vladislav Tretyak</b> slipped when stepping out of a bus and will have his leg in cast until-the end of March. This lengthy layoff may jeopardize his aim to make the roster for the World Championships tournament in Sweden in April. If Tretyak does not recover, <b>Victor Dorochenko</b>, from the Moscow Spartak, is the likely replacement but Soviet officials are hoping for a quick recovery from Tretyak, who has played tremendously this season and who is the outstanding national team goalie, sporting a 0.85 goals per game average in 10 outings for the Soviet Union. The games include a remarkable five shutouts, plus a shared shutout against Holland when <b>Vladimir Myshkin,</b> who is ranked No. 2 in the USSR, took over for the final two periods.</p><p><b>Sergei Makarov</b>, the Soviet scoring leader, bolstered his lead with a five-point game (four goals and an assist) when CSKA bombed the Ufa team, Salavat Yulayev, 11-3. In other league action the army team from Leningrad, who in the last three seasons have had to play in the qualification pool to avoid relegation, are having a solid season.</p><p>The upward trend for SKA Leningrad has been aided by the arrival of a new coach, none other than <b>Boris Mikhailov</b>, under whose guidance the Leningrad team already has one major victory&rsquo;, a 4-3 triumph over Dynamo Moscow, who are in a slump that saw them lose another point in the following game, when Dynamo Riga, led by Helmut Balderis, managed a 3-3 draw.</p><h2>EAST GERMANY</h2><h3>Weisswasser Takes Title</h3><p>Dynamo Weisswasser, which has been an outsider in recent years, stopped the title winning streak of Dynamo Berlin at five straight, when they defeated their arch-rivals in the last game of the season 6-4. In the fifth game of the six-game series Berlin had caught up with Weisswasser on points and overtaken them in the goal difference with a great 10-1 win with 22-year-old <b>Harald Kuhnke</b> leading the way with five goals, ably assisted by linemates <b>Detlef Radant</b> and <b>Frank Proske</b>. Radant had two goals to raise the line&rsquo;s output to seven. The win in the next game meant a record 23rd title, while Berlin has eight.</p><h2>FRANCE</h2><h3>Three In A Row For Tardif</h3><p>Last year, <b>Luc Tardif</b> won the scoring title because he had more goals (44) than runner-up <b>Andre Peloffy</b>. Tardif had a much easier time this year, finished 12 points ahead of runner-up <b>Normand Pepin</b> of Megeve, Tardif, of Chamonix, scored three goals less than last year (41) but racked up four more points (70). <b>Guy Dupuis</b>, of Villard-de-Lans, who topped the standings going into the playoffs, was third in the scoring with the same points total as Pepin but one less goal (30).</p><p>Despite the scoring feats of Tardif, Chamonix was only second in the standings, with defending champions ASG Tours in third. Grenoble, Viry and Megeve were the only three teams that made up the championship pool.</p><h2>ITALY</h2><h3>Another &ldquo;Scudetto&rdquo; For Gardena</h3><p>Credit for Gardena&rsquo;s fourth title, or &ldquo;scudetto&rdquo;, must go to the two Canadian stars of the club, ex-WHA and NHL goalie <b>Jim Corsi</b> and goal scoring whit <b>Jim Gellert</b>. The title was the second straight for the club, but they still have a long way to go to match the record of 23 held by Milan. Cortina, with. 15. and Bolzano, with five, are also ahead of Val Gardena in titles.</p><p>With the national championships out of the way Italian hockey was looking forward to its next highlight, the B-Pool World Championships, which will be staged at Val Gardena from March 20-29. Italy has assembled its strongest team ever, with a host of naturalized Canadians: goalies Corsi and <b>Nick Sanza</b> (Sherbrooke Castors), defensemen <b>John Bellio</b> and <b>Guido Tenesi</b>, who played with the Oshawa Generals; Dave Tomassoni, who used to be a right wing with Denver University, and Rocci Pagnello, formerly of the University of Toronto. The forwards have the likes of <b>Steve Cupolo</b>, a center who played junior with the Niagara Falls Flyers, <b>Wayne Bianchin</b>, who after many years in the Pittsburgh Penguins&rsquo; organization, ended his NHL career with 11 games for Edmonton; <b>Rick Bragnolo</b>, who once patrolled center ice for the Washington Capitals for 145 games; Cary Farelli, a whiz kid with the Toronto Marlies and a late cut last season from the Canadian Olympic Team; and <b>Tom Milani,</b> whose last address was Kalamazoo in the International League.</p><h2>JAPAN</h2><h3>Honors To Seibu and Oji-Seishi</h3><p>Seibu from Tokyo, led by Canadian <b>Gary Monahan</b>, won the league championship for the current season, while Oji-Seishi from Tomakomai, who lost the league title by a single point, won the cup, defeating Kokudo Keikaku from Tokyo 7-4 thanks to a four-goal rally in the final period. <b>Markku Hakulinen</b>, a regular on the Finnish national team last season, was the leading goal scorer, with 20, and <b>Yoshio Hoshino</b> of Kokudo was the best playmaker, with 27 assists.</p><p>Canadian Olympian <b>Randy Gregg</b> was the head coach for Kokudo, assisted by Tanaka and Mori, and the Soviet traditions on the Oji club, started by the legendary <b>Vyatcheslav Starshinov</b>, were continued this season by <b>Vladimir Shadrin</b> and defenseman <b>Yuri Ljapkin</b>. who with 15 assists was fourth best in that category during the season.<span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span></p>

f0006-01

THE INTERNATIONAL SCENE

<h2><b>BULGARIA</b></h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0006-02910/4439179-1-eng-US/f0006-022.jpg" title="f0006-02" width="550" height="194"></div><h2><b>CZECHOSLOVAKIA</b></h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0006-03598/4439172-1-eng-US/f0006-032.jpg" title="f0006-03" width="544" height="372"></div><h3><b>SCORING LEADERS</b></h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0006-04393/4439165-1-eng-US/f0006-042.jpg" title="f0006-04" width="548" height="302"></div><h2><b>EAST GERMANY</b></h2><p><b>(Final Standings)</b></p><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0006-05319/4439158-1-eng-US/f0006-052.jpg" title="f0006-05" width="550" height="124"></div><h2><b>FINLAND</b></h2><p><b>(Final Standings)</b></p><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0006-06226/4439151-1-eng-US/f0006-062.jpg" title="f0006-06" width="546" height="318"></div><h3><b>SCORING LEADERS</b></h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0006-07119/4439144-1-eng-US/f0006-072.jpg" title="f0006-07" width="554" height="1419"></div><h2><b>FRANCE</b></h2><p><b>(Final Standings)</b></p><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0006-0863/4439137-1-eng-US/f0006-082.jpg" title="f0006-08" width="552" height="324"></div><h3><b>SCORING LEADERS</b></h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0006-0942/4439130-1-eng-US/f0006-092.jpg" title="f0006-09" width="550" height="308"></div><h2><b>HOLLAND</b></h2><p><b>(Final Standings)</b></p><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0006-1027/4439123-1-eng-US/f0006-102.jpg" title="f0006-10" width="554" height="302"></div><h3><b>SCORING LEADERS</b></h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0006-1126/4439116-1-eng-US/f0006-112.jpg" title="f0006-11" width="544" height="310"></div><h2><b>JAPAN</b></h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0006-1221/4439109-1-eng-US/f0006-122.jpg" title="f0006-12" width="544" height="204"></div><h3><b>SCORING LEADERS</b></h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0006-1317/4439102-1-eng-US/f0006-132.jpg" title="f0006-13" width="546" height="172"></div><h2><b>NORWAY</b></h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0006-1413/4439095-1-eng-US/f0006-142.jpg" title="f0006-14" width="549" height="318"></div><h2><b>RUMANIA</b></h2><p><b>(Final Standings)</b></p><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0006-1512/4439088-1-eng-US/f0006-152.jpg" title="f0006-15" width="544" height="205"></div><h2><b>SOVIET UNION</b></h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0006-1611/4439081-1-eng-US/f0006-162.jpg" title="f0006-16" width="544" height="368"></div><h3><b>SCORING LEADERS</b></h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0006-178/4439074-1-eng-US/f0006-172.jpg" title="f0006-17" width="544" height="314"></div><h2><b>SWEDEN</b></h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0006-188/4439067-1-eng-US/f0006-182.jpg" title="f0006-18" width="542" height="314"></div><h3><b>SCORING LEADERS</b></h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0006-198/4439060-1-eng-US/f0006-192.jpg" title="f0006-19" width="539" height="305"></div><h2><b>SWITZERLAND</b></h2><p><b>(Final Standings)</b></p><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0006-207/4439053-1-eng-US/f0006-202.jpg" title="f0006-20" width="545" height="256"></div><h3><b>SCORING LEADERS</b></h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0006-217/4439046-1-eng-US/f0006-212.jpg" title="f0006-21" width="547" height="313"></div><h2><b>WEST GERMANY</b></h2><p><b>(Final Standings)</b></p><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0006-227/4439039-1-eng-US/f0006-222.jpg" title="f0006-22" width="541" height="360"></div><h3><b>SCORING LEADERS</b></h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0006-237/4439032-1-eng-US/f0006-232.jpg" title="f0006-23" width="548" height="310"></div><h2><b>YUGOSLAVIA</b></h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0006-247/4439025-1-eng-US/f0006-242.jpg" title="f0006-24" width="544" height="254"></div><span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span>

f0006-02

European Hockey Statistics

<div class="byline">BY GLENN COLE</div><div class="image-hero"><img title="f0007-01" src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0007-011059/4439210-1-eng-US/f0007-012.jpg"><figcaption class="caption-body">The Canadiens will give Robert Picard, above, obtained from Toronto for Bunny Larocque, a chance to earn a spot on defense, which they didn&rsquo;t afford to Bill Baker, now with Colorado.</figcaption></div><p class="dropcap"><span>M</span>ONTREAL - Normally, the Canadiens are placid when the National Hockey League&rsquo;s trading deadline comes and goes in March. But these are not normal times.</p><p>Just how the Montreal hockey club fared in its two deals is still questionable and probably will be until next season. The move which sent defenseman Bill Baker to the Colorado Rockies for a third-round draft choice in 1983 didn&rsquo;t raise too may eyebrows in the Montreal media circles, although it bothered a number of players.</p><p>The Baker deal was overshadowed by a highly-trumpeted move which brought defenseman Robert Picard from the Toronto Maple Leafs for goaltender Michel Larocque and an eighth-round draft choice. The Picard-Larocque exchange was the first to be announced and everyone travelling with the Canadiens on a road swing through Winnipeg, Minnesota and Pittsburgh knew that Baker would be the next to go.</p><p>The Canadiens never gave Baker, the former U.S. Olympian, a chance to prove his mettle with their organization. He appeared in only 11 NHL games before being optioned, in late January, to Halifax, where he had five goals and 13 assists in 18 American Hockey League games with the Nova Scotia Voyageurs.</p><p>&ldquo;I guess I&rsquo;ll always wonder.&rdquo; said Baker, who played against his former teammates March 14 as the Rockies lost 2-1. &lsquo;&lsquo;But it was becoming pretty obvious that I didn&rsquo;t fit in their long-range plans. Maybe they did me a favor by getting me to another club rather than letting me stay in Halifax. But I&rsquo;ll always wonder.&rdquo;</p><p>The fact the Canadiens gave Baker away to the Rockies shows precisely what they thought of him, although no one in the organization will ever say why. They were too busy bubbling over the fact that after a couple of years of trying, they had acquired former Montreal Junior Picard</p><p>&ldquo;He&rsquo;s a good young prospect.&rdquo; said coach Claude Ruel. &ldquo;We are going to have to do some work with him to get him accustomed to our system, but he&rsquo;s a gros <i>bonhomme</i> and he will help us. Don&rsquo;t forget Serge Savard [age 35] can&rsquo;t go on forever. You have to realize that.&rdquo;</p><p>When Picard joined the Canadiens in Pittsburgh, he received a coolish reception from his new teammates. No one rushed to meet him at the airport and the only people in the hotel lobby were some reporters.</p><p>The introductions and welcome for Picard were saved for the next day at practice where Ruel put him through a series of extra drills to try to bring Picard&rsquo;s conditioning in line with the rest of his teammates.</p><p>There are two questions about Picard which will be answered somewhere along the line. He has a bad knee which has some people associated with the team concerned. The former (1977) Washington first-round draft choice wears a brace on it, and there is allegedly still a problem with it.</p><p>The people who had him in Washington and Toronto have questioned an attitude problem, something which should be rectified quickly here, not only by team management but also by the veterans on the team.</p><p>Picard has already had the facts of Montreal Canadiens&rsquo; life explained to him by Rejean Houle and Mario Tremblay and no doubt a few more vets will help mould him into a Montreal Canadien.</p><p>&ldquo;I know I&rsquo;m not going to get any special treatment here,&rdquo; said Picard, who was thrust into Baker&rsquo;s old designated sitter role for his first three games in Montreal. &ldquo;Everybody here has to work hard. I&rsquo;ve been on teams where guys only worry about points&hellip;not the team. It&rsquo;s not that way here.&rdquo;</p><p>As long as Picard continues to realize that, he should, have no problems adapting to Montreal&rsquo;s style. If he doesn&rsquo;t, then Montreal management has pulled off a 6-2, 211-pound blunder.</p><p><b>IN PASSING</b>&mdash;Guy Lapointe continues to work his way into the Canadiens&rsquo; five-man defense rotation and was one of the few Montreal players that looked half-way interested in the victory over Colorado. Lapointe is the most vulnerable of the Canadiens&rsquo; defensemen if Ruel chooses to insert Picard into the five-man defense system, but as Lapointe explained: &ldquo;It&rsquo;s not my decision to. make. If I play like I&rsquo;m capable of playing, then I think I will stay in the lineup&rdquo;&hellip;Pugnacious Chris Nilan was knocked out of the lineup with a bone-jarring check from Minnesota&rsquo;s Fred Barrett in the first period of the Canadiens-North Stars game March 9. Rib cartilage damage kept Nilan out for games against Pittsburgh, St. Louis and Colorado&hellip;Steve Shutt was ejected from the game against Pittsburgh by referee Gregg Madill when he bumped the referee along the boards after he failed to call a holding penalty against the Pens&rsquo; George Ferguson in the third period. Shutt had a hearing set with the NHL&rsquo;s disciplinarian Brian O&rsquo;Neill and was likely to miss a game or two towards the end of the season&hellip;The whole Montreal team was upset with what was perceived as another inept performance by Madill. Doug Risebrough, ejected with a gross misconduct for rearranging Gary Rissling&rsquo;s hairdo, was incensed that Madill didn&rsquo;t catch Rissling biting him during their second-period fight&hellip;Larry Robinson had to appear before NHL president John Ziegler for his uncomplimentary remarks about Madill&rsquo;s effort and was told by the president to cool it.<span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span></p>

f0007-01

Habs’ Wisdom Questioned After Late Trade Flurry

<p>The International Hockey Weekly Founded in 1947</p><p>Published by W.C.C. Publishing Ltd.</p><p>214 King St. West, Suite 314, Toronto, Ont. M5H 1K4</p><h2><b>Disaster On 34th Street</b></h2><p><b>FOR OVER ONE HUNDRED</b> years, New York City&rsquo;s Madison Square Garden has enjoyed and deserved its reputation as the world&rsquo;s most glamorous and famous sports arena&mdash;the No. 1 choice for staging every kind of event, from heavyweight fights to political conventions to championship tennis matches to rock concerts.</p><p>Recently, however, the Garden has found itself in the unenviable and unfamiliar position of being upstaged&mdash;not by the Los Angeles Forum or the Philadelphia Spectrum or, perish the thought, the Nassau Coliseum, but by an arena that won&rsquo;t even <i>be finished</i> until sometime in mid-June.</p><p>The name of the place is the Brendan T. Byrne Meadowlands Arena, and it sits right next to the New Jersey Turnpike, alongside Giants Stadium, where the National Football League&rsquo;s New York Giants play their home games, and the Meadowlands Race Track, the most popular harness track in the world.</p><p>There was a time, not too long ago, when-the Giants played their games in New York&rsquo;s Yankee Stadium, but they were lured out to New Jersey, where&mdash;despite their woeful record of futility year after year&mdash;they enjoy the largest season-ticket sale of any team in the NHL.</p><p>And the race track is doing so well and is so popular that two long-established New York tracks&mdash;Yonkers and Roosevelt Raceways&mdash;may soon become extinct.</p><p>With that kind of success surrounding both the stadium and the race track, there is no reason to believe that the arena, once it is completed, will not enjoy similar success. The only thing that could prevent it would be if Madison Square Garden suddenly started to flourish. But in light of several recent developments, that just isn&rsquo;t going to happen.</p><p>First of all, there&rsquo;s the small matter of the $3.7 million in real estate taxes that the Garden has to pay to New York City each year&mdash;the highest taxes of any sports building in the United States. Since the Garden also loses approximately the same amount of money each year, one has to wonder how much longer the Garden&rsquo;s owner, Gulf and Western Industries, is going to tolerate the situation&mdash;even if they did make a profit of $70 million in the last quarter of 1980. (There are no real estate taxes on any of the Meadowlands buildings, which are owned by the semi-public Meadowlands sports authority.)</p><p>Then there&rsquo;s the matter of future engagements at the Garden. Not too long ago, the Garden used to be the true mecca of sports entertainment in North America, with throngs of prospects fighting for the opportunity to get into the Garden on the nights that the Knicks, Rangers or some other event weren&rsquo;t scheduled. No more. The Olympic Track Meet, held in the Garden for years, has already been scheduled for the Meadowlands Arena, which will also stage its own horse and dog shows, as well as a new tennis tournament. Not only that, but the 1982 National Basketball Association All Star game, scheduled for the Garden, has been moved to the Meadowlands.</p><p>Last, but certainly not least, there&rsquo;s the lease that the NBA&rsquo;s Knicks and the National Hockey League&rsquo;s Rangers have with the Garden, which goes well beyond the year 2000 and which apparently stipulates that both teams have to play all their home games&mdash;more than 40 each, including playoffs&mdash;at the Garden.</p><p>While Sonny Werblin, the president of Madison Square Garden Corp., won&rsquo;t comment on the subject, the word is that he has G&W&rsquo;s lawyers working on a plan which would enable the Knicks and Rangers to terminate their lease with the Garden, arrive at a handsome settlement, and free both teams to move elsewhere&mdash;the Knicks to Long Island&rsquo;s Nassau Coliseum and the Rangers to&mdash;you guessed it&mdash;Meadowlands Arena in New Jersey, where over 60 percent of their season ticket holders reside.</p><p>If that happens, the once mighty Garden would be reduced to the humiliating position&mdash;if it survived&mdash;of having to sustain itself on whatever events the Meadowlands Arena rejected. And one can only wonder how long that situation could last before Madison Square Garden, once the World&rsquo;s Greatest Sports Arena, would turn into the world&rsquo;s greatest white elephant.<span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span></p>

<div class="byline">BY MURRAY COSTELLO</div><p class="dropcap"><i><span>I</span>n recent years, Canadian amateur hockey teams at all levels of the game&mdash;from midgets all the way up to the Olympics&mdash;have not enjoyed much success when competing internationally.</i></p><p><i>A major reason for this lack of success, critics say, is that the country has not had a long-range plan which would train the athletes properly, starting at a very young age, and ensure that when they did compete, the best possible team could be assembled.</i></p><p><i>Murray Costello, the executive director of the Canadian Amateur Hockey Association, recently proposed such a plan, which he explains in the space below.</i></p><p>We&rsquo;ve been looking at what the other countries are doing&mdash;not just the United States&mdash;but many of the European countries, and particularly the ones that have federations similar to ours. Dennis McDonald, our development coordinator, was over only a couple of weeks ago to a camp that the Finnish Federation ran and they now have well underway. And I think that fits perhaps as closely as anything to the situation we find ourselves in in Canada.</p><p>We, of course, have a much, much larger geographical area to cover and more players. They have about 20,000 of what they call junior players coming up who all work in club development programs. Of those, there are nine regional teams selected and they are invited to a seven-day camp each February. There are about 17 players on each of their teams, so it comes to about 150 or 155 players. These would be kids who are under 15 years of age, so they&rsquo;d be taking kids who in Canada would be in their first year of midget play.</p><p>From these 150 or so players, they pick about 30 players, who are designated as the Finnish Youth National Team. This team then goes into a program that is about four years running and is flexible so that it can accomodate late-bloomers who distinguish themselves in national tournaments and the like.</p><blockquote class="pullQuote">In Canada, we tend to be very reserved about showing our patriotism. For whatever reason, we&rsquo;re very conservative in that area&hellip;</blockquote><p>The four-year program is comprised of a series of camps four times a year, about a week long each. After the first year, they begin to enter them into European competitions, which would be for players under 16 at this point. They do the same thing for players who. are under 17, moving them up in the European competitions and making concessions to maintain the competitive balance. This process continues on up to the Youth national team that is under 18 and they go into the under-18 European championship. This group of players becomes the under-20. National Junior team, and they can cut and add to it if they see any exceptional talent in their own federation or in the playoffs leading up to the championship. So, by the time this national junior team is formed, consisting of players who are under 20 years of age, all of those kids have played with each other for a good four years, training and competing internationally with each other so that they can form the nucleus of the World Team and the Olympic Team.</p><p>We think this is the approach Canada should take, and we have encouraged all of our branches to begin to look for provincial funding for a program like the one in Finland. We could hold these midget elite camps, establish a scouting system or whatever is best in a given area and pick these select midget players, who would probably be 14 and 15. We might have to hold as many as 12 of these camps, because some of them would be regional. Out of them, we could pick about 60 players, whom we could then bring together for a national midget camp.</p><p>We&rsquo;ve already applied to the federal government for funding, and they find this program attractive. They haven&rsquo;t committed funds to us, but they have given us indication that they look favorably upon it and they&rsquo;re going to try and do it. We&rsquo;re waiting for that to happen and, hopefully, it will&mdash;momentarily.</p><p>We&rsquo;ve encouraged all of our branches to get going on this idea right away and the response has been excellent: B.C. has one going; Alberta has one going. We&rsquo;re hopeful that Ontario will get moving soon, and Saskatchewan has one in the works. So that&rsquo;s a good start. We&rsquo;re not certain whether the rest of the provinces can get going that quickly, but we&rsquo;re encouraging them to do so as quickly as possible.</p><p>Hopefully, we&rsquo;ll be able to hold this national camp sometime in August, and while there are many, many details to still be worked out, I visualize something like this: You&rsquo;d have a collection of top midget players who would have good leadership qualities, as well as great hockey talent. They would have about an hour and a half on the ice in the morning and another hour and a half session in the afternoon&mdash;with a very strong coach-to-player ratio so that they&rsquo;d get almost individual instruction from the very best amateur coaches we could provide. There would also be some conditioning in the latter part of August or whenever we could arrange it.</p><p>In addition, I would like to arrange their schedule in a kind of a seminar fashion to give them a full day, so that between the on-ice sessions we would have seminars for them which would involve everybody that they are going to end up dealing with so that they would have more knowledge and a greater idea as to the options available to them and the ability they should possess to measure what is best for them.</p><p>For instance, we&rsquo;d have a university president come in and talk about the prospects of combining a university education with hockey program. Or, we could have someone like Alan Eagleson come in and discuss agency, how important it is to them, and when and if they should consider getting an agent. We&rsquo;d have a representative of the major juniors come in and talk to them about major junior hockey in the various areas of the country, what that program consists of and how it ties in not only to education but also to the NHL, if that&rsquo;s a player&rsquo;s goal.</p><p>I would also like to see some of our more important politicial figures come in and talk to these kids about the value of giving serious consideration to devoting one year of their lives to representing their country, and what it means to wear that national team sweater.</p><p>In Canada, we tend to be very reserved about showing our patriotism. For whatever reason, we&rsquo;re very conservative in that area and yet I think it&rsquo;s there. I think people would like to do it, given the opportunity. If we got some people to point out the fact that this is a once in a lifetime opportunity and that it&rsquo;s gone forever once you take those big dollars, it would be greatly helpful.</p><p>I&rsquo;m also hoping to meet with and talk to some people in the NHL about the fact that cooperation from them would be in their best interest as well. That, obviously, is going to be a harder sell, because if you&rsquo;re a marginal NHL operation, you&rsquo;re not going to want to wait for those players in that final year. But, at the same time, I think that last year&rsquo;s victory by the U.S. Olympic team has indicated that some of the players&mdash;and I think the best example is Winnipeg&rsquo;s Dave Christian&mdash;are much more complete on the ice and much more marketable off it. If we could do that in our country, it would be much more meaningful to us. I&rsquo;m hoping that the NHL would only have to make that kind of a sacrifice in an Olympic year, like 1984. But up until then, we&rsquo;d like to have their cooperation and there are some ideas I have where they could really help make something go.</p><p>Time is of the essence, though, and we really have to start moving on this. After all, 1984 isn&rsquo;t that far away.<span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span></p>

Improving Canada’s Amateur Teams

<div class="byline">BY TONY GALLAGHER</div><p>VANCOUVER&mdash;Calgary&rsquo;s Kent Nilsson, a former teammate of Thomas Gradin with Stockholm&rsquo;s AIK, says he is &ldquo;a perfect man.&rdquo;</p><p>Harry Neale wishes he would shoot more, but probably doesn&rsquo;t much disagree with Nilsson&rsquo;s assessment of his 25-year-old Swedish center.</p><p>Gradin, fresh from his first hat trick in the NHL in a 5-2 victory over the Toronto Maple Leafs, is beginning to start flying again, after a slow start which saw his goal-scoring production dip despite the success of the Canucks.</p><p>Now that the team seems to be going for a skid, Gradin is doing his best to contribute to the offense as he had eight goals in a stretch of nine games&hellip;Unfortunately for the canucks, Gradin&rsquo;s work has been almost all of the offense the team can muster.</p><p>&ldquo;Harry has been telling me for three years, ever since 1 came to Canada, to shoot more,&rdquo; said Gradin after ripping off two perfect shots for goals against the Leafs. &ldquo;He says that if I shoot more my linemates will get more chances to score. I don&rsquo;t know whether I agree with all that, but I think I shoot when I get the opportunity. I feel that if the other people on the line are scoring and we are not giving up too many goals, what does it matter whether I shoot?&rdquo;</p><p>Gradin&rsquo;s first two and three-quarter seasons in the NHL have made his argument convincing. He got 30 goals last year using that style of play, with linemates Stan Smyl and Curt Fraser also having pretty good years, Smyl also reaching the 30-goal plateau.</p><p>Of late, Neale has broken up the Canucks&rsquo; top line and put Gradin on left wing with Per-Olov Brasar and Smyl. It has been by far the club&rsquo;s most effective line and has been the only one producing with consistency.</p><p>&ldquo;I think that you feel the responsibility to shoot more when you play on the wing,&rdquo; said Gradin. &ldquo;Harry put us together because I think he wants more skating from us.&rdquo;</p><p>Gradin had considerable tough luck at the beginning of the year as the puck would not go in for him, even on the limited number of times he did shoot. But lately, more conscious of scoring, he has come on and appears to be a shoo-in candidate to become the club&rsquo;s seventh 20-goal scorer.</p><p>&ldquo;It&rsquo;s funny,&rdquo; said assistant coach Dave Dunn. &ldquo;Thommy has come on just as Smyl and Fraser were beginning to have their problems.&rdquo;</p><p>Neale, in an attempt to get Fraser and Smyl back to their regular form, stuck the line back together in the team&rsquo;s 4-1 loss to Boston, hoping some of Gradin&rsquo;s steam would rub off on the other two workers.</p><p>Meanwhile, the club was dealt a crushing blow in the Toronto win, as Lars Lindgren, the club&rsquo;s top defenseman, was hip checked by Leafs&rsquo; Dave Farrish and suffered torn knee cartilage. He went immediately back to Vancouver to undergo surgery, at which time they will probably operate on his wrist, which has been bothering him on and off for two years.</p><p>&ldquo;That will be a real blow, there is no doubt about that.&rdquo; said Neale of Lindgren&rsquo;s departure.</p><p>At plus-16 he was the top plusminus player on the team and without doubt the best defenseman on the team on a season long basis.</p><p>He was in the middle, leading a three-on-two break, when he made a bad pass, behind him to the right winger. While he was admiring the pass, Farrish came in and blindsided him, nailing Lindgren right in the left knee and sending him for a vicious spin and fall.</p><p>He had to be carried from the Gardens ice on a stretcher, and his departure forced a hasty, botched-up job on the part of the club to find a defenseman, who turned out to be Doug Halward of the Los Angeles Kings.</p><p>General manager Jake Milford announced that Halward had been acquired for future considerations, which upon prying turned out to be a fifth round draft pick in the 1982 draft. Then Halward was told by Kings&rsquo; general manager George Maguire that the team had acquired a goalkeeper&mdash;Gary Bromley&mdash;for his services.</p><p>Harry Neale had been told it was only the draft pick by Milford, who promptly departed for Finland. Bromley, while welcoming any deal that would give him a shot at earning a contract next season, was in total limbo, aware of the controversy but having been told nothing and still dressing as Glen Hanlon&rsquo;s backup. The Canucks needed him as Richard Brodeur had not recovered from minor knee surgery. They really needed Bromley shortly thereafter when Hanlon separated his shoulder and Bromley played and was the difference in a victory over Buffalo, 2-1.</p><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0009-011137/4439289-1-eng-US/f0009-012.jpg" title="f0009-01" width="610" height="732"><figcaption class="caption-body">Thomas Gradin has been shooting more and the goals are starting to come quickly for the stylish Canuck center.</figcaption></div><span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span>

f0009-01

Gradin Regains Form To Lift Sinking Canucks

<div class="byline">BY PAT THOMPSON</div><p class="dropcap"><span>B</span>LOOMINGTON - When John Ziegler relinquishes the microphone at the National Hockey League draft next summer after the first round, he should turn it over to Lou Nanne.</p><p>No, Nanne doesn&rsquo;t want Ziegler&rsquo;s job (yet).</p><p>It&rsquo;s just that the second round will be Nanne&rsquo;s personal plaything. Through a series of trades in the last three years, the Minnesota North Stars will have five&mdash;f-i-v-e&mdash;selections in the second round of the 1981 draft.</p><p>Nanne gave himself a fifth choice in that round with the trade of plucky right winger Ron Zanussi and a fourth round choice to the Toronto Maple Leafs.</p><p>So the Stars have their own pick. They have Toronto&rsquo;s; they own Chicago&rsquo;s in the Glen Sharpley trade; they possess Vancouver&rsquo;s in the Kris Manery deal a year ago; and they hold St. Louis&rsquo; pick from the Bob Stewart trade way back from the merger.</p><p>And in 1982, the Stars have three more second rounders&mdash;their own, St. Louis&rsquo; in the Bryan Maxwell trade and Vancouver&rsquo;s in the Per-Olov Brasar deal.</p><p>Minnesota also has kept its own first-round picks in Nanne&rsquo;s continuing policy of stockpiling talent for the future.</p><p>&ldquo;I don&rsquo;t expect any of our choices to be able to help the team immediately,&rdquo; Nanne said. &ldquo;The way the draft is set up now, I don&rsquo;t expect our first-round choice to play right away, but in two, three seasons. Because of the under-age drafting, probably only the top three or four players taken will make it next season.&rdquo;</p><p>Nanne is convinced there is plenty of talent to stock his club in the coming seasons from the second round alone.</p><p>&ldquo;How about Steve Payne, Steve Christoff, Don Beaupre and Neal Broten?&rdquo; is all Nanne needs to say.</p><p>Payne developed into a 42-goal scorer his second season in the league in 1979-80. Christoff bounced from winning an Olympic gold medal into a late-season rookie regular in the playoffs last spring. Beaupre was voted starting goalie as a rookie in this year&rsquo;s All Star game.</p><p>And Broten (another U.S. Olympian) will be a North Star very soon, once the University of Minnesota concludes play in the NCAA eliminations and an elbow injury heals.</p><p>Zanussi&rsquo;s departure sends one of Minnesota&rsquo;s most popular and unselfish players to the Maple Leafs.</p><p>&ldquo;I hate to see him go,&rdquo; Nanne said. &ldquo;He&rsquo;s a good guy for the community as well as the team. He got hurt a few times, but the way he plays in the corners, he&rsquo;s in the action and takes the risk of injuries. Toronto needs a shot in the arm to make the playoffs and we can afford to wait for some of our younger forwards. We got a pick that might be about 28th overall for one that might be about 54th.&rdquo;</p><p>Zanussi, like goalie Gary Edwards who went before him, left the Twins Cities with a great deal of class.</p><p>&ldquo;I&rsquo;m surprised and disappointed,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;but I&rsquo;ve got to look at the positive side. Toronto is my home and I&rsquo;m glad to get the opportunity to play more.</p><p>&ldquo;It was frustrating to not be playing the last couple of games. I never stopped caring or working. I guess I&rsquo;ll have to prove to these people [North Stars] that I can play. Unfortunately, I&rsquo;ll have to do it someplace else.&rdquo;</p><p>Zanussi, 24, had played in only 41 games because of varied injuries and scored six goals and 11 assists for a career total of 49 goals and 75 assists since 1977-78.</p><p>A third-round draft choice in 1976, Zanussi earned his spurs with a 53-goal season in the International League.</p><p>The highlight of his days&rsquo; with the North Stars came toward the end of last season when he joined with Christoff and Mike Eaves to give Minnesota its top offensive line in the playoffs and the late portion of the regular season.</p><p><b>STAR DUST</b>&mdash;The Stars broke out of a six-game winless streak by tying Boston, beating Pittsburgh, tying Montreal and beating Buffalo&hellip;Left winger Tom McCarthy suffered a wrist injury and was lost for a few games&hellip;Defenseman Curt Giles has resumed skating after doctors pronounced a knee injury healed&hellip;Center Mike Eaves, who has had three concussions, remains out of action&hellip;The Stars have lost more man-games to injuries and illness than any other team in the NHL for the second straight season&hellip;Beaupre, with back-to-back one-goal games against the Canadiens and Sabres, has lowered his average below 3.00 again&hellip;Assistant coach Murray Oliver bypassed the team&rsquo;s trip to Calgary to help scout the Minnesota High School championship tournament, especially a young winger on the Edina West team by the name of Mike Oliver (his son)&hellip;J. P. Parise pinch-hit for Oliver on the road trip.<span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span></p>

North Stars Corner Draft Market

<div class="byline">BY STAN FISCHLER</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0010-011169/4439344-1-eng-US/f0010-012.jpg" title="f0010-01" width="305" height="369"></div><h2>Advice For Sonmor</h2><p><b>Open letter to Glen Sonmor, Coach, Minnesota North Stars:</b></p><p>Dear Glen:</p><p>I held back on this note for a few weeks to enable my Hungarian blood to cool down from a boil to a Simmer.</p><p>Boy, Glen, am I ever miffed at you. When it comes to getting yourself in trouble, you are a beaut.</p><p>In case you&rsquo;re wondering, I&rsquo;m talking about the impudent manner in which you have allowed your players to behave in the fair city of Boston, that quaint suburb of Manhattan.</p><p>For years the North Stars have visited Boston Garden and conducted themselves like Freddie Bartholomew in &ldquo;Little Lord Fauntleroy.&rdquo; If the Minnesota skaters had been any better behaved in Beantown, they would have qualified for instant sainthood.</p><p>Your boys would skate out on to the <i>Gahden</i> ice and play hockey the way Lord Stanley of Preston meant it to be played, like in those talcum commercials.</p><p>When Wayne Cashman, the original Mister Nice Guy, would massage your Bobby Smith&rsquo;s chin with all the gentility of a demented rhinoceros, ever the sportsman, Bobby would turn the other cheek.</p><p>And if Stan Jonathan decided to perform some unexpected surgery on Steve Payne&rsquo;s molars, it was regarded as acceptable as exhaling. Payne didn&rsquo;t need those teeth anyway.</p><p>Glen, old buddy, there was no rhyme or reason for your North Stars to get huffy-miffy with your Boston hosts or the Garden fans who cleansed you and your players with a few pints of beer. The way I see it, you should be thankful that they even let you skate in such an historic landmark as Boston Garden. (I believe it as built either shortly before or shortly after the Mayflower landed.)</p><p>Surely, you must have realized that it would be insulting to your host Harry Sinden, the man who created The Big, Bad Bruins, not to mention his resident door clerk, Gerry Cheevers, for your troops to raise a stick in anger.</p><p>With great wisdom, your North Stars stuck to <i>hockey,</i> secure in the knowledge that the referee would detect any infractions the ever-dainty Bruins might accidentally commit against your club.</p><p>So what if the Bruins stomped on your stickhandlers with the impunity of the little old winemaker crushing his grapes. So what if your North Stars never won a game in Boston. Doesn&rsquo;t NHL bylaw-22 (as in Catch) stipulate that it&rsquo;s not whether you win or lose but how you play the puck?</p><p>Up until the end of February, Glen, your guys played hockey according to Lady Byng. You didn&rsquo;t win, to be sure, and your lads limped out of Back Bay with a few dozen cuts and bruises but, alas, the North Stars&rsquo; dignity was intact. And, as everyone with electrician&rsquo;s tape for a brain knows, the team that displays the most integrity in Boston Garden automatically qualifies for a playoff berth.</p><p>But, Glen, you botched it up, but good. You broke the rules. You scoundrel, you had the colossal nerve to visit Beantown with the express purpose of winning a hockey game. The unmitigated gall!</p><p>Furthermore, you told your boys to play the game the Bruins&rsquo; way. Instead of turning the other cheek, you instructed your players to show some cheek.</p><p>You gave Harry Sinden a headache. You made Gerry Cheevers do a double-take. The North Stars didn&rsquo;t back off. They didn&rsquo;t cordially thank the Bruins for a stick in the stomach. Egad, they got good and mad.</p><p>You must accept the responsibility, Glen. You know good and well that it is a sin to show gumption against the Bruins.</p><p>And 1 don&rsquo;t mind telling you that I was absolutely appalled when a battalion of North Stars raced to the aid of teammate Greg Smith after Smith was punched out by Keith Crowder of Boston.</p><p>Your men should have graciously allowed Smith to be pummelled until he was senseless. I&rsquo;m sure Sinden and Cheevers would agree.</p><p>Now everyone is saying tsk-tsk and naughty-naughty. You are being treated as no less a villain than Jesse James or Godzilla, King of the Monsters.</p><p>I could have told you that would happen, Glen, but you wouldn&rsquo;t listen. Now, you better pay me some heed. Next time you play the Bruins&mdash;or the equally sensitive Philadelphia Flyers&mdash;please don&rsquo;t try to win. Let them maul, mash and mangle your men. Play it clean and rest assured that the NHL office will mail you two points by Special Delivery.</p><p>I&rsquo;m convinced of it, just as I believe that there is a Santa Claus. Your friend, Stan.</p><h2>Liut&rsquo;s Difference</h2><p><b>NOTES:</b> Those who have gotten close to Blues&rsquo; goalie Mike Liut point out a basic distinction between Mike and Ken Dryden, the personality to whom he is most compared.&hellip; &ldquo;When Dryden talked,&rdquo; says one NHL official, &ldquo;he always seemed to be trying to impress you with his vocabulary. Liut, who can match Dryden word for word, doesn&rsquo;t try to impress anyone. There&rsquo;s nothing phony about Mike.&rdquo;&hellip; Success has not spoiled Blues&rsquo; coach Red Berenson. He talks the same as he did when he played and dresses the same, too. One of Red&rsquo;s pals kids: &ldquo;He looks like he buys his suits in Macy&rsquo;s basement!&rdquo;&hellip;Russ White, a good man, leaves the Washington <i>Star</i> hockey beat for the <i>Knickerbocker News</i> in Albany, N.Y.&hellip;You either love John Ziegler or loathe him. Dave Anderson of The New York <i>Times,</i> in a cheap-shot column about the NHL prexy, says &ldquo;he&rsquo;s seldom in his office.&rdquo;&hellip;Applesauce&hellip;Boston <i>Herald-American</i> sports editor Joe Fitzgerald tells me that Ziegler gave him an hour-and-a-half interview &ldquo;on the phone after midnight&rdquo; so that Joe could put together a column&hellip;Fitz, the best writer-editor in Boston, says it&rsquo;s funny how Boston writers were so quiet last year when the Bs went into the Madison Square Garden stands after Ranger fans but this year the Beantown scribes ripped the Rangers for going after Red Wing fans in Detroit&hellip;Bobby Orr&rsquo;s friends report that he is quite content with his Standard Brands&rsquo; job and enjoys life in Boston&hellip;The Toronto report that had Fred Shero moving to Buffalo is wrong. Freddie is still counting his money at his Westchester retreat as rumors swirl about his hockey future&hellip;I&rsquo;d like to see the reference letter he gets from Sonny Werblin&hellip;Don (Grapes) Cherry, who will be coaching the Canadian team in the world championships in April, tells me he&rsquo;s just finished doing an &ldquo;Ugly Dog Contest&rdquo; for The American Cancer Society. &ldquo;Before you jump to conclusions, says Grapes, &ldquo;Blue [Don&rsquo;s dog] and I were only judges!&rdquo;&hellip;Guy Lafleur&rsquo;s periodic outbursts are becoming a pain in the neck. One minute he&rsquo;s putting down the revenue service over his high income tax, the next minute he&rsquo;s twitting coach Claude Ruel&hellip;Guy&rsquo;s problem is that he hasn&rsquo;t worried enough about Guy; a point that became evident when he showed up at training camp looking, as one ex-Canadien put it, &ldquo;like a middle-aged businessman.&rdquo;&hellip;Hence Guy&rsquo;s numerous injuries this year&hellip;A respected hockey man (former player) tells me that Gary Green&rsquo;s problem in Washington stems from &ldquo;overconsultation.&rdquo; The man also questions Green&rsquo;s use of two defensemen on a power play (which was the case when the observer saw the Caps.)&hellip;</p><h2>Swedes Learning Fast</h2><p><b>MORE NOTES:</b> When the Washington Caps&rsquo; Rolf Edberg showed up at 11:15 a.m. for an 11:30 practice a railbird cracked: &ldquo;It didn&rsquo;t take those Swedes long to learn the North American tricks.&rdquo;&hellip;Maple Leafs&rsquo; coach Mike Nykoluk is one of the few who view the Blues&rsquo; playoff chances with skepticism. &ldquo;St. Louis will fail&rdquo; Mike tells me, &ldquo;because the Blues are relying too much on [goalie] Mike Liut.&rdquo;&hellip;Rumors that Fred Shero will return as an NHL coach continue to surface. The pro-Shero bloc insists that Freddie still has the touch of genius but has been unfairly maligned by the Flyers&rsquo; and Rangers&rsquo; high command&hellip;Stories out of Toronto suggesting that Leafs&rsquo; boss Harold Ballard would like to axe GM Punch Imlach but won&rsquo;t because of Imlach&rsquo;s fragile health are pooh-poohed by one agent with close dealings with Imlach. He tells me that Punch is thriving as of yore and Harold is quite content with Imlach just as Harold is content with all the headlines swirling about his alleged disenchantment with Imlach.</p><p><b>(NEXT WEEK: DO PLAYERS HAVE THE RIGHT TO GO AFTER ABUSIVE FANS?)</b><span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span></p>

f0010-01

ON THE CONTRARY

<div class="byline">BY BOB KEISSER</div><p class="dropcap"><span>L</span>OS ANGELES&mdash;The Los Angeles Kings&rsquo; season came to an end with 5:49 left in a game with the Maple Leafs in Toronto. That&rsquo;s the precise moment that Charlie Simmer, he of the 56 goals in 65 games, broke his leg.</p><p>Or so most people in hockey thought. That was before the Kings rebounded to play some good defense and before general manager George Maguire swung his second on-the-deadline blockbuster trade in as many seasons.</p><p>Last year, it was Butch Goring to the Islanders for Dave Lewis and Billy Harris. This year, just a few hours before the deadline. Maguire filled the Simmer hole and a few others with three deals, the biggest being the acquisition of left winger Rick Martin and center Don Luce from Buffalo for a first round 1981 draft pick.</p><p>The Kings also obtained goalie Jim Rutherford from Toronto for a low draft pick in &lsquo;81, and got the same from Edmonton in exchange for veteran center Garry Unger.</p><p>Undoubtedly, it was the most tumultuous week the Kings have ever had, seeing their spirits do a couple of mountain-to-valley-and-back sprints in the span of eight days.</p><p>First things first. Simmer&rsquo;s injury was a devastating blow to the team and to the left winger&rsquo;s career. It happened on a rather innocuous looking play in the Kings&rsquo; defensive end late in a 1-0 King win.</p><p>Simmer moved towards the left wing boards to check Borje Salming. He took his position but had his left leg start to slip as Salming sped by. Unfortunately, his right foot stayed in place, snapping the tibia and fracturing the fibula. Simmer underwent a two-hour operation the next day. having a plate and nine screws implanted in his leg. He&rsquo;ll be off his feet for three to four months.</p><p>Any return date for next season is premature. &ldquo;Guess it&rsquo;s going to be a quiet summer, eh?&rdquo; he said after the operation. &ldquo;I&rsquo;m down, but the doctors did the best they could. Now we&rsquo;ll have to wait and see how it heals.&rdquo;&rsquo;</p><p>Simmer, who scored 133 goals in 167 games since joining the Kings in January of 1979, can be buoyed by the way Serge Savard and Gil Perreault came back from broken legs. &ldquo;The best thing he has going for him,&rdquo; said his Triple Crown linemate, Marcel Dionne, &ldquo;is that he never relied on his speed.</p><p>&ldquo;It&rsquo;ll be a tough road back, but knowing Charlie, he&rsquo;ll work hard. The problem the team has now is forgetting about his absence and working hard to make up the difference.&rdquo;</p><p>That shouldn&rsquo;t be as hard in light of Maguire&rsquo;s bombshell. The Kings have been playing good defense ever since owner Jerry Buss offered them a new incentive plan, so that&rsquo;s half the battle.</p><p>&ldquo;I&rsquo;d have to say I&rsquo;m more than a little pleased,&rdquo; said Maguire. &ldquo;We replaced Simmer as well as possible in Martin, one of the finest shooters in the league. We filled a goal need behind Mario Lessard. And Luce is a fine two-way player who can help this team in a lot of ways.&rdquo;</p><p>Critics were quick to point out that the Kings once again traded away a first round pick, and made deals for aged players by NHL terms, Martin is 29. Rutherford and Luce 32. And that first round pick will be a high one, as it comes from Detroit as part of the Rogie Vachon compensation.</p><p>&ldquo;It&rsquo;s a little comical to hear that talk again.&rdquo; said Maguire. &ldquo;We felt there wasn&rsquo;t a single player in the &lsquo;81 draft who could make our team next year. It&rsquo;s as simple as that. When you have the chance to acquire players like Martin and Luce, and you have the need, you move.&rdquo;</p><p>Maguire, as some may have noted, doesn&rsquo;t mince his words. These deals were by no means just stop-gap moves. Noting the Kings&rsquo; status&mdash;they stood fifth overall and just a point out of third at press time&mdash;and the wide-open playoff race upcoming, Maguire ventures the opinion that the Kings have just as good a shot at Lord Stanley&rsquo;s Cup as anyone.</p><p>&ldquo;Damn right,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;It&rsquo;s within the realm of possibility if we can get past that lousy first round and avoid one team in the playoffs [Philadelphia]. We do that, we&rsquo;re for real.&rdquo;</p><p><b>NOTES</b>&mdash;The Martin deal has a string attached. The left winger who&rsquo;s scored 45 or more goals five times has been sidelined most of the season with a knee injury, and he&rsquo;ll have to pass an L.A. physical before the deal is finalized. If he fails, a contingency deal has been made for Luce&hellip;Both ex-Sabres were happy about the trade since neither were getting as much time with Scotty Bowman in charge as they would have preferred&hellip;Buss&rsquo; incentive plan called for $1,000 to each man if the Kings kept their goals allowed in a 10 game period to 30. and $.500 extra for each goal under that number. In nine games, the Kings had allowed just 21, giving them a potential $5,500 profit going into the finale of the plan, a home date versus Chicago&hellip;Mario Lessard has been just short of superb lately, having allowed just 15 goals in his last eight appearances. That span included a 6-5 loss to Pittsburgh on a night his teammates forgot to play defense.</p><p><i>Bob Keisser. who covers the Kings for the Los Angeles</i> Herald-Examiner, <i>starts this week as</i> THE HOCKEY NEWS&rsquo; Los <i>Angeles correspondent.</i><span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span></p>

Kings’ Deadline Deals Offset Loss Of Simmer

<div class="byline">BY RICHARD FRIEDMAN</div><p class="dropcap"><span>N</span>EW YORK&mdash;Finally, Craig Patrick got it off his chest, his first public denunciation of a team that had been playing for weeks like minor leaguers, as if making the playoffs were the furthest thing from their minds.</p><p>The playoffs, however, and the uncomfortable proximity of the 17th-place team, were on the Rangers&rsquo; minds all too much, had become an albatross, had paralyzed them. In Quebec on the day the trading deadline came and went, they fell apart once again in the third period, blowing a 4-2 lead and losing 6-4 to the Nordiques.</p><p>The next night, they returned to Madison Square Garden to face the Colorado Rockies and their newly-acquired goaltender, former Islander Glenn &ldquo;Chico&rdquo; Resch. Colorado took a 2-0 lead in the first period on two power-play goals by former Ranger Lucien DeBlois, a legacy of last season&rsquo;s Barry Beck deal.</p><p>The Rangers did not begin to play until midway through the third period, when Beck and Anders Hedberg scored 64 seconds apart to tie the score at 3-3. Then, the Rangers had the Rockies on the run, but center Steve Tambellini, who had arrived with Resch from the Islanders the day before, scored the winning goal for Colorado with 1:01 to play, and minutes later Patrick agonized over the 4-3 loss.</p><p>&ldquo;Tonight was the worst exhibition we&rsquo;ve put on since I started coaching,&rdquo; snapped Patrick, who succeeded Fred Shero behind the Rangers&rsquo; bench on November 22. &ldquo;It was 50 minutes of nothing and ten minutes of hockey.&rdquo;</p><p>The total breakdown in teamwork had moved Patrick from what had been virtually a no-comment stance with regard to his team&rsquo;s performance, even on bad nights. He acknowledged that he was more disappointed with their play against the Rockies than he had been all year, and added &ldquo;if we keep playing like this, we won&rsquo;t get another damn point.&rdquo;</p><p>It was not as if they didn&rsquo;t care, Patrick added. &ldquo;We were trying tonight, but it&rsquo;s a team game and they can&rsquo;t do it by themselves. We don&rsquo;t have 19 superstars out there.&rdquo;</p><p>And so the Rangers continued their seemingly endless search for the reason why. &ldquo;Maybe the guys are keeping something inside them,&rdquo; said captain Barry Beck. &ldquo;I told the guys in Quebec that this is the first time I&rsquo;ve really felt a part of this team, and I know the guys feel like I do. You&rsquo;re damn mad inside and you want to do something about it.&rdquo;</p><p>Three days and another team meeting later, the Rangers turned the lusty boos of the Garden crowd to cheers as they demonstrated what they, and at least some of their fans and some of the media believed they were capable of better.</p><p>The long drought ended with their first win in eight games as the Rangers took a 3-0 lead against the Hartford Whalers and dominated them, winning 6-2. Six different Rangers scored, including Mike Allison, whose goal and assist gave him 57 points, a Ranger rookie record, and Jere Gillis, playing for the first time since January 31.</p><p>&ldquo;That&rsquo;s the one way to relieve the pressure,&rdquo; said Patrick as the Rangers prepared for a tough homestretch. &ldquo;It reassures them to know they can play like that.&rdquo;</p><p>At the team-meeting held in the wake of the Rockies debacle, the Rangers had looked at films of their previous three games, which also included a tie against Detroit in which yet another third-period lead was erased.</p><p>&ldquo;There were times when we were embarrassed to look at ourselves,&rdquo; said Patrick.</p><p>Asked if the pressure had been getting to the team, Hedberg said, &ldquo;1 think so. That&rsquo;s why this game was so important to us. We got off to a good start and they never challenged us after that. This will help us play with more confidence.</p><p>&ldquo;At the meeting, the thing we all concurred on was staying away from bad penalties. We&rsquo;ve taken too many.&rdquo;</p><p>Shamed into playing well, the Rangers faced the next seven games minus sparkplug Nick Fotiu, whose eight-game suspension for going into the stands in Detroit last month was upheld by the league&rsquo;s Board of Governors in a meeting hours before the loss to Colorado. Don Maloney was sidelined for two games for flinging a glove in that incident. Both began their suspensions with the Whalers game.</p><p>The Rangers took a giant step backward after standing in place as the league&rsquo;s trading deadline came and went. Four goalies changed teams on that last day, but the Rangers came up empty-handed, failing to make a deal for Montreal&rsquo;s Bunny Larocque or for Resch.</p><p>Instead, they sent center Ray Markham to Edmonton for defenseman John Hughes, and sent down to New Haven former Olympian Dave Silk, which was not a shock considering his recent lack of playing time and the team&rsquo;s signing of Swede Peter Wallin.</p><p>The blockbuster was the demotion of goalie Doug Soetaert to New Haven and the promotion to the Rangers of former goalie Steve Weeks. The irony of it all is that the Rangers started the season swamped with goalies, and none of the three original remained with the team as they began their final run for the playoffs. John Davidson is recuperating from knee surgery, Wayne Thomas now is the goaltender&rsquo;s coach, and Soetaert was in New Haven after playing in 31 games of a 40-game stretch and becoming, in the minds of many, the scapegoat for the Rangers&rsquo; recent collapse.</p><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0011-011116/4439399-1-eng-US/f0011-012.jpg" title="f0011-01" width="614" height="824"><figcaption class="caption-body"><b>Rangers&rsquo; captain Barry Beck said it was time to start playing instead of brooding</b> <span class="photo-credit">(Photo By Steve Babineau)</span></figcaption></div><span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span>

f0011-01

Patrick Levels Blast At Listless Rangers

<div class="byline">BY JAY GREENBERG</div><p class="dropcap"><span>P</span>HILADELPHIA&mdash;As usual, his perspective was better than ours. Because he had insisted all along it was just a number. No one is going to remember Bobby Clarke for his totals. Goal No. 300 was not for him, it was for us.</p><p>&ldquo;He embodies so many things that even his personal stats are going to be downplayed,&rdquo; said coach Pat Quinn. &ldquo;What will be recognized is his attitude, his dedication, his courage. The fact that he got those statistics is a reward for us fans, and a side benefit.</p><p>&ldquo;I can&rsquo;t think of a particular player who provided that same characterization of the team player. The great ones we remember were the superlative individuals. And their contributions were reflected towards the team.</p><p>&ldquo;All of us felt Orr was a team player and Esposito and Howe. But somehow Bobby falls into a different context when we&rsquo;re talking that way.&rdquo;</p><p>Bobby Clarke now has 300 National Hockey League goals. Too many guys, 38 in all, have done that. Guys who couldn&rsquo;t carry Clarke&rsquo;s spitoon have been called superstar, guys with half his heart and none of his grace have been mentioned in the same breath.</p><p>&ldquo;No player ever had more impact on his team.&rdquo; said Joe Watson, Clarke&rsquo;s former teammate. &ldquo;In hockey, or all of sports. I can honestly say I never saw him dog a shift. Not one.&rdquo;</p><p>If that attempt at summary praise is still inadequate, it is nonetheless in the terms that Clarke would most appreciate. Asked how, as his twilight begins to fall, he would like to be characterized, Bobby said what you&rsquo;d expect.</p><p>&ldquo;As an honest, hard-working hockey player,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;Like the majority of guys who come every night to contribute any way they can. I don&rsquo;t think statistics should be a barometer. A guy like Paul Holmgren doesn&rsquo;t score that many goals, but he&rsquo;s a helluva player.</p><p>The puck, retrieved by Reggie Leach 1:32 into the second period of a 9-4 victory over the Detroit Red Wings, will go to Bobby&rsquo;s son, Wade, to use in the backyard. Clarke&rsquo;s not into bronze, just blood and sweat, and if you still want to measure in numbers, the stitches in his face are as telling as the figures in the record book.</p><p>&ldquo;I don&rsquo;t know if the attention given to it [he had reached No. 299 10 games ago] was a pain in the butt.&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;But it just didn&rsquo;t mean anything to me. I just wanted to get a goal.</p><p>&ldquo;But to get an ovation like that is an unbelievable feeling. It was-tremendous that people feel that way.&rdquo;</p><p>One cannot measure what he&rsquo;s meant to the 17,077 by timing one ovation, but it was loud and long. And it came more out of love for Clarke than the kick&rdquo; out of sitting in on history. Gary MacAdam had just cut the Flyers&rsquo; lead to 3-2 when Clarke, taking a pass from Leach, crossed in front of the goal and let go a 10-foot backhander. It skidded off goalie Larry Lozinski&rsquo;s stick and between his legs.</p><p>&ldquo;Look at this,&rdquo; said Clarke, pointing to a chip out of the side of the puck. It&rsquo;s an example of my stickhandling.&rdquo;</p><p>Which brings us to another point about him. All the attention given to the intangibles has long obscured what a skilled player he has been. He lacks only the superstar&rsquo;s speed and shot, but few players get his jump. No one has ever passed the puck better. No one has ever been smarter or stronger on faceoffs or along the boards.</p><p>Whether the Flyers finish third or sixth is not as important as what begins April 7, and Clarke&rsquo;s battery, winding down all season, needs to be recharged. But he simply will not hear it.</p><p>&ldquo;Probably the only way he&rsquo;d go for it,&rdquo; said general manager Keith Allen, &ldquo;is if we asked him to sit out so that a kid could play.&rdquo;</p><p>But grudgingly. He can prolong his effectiveness and his career only with periodic rest. And if he doesn&rsquo;t take it, retirement will come up sooner than he wishes.</p><p>&ldquo;I don&rsquo;t think like that.&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;Two years, three years, you have to look at them one year at a time. The organization will always be bringing in good young players. I don&rsquo;t expect them to keep me in the lineup past the point where a kid can contribute more than me. They don&rsquo;t owe me anything.</p><p>&ldquo;The only thing left that I&rsquo;d really like to do is win another Stanley Cup. But if I had to quit right now. I&rsquo;d have to consider it a successful career.&rdquo;<span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span></p>

Stats Can’t Gauge Clarke’s Worth

<div class="byline">BY ERIC DUHATSCHEK</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0012-011142/4439454-1-eng-US/f0012-012.jpg" title="f0012-01" width="598" height="964"><figcaption class="caption-body">Ken Houston, being checked by the Rangers&rsquo; Carol Vadnais, allows his linemates plenty of room <span class="photo-credit">(Photo by Bruce Bennett)</span></figcaption></div><p>CALGARY&mdash;Is it simply coincidence that Kent Nilsson chose the present to make a run at the National Hockey Leagues scoring title?</p><p>Or does the return to form of Ken Houston, his omnipresent, intimidating right winger have anything to do with it?</p><p>To Nilsson, it&rsquo;s obvious. He has scored consistently all year, no matter who patrolled the right side. But since coach Al MacNeil reunited him with Houston, Nilsson&rsquo;s scoring pace is accelerating. His 10 goals and 14 assists in six games recently pushed him past L.A.&rsquo;s Charlie Simmer into third place in the scoring race, only four points behind Marcel Dionne.</p><p>Ask the 24-year-old Swede what&rsquo;s behind this sudden scoring binge and he&rsquo;ll point across the dressing room.</p><p>&ldquo;Kenny&rsquo;s playing really well,&rdquo; says Nilsson in succinct summation.</p><p>The unassuming Houston, of course, waves off the credit, but the facts suggest Nilsson may have pinpointed the reason. Houston missed the first 34 games of the season with hepatitis. Then he missed another two games in mid-January to undergo further tests at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester.</p><p>Since then, knowing that his disease is responding to the medication and under control, Houston is playing his best hockey of the season, perhaps of his career. In fact, he&rsquo;s scoring at a rate that, translated over the full season, would be a personal best. He managed four consecutive 20-goaI seasons, in years past but had 13 already in only 32 games played.</p><p>The day Houston returned to the lineup the second time, Flames had lost four of five on the road, were losing ground to the Boston Bruins and could not put together a consistent winning streak.</p><p>Since then, they have lost only three times in six weeks, are gaining ground on the Los Angeles Kings and, with the odd exception, can do no wrong.</p><p>&ldquo;I&rsquo;d never say my coming back is the reason for this turnaround,&rdquo; says the modest Houston. &ldquo;But I&rsquo;m sure happy to be part of it. The potential of this team is unlimited. If we come to play, we can beat anybody on a given night.&rdquo;</p><p>Houston&rsquo;s presence on a line instills the sort of respect an opposing player concedes only grudgingly. It becomes apparent in the byplay between whistles. A word from Houston provokes fear, not anger, in an opponent. His eyes will never meet Houston&rsquo;s but drift off into the corner, the crowd or towards the bench.</p><p>Houston&rsquo;s presence keeps people backing off, especially from Nilsson, who is not the most physical player in the league. It&rsquo;s no coincidence that Nilsson has pulled his disappearing act in hard-hitting, physical games less and less frequently of late.</p><p>The two are at opposite ends of the player spectrum, yet complement each other completely. One is the shifty playmaker, the other the mammoth cornerman. Together, they make up one of the league&rsquo;s more dynamic, if unknown, duos.</p><p>At the start of Houston&rsquo;s season&mdash;Dec. 27&mdash;the future did not look nearly as good. The disease took away his strength and his conditioning, the two elements that make up his game.</p><p>MacNeil introduced him into the starting lineup gradually and only for short shifts. It took him a month of spot duty to regain his regular place next to Nilsson.</p><p>&ldquo;It&rsquo;s tough to play a bump and grind game when you&rsquo;re not in top shape,&rdquo; said Houston. &ldquo;I wasn&rsquo;t and couldn&rsquo;t expect to be when I first came back. It&rsquo;s coming along slowly. It&rsquo;s taken time to get into good shape. This sickness takes time.</p><p>&ldquo;The last tests were all normal. The only thing is I&rsquo;ll still be taking pills until the end of May. The real test will be to see if I can stay off them then.</p><p>&ldquo;Things are going fairly well for me and the team right now. I&rsquo;m scoring quite regularly, partly because of the guys [Nilsson and Don Lever] I&rsquo;m with. We were put together near the end of last and were getting a lot of goals and points. Things are really coming together for me. I&rsquo;m really excited about the way the team&rsquo;s playing.&rdquo;<span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span></p>

f0012-01

Houston’s Presence Lifts Flames’ Performance

<div class="byline">BILL FLEISCHMAN&#x2019;S</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0012-02974/4439485-1-eng-US/f0012-022.jpg" title="f0012-02" width="322" height="366"></div><h2>Call It A Disgrace</h2><p><b>IS IT OVER YET?</b></p><p>Are the Boston Bruins and Minnesota North Stars through fighting? Talk about stamina&hellip;The few survivors of the NHL&rsquo;s all-time penalty minute game should all enter the next Boston Marathon These guys were still fighting in the third period, long after Minnesota&rsquo;s futility record (O-for-the-franchise) in Boston had been assured.</p><p>As someone who has chronicled a few penalty-record games over the years, I was asked by several Boston writers how to record the epic game for history. &ldquo;Say it was a disgrace, and made sure you write that both teams were at fault,&rdquo; 1 replied in my best professorial/judicial tone. (By mere coincidence, I was in Boston preparing a series for the Philadelphia <i>Daily News</i> on U.S. Olympic players now in the NHL).</p><p>The entire episode was a disgrace, but there were some lighter moments:</p><p>&ldquo;The first book on the Jean Harris murder trial will be out before the first period is over,&rdquo; said one weary press-box observer.</p><p>&ldquo;Jerry Buss should ask for tapes of this game. Then he won&rsquo;t think the Flyers are the only team guilty of lunacy.&rdquo; I&rsquo;ll accept credit (or blame) for that comment.</p><p>After Nate Greenberg, the Bruins&rsquo; conscientious publicist, revealed the game total was close to the NHL record, the Boston <i>Globe&rsquo;s</i> Leigh Montville cracked, &ldquo;I hope the penalty that breaks it isn&rsquo;t a cheap one.&rdquo; It wasn&rsquo;t.</p><p>There were also some bizarre moments, such as one coach (Glen Sonmor) challenging another coach (Gerry Cheevers) to a fight the following week when the teams met in Minnesota&hellip;A general manager, Boston&rsquo;s Harry Sinden, calling the North Stars &ldquo;the most chicken organization in the history of the league&rdquo; (he later apologized to Minnesota GM Lou Nanne)&hellip;Bobby Lalonde, all 5-5 of him, fighting twice and Rick Middleton, one of the league&rsquo;s most mild-mannered and best players, responding to punches thrown by Minnesota&rsquo;s Ron Zanussi.</p><p>It&rsquo;s no wonder a caller to a Boston talk radio show the next morning described what hapened on the ice, and in the runways, as &ldquo;temporary group insanity.&rdquo;</p><h2>Temperamental Displays</h2><p><b>SEVERAL TIMES A</b> season, NHL teams are customers for discount rates at the neighborhood psychologist&rsquo;s office (not to mention Brian O&rsquo;Neill&rsquo;s disciplinary waiting room in Montreal). If players aren&rsquo;t fighting in the runways, or on the ice at the end of periods, they are invading the customers&rsquo; turf, as the Rangers did in Detroit.</p><p>Such temperamental displays are, of course, perfect video tape segments for the 11 o&rsquo;clock sportscasts. &ldquo;Another example of violence in hockey occurred tonight,&rdquo; the perfectly groomed sportscaster will say. &ldquo;Isn&rsquo;t if time the NHL stopped such nonsense?&rdquo;</p><p>Of course the NHL should stop such nonsense. But it won&rsquo;t, as long as fighting is punishable only by majors or misconducts. I respect people such as Sonmor, Sinden and Cheevers for their knowledge of, and affection for, hockey. But it worries me that they don&rsquo;t see how a fiasco like the 406 penaltyminute game degrades their sport. Just as the mass sports audience is learning to appreciate a Middleton, Mike Bossy, Bryan Trottier or Guy Lafleur, they see tapes of the Bruins and North Stars trying to punch each other&rsquo;s lights out, shake their heads in dismay and mutter, &ldquo;Roller derby on ice.&rdquo;</p><p>A neutral visitor could have spent the next 24 hours trying to convince Sonmor, Sinden and Cheevers that both sides were at fault, and still failed miserably. Sonmor made it clear before the game that his North Stars wouldn&rsquo;t be pushed around anymore. When 6-4 Bobby Smith and 5-8 Steve Kasper started fighting seven seconds after the opening faceoff, each side blamed the other.</p><h2>Star&rsquo;s Last Resort</h2><p><b>LATER, A VISITOR</b> suggested to the Bruins that the North Stars&rsquo; willingness to fight shouldn&rsquo;t have been a surprise. They&rsquo;ve tried everything else and lost in Boston. The rules allow fighting, so why not try it as a last resort?</p><p>Until the Board of Governors decides to stop the ridicule the NHL suffers by allowing fights, it could at least take one common-sense step and insist that everyone play by the same regulations. Example: don&rsquo;t permit the home-team penalty boxes in Boston and Montreal to be adjacent to the home-team benches.</p><p>The potentially ugly scuffles between North Stars and Bruins, and between Sonmor and Boston fans, occurred as the North Stars players and coach were required to pass between the Bruins&rsquo; penalty box and bench to reach their dressing room. All the NHL has to do in Boston&rsquo;s case, is insist the visitors exit the ice at the opposite end from the Bruins, instead of center ice.</p><p>The solution to this problem is so simple it makes you wonder why the league doesn&rsquo;t enforce it. But then, a lot of things about the NHL&rsquo;s attitude toward problems that demean it make you wonder.<span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span></p>

f0012-02

HOCKEY WORLD

<div class="byline">BY RANDY SMITH</div><p>HARTFORD&mdash;The torch of the Whalers has been passed to Larry Pleau, a 34-year-old believer in oldschool virtues.</p><p>&ldquo;Character, pride, discipline and professionalism&mdash;that&rsquo;s what this game is all about,&rdquo; said Pleau, who has signed a two-year contract as the Whalers&rsquo; fulltime coach.</p><p>Pleau replaced Don Blackburn, who was fired with 20 regular-season games remaining, as interim coach. Pleau coached seven games&mdash;three wins, four losses&mdash;and distinguished himself enough to earn a fulltime position.</p><p>&ldquo;I&rsquo;ve watched and observed Larry closely.&rdquo; said Jack Kelley, the club&rsquo;s director of hockey operations. &ldquo;I think that he&rsquo;s been preparing himself for this moment for a. long, long time. Even as a player, I suspect that he thought about coaching someday. It&rsquo;s hard not to be positive about Larry because he&rsquo;s so positive about himself.&rdquo;</p><p>Pleau grew up in the Montreal Canadiens&rsquo; organization, an outfit built on the unshakable belief that what was good for the team was good for the individual, not the other way around.</p><p>&ldquo;I am not a coach who has been hired to be fired,&rdquo; said Pleau. &ldquo;If I can&rsquo;t get the job done. I&rsquo;ll step down on my own. I know I&rsquo;m ready. The challenge doesn&rsquo;t scare me. I love it.&rdquo;</p><p>The Whalers desperately want to make the playoffs, but Pleau&rsquo;s job is secure even if they don&rsquo;t, according to Howard Baldwin, the team&rsquo;s managing general partner.</p><p>&ldquo;We&rsquo;re looking to make the playoffs, of course, but what we&rsquo;re really looking for is 100 percent effort, 100 percent of the time.&rdquo; Baldwin said. &ldquo;From now until June is an important period of any year. We want our draft to have an impact on our team. We want our coach to be involved in the draft. We need that stability.&rdquo;</p><p>Pleau was the first player ever signed by the Whalers, in April. 1972. He played on the 1968 U.S. Olympic Team, the 1969 U.S. National Team, and was selected for Team USA in 1976. He played in three WHA All Star Games and has his name inscribed on both the Stanley Cup. when he was with Montreal, and the Avco Cup, emblematic of WHA supremacy.</p><p>&ldquo;I think that in the next two to four years we can finish somewhere in the top 10,&rdquo; Pleau said. &ldquo;I believe that is a realistic goal.&rdquo;</p><p>The Whalers won 27 games in their inaugural NHL campaign a year ago, finishing 14th overall. They won&rsquo;t win that many this time around. Will they have to win at least that many next year to insure his job, Pleau was asked?</p><p>&ldquo;No, not as far as I&rsquo;m concerned,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;A coach&rsquo;s job is to assess his talent and then do something with it. My job is to get 75 percent of the players to play a good game every night. The other 25 percent will take care of itself. Every player has 12 to 15 above average games each year. The trick is to get every player to play an average game every night. There can be no bad games. That takes pride and character.</p><p>&ldquo;If every player plays an average game and say, just two play above average, well, if those two are Mike Rogers and Mark Howe, it&rsquo;ll be enough.&rdquo;</p><p>What if, having accomplished that, the team still doesn&rsquo;t win, Pleau was asked?</p><p>&ldquo;Then you don&rsquo;t have enough talent,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;You&rsquo;ve got to go out and look for more players.&rdquo;</p><p>Mother of mercy, you mean, it might not be the coach&rsquo;s fault?</p><p>&ldquo;You&rsquo;ve got to realize what the problem is before you can solve it,&rdquo; Pleau said. &ldquo;I told you before, if I can&rsquo;t do the job. I&rsquo;ll hike on my own. If they fire me, I&rsquo;ll tell you one thing. I won&rsquo;t be the problem.&rdquo;<span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span></p>

Whaler Challenge Won’t Scare Pleau

<div class="byline">BY FRED PIETILA</div><p class="dropcap"><span>D</span>ENVER&mdash;Another season of Rocky Hockey was reaching the peak of frustration again in the Mile High City as the Colorado Rockies swandived toward Winnipeg and 21st place in the National Hockey League.</p><p>The term Rocky Hockey has been used in the past as a kind of catch-all phrase for the struggling five-year-old team.</p><p>But on the afternoon and early evening of March 8, Rocky Hockey seemed to be hitting the pits. The team was humiliated 7-0 by the St. Louis Blues before 8,655 fans, who booed and cat-called the Rockies unmercifully and who eventually began cheering the classy visitors. During the game a sewer pipe in McNichols Sports Arena broke, flooding portions of the Rockies&rsquo; offices and forcing all spectators to exit the facility from the concourse level&mdash;an inconvenience to some after an especially nauseating hockey game.</p><p>The fans&rsquo; disenchantment even spilled over to quiet head coach Billy MacMillan, who has chosen his words carefully in this, his first season of NHL coaching in a most difficult situation.</p><p>That particular loss was the team&rsquo;s fourth shutout defeat of the season, first before the normally loyal home fans and left the Rockies with a 19-37-10 record&mdash;20th in the league and just a shade better than the previous season when they were 17-38-11 after the same number of games.</p><p>&ldquo;I&rsquo;ve got to sit down for this one,&rdquo; a weary-looking MacMillan said as he began his post-game media interview. He then arose and started on a controlled tirade.</p><p>&ldquo;In order for us to compete with anybody, we&rsquo;ve got to have everybody doing their job. And today it was obvious we didn&rsquo;t,&rdquo; MacMillan said. &ldquo;Our defense had two hits in the first two periods and that sort of detailed the play in our end of the rink. Lanny McDonald had five straight hits in the second period, but he&rsquo;s our leading goal-scorer.&rdquo;</p><p>&ldquo;I don&rsquo;t know&hellip;That was our worst performance at home this year and now we set out on the road. It&rsquo;s not like this type of performance has been going on game in and game out. Tonight was a difficult one to explain&mdash;for me,&rdquo; MacMillan said.</p><p>MacMillan acknowledged the noisy fans, many of whom have been so supportive in the worst of times the past five seasons. &ldquo;We know that they&rsquo;re rowdy fans&hellip;and you&rsquo;ve got to expect it. They paid a good buck to see the home team play and the way they did tonight, we deserved it.&rdquo;</p><p>The additions of goalie Phil Myre from Philadelphia and center Bobby Miller from Boston helped the club in two of its weaker areas. Then the Rockies made two last-minute trades before the NHL&rsquo;s March 10 trading deadline to acquire defenseman Bill Baker from the Montreal Canadiens for future considerations and goalie Glenn &ldquo;Chico&rdquo; Resch and center Steve Tambellini from the New York Islanders for defenseman Mike McEwen and Finnish goalie Jari Kaakela.</p><p>But, the three newcomers hadn&rsquo;t reported in time for the Rockies&rsquo; franchise-record ninth straight road loss&mdash;a 4-3 defeat to Washington in Landover, Md.</p><p>Veteran center Walter McKechnie&rsquo;s knee injury, diagnosed Feb. 17 as only a slight sprain, was more serious than first expected. McKechnie was expected to miss the remainder of the season after he was involved in a collision with Rockie goalie Hardy Astran during a game-day skate.</p><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0013-011092/4439540-1-eng-US/f0013-012.jpg" title="f0013-01" width="604" height="794"><figcaption class="caption-body">Coach Billy MacMillan was at a loss to explain the Rockies&rsquo; slide, which has taken them to 20th place.</figcaption></div><span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span>

f0013-01

Colorado Hockey Hits Rock-Bottom

<div class="image-hero"><img title="f0014-01" src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0014-011123/4439585-1-eng-US/f0014-012.jpg"></div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0015-011076/4439578-1-eng-US/f0015-012.jpg" title="f0015-01" width="586" height="964"></div><h2><b>GOALTENDING STATISTICS</b></h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0015-02829/4439571-1-eng-US/f0015-022.jpg" title="f0015-02" width="570" height="2835"></div><span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span>

f0014-01

NATIONAL HOCKEY LEAGUE SCORING

<div class="byline">BY ARNOLD IRISH</div><p>ST. LOUIS&mdash;What are the byproducts of playing for hockey&rsquo;s No. 1 team? One can be not playing.</p><p>That happened for awhile to Tony Currie, the Blues&rsquo; winger who for an 11-game stretch in mid-season found himself not dressing for St. Louis despite being healthy.</p><p>For Currie, whose quick reactions around the net have earned him a reputation for being one of &ldquo;the good-hands people&rdquo;&mdash;and, in fact, enabled him to rank eighth among scorers in St. Louis&rsquo; supercharged lineup&mdash;the month-long sitdown wasn&rsquo;t easy to accept.</p><p>&ldquo;It&rsquo;s rough mentally when you&rsquo;re out but healthy,&rdquo; Currie admitted. &ldquo;You&rsquo;ve just got to keep your head set so that you&rsquo;ll be ready when you get your chance.&rdquo;</p><p>When a team is fighting for the No. 1 spot in the NHL&rsquo;s overall standings, it isn&rsquo;t uncommon for athletes&mdash;who could play regularly for other teams&mdash;to be squeezed out&mdash;at least temporarily.</p><p>&ldquo;I&rsquo;m just happy to be right where I am. with the best team in hockey,&rdquo; said Currie, who since then has been restored to active duty opposite Perry Turnbull on Mike Zuke&rsquo;s line. In fact, coach Red Berenson assembled that line about the same time the Blues took over the league&rsquo;s top spot.</p><blockquote class="pullQuote"><b>&ldquo;The biggest difference we notice is that other teams are prepared for us,&rdquo; Currie said. &ldquo;They aren&rsquo;t just playing St. Louis, they&rsquo;re playing the No. 1 team.</b></blockquote><p>&ldquo;We&rsquo;ve struggled around the net, but we&rsquo;ve been holding our own in our own end,&rdquo; Currie said.</p><p>&ldquo;We&rsquo;ve been getting our chances, but the puck hasn&rsquo;t been going in.</p><p>&ldquo;I&rsquo;ve been in a defensive role more lately because Red said, when he put us together just before the All Star Game break, that he wanted us to play against some of the better lines.&rdquo;</p><p>Currie welcomed the opportunity. &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll probably never be a 100 percent defensive player, but I like to go both ways,&rdquo; Tony said. &ldquo;And I get just as upset when somebody scores a goal on me as I do when I miss a chance to score.</p><p>&ldquo;They&rsquo;ve tried me at killing penalties, too,&rdquo; he added. &ldquo;It&rsquo;s the first year I&rsquo;ve had a chance to do it. We have five or six of the best defensive forwards in the league. I watch and learn. My offense will take care of itself.&rdquo;</p><p>Currie, 23, especially savors the Blues&rsquo; current success because he is one of seven on the team who played for St. Louis two years ago when it struggled to an 18-50-12 record.</p><p>&ldquo;The biggest difference we notice is that the other teams are prepared for us,&rdquo; said Tony Currie, who played for the Blues 18-50-12 team of two years ago.</p><p>&ldquo;There&rsquo;s a quiet confidence on this team. Nobody&rsquo;s saying we&rsquo;re going all the way, but not a guy on the team is surprised. People ask why we&rsquo;re doing so well, and it&rsquo;s because we have all the ingredients. We&rsquo;ve got the league&rsquo;s best man between the two pipes. You just can&rsquo;t measure how much having Mike Liut in goal has helped us. All winning teams are solid in goal. Montreal&rsquo;s teams a few years ago had Ken Dryden. When the Islanders won it last year, Glenn Resch and Billy Smith played real well.</p><p>&ldquo;I couldn&rsquo;t tell how good Liut was in training camp before last season. He was with a new team and trying to establish his identity. But when I came back from Salt Lake City in January, I couldn&rsquo;t believe it. I put the puck past him in practice and he cussed me out. That&rsquo;s when I knew we really had a goalie. He hates to get beat, even in practice.&rdquo;</p><h2><b>NHL Leaders</b></h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0015-04479/4439616-1-eng-US/f0015-042.jpg" title="f0015-04" width="550" height="610"></div><span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span>

f0015-04

Currie Happy Despite Reduced Role

<p class="dropcap"><span>S</span>T. LOUIS&mdash;&ldquo;It&rsquo;s not a comfortable feeling,&rdquo; Blues&rsquo; coach Red Berenson said about his team&rsquo;s new image as No. 1 in the NHL&rsquo;s overall standings.</p><p>&ldquo;All of a sudden, you&rsquo;re the hunted instead of the hunter. It&rsquo;s not a bad feeling, just a different feeling.</p><p>&ldquo;The other teams look at you differently. The first thing Wayne Gretzky said when we lost to Edmonton was, &lsquo;It&rsquo;s a great feeling to beat the first-place team.&rsquo;&rdquo;</p><p>Berenson, who was then-coach Bare Plager&rsquo;s assistant two years ago when St. Louis&rsquo; record was a dismal 18-50-12, noted that seven Blues played on that team&mdash;Brian Sutter, Bernie Federko, Larry Patey, Mike Crombeen, Mike Zuke and Tony Currie (all forwards, which means the defense corps has been totally overhauled in that short time) and goalie Ed Staniowski.</p><p>&ldquo;It&rsquo;s great for the guys who were here two years ago,&rdquo; Berenson said. &ldquo;The rest of the league looked down its nose at them. It&rsquo;s important for them to know what it was like to work hard and still be at the bottom.</p><p>&ldquo;Bare kept saying this was going to be a good team, but people wondered when. Now these guys have confidence in themselves. They aren&rsquo;t spinning their wheels. I hope we finish first because it would be great for all of us&mdash;the city, the fans, everybody&mdash;but if we don&rsquo;t, it won&rsquo;t be the end of the world.&rdquo;</p><p>Berenson, like his players, is thinking ahead to the playoffs.</p><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0015-03639/4439647-1-eng-US/f0015-032.jpg" title="f0015-03" width="600" height="1429"><figcaption class="caption-body">Tony Currie notices a quiet confidence on the Blues, who aren&rsquo;t surprised by their success.</figcaption></div><span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span>

f0015-03

Blues Not Comfortable In New No. 1 Position

<div class="byline">BY DICK JOHNSTON</div><p>LOUISVILLE HOCKEY STICKS</p><p>LOUISVILLE HOCKEY STICKS</p><p>BUFFALO&mdash;If there was any doubt that the Buffalo Sabres are in the midst of a youth movement, it was dissipated by the departure of Rick Martin and Don Luce.</p><p>Martin and Luce, each in his 10th season with the Buffalo club, were traded to Los Angeles, just before the National Hockey League trading deadline, for a first-round draft choice this year.</p><p>The draft choice is one originally belonging to Detroit, so the Sabres should get one of the first few players to go in the draft. They also have the Kings&rsquo; first-round pick in the 1982 draft, received in a deal for Jerry Korab a year ago.</p><p>With Martin and Luce gone, only five players remain with the Buffalo club who were with it when the Sabres went to the Stanley Cup finals in 1975. They are Gil Perreault, Craig Ramsay, Jim Schoenfeld, Bill Hajt and Danny Gare.</p><p>Perreault is the only remaining member of the famed French Connection Line.</p><p>Playing for the Sabres now are nine youngsters who are in either their first or second full season in the NHL.</p><p>Steve Patrick. Buffalo&rsquo;s first selection in the 1980 draft, is an underager who started the season playing junior hockey for Brandon of the Western Hockey League and now is playing a regular shift at right wing for the Sabres.</p><p>Alan Haworth and Gilles Hamel were picked as underagers in 1979 and played junior last year. They started this season with Rochester of the American Hockey League but have been with Buffalo most of the campaign.</p><p>Mike Ramsay and Rob McClanahan signed with Buffalo late last season after helping the United States team win the Olympic hockey gold medal. Ramsey has been with the Sabres since. McClanahan was down to Rochester for two short stays but now is playing regularly for the Sabres.</p><p>Lindy Ruff, an underage pick in 1979. played for the Sabres last season but not regularly. This year he has taken regular shifts at both defense and left wing.</p><p>Tony McKegney, Richie Dunn and Larry Playfair all were in the Buffalo organization in 1978-79 but last season was the first full NHL year for them.</p><p>Since Scotty Bowman took over the Sabres in the summer of 1979, he has dealt away five members of the Stanley Cup finalists - Rene Robert, Jerry Korab. Rick Dudley, Martin and Luce. For only one&mdash;Robert&mdash;did he receive a player immediately. Robert, the high-scoring rightwinger, went to Colorado for John Van Boxmeer, currently the top scorer among Buffalo defensemen.</p><p>Martin is Buffalo&rsquo;s leading goal scorer of all time and his 382 goals and 313 assists put him second to Perreault on the all-time scoring list. Luce is fourth with 216 goals and 311 assists. Martin was Buffalo&rsquo;s first pick in the 1971 draft. Luce came from Detroit in a trade that year.</p><p>Said Bowman, in making the trade, &ldquo;The encouraging performance of our younger players thus far this season has allowed us to make a deal which will help solidify the future of the Buffalo Sabres hockey club.&rdquo;</p><p>Martin has been having knee troubles since he collided with Washington goaltender Mike Palmateer in a home game Nov. 9. He played in only 23 games for the Sabres, scoring seven goals and assisting on 14.</p><p>He and Bowman engaged in something of a controversy over the seriousness of the left winger&rsquo;s injury and the treatment needed. After missing 20 games, Martin returned for nine but had more trouble and had his knee operated on by a Toronto surgeon. After that, he and the GM again disagreed on when Martin would be able to return to action. He still is not able to play and if he can&rsquo;t play by April 1, he will be returned to Buffalo and a new deal will be worked out.</p><p>Luce, known as a great penalty killer and a strong two-way player, did not take a regular turn in any of the 61 games he played for Buffalo this season. He sat out five and was known to be dissatisifed with his role, particularly since he scored 15 goals in very limited action.<span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span></p>

Martin, Luce Sabres’ Youth Movement Losers

<div class="byline">BY VARTAN KUPELIAN</div><p class="dropcap"><span>D</span>ETROIT - The Detroit Red Wings posted the &ldquo;Help Wanted&rdquo; sign but didn&rsquo;t find any as the National Hockey League&rsquo;s trading deadline passed.</p><p>But, boy, could they use some help.</p><p>The Red Wings&rsquo; late-season winless streak reached nine games with a 5-3 loss in St. Louis.</p><p>The Red Wings didn&rsquo;t look like a team which was serious about making the playoffs and that rubbed coach Wayne Maxner the wrong way.</p><p>He was furious after a sour 4-4 tie against the Hartford Whalers at home in a game everybody agreed was an absolute &ldquo;must&rdquo; for the Wings. Yet they weren&rsquo;t ready to play and were saddled with their fourth straight tie instead.</p><p>&ldquo;I was so mad behind the bench,&rdquo; Maxner said. &ldquo;They&rsquo;re supposed to be professionals. They&rsquo;re supposed to be ready to play. You can&rsquo;t make the playoffs this way. We had meetings in the morning to go over the things we had to do.</p><p>&ldquo;We had nine, 10, 11 guys who didn&rsquo;t play well. We were lucky Gilles Gilbert was hot in goal or we wouldn&rsquo;t even have gotten the tie.&rdquo;</p><p>The Wings had another meeting the day after, on the eve of a contest in Philadelphia.</p><p>It didn&rsquo;t do any good.</p><p>The Wings were walloped 9-4 by the Flyers. In the process, Detroit lost Paul Woods (concussion, broken jaw) when he was checked by Paul Holmgren. The loss of Woods was one the Wings couldn&rsquo;t afford. He&rsquo;s one of the few guys who gives the club a much-needed spark occasionally.</p><p>&ldquo;The frustrating thing is, we&rsquo;re giving points away,&rdquo; Maxner said after Dave Debol, a native Detroiter, had scored his first NHL hat trick for the Whalers. &ldquo;It&rsquo;s disappointing. It was a game we had to win. 1 saw so many bad passes, so many bad plays. What upsets me, really bothers me, is that we had the puck on all four of Hartford&rsquo;s goals and gave it away. It was the worst effort by our defense in a long time.</p><p>&ldquo;We can&rsquo;t afford to have seven or eight guys going through the motions,&rdquo; Maxner said. &ldquo;We need 19 guys working to win. If you&rsquo;re a player you have to ask yourself if you&rsquo;re disciplined enough off the ice to prepare properly for the game. That bothers me and I told them so after the game.&rdquo;</p><p>Jimmy Skinner, the director of hockey operations, was hoping to bolster the roster for the stretch run but came up empty.</p><p>The Wings have a nucleus of six or seven fine young players who are being sought by a number of clubs. The names are obvious. Reed Larson, Mike Foligno, Willie Huber, Dale McCourt, John Ogrodnick, Jim Korn.</p><p>&ldquo;If I traded one of those guys, it would disrupt the whole club and I can&rsquo;t afford to do that right now with us chasing a playoff spot,&rdquo; Skinner said on the eve of the trading deadline. &ldquo;If I got three hockey players in a trade, they wouldn&rsquo;t help me right away. They&rsquo;d be strangers coming in. After the season I might be open for suggestions. We can&rsquo;t afford to lose too many more. It&rsquo;ll be a grind right to the end now.&rdquo;</p><p>The end might be approaching sooner than the Wings expected.</p><p>&ldquo;We&rsquo;re a club that&rsquo;s working hard,&rdquo; Skinner said. &ldquo;I can&rsquo;t fault the players. They&rsquo;ve given 100 percent. Maybe we just haven&rsquo;t got it and we&rsquo;ve got to strengthen ourselves during the summer. But I&rsquo;ll say this: The players we have are giving more than any club we&rsquo;ve had in 10 years.</p><p><b>MOTOR CITY SHORTS</b> - Woods&rsquo; injuries knocked him out of the lineup indefinitely&hellip;Center Mark Kirton is sidelined with a shoulder separation suffered in practice. His return date is also indefinite&hellip;The Wings won only three of their first 35 road games this season&hellip;They continue to be the NHL&rsquo;s lowest scoring team.&rdquo; We keep saying we&rsquo;re coming up against hot goaltending all the time. Maybe it&rsquo;s our inability to put the puck in the net,&rdquo; Skinner said.<span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span></p>

Relief Nowhere In Sight For Rapidly Fading Wings

<p class="dropcap"><span>T</span>he Toronto Maple Leafs continue their late-season push to catch an NHL playoff berth and the man leading the way, as expected, is team captain Darryl Sittler.</p><p>The 30-year-old, 11-year veteran has been providing the offensive punch along with Wilf Paiement, Rick Vaive and Bill Derlago as the Leafs battle to grab one of the few remaining playoff spots. Sittler gave a good example of his valuable leadership when he produced a six-point week for the Leafs, scoring five times and setting up a sixth goal as Toronto tied Boston 4-4, beat Washington 5-3 and tied the Flyers in Philly 4-4.</p><p>Sittler was selected by THE HOCKEY NEWS as Player of the Week for the second time this season after he connected for a hat trick, the fifth of this season and the 18th of his career, to turn back the Caps. In scoring the hat trick. Sittler also notched his 367th career goal, breaking Dave Keon&rsquo;s record of 365 goals and becoming the Leafs&rsquo; leading goal scorer. Later on in the week, Sittler added single goals in the ties with the, Bruins and Flyers. With 40 goals and 43 assists for 83 points, Sittler ranked 15th in the overall scoring race, tied with the Flyers&rsquo; Bill Barber.</p><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0016-01927/4439726-1-eng-US/f0016-012.jpg" title="f0016-01" width="582" height="1032"><figcaption class="caption-body"><b>DARRYL SITTLER Toronto MIaple Leafs</b></figcaption></div><span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span>

f0016-01

NHL Player Of The Week

<div class="byline">BY JOHN GILBERT</div><p class="dropcap"><span>S</span>T. PAUL&mdash;Bloomington Jefferson, exhibiting a poised, disciplined defensive style, captured the 37th annual Minnesota state high school hockey tournament championship with a 3-2 victory over Irondale, before 17,772 fans at the St. Paul Civic Center.</p><p>That crowd pushed the total for six sessions in three days to 100,914 to watch the winners of the eight regional playoffs in Minnesota fight it out in single elimination play.</p><p>Jefferson unseated defending champion Grand Rapids 4-3 in overtime, after coming from a 3-1 deficit in the first game, with Paul Gess scoring the winner at 0:49 of overtime.</p><p>Apple Valley tied North St. Paul on Mike Beaudry&rsquo;s power play goal with a minute remaining, then won another 4-3 game on Bruce Hegland&rsquo;s goal at 0:29 of overtime. A crowd of 18,007 watched those first games.</p><p>And 18,096 turned out for the first night session, in which South St. Paul eliminated once-beaten and No. I ranked Edina-West 2-1 when Larry Housley scored with only five seconds remaining in the third period.</p><p>The most controversial incident of the games followed, when, after the faceoff with five seconds to play, Edina-West&rsquo;s Mike O&rsquo;Connor fired a quick shot and Tom Frisk shot the rebound into the South St. Paul net.</p><p>The clock read 0:00, but the puck appeared to hit the net just as the clock went to zero. The whole matter was settled when it became evident the referee had been signalling that Frisk was offside by an eyelash on the play.</p><p>Irondale whipped injury-plagued Roseau 7-3 with seven different players scoring goals to complete the quarterfinals.</p><p>In semifinal play, before 18,897 fans, Jefferson shut down Apple Valley with another impressive show of team defense, 4-1. Dan Beaty scored twice for Jefferson, which led 4-0 until the closing minutes.</p><p>Explosive Irondale trailed South St. Paul 3-1 in the second semifinal game, but Lou Hedberg scored late in the second period and goals by Ken Bro-vold and Dave Kirwin vaulted Irondale into a 4-3 lead; then Steve Hoppe slid a backhander from his own blue line that hit an empty net with 44 seconds left for a 5-3 Irondale victory.</p><p>Kirwin&rsquo;s goal put Irondale ahead of Jefferson 1-0 in the first period of the final game, but Jefferson&rsquo;s extremely disciplined skaters defused the Knights the rest of the way, while Jim Becker and Paul Gess scored to get a 2-1 lead for Jefferson before the first period ended.</p><p>Tony Mazzu scored again for Jefferson in the second period, and it stayed 3-1 until Steve Checco scored a too-litle, too-late goal for Irondale with four seconds remaining.</p><p>Grand Rapids came back to win the consolation round trophy 5-2 over Edina-West, and South St. Paul beat Apple Valley 3-1 in the third-place game.<span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span></p>

Jefferson Is State Champ, Winning Before 17,772

<p>BOSTON - Tom Songin, RW, recalled from Springfield.</p><p>BUFFALO&mdash;Traded Richard Martin. LW, and Don Luce, C, to Los Angeles for first round draft choice. Returned Mike Moller, RW, an underage draft, to Victoria of WHL.</p><p>CHICAGO - Brian Young, D, recalled from Dallas of CHL.</p><p>COLORADO&mdash;Traded goaltender Jari Kaarela and Mike McEwen, D, to N.Y. Islanders in exchange for goaltender Chico Resch and Steve Tambellini. C. Craig Norwich. D, Doug Berry, C, and Hardy Astrom, G, all assigned to Fort Worth of CHL.</p><p>DETROIT - Tom Bladon, D, recalled from Adirondack of AHL. Mike Blaisdell, RW, assigned to Adirondack.</p><p>EDMONTON - B. J. MacDonald, RW, and NHL rights to Swedish star Lars-Gunnar Pedersson, traded to Vancouver in return for Garry Lariviere, D, and NHL rights to Ken Berry. Tom Roulston, C and Dave Semenko, RW, recalled from Wichita of CHL. Pat Price, D, traded to Pittsburgh in exchange for Pat Hughes. RW.</p><p>HARTFORD - Tom Abrahamsson, D, and Ray Neufeld, RW, sent to Binghamton of AHL.</p><p>LOS ANGELES&mdash;Garry Unger, C, traded to Edmonton for future considerations. John-Paul Kelly, LW, brought up from Rochester of AHL as replacement for Charlie Simmer, LW, out for season with broken leg. Glenn Goldup, LW, sent to New Haven of AHL. Paul Pageau, G, recalled from Oklahoma City of CHL to replace Doug Keans, G, who was sent down.</p><p>MINNESOTA&mdash;Brad Palmer, LW, an underage draft, recalled from Victoria of WHL. Ron Zanussi, RW, and a third-round draft pick traded to Toronto in return for Leafs&rsquo; second round draft choice. Don Jackson, D, returned to Oklahoma City of CHL.</p><p>MONTREAL&mdash;Michel Larocque, G, traded to Toronto in exchange for Robert Picard, D, and a seventh round draft choice. Bill Baker, D, traded to Colorado for a third round draft choice in 1983.</p><p>N.Y. ISLANDERS - Roland Melanson, G, recalled from Indianapolis to replace Chico Resch. Jari Kaarela, G, obtained from Colorado, assigned to Indy as replacement. Brent Sutter, C, an underage draft, returned to Lethbridge of WHL.</p><p>N.Y. RANGERS - Ray Markham, C, traded to Edmonton in exchange for John Hughes, D. Hughes sent to New Haven of AHL. Steve Weeks, G, recalled from New Haven and Doug Soetaert, G, and Dave Silk, RW, assigned to New Haven. Peter Wallin, RW, signed to 10-game pro trial from Swedish Hockey League.</p><p>PHILADELPHIA - Reid Bailey, D, recalled from Maine of AHL as replacement for Bob Dailey, D, out for season. Ron Flockhart, C, also brought up from Maine. Blake Wesley, D, sent down to Maine as replacement. Dave Logan, D, signed as free agent.</p><p>PITTSBURGH - Signed defenseman Marc Chorney, a 1979 draft pick, from Univ. of North Dakota, to multi-year contract. Pete Scamurra, D, signed as free agent from European Hockey league and assigned to Binghamton of AHL. Russ Anderson, D, out for season with third broken finger.</p><p>QUEBEC&mdash;Garry Lariviere, D, traded to Vancouver for Mario Marois, D.</p><p>TORONTO&mdash;Jim Rutherford, G, traded to Los Angeles for unspecified draft choice. Mike Kaszycki, C, returned to Dallas of CHL. Paul Marshall, LW, returned to New Brunswick of AHL. Dave Shand, D, and Laurie Boschman, C, recalled from New Brunswick.</p><p>VANCOUVER&mdash;Secured Doug Halward, D, from Los Angeles for future considerations as replacement for Lars Lindgren, D, who is out for season. Dennis Kearns, D, retired.</p><p>WINNIPEG&mdash;Ross Cory, D, and Anders Steen, C, sent to Tulsa of CHL. Scott Campbell. D, recalled from Tulsa.</p><p>WASHINGTON - Mark Lofthouse, RW, returned to Hershey of AHL. Errol Rausse, LW, recalled from Hershey.</p><h2>AMERICAN LEAGUE</h2><p>ADIRONDACK&mdash;Claude Legris, G, recalled from Kalamazoo of IHL as. replacement for Al Jensen, G, who is injured.</p><p>BINGHAMTON - Don Kozak, RW. released outright. Ross Yates, C, signed as free agent. Mickey Volcan, D, Marty Howe, D, John Smrke, RW, and John Stewart, C, all on injury list.</p><p>NEW BRUNSWICK - Jean Gaston Douville, LW, assigned to Hampton of EHL. Louis Begin, LW, on injury list.</p><p>NEW HAVEN&mdash;Tom Mullen, C, recalled from Richmond on pro tryout and later returned. Mark Wells, RW, returned from injury list. Bud Stefanski, C, signed as free agent from European hockey.</p><p>NOVA SCOTIA&mdash;Bruce Baker, RW. retired from hockey. Al Luciw, D. sent to Flint of IHL. Greg Lynott, D. and Dave Saatzer, D, both on injury list. Dave Orleski, LW, returned from injury list.</p><p>MAINE&mdash;Mike Greeder, D, recalled from Fort Worth of CHL.</p><p>ROCHESTER - Val James, LW, recalled from Erie of EHL on pro tryout. Doug Caines, C, signed as free agent from Holland hockey league. Mark Wichrowski, RW, on injury list likely for rest of season.</p><h2>CENTRAL LEAGUE</h2><p>DALLAS&mdash;Kelly Elcombe, D, recalled from Fort Wayne of IHL. Greg Vaydick, C, returned to active playing from retirement list.</p><p>FORT WORTH - Dean Turner, D, reassigned to Springfield of AHL.</p><p>OKLAHOMA CITY - Peter Hayek, D, and Henry Taylor. RW, returned to Baltimore of EHL. Barry Gibbs, D, secured from Los Angeles on reassignment. Roger Molin, C, signed to 10-game pro trial from Swedish Hockey League by Minnesota and assigned to CHL Stars.</p><p>SALT LAKE - Kevin Willison, D, returned to Port Huron of IHL. Neil Komadoski, D, secured from Oklahoma City on reassignment by St. Louis.</p><p>WICHITA&mdash;Jerry McDonald, D, signed to 10-game pro trial from West German Hockey League and assigned to Wind by Edmonton. John Bethel, RW, out for season after undergoing knee surgery. Frank Beaton, LW, announced retirement rather than report to Wichita from defunct Birmingham team.</p><h2>INTERNATIONAL LEAGUE</h2><p>FLINT&mdash;Kevin MacDonald, D, and Bob Sauve. C, traded to Port Huron in return for Jim Bannatyne. D.</p><p>FORT WAYNE - Bruce Gill. D. returned from injury list.</p><p>KALAMAZOO - Michel Champigny. LW. signed as free agent.</p><p>MILWAUKEE - Bob Dugan, D. sent to Fort Wayne on loan for rest of season.</p><p>MUSKEGON&mdash;Jean Chouinard, LW. claimed on waivers from Toledo. Stu Irving, LW, signed as free agent. Jeff Carlson. Rw. sent to Fort Wayne on loan for rest of season.</p><p>PORT HURON - Don Boyd. LW. returned from injury list.</p><p>SAGINAW&mdash;Bruce Guthrie. D. traded to Muskegon.<span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span></p>

Latest Player Movements

<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0019-01799/4439874-1-eng-US/f0019-012.jpg" title="f0019-01" width="272" height="320"></div><p>The St. Catharines Falcons, of the OHA Golden Horseshoe Junior B league, have gained a first for the record books.</p><p>The Falcons, led by six-foot 160-pound right winger John Dakin, captured the first ever OHA International Challenge Cup of Junior Hockey, defeating the Buffalo Junior Sabres 3-2 in a tournament final held in Tonawanda, New York, on February 15th, 1981.</p><p>The tournament, which was the culmination of a long season for the Golden Horseshoe League, drew heavy interest and crowds in the Buffalo, New York area.</p><p>Spread over five days, a crowd estimated at 2,500 saw the St. Catharines club defeat a well disciplined Buffalo team, coached by ex-NHLer Jim Lorentz.</p><p>Lorentz, who drew his players from the Buffalo area, was generally pleased with the result. &ldquo;I wish for the boys&rsquo; sake that we could have pulled off the championship,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;but that St. Catharines club gave us trouble all year and again in the final.&rdquo;</p><p>St. Catharines coach Roger Poirier has nothing but praise for the Buffalo organization. &ldquo;We thought they were class when we first met them,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;and we certainly haven&rsquo;t changed our minds since.&rdquo;</p><p>In the Bronze Medal game, the Welland Cougars defeated the Grimsby Peach Kings 6-5.</p><p>Grimsby was picked as an underdog going into their final game, but someone forgot to tell Grimsby, and the Peach Kings, behind excellent goalkeeping from Brent Eymann, wouldn&rsquo;t give up.</p><p>Welland, who were eliminated from a berth in the Gold Medal game by virtue of an earlier defeat at the hands of St. Catharines, played a tough, well disciplined hockey game, and failed to get rattled as the persistent Peach Kings kept bouncing back.</p><p>The tournament, which was the result of a huge joint effort between the Ontario Hockey Association and the New York State Amateur Hockey Association, was a true international event, with the final games being refereed by a mixture of American and Canadian Officials.</p><div class="figure-block image-bleed"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0019-02636/4439867-1-eng-US/f0019-022.jpg" title="f0019-02" width="1865" height="1523"><figcaption class="caption-body">St. Catharines Junior &lsquo;B&rsquo; Falcons&rsquo; captain Graham Craig, left, accepts championship trophy from OHA Chairman Bill Ruddock after Falcons won first ever International Challenge Cup event.</figcaption></div><span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span>

f0019-01

St. Catharines Wins Challenge Cup Showdown

<p class="dropcap"><span>E</span>very season, the MTHL is besieged with inquiries for tournament contacts throughout Canada and the U.S. As over 300 teams from the League and its three affiliated divisions file application for approval to travel to tournaments each season, the MTHL is setting up a master file, listing all tournaments for the 1981-82 season. Any organizations wishing to have their tournament publicized within Metropolitan Toronto and Mississauga should forward the information and application forms to: Paul B. McNamara, Secretary-Manager, Metropolitan Toronto Hockey League, 1415 Lawrence Ave. West, Ste. 211, Toronto M6L 1A9.<span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span></p>

MTHL Sets Up Tourney File

<p class="dropcap"><span>I</span>n January, the MTHL, along with the Ontario Minor Hockey Association and the Northern Ontario Hockey Association, agreed jointly to withdraw from participation in this year&rsquo;s National Midget Championship. This effectively meant that the largest branch in the Canadian Amateur Hockey Association, the Ontario Hockey Association, would not have a representative team participating.</p><p>The group decided to boycott the championship unless a CAHA rule prohibiting out of province transfers was enforced. Specifically, the group was objecting after Notre Dame College of Wilcox, Saskatchewan won the title last year utilizing players from across the country.</p><p>Notre Dame, however, obtained a interim court injunction prohibiting the CAHA from enforcing the rule. The boycotting associations maintained that by using players from across the country, Notre Dame built a &ldquo;stacked team&rdquo;.</p><p>MTHL President John Gardner, who was initially reluctant about the decision, felt that something had to be done regardless of the consequences and had the full backing of the League&rsquo;s midget contending clubs.</p><p>&ldquo;The club system in minor hockey cannot realistically compete against an elite system with any hope of accomplishment&rdquo;, noted Gardner. &ldquo;The much reported Notre Dame situation is the focal point of elitism and Quebec, with its larger zones permitting the recruiting of players from, in some cases, over 100 miles, isn&rsquo;t much different.&rdquo; Gardner added that: &ldquo;Basically, elitism supports a minority at the sacrifice of the majority and our commitment is to the club system and the majority&hellip;When it got to the point that the bulk of this great hockey nation could be sacrificed because of a few, the OHA divisions had to take a stand somewhere along the line.&rdquo;</p><p>In the final summation last month, however, the divisions relented for the sole purpose, of getting the national hockey body off the hook. They were equally united in stating that if the situation isn&rsquo;t totally resolved at this year&rsquo;s CAHA meeting in May, they don&rsquo;t even want to be approached with regards to participating next year.<span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span></p>

Ontario Midgets Back Off Boycott

<p>The Ontario Senior Hockey League isn&rsquo;t waiting for Spring!!</p><p>League chairman Hugh McLean, a former OHA President and NHL referee, announced that the league is currently undertaking a strong mandate to strengthen their program from both a competitive and financial standpoint for next season.</p><p>McLean, who has nurtured the League for nine years now, said that the league must move into the &lsquo;80s with a fresh new marketing approach and new innovative ideas.</p><p>&ldquo;I think we can strengthen our League by approaching the problem on an individual unit basis,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;If we can get each of the team&rsquo;s competitive on the ice, the league will benefit as a whole. Tough competitive hockey teams are what we need, and we&rsquo;re putting together an all-out effort to find them. If that happens, then the financial problems should take care of themselves.&rdquo;</p><p>One of the approaches being examined by a special league committee is the inclusion of University teams in their schedule. The University of Toronto Varsity Blues, who have won nine Canadian National University titles in recent years, is one team that has shown interest.</p><p>While the league committee examines that and other possibilities, five teams&mdash;Dundas, Petrolia, Woodstock, Cambridge, and Durham&mdash;are presently addressing themselves to the task at hand, namely winning this year&rsquo;s OHA Championship and the Allan Cup.</p><p>Going into playoffs, the Dundas Merchants were helped with the addition of former NHLer Mike Marson (Washington Capitals), whom they hope will lift them into a berth in the Ontario Hockey League finals. The Merchants, however, will have to be out in full strength if they hope to get past Durham, who boast league scoring champion Dave Neuman. Neuman, who is also a sly penalty killer, (eight shorthanded goals) scored 34 goals in just 36 games.</p><p>The Petrolia Squires blew Chatham out in four straight games and are vying revenge against Cambridge for this year&rsquo;s league title. Petrolia was eliminated by Cambridge last year, four games to three, in a series which saw neither team win a game on home ice.</p><p>Petrolia has benefited immensely from the addition of Steve Stoyonovich, a late cut from the New York Islanders and a former RPI player. Since joining Petrolia, Stoyonovich has scored 31 goals and assisted on 12 in just 20 games.</p><p>The Woodstock Gems are hoping to regain their form of 1978, when they finished fourth in the League and then went on to upset everyone and capture the league championship. Gems&rsquo; Manager Al Robinson will be relying heavily on his big shooter, Rick Hill (18 goals, 19 assists in 37 games), to lead the way. Hill&rsquo;s assignment will be tough, however, as the Gems&rsquo; faced the league leading Cambridge Hornets in the first round of the playoffs.</p><p>The Hornets, who captured the Allan Cup in &lsquo;61, &lsquo;69, &lsquo;71, have made no bones about the team&rsquo;s goal for this year.</p><p>&ldquo;If you&rsquo;re not thinking Allan Cup in September, you shouldn&rsquo;t be looking for it in April,&rdquo; says general manager Henry Wynen. &ldquo;We consistently build our hockey club with that objective in mind, and we&rsquo;ve been a successful organization both competitively and financially as a result.&rdquo;</p><p>Cambridge should certainly not have to worry about one area in playoffs, and that is goaltending. Ex WHA&rsquo;er Dave Tataryn was the league&rsquo;s strongest netminder this season, with a 3.55 goals-against average.</p><p>&ldquo;If and when we lock up with Petrolia, goalkeeping will be the key,&rdquo; added Wynen. Petrolia goalkeepers Larry Lucas and Bruce Aberhart were right behind Tataryn with, respectively, 3.62 and 3.63 goals-against averages.</p><p>While these teams set their sights on this year&rsquo;s championship, the Stratford Perths and Chatham Maroons will be sitting down to evaluate next year&rsquo;s program.</p><p>The Perths, troubled by player shortages all year, are asking themselves what they have to do to get players. The League is keeping a close eye on developments in Stratford in an effort to assist them for next season.</p><p>On the other hand, Chatham, which was experiencing similar problems at the beginning of this season, cured the problem at the beginning of January, and almost turned things around.<span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span></p>

Ontario Seniors Regroup To Become Stronger

f0020-01

Ontario Juniors Get Facelift For Next Season

<p>Metropolitan Toronto Junior B Convenor Colin MacKenzie recently announced the institution of a scholarship program effective this season.</p><p>A special league committee will select two players this year who will each receive $1000 to attend any Canadian University of their choice. Mr. MacKenzie advised that the league was hopeful that the program would be ongoing.</p><p>The league, which enjoyed an extremely successful season, will enter OHA post season play represented by either Pickering or the ever powerful St. Michael&rsquo;s Buzzers.</p><p>After finishing second overall in the league&rsquo;s Eastern Conference, the Pickering Panthers baffled the experts by knocking off the first place Oshawa Legionaires in a best-of-seven series which went the distance. The Pickering entry, down three games to none to Oshawa, roared back in four straight games to pull off the upset.</p><p>The Belleville Bobcats, last year&rsquo;s OHA Jr. B winner, were victimized by the Panthers in an earlier series, which indicated that their club may not have fully recovered from player losses from last year&rsquo;s team.</p><p>The Central Division, which was won by the St. Michael&rsquo;s squad, enjoyed one of its most competitive seasons ever. With new addition Henry Carr providing crosstown rivalry for the Buzzers, the North York Flames showed solidarity under new coach Dave McDowal, who also is the province&rsquo;s Coaching Technical Director. McDowal moulded a group of unseasoned players after the club suffered a number of player losses last season. The club finished second in their conference, and were successful in eliminating the ever consistent Bramalea Blues in the first round of the playoffs.</p><p>The League is looking ahead to a stronger season next year, after enlisting the services of a private business consulting firm to look at the overall operation.</p><p>MacKenzie maintains that the league has never been more positive on the direction in which it is going. &ldquo;We understand that the Association has been alerted to three possible new applications for next season, which we will be discussing at our next League meeting,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;If the league covenors feel that we can entertain any of the proposed entries, then we will immediately be notifying the OHA of our recommendations.&rdquo;<span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span></p>

MTHL Institutes Player Scholarship Program

<p class="dropcap"><span>A</span>s many of you are undoubtedly aware, the NOHA has placed many good players in the National Hockey League over the years and with a large number of teams, improved coaching, better officiating, as well as good fan support, we will no doubt continue to produce more professionals, as well as give a lot of kids an opportunity to participate in this sport.</p><p>We have a six-team Junior Tier 1 League operating in the Sudbury area and the winner will once more compete against the OHA Champion in a best-of-five series. Our Junior B League has a number of entries, from Elliot Lake to Wawa, including teams from Sault Ste. Marie and the United States. Last yar, our Timmins North Stars Intermediates obtained recognition as the OHA Intermediate Champs, defeating Dundas in a fine series.</p><p>Our big games this year will be in the Juvenile category, with a League in Sault Ste. Marie, as well as another league from Timmins North. We are certainly pleased that the NOHA will not only be hosting the OHA Juvenile Championship series at Haileybury from March 27-29, 1981, but also the Central Region, Kentucky Fried Chicken Juvenile Championship, with a team from Quebec, the winner of the Ottawa District, the OHA Championship team as well as a host club competing. This will be played in Iroquois Falls, April 2-5, 1981. I am sure this is a first for Northern Ontario and will create a lot of interest in juvenile hockey over the next few years.</p><p>Another feather in our hat this season will be hosting the Air Canada Regional in Sault Ste. Marie. After considerable controversy, our three Divisions have accepted the challenge and all arrangements to proceed with this series are well under way. We have triple A Midget hockey in the Soo, Sudbury, Sudbury District and Timmins and the playoffs are progressing well. The Soo almost defeated St. Mike&rsquo;s two years ago for the Regional, and at Barrie won the OHA Championship before they were finally defeated in the Air Canada Championship series at Cornwall.</p><p>We will have a winner to compete in the Loblaw Cup Bantam Series at Cornwall.</p><p>Our Annual Meeting this year will be held in Elliot Lake on April 11-12th, 1981, hosted by that City&rsquo;s Major Hockey Association and I am sure it will be an enjoyable event, as this is the home town of President Ed Pilon.</p><p>For many past years, the best hockey players came from the North and we are in hopes of once more becoming the Hockey Hot Bed of Canada.<span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span></p>

NOHA Juniors Await Test Against OHA Champions

<p class="dropcap"><span>L</span>ast September. Hockey Ontario made an unprecedented move when it hired Rhonda Leeman as its first ever female Provincial Hockey Administrator.</p><p>Rhonda, originally from Kingston, Ont., came into the job with nine years of hockey experience behind her&mdash;many of them as a player with both Queen&rsquo;s University and the Kingston Red Barons, a Senior A club. Rhonda also spent two years as a referee in boy&rsquo;s hockey and three years as an administrative volunteer with the Ontario Women&rsquo;s Hockey Association. After graduating from Queen&rsquo;s, Rhonda moved to Kapuskasing, Ont., to work for the Board of Education. While there, she also worked with a girl&rsquo;s hockey club and was the northeast representative for the OWHA.</p><p>&ldquo;My main role,&rdquo; says Leeman of her new position, &ldquo;is to promote girl&rsquo;s hockey. In doing that, I am identifying Hockey Ontario and the OWHA.&rdquo;</p><p>Easier said than done. Since Leeman took her job last September, she has logged more than 14,000 miles traveling around the province, spreading the word as she promotes and helps develop girl&rsquo;s hockey in Canada.</p><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0022-01524/4440056-1-eng-US/f0022-012.jpg" title="f0022-01" width="606" height="597"><figcaption class="caption-body">Rhonda Leeman has become the first Ontario Women&rsquo;s Hockey Association development coordinator. <span class="photo-credit">(Photo by Miles Nadal)</span></figcaption></div><span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span>

f0022-01

Women’s Hockey Gets Boss

<div class="byline">BY TOM HENSHAW</div><div class="image-hero"><img title="f0023-01" src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0023-01491/4440087-1-eng-US/f0023-012.jpg"><figcaption class="caption-body">Dwight Foster, above, being checked by Montreal&rsquo;s Steve Shutt, can&rsquo;t decide whether he likes playing center or right wing more, and the Bruins have been using him at both places. <span class="photo-credit">(Photo by Ian MacAlpine)</span></figcaption></div><p class="dropcap"><span>B</span>OSTON&mdash;Dwight Foster has not yet made up his mind whether he likes to play center or right wing for a living and the Bruins are the beneficiaries of his indecision.</p><p>In mid-November, after he had scored seven goals in eight games at right wing with Stan Jonathan and Peter McNab, he told interviewers he preferred to play the wing.</p><p>&ldquo;I&rsquo;d just as soon stay on right wing,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;If I was to play center I&rsquo;d like it to be at a time when I could stay there a while. I don&rsquo;t like to go back and forth. It&rsquo;s two different styles of play completely.</p><p>&ldquo;If you were to put Peter McNab on right wing and me at center, the line would look terrible. I think I&rsquo;d like to stay on right wing right now.&rdquo;</p><p>In early February, a line that had Foster, centering for Jonathan and Rick Middleton was the talk of-Boston Garden and Foster loved it.</p><p>&ldquo;I like playing center,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve played about 15 games now at center with this line. I enjoy it. I like skating. I like getting into the play. That way I think I get into the game better.&rdquo;</p><p>A month later, when Keith Crowder was serving a three-game suspensions for crimes committed during the infamous Minnesota game, Foster filled in for him and got his first NHL hat trick&mdash;at right wing.</p><p>Weren&rsquo;t you the guy who said you preferred to play center?</p><p>&ldquo;I did.&rdquo; laughed Foster. &ldquo;But maybe tonight I preferred to play right wing. Actually, I don&rsquo;t care that much. As long as I&rsquo;m helping out, I don&rsquo;t care where they play me.</p><p>&ldquo;I think playing center helped me realize what I had to do to play the wing better. It was more emotional than physical. I needed to handle the puck and get into the game more. I got to do those things playing center.</p><p>&ldquo;When I was on the right side, I had a tendency to freeze when I got the puck. Sometimes I&rsquo;d stand around. I&rsquo;m not effective at all when I stand still. If I&rsquo;m not skating I&rsquo;m not in the game and [coach] Gerry Cheevers knows it.&rdquo;</p><p>&ldquo;Actually,&rdquo; Foster added, &ldquo;sometimes the way we play there&rsquo;s not much difference between positions on this team. The position you play is where you line up for the faceoff. Then we tend to go all over the place, especially in the offensive end.&rdquo;</p><p>Foster played center all through minor hockey until he arrived at Junior A level with the Kitchener Rangers, when he was transplanted suddenly to right wing.</p><p>He was just getting used to that when Ranger centerman Red Laurence broke his leg and Foster was back at center for his final junior year in which he scored 60 goals.</p><p>He was drafted by the Bruins in the first round (16th overall) in the 1977 draft. Then, in his 10th NHL game, he tore the cartilage in his left knee so badly it required surgery. The Bruins had still not figured out if he was a centerman or a right wing.</p><p>The next year, he fell into disfavor with coach Don Cherry and divided his time between the Bruins and the Rochester farm. He&rsquo;s playing his fourth year of pro hockey but considers himself a second-year man.</p><p>After 69 games, Foster had 17 goals and appeared to be closing in on his first 20-goal season, which is the least that the Bruins expected from him long ago.</p><p>&ldquo;He&rsquo;s played some good games for us this, year and he&rsquo;s played some games that made me sit him out a few others,&rdquo; said Cheevers.</p><p>&ldquo;Dwight&rsquo;s got great ability, there&rsquo;s no doubt about it. He&rsquo;s got a great hockey mind. He&rsquo;s probably as intelligent as anyone on our team. But his contentment level might be low.</p><p>&ldquo;I was talking to him the other day in the shower and I said, &lsquo;You&rsquo;ve got to drive to be a top player on this team. You gotta keep driving at it all the time.&rsquo;</p><p>&ldquo;This is the first time in his four years in Boston that he&rsquo;s gone at a consistent pace.&rdquo;</p><p><b>WHAT&rsquo;S BRUIN</b>&mdash;Residents of Salem, N.H., voted 5,110 to 3,193 to permit dog racing in the town, which is the first of several steps toward construction of an arena-track complex that would transplant the Bruins out of Boston.</p><p>&ldquo;The next step is to work with the New Hampshire legislature and develop a financial package [read a tax break] that&rsquo;s acceptable all around,&rdquo; said Sam Gifford, spokesman for Delaware North Companies, Inc., the owner of the Bruins.<span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span></p>

f0023-01

Bruins’ Foster Enjoying Variety Of ‘Homes’

<div class="byline">BY JIM MATHESON</div><p>EDMONTON&mdash;Blair MacDonald had a feeling it was coming; but it was still like a knife in the back. It was sudden and swift and it hurt.</p><p>Pat Price barely had a clue; but wrote it off as an irritation. It bugged him but he could put up with it.</p><p>That about sums up the Tale of Two Traded Players. MacDonald, the Edmonton Oiler captain, with 470 games of service, was dealt to the Vancouver Canucks. Price, an Oiler defenseman, was shuffled off to Pittsburgh. Both deals were completed just before the NHL trade deadline March 10.</p><p>MacDonald was probably the second most popular Oiler player. He wasn&rsquo;t lionized like Wayne Gretzky, but he was adored for his good looks, dogged style of play and the fact he wore the captain&rsquo;s C. He was the last hold-out from the early days of the World Hockey Association, joining the team from Cornwall in &lsquo;73-74. But for an 18-month stay in Indianapolis, when he was foolishly traded for a third-round draft pick the Oilers never received, he had the longest service record of any Oiler.</p><p>In coach Glen Sather&rsquo;s eyes, B. J. became tradeable with the arrival of 20-year-old rookie right wings Jari Kurri of Finland and Glenn Anderson of the Canadian Olympic team. &ldquo;He became expendable with the arrival of the other two kids,&rdquo; said Sather, who indicated that their youth and speed worked against the heart and persistence of MacDonald. The captain&rsquo;s C didn&rsquo;t help his cause any, either. He became the second captain to exit in as many years. Last March Ron Chipperfield was swapped to Quebec for goalie Ron Low. If anything the C was a &ldquo;Ciss&rdquo; of death.</p><p>MacDonald, who finished 10th in league scoring last year (94 points, 46 goals), had struggled with 42 points in 55 games this season. But he had missed five weeks with a broken thumb, which had some bearing on his lower stats. &ldquo;I was a little surprised, but more disappointed than anything,&rdquo; said MacDonald. &ldquo;I sort of had a feeling it was coming. 1 had heard them say I had lost a step&hellip;but that&rsquo;s like saying I was too old or overweight.&rdquo;</p><p>MacDonald had also heard Sather say &ldquo;a fire hydrant could score 40 goals playing with Wayne Gretzky&rdquo;, which may have been said in jest but it was still a shot. The statement more or less indicated that Sather felt some of MacDonald&rsquo;s 46 goals were tarnished.</p><p>The 27-year-old forward never made his grudge with Sather public, but it must have eaten at him. &ldquo;I think it all started when they made a big schmozzle about my contract talks before this season,&rdquo; said MacDonald, who wanted more money and a longer deal and got both. &ldquo;I had the feeling they were hanging it over my head. The team just never seemed to have any confidence in me this season. I got shoved around, got benched and was hurt for the first time in my career. I didn&rsquo;t play as much as I was used to and it sort of confused me.&rdquo;</p><p>After being No. 1 right-winger last season, working the power play and killing penalties, MacDonald found it hard to play only every third shift this past season. &ldquo;I think they were looking for ways to wheedle me out.&rdquo;</p><p>Price wasn&rsquo;t in the same boat. After a horrible start, he had rebounded from a -19 rating to -5 with hard work in the past six to eight weeks. While the fans still hadn&rsquo;t warmed to him, because of his bad play early and some intemperate remarks he wanted to retract later, he was a valuable member of the team. He could barely fight a lick, but got himself in scores of altercations. He stuck his nose in and usually got smacked for his trouble. Unfortunately, he also liked to rush the puck and Sather felt he had too many offensive blueliners. &ldquo;We just had too many of those with Kevin Lowe and Paul Coffey and Risto Siltanen,&rdquo; said Sather. &ldquo;I wanted more of a stay-at-home defenseman.&rdquo;</p><p>So Price became swappable too. He took it in stride. He even went down to a park in town and gave a wino his $150 ticket to the Oilers&rsquo; first celebrity dinner. &ldquo;Here, go have a good meal,&rdquo; said Price. &ldquo;I don&rsquo;t think I&rsquo;m invited.&rdquo;</p><p>&ldquo;What can I say,&rdquo; said Price, &ldquo;it&rsquo;s a fact of life. Getting traded is an experience. I&rsquo;ll meet some new people, get to know a new city. The hard thing is I was really enjoying Edmonton. 1 won&rsquo;t wear an Oiler jersey for the rest of my life but I met my fiancee here and I&rsquo;ll be with her for the rest of my life.&rdquo;</p><p>The Oilers got defenseman Garry Lariviere for MacDonald. Lariviere started the day in Quebec, was swapped to Vancouver for Mario Marois and later came onto Edmonton. He&rsquo;s a defensive blueliner, steady, not overly flashy. &ldquo;You won&rsquo;t see me leading any end-to-end rushes&hellip;it&rsquo;s too far back,&rdquo; chuckled Lariviere, who was one of Nords&rsquo; two protected players in the expansion draft.</p><p>&ldquo;I&rsquo;ve been trying toget Lariviere for a while,&rdquo; admitted Sather. &ldquo;We couldn&rsquo;t get him last year because he was one of Quebec&rsquo;s priority selections and they couldn&rsquo;t trade him before offering him to the [old] NHL team that had his rights [NY Islanders] or getting him waived through the league. They changed the rule this year, however.&rdquo;</p><p>&ldquo;The best thing about coming to Edmonton,&rdquo; said Lariviere, &ldquo;is 1 won&rsquo;t have to check that little weasel Gretzky. I can watch him instead.&rdquo;</p><p>For Price, the Oilers obtained winger-center Pat Hughes. He had 18 goals last season for the Pens but had been a utility player for much of this campaign. &ldquo;Mark Johnson and I were often the extra forwards,&rdquo; said Hughes. &ldquo;I was the fourth right winger behind Rick Kehoe, Peter Lee and George Ferguson.&rdquo;</p><p>Sather liked his strong shot and his aggressiveness, more than anything. &ldquo;He&rsquo;s a good hard-nosed winger, somebody who plays different than Kurri and Anderson.&rdquo; Ironically, the man he&rsquo;ll have to beat out on the right side is Dave Lumley, who played with Hughes in junior B in Ontario and the Nova Scotia Voyageurs.</p><p>While those were the main deals, Sather also picked up L.A. center Garry Unger for a seventh-round draft pick. There&rsquo;s also a provision that the Oilers have to pick up only a portion of Unger&rsquo;s reported $200,000 yearly salary. &ldquo;I don&rsquo;t buy the stories of his being burned out,&rdquo; said Sather, who ostensibly got him for insurance at center. &ldquo;How can they say he&rsquo;s finished at 33&hellip;a guy like him who doesn&rsquo;t smoke or drink? He&rsquo;ll get his desire back.&rdquo;</p><p>Sather hopes another player, Kenny Berry, has lots of desire too. He could be the sleeper. The ex-Canadian Olympic teamer played at the U of Denver this season and had 56 points in 40 games. He&rsquo;s small (5-9 and 175 pounds), but he&rsquo;s a tremendous skater. The Oilers will try to sign him before the year&rsquo;s out. He refused to sign with the Canucks after being &bull; drafted and the Oilers were only too glad to take him in the deal for MacDonald.<span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span></p>

MacDonald, Price Traded As Oilers Seek Balance

<div class="byline">BY JIM LEAHY</div><p><b>LOUISVILLE HOCKEY STICKS</b></p><p><b>LOUISVILLE HOCKEY STICKS</b></p><p>ROCHESTER&mdash;A four-goal third period gave the Rochester Americans an important 5-2 win at New Haven and undisputed possession of second place in the wild scramble for a playoff berth in the Southern Division. Rochester tied the contest at 1-1 midway through the first period on Mark Robinson&rsquo;s goal. New Haven went ahead 2-1 some 17 seconds later but the Amerks saved their scoring explosion for the next stanza. Jim Walsh, Jim MacRae, Doug Caines and Ron Carter each found the range to give Rochester a much-needed win.</p><p>Earlier in the week, a crowd of 3,942 at the War Memorial saw the Amerks skate to a 3-3 overtime tie against New Brunswick. Rochester came from behind twice in that game, took a 3-2 lead, but the Hawks tied the score. Carter, Bob Hess and John Bednarski did the scoring for Rochester. Goaltender Jari Paavola came up with 24 saves and Hess set a new club record for most points by a defenseman in one season when he was credited with his 59th point in the tie against New Brunswick. Rochester lost 5-3 at Hershey in the only other game on their schedule.</p><p>The Amerks are still without J. P. Kelly (now with the Kings), Pete Horachek (separated shoulder), Vai James (sent down to Erie of the EHL) and center Bill Army, who is on the injured list. Rookie Ron Carter is red-hot. He has six goals in his last five games and 25 goals in 26 AHL contests since being called up from the Eastern League.</p><p><b>MAINE</b>&mdash;One of the biggest nights of the season occurred recently, in Portland when the Mariners had THE HOCKEY NEWS&rsquo; &ldquo;Player of the Decade&rdquo; on hand for a game against Nova Scotia. Bobby Orr thrilled the fans but the Voyageurs won 2-0 in a fight-filled affair. The Mariners played a home-and-home series with the Springfield Indians and came out winless in both games. They lost 5-2 at the Civic Center to the improving Indians and then went down to Springfield and skated to a 2-2 tie with the Tribe. A rare week without a victory for the Mariners still left them comfortably out in front of New Brunswick for the Northern Division title.</p><p>In player moves, the Mariners lost center RON Flockhart and defenseman Reid Bailey to the parent Flyers, but they picked up defenseman Mike Greeder from Ft. Worth of the Central Hockey League. Flockhart led the Mariners in scoring with 33 goals and 32 assists through 59 games and will be missed.</p><p><b>ADIRONDACK</b>&mdash;After losing 7-4 at home to Nova Scotia and 3-1 in Hershey, the Red Wings beat New Haven 4-2 before 4,801 at the Civic Center and kept the slumping Nighthawks from moving up in the Southern Division standings. With games in hand on New Haven and Rochester, the Wings could be in a good position to finish as high as second this year.</p><p>In the victory over New Haven, they overcame a 2-1 Nighthawks&rsquo; lead after one period and scored three unanswered goals. Pete Mahovlich had scored the lone Adirondack goal in the first period and Ted Nolan added two in the second stanza to make it a 3-2 contest going into the final 20 minutes of play. George Lyle&rsquo;s goal at the 7:25 mark gave the Wings a 4-2 win before another SRO crowd in Glens Falls.</p><p><b>SPRINGFIELD</b>&mdash;Two wins, a loss and a tie during the week gave the Indians a good chance to at least earn a wild card playoff berth in the upcoming race for the Calder Cup title. The Indians skated to a 2-2 tie at home against Maine and upset the Mariners 5-2 in Portland on two goals by Randy Wilson and 40 saves by netminder Gary Carr. Earlier in the week they beat Hershey at home by a 5-2 margin and lost to Nova Scotia 8-6.</p><p>Randy Wilson, Larry Skinner and Tom Songin lead the Indians in scoring as the well-balanced Springfield scoring attack has nine players with 30 or more points. Wilson has been an outstanding performer, also tied for the AHL lead with 20 power play goals. In player transactions, the Tribe lost defenseman Barry Ryan to an injury, but got right winger Doug Morrison back on the ice after he was hurt for a few games.</p><p><b>NEW BRUNSWICK</b>&mdash;Only two games were on tap for the Hawks during the week as they continue their attempt to overtake Maine in the race for the Northern Division championship. Last year the Hawks did in fact win the divisional title, finishing some three points in front of Maine and Nova Scotia and going all the way to the championship round of the Calder Cup playoffs where they lost to Hershey.</p><p>A visit to Binghamton started the week and the Hawks blasted the Whalers 7-2. The next night in Rochester. New Brunswick managed a point in a 3-3 tie against the Amerks. Norm Aubin is still leading the club in scoring with 28 goals and 32 assists for 60 points in 62 AHL contests. Goaltender Vince Tremblay is also having a great year with his 19-9-4 record and 3.23 goals-against average in 36 games.</p><p><b>NOVA SCOTIA</b>&mdash;Maybe the presence of Bobby Orr in Portland is what excited the Mariners and Voyageurs, but 14 majors were handed out and Voyageur Dave Allison was in the thick of things as he ran his league-leading penalty minute record up to 278 with 24 in that game. Vees&rsquo; goaltender Mark Holden was credited with the 2-0 shutout over Maine.</p><p>The Vees started the week with a 7-4 win over Adirondack at Glens Falls and then visited Springfield and edged the Indians 8-6 on a hat trick by Dan Daoust. A trip to New Haven ended in a 4-2 win for the Voyageurs as Dave Gorman scored twice and the Vees got solo tallies from Bill Baker and Craig Levie. After winning 2-0 in Maine, the long road trip neared its conclusion in Binghamton, where the Vees dropped a 6-3 decision to the Whalers. By the end of the week. Nova Scotia had won four of five on the road and moved to a six-point lead over Springfield in the battle for third place.</p><p>Nova Scotia lost right winger Bruce Baker during the week when he decided to retire from hockey.</p><p><b>HERSHEY</b>&mdash;Right now, the Bears have practically clinched the Southern Division title and are looking forward to defending their Calder Cup championship in the playoffs. A record of 2-1-1 during the week kept Hershey way out in front of their Southern Division rivals. The Bears defeated Adirondack 3-1 before 4,177 in Hershey and skated to a 5-5 overtime tie against the New Haven Nighthawks before a near-capacity crowd of 7,133 at the Hersheypark Arena. The club lost 5-2 in Springfield and edged Rochester 5-3 at home.</p><p>In that 3-1 win oyer Adirondack, referee Don Koharski was in the middle of the action at the wrong time. Archie Henderson decked Koharski accidentally when the shaft of his stick caught Koharski high on the forehead. The official left the ice and the two linesmen carried on. Koharski came back later in the game but fell and injured his ankle midway through the third period, although he was able to complete the game.</p><p><b>BINGHAMTON</b>&mdash;Strange as it may seem, this team could be tough in the playoffs&mdash;assuming that the Whalers qualify for post-season play and don&rsquo;t end up beached in Binghamton when the eight other AHL clubs start the race for the Calder Cup in a few weeks. Even though the Whalers split their two games, the team is starting to jell. They attracted a season-high crowd of 4.080 to the Broome County Arena, but the home team was blown out 7-2 by New Brunswick. Later in the week, the Whalers were back at home and this time they got their act together and bombed Nova Scotia 6-3.</p><p><b>NEW HAVEN</b>&mdash;An eight-game winless streak (0-7-1) couldn&rsquo;t have come at a worse time for rookie coach Rod Gilbert&rsquo;s Nighthawks.</p><p>Bud Stefanski&rsquo;s hat trick in Hershey was the only bright spot during the week. He gave New Haven a 5-5 tie there but the Nighthawks lost 4-2 at home to Nova Scotia, 4-2 in Adirondack and 5-2 back home to Rochester.</p><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0024-01510/4440142-1-eng-US/f0024-012.jpg" title="f0024-01" width="603" height="807"><figcaption class="caption-body">Red-hot Ron Carter has been a Rochester pace-setter with 25 goals in 26 games.</figcaption></div><span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span>

f0024-01

Amerks’ Rally Brightens Prospects; Whalers Assembling Powerful Squad

<div class="byline">BY TOM LOBAUGH</div><p>LOUISVILLE HOCKEY STICKS</p><p>LOUISVILLE HOCKEY STICKS</p><p>TULSA&mdash;The Oilers, who earlier in the season had the most dismal offense in the CHL, went goal-happy in swamping the Dallas Black Hawks, 9-3, and the Oklahoma City Stars, 9-1, with both those rampages in the Tulsa Assembly Center. Then Bobby Guindon&rsquo;s crew took to the road and won in Fort Worth, 5-2, for their third victory in a row.</p><p>Although the scoring heroics got the headlines, the key man in the three Oiler victories was goalie Lindsay Middlebrook, especially in Fort Worth, where Tulsa was outshot, 42-26.</p><p>Mike Antonovich had the hat trick against Dallas with a shorthanded goal, a power play goal, and one at even strength. Greg Meredith scored shorthanded against Oklahoma City. Kris Manery collected a hat trick with three power play goals in Fort Worth. It was Kris&rsquo; third hat trick in 22 Oiler appearances, and all three had corrie on the road. It was the second time he&rsquo;d scored three power play goals in a game, having done it previously in Wichita, Feb. 11.</p><p>Against the high-flying Hawks, who were on a six-game winning streak. Larry Hopkins and Ben Gosselin scored early power goals, but Dallas caught up on goals by Steve Hazlett and Rick Blight.</p><p>Then Antonvich took personal charge, scoring twice in the last five minutes of the first period, his shorthanded goal coming with only 39 seconds left. Al Cameron and Meredith padded the margin in the middle period. Ross Cory and Antonovich added third-period power tallies. and Anders Steen completed the Oiler scoring before Rob Tudor got the third Dallas goal with 38 seconds left in the game.</p><p>Oklahoma City actually scored first when the two state rivals met two nights later. Ron Friest put the Stars ahead just 37 seconds into the contest, but Middlebrook was unbeatable the rest of the way. John Markell, Don Maclver and Pat Daley put the Oilers in command in the first period. Markell scored again in the second, followed by Meredith and Hopkins. In the third it was Manery, Meredith shorthanded, and finally Gosselin.</p><p>In Fort Worth the next night, Alex McKendry scored for the Texans just 43 seconds after the game began, but Manery answered it with his first power play goal at 3:37. It stayed at 1-1 through the second period, a goal-tending duel between Middlebrook and Bill Oleschuk. But penalties cost the Texans in the final period, as Manery scored twice more on power plays, Antonovich once, and Lyle Moffat got an even-strength goal. The Texans&rsquo; second tally came from Rey Comeau.</p><p>The victory over OC gave Tulsa an 8-6 advantage in the 17-game Turnpike Series, but the fifth-place Oilers still trailed the fourth-place Stars by seven points.</p><p>Dallas had all but clinched the regular-season championship, with 98 points and 13 games still to play. Salt Lake had 81, Indianapolis 80, Oklahoma City 71, Tulsa 64, Wichita 50 and Fort Worth 44.</p><p>As the new week began, the Winnipeg Jets returned center Murray Eaves and right wing Jimmy Mann, who had been recalled two weeks earlier.</p><p><b>SALT LAKE</b>&mdash;Losing three out of four to the challenging Indianapolis Checkers had the Golden Eagles in danger of falling out of second place. A 17-point margin in early February had dwindled to a single point as the result of recent reverses.</p><p>The two teams broke even in Salt Lake. On Wednesday the Checkers won, 2-1, but on Friday it was the Eagles, 4-2. Switching to Indy, the Checkers won 4-1 on Saturday, 5-1 on Monday.</p><p>Mike Boland got the only goal off Roland Melanson in the first loss. Red Laurence had two to key the home victory. But Melanson was almost perfect in the two games at Market Square Arena. Joey Mullen&rsquo;s 49th goal didn&rsquo;t spoil the shutout bid until 18:03 of the final period Saturday. Laurence counted the Lone Eagle goal after 14 minutes of the second period Monday.</p><p>Mullen padded his league scoring leadership margin to 15 points over Oklahoma City&rsquo;s Joe Contini, 97 points to 82. Joey&rsquo;s 49th goal not only set a club record, but gave him the highest single-season total for any U.S.-born player in professional hockey. Both records formerly belonged to injured teammate Doug Palazzari.</p><p><b>FORT WORTH&mdash;</b> The Texans won but one of three games, trimming first-place Dallas at home, 4-1, on Friday. But they had lost to the Hawks, 7-4, in Dallas the previous night, and the week ended with a 5-2 home loss to Tulsa.</p><p>Rey Comeau had the first and last goals in the victory. Earlier, a three-goal burst in the final period at Dallas (Dave Watson, Bobby Attwell and Alex McKendry) wasn&rsquo;t enough, as the Hawks had already taken a 5-1 lead. McKendry scored early against Tulsa, and it was 1-1 after two periods before the Oilers erupted.</p><p>That loss eliminated the possibility of a first-division finish for the faltering Texans. The split with Dallas left the Hawks with a 12-5 advantage in the 21-game Turnpike Series.</p><p>After the Friday night victory, the parent Colorado Rockies summoned winger Watson, defensemen Mario Giallonardo and Jack Hughes. Previously they had sent down center Doug Berry, defenseman Craig Norwich and goalie Hardy Astrom.</p><p><b>INDIANAPOLIS&mdash;</b> A CHL record crowd of 15,925 jammed Market Square Arena to see the Checkers edge Salt Lake, 4-1, to start a five-game home stand. Two nights later Bert Marshall&rsquo;s crew again handled the Eagles, this time by a 5-1 margin.</p><p>A seven-game road trip had ended with a 4-3 record when the Checkers split in Salt Lake, winning 2-1 but losing 4-2. By taking three of four from the Big Birds, Indianapolis moved within a point of second place. The Checkers had won 16 of their last 19 outings.</p><p>Goalie Roland Melanson worked all three victories (except for 35 seconds out for equipment repair in the third one). Robbie Holland was the loser in Salt Lake. Lorne Stamler missed the two home games with a bruised knee.</p><p>Two first-period power play goals by Kevin Devine were all the Checkers could get Wednesday in the Salt Palace, but they stood up, as Melanson yielded only a second-period goal to Mike Boland. Glen Duncan had a goal in each of the next three games. Shane Turner scored twice in the second game at home. Melanson missed his third shutout by only 1:57 (Joey Mullen scored for the Eagles) in the first game back at Market Square, and allowed only a late second-period goal (by Red Laurence) in the next.</p><p>Melanson moved to the top of the CHL goaltending chart with a 2.36 average and was recalled by the Islanders.</p><p><b>OKLAHOMA CITY&mdash;</b> Jim Weaver suffered a concussion and Doug Keans a severely swollen ankle. That left Louis Levasseur (who had missed much of the season with an injury) as the Stars&rsquo; only healthy goaltender.</p><p>Weaver was knocked out near the end of the second period of an 8-3 Wednesday loss in Wichita by the Wind&rsquo;s Bill Bennett. Bennett drew a match penalty, and the Stars, trailing 2-6, had a 10-minute power play. They finally scored, but had only one shot in the first eight minutes of that span.</p><p>Keans had started that game, but was replaced by Weaver when the Wind made it 5-1 early in the middle period. Keans came back in when Weaver was hurt.</p><p>Levasseur was stingy in the rematch the next night, and the Stars got revenge, 3-1. The victory was especially sweet for Levasseur, who had whipped a puck into his own net in losing a 3-2 game on his last previous start in Kansas Coliseum. Mike Dwyer got the lone goal off Louis, early in the second period.</p><p>But Levasseur couldn&rsquo;t stop Tulsa the next night, yielding six goals in the first two periods. Keans, in spite of his lame ankle, took over for the third.</p><p><b>DALLAS</b>&mdash;Rick Blight and Drew Callander both scored hat tricks ina 7-4 romp at home over Fort Worth, but the Black Hawks again fell in Fort Worth. 4-1. Hal Phillipoff scored the lone Dallas tally at 1:01 of the first period. The Hawks had started the week with a 9-3 loss in Tulsa, wiping out a six-game winning streak.</p><p>Paul Harrison was. the winning goalie at home. Ken Ellacott suffered both losses, being relieved by Harrison after two periods in Tulsa, with the score 6-2.</p><p><b>WICHITA&mdash;</b> With a chance to improve their fortunes in a five-game homestand, the Wind split a pair against Oklahoma City. Newcomer Mike Dwyer (from the defunct Birmingham Bulls), Guy Lash and Don Ashby each scored twice in a 8-3 rout of the Stars. Walt Poddubny and George Pesut got the other goals. But Dwyer was the only one who could score the next night.<span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span></p>

Goalie Holds Fort As Oilers’ Offense Spurts

<div class="byline">BY BUD GALLMEIER</div><p>LOUISVILLE</p><p>HOCKEYSTICKS</p><p>LOUISVILLE</p><p>HOCKEYSTICKS</p><p class="dropcap"><b><span>M</span>ILWAUKEE&mdash;</b> Phil Wittliff was a little reluctant about going behind the players&rsquo; bench again. The Milwaukee general manager was pressed into service when the management terminated Nellie LeClair&rsquo;s services as coach.</p><p>While Wittliff had been behind the bench before, he wasn&rsquo;t looking forward to the challenge. And at the time he again assumed the coaching duties, it was quite a challenge.</p><p>Wittliff could be having second thoughts now. Since he jumped behind the bench Milwaukee has skated at a 7-3-2 clip. A playoff berth, at the time Wittliff took over, appeared a remote possibility at best. Now it looms as a sure bet.</p><p>Following a near-perfect weekend, Milwaukee was a solid fifth in the overall standings and just a point out of fourth. The Admirals ended the week with 59 points. Flint is one up at 60 and Muskegon, another team which seems to have responded well to a coaching change, is three back.</p><p>&ldquo;We got five of six points on the weekend,&rdquo; said a smiling Wittliff after the Admirals had come from behind to tie Fort Wayne on the road in the final 17 seconds; 5-5. &ldquo;That&rsquo;s a pretty good weekend. And the schedule is in our favor the rest of the way.&rdquo;</p><p>&ldquo;I feel good about our playoff chances,&rdquo; said Dwight Schofield, a former Komet, who scored the tying goal. &ldquo;I think we are finally getting together. We had a lot of injuries&mdash;and a lot of road games. The schedule is in our favor now.&rdquo;</p><p>Schofield has hurt the Komets several times this season. On the last visit to Fort Wayne he flipped a 180-foot shot into an empty net which proved to be the winning goal in a 5-4 victory.</p><p>Before gaining the tie in Fort Wayne, Milwaukee posted a pair of home victories. Dave Aquin scored a pair of goals in a 4-2 win over Fort Wayne and Michel Bergeron celebrated his return to the lineup with the winning goal in a 6-4 win over Toledo. Bergeron missed seven games.</p><p>Elsewhere in the IHL:</p><p><b>KALAMAZOO&mdash;</b> The K-Wings appear headed for their second straight Huber Trophy and the favorite&rsquo;s seat for the Turner Cup playoffs, which they have won the last two seasons.</p><p>Getting balanced scoring and solid goaltending, Kalamazoo has put together a 12-game undefeated string. The streak includes 10 wins and a pair of ties. The lone blemish during the week was a 2-2 tie with Muskegon at home. Three straight victories followed, including an impressive road success at Toledo, 6-2.</p><p>Flint fell, 3-0, as Claude Legris posted his third shutout of the season and the week ended with a 7-3 romp over Saginaw. The week ended with Kalamazoo 10 points in front of Saginaw and 11 up on Fort Wayne.</p><p><b>FORT WAYNE</b>&mdash;Injuries and raids by the Central League continue to plague the Komets. The latest loss to the Central League (Dallas) was rookie defenseman Kelly Elcombe, who had 50 points for the Komets. Greg Kostenko was lost earlier while other Komet players have been up and down several times during the season.</p><p>The worst injury was to Pete Crawford, who has missed nine games with a knee injury. The Komets have won just twice with Crawford out. Coach Moose Lallo hopes the slump ends before the playoffs begin.</p><p><b>MUSKEGON</b>&mdash;The Mohawks finally know what it feels like to lose under Ted Garvin. It&rsquo;s not as much fun as winning.</p><p>Flint ended the six-game undefeated string with a 4-1 win in Flint. But Garvin wasn&rsquo;t too upset. The game followed three games with the IHL&rsquo;s top three clubs&mdash;Kalamazoo, Fort Wayne and Saginaw. And the Hawks got five of a possible six points against the Big Three.</p><p>&ldquo;I think we were a little tired,&rdquo; Garvin said. &ldquo;We made a few too many mistakes also,&rdquo; he added.</p><p>The week started with a 2-2 tie at Kalamazoo. Then came victories at home over Saginaw, 7-4, and Fort Wayne, 5-3, before the loss at Flint.</p><p>Muskegon has moved into sixth place overall and is just four points out of fourth.</p><p><b>SAGINAW</b>&mdash;The Gears lost ground on Kalamazoo during the week, winning just once in three starts. The two losses came on the road&mdash;at Muskegon and Kalamazoo. The lone victory was impressive, a 9-0 romp over Port Huron. Bob Froese posted the shutout, his third of the season. Marcel Comeau led the offense with the hat trick. Scott Gruhl picked up his 40th goal in the romp as well.</p><p><b>FLINT</b>&mdash;The Generals split during the week, winning twice at home and losing a pair of road games. The road games were a complete loss as both Toledo and Kalamazoo posted shutouts by 3-0 scores. The wins came over Port Huron, 6-3, and Muskegon. 4-1. Flint finished the week with 60 points, still good enough for fourth place overall. But Milwaukee is just a point back and Muskegon three behind.</p><p><b>PORT HURON</b>&mdash;The Flags won just once during the week but the win came at the-right time. After losing at Flint, 6-3, and at Saginaw, 9-0, the Flags regrouped to turn back Toledo at home, 5-4. The victory gives Port Huron a six-point edge over the Diggers in the fight for the final playoff berth.</p><p><b>TOLEDO</b>&mdash;Time is running out on the Diggers. They posted just one victory in four games during the week&mdash;a 3-0 shutout over Flint. Losses to Kalamazoo (at home), Milwaukee and Port Huron on the road followed.</p><p>Toledo is six points behind Port Huron and of the Diggers&rsquo; final 14 games only six are at home. Port Huron has 19 games remaining.</p><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0026-01458/4440197-1-eng-US/f0026-012.jpg" title="f0026-01" width="612" height="942"><figcaption class="caption-body">Dwight Schofield&rsquo;s tying goal, in the final minute against Fort Wayne, aided Milwaukee&rsquo;s recent spurt.</figcaption></div><span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span>

f0026-01

Admirals Setting Sail For Playoffs

<p><b>LOWELL</b>&mdash;They went for the hat trick, and the hat did the trick!</p><p>Head coach Bill Riley, vowing not to change hats until his University of Lowell Chiefs lost again, is still wearing his brown cowboy hat after 16 games, an ECAC Division Two east regular season title, the tournament championship, and now, the NCAA Division Two National Championship.</p><p>The Chiefs, who ran off to a 9-0 record before Christmas, were in the grips of a three-game losing streak when Riley elected to change the hat he wore during games. After coming up with a 5-2 victory over Babson in January, the personable head coach said he would not change his hat until the Chiefs lost again. They have not lost yet.</p><p>Last weekend, the Chiefs won their second national title in the past three years with a heart-stopping 5-4 triumph over ECAC Division Two West champion, Plattsburgh State (N.Y.) College. To get to the final, UL had to get past defending national champion Monketo State, doing so in overtime, 8-7, while Plattsburgh dismantled Concordia College (Minn.), 10-4.</p><p>The championship game was everything everyone anticipated. The two squads, champions of the two ECAC Division Two conferences, battled not just for the national championship, but for supremacy of eastern hockey.</p><p>During the hard skating first period, the only winners were the officials, who whistled 11 minor penalties. With the two most penalized teams in the ECAC going head to head, the men in striped shirts were going to keep the lid on.</p><p>UL broke the ice at 3:15 of the second period when all-tournament forward Mike Carr backhanded a centering pass from Kevin Charbonneau into the net for a power play goal. But head coach Herb Hammond&rsquo;s Cardinals came back less than a minute later to tie the score when Michel Talbot deflected a shot past UL&rsquo;s John Mackenzie.</p><p>Plattsburgh took its only lead of the night during a five-on-three advantage midway through the period. Ted Wescott&rsquo;s slapshot from the left point found its way through the UL defense and the Cardinals had a 2-1 margin.</p><p>All season long, when UL needed a lift, it came from senior captain Dean Jenkins. The 6-1, 185-pounder did it again, stealing a loose puck behind the Plattsburgh goal and stuffing it home for his sixth shorthanded goal of the season, just 32 seconds after Wescott&rsquo;s score.</p><p>With momentum back in their favor, the Chiefs tallied a pair of goals 23 seconds apart to take a 4-2 lead. Sophomore Chuck Sage made a beautiful shift around the defense and snapped a 25-foot wrist shot past all-tournament goalie Rick Strack. Then, Carr won a face-off back to the tournament&rsquo;s Most Valuable Player, Tom Mulligan, and the junior defenseman found the net with his third goal of the tourney.</p><p>But the Chiefs did not make it easy on themselves. With chants of &ldquo;Os-we-go, Os-we-go&rdquo; ringing throughout the building, Plattsburgh came back to tie the game before six minutes were gone in the third period. All-tournament forward Pierre Brunet took a set-up from Denny Poulin to beat MacKenzie, then Jim Griffin was left all alone in the slot to take a feed from Brunet. His 30-foot wrist shot found the net and the Cardinal partisans went wild.</p><p>It has been their trademark over the past few games for the Chiefs to give up leads early in the third period, only to regain control of the contest and score the winning goal. Sage, who beat Merrimack College two weeks ago for the ECAC Division Two East Championship, converted a two-on-one situation by slipping the puck between the pads of Strack after giving him a number of head and shoulder fakes.<span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span></p>

Lowell Coach’s ‘Hat Trick’ Was Champs’ Lucky Omen

<div class="byline">BY PATRICK LYON</div><p>LOUISVILLE HOCKEY STICKS</p><p>LOUISVILLE HOCKEY STICKS</p><p>BALTIMORE&mdash;The Clippers are hopeful of regaining last year&rsquo;s &ldquo;magic&rdquo; with the return of Henry Taylor to the lineup.</p><p>Taylor, who spent the entire season with Oklahoma City in the Central League, was returned to the Clippers for a minimum of two weeks and coach Gene Ubriaco is optimistic that he will have the talented offensive performer in his lineup for the remainder of the regular season and playoffs.</p><p>After scoring just 10 goals and 12 assists in 56 games with the Stars, Taylor was reunited with a league that he set on fire a year ago.</p><p>The fleet-footed skater was seventh among EHL scorers with 49 goals and 34 assists for 83 points in 64 games. Taylor&rsquo;s 49 goals ranked second in the league in 1979-80 and the offensive threat also racked up five shorthanded goals, nine power play goals and eight game-winning goals.</p><p>&ldquo;He certainly will be a welcome addition,&rdquo; remarked Ubriaco. &ldquo;He is very skillful and a pure scorer. We haven&rsquo;t done as well as we did last season, but Henry should help us in that respect. Baltimore gained the finals of the John Mitchell Cup playoffs in their rookie season last year.</p><p>Another player who has improved dramatically over the past two seasons is Gerry Ciarcia, currently the top Clipper pointman with 11 goals and 58 assists.</p><p>The former Bowdoin College standout has been fighting with Erie&rsquo;s Pierre Aubry for the assist lead for much of the current campaign. Baltimore&rsquo;s rugged defenseman has also shown his skills on the power play, where he has earned seven of his 11 goals.</p><p>&ldquo;When Ciarcia went to the North Stars&rsquo; camp two years ago, people thought we were wasting our time,&rdquo; explained Ubriaco, &ldquo;however they&rsquo;re not thinking that way anymore. Ciarcia is the most improved player in the organization and he played well when he went up to Oklahoma City. He&rsquo;s an asset to the team and I&rsquo;m sure he&rsquo;s going to get a real good look next season.&rdquo;</p><p>Ubriaco has also been pleased with Dale Yakiwchuk since he moved to Baltimore from Richmond. The former Rifle captain has eight goals and five assists in his first eight games With the Clippers.</p><p>Baltimore still possessed hopes of catching Salem for third place in the standings though they were nine points down with 12 games to play.</p><p>The Clippers had won four of six games, losing a 5-2 contest to Richmond before stopping Salem 5-3. The line of Jon Fontas, John Meredith and Peter Hayek had four of the five goals against Salem with Fontas getting a goal and two assists, Meredith two goals and one assist and Hayek one goal and three assists. Ciarcia chipped in a shorthanded goal and Tony Thomas got credit for the game winner.</p><p>In other player moves, Kim Spencer was loaned to Toledo of the IHL and Dave Tracey was lost for the season with a broken jaw in two places and a broken nose.</p><p><b>HAMPTON</b>&mdash;The Aces&rsquo; losing streak reached five games before they posted a 5-2 win over the Raiders.</p><p>Hampton was treated rudely in Erie for a two-game set as the Blades demolished the Virginians 12-4 and 8-3. Stevel Salvucci. Darre Switzer, Kent Reardon and Rob Clavette posted goals in the first contest, Dave Walter. Bill MacNaught and Reardon nailing&rsquo; down scores in the 8-3 loss. Hampton remained winless in Erie, suffering seven straight losses.</p><p>Walter continued in the top 10 in league scoring with 62 points on 25 goals and 37 assists.</p><p><b>SALEM</b>&mdash;The Raiders saw their run at second place come short with three losses in four games. Pat Kelly&rsquo;s crew did capture a big 4-2 triumph in Richmond, but Salem then dropped a 5-3 decision in Baltimore and a 4-2 home game to Hampton.</p><p>Claude LaFontaine wielded a hot stick with three straight two-goal games and ran his streak to seven goals in four nights. LaFontaine shares league leadership with two other players with five unassisted goals.</p><p>Alan Aime and Kevin Street, both of whom came to Salem in a recent trade, were playing well according to Kelly. Street had 14 points in nine games.</p><p>Lee Keller, the EHL leader with three tying goals, was lost to the Raiders for 21 days with a knee problem. Keller was Salem&rsquo;s second best scorer with 47 points behind Jim Toomey&rsquo;s 51.</p><p><b>RICHMOND</b>&mdash;Just when coach Andre Beaulieu was hoping to get his club back to full strength, Paul Conway and Tom Mullen suffered injuries.</p><p>Ray Kurpis and Lawrie Nisker&rsquo;s return would have put Richmond at the legal limit of 17 players for the first time in weeks, but Conway hurt a knee and Mullen injured his shoulder.</p><p>After rebounding with good performances after their recent trades, the Rifles went into a tailspin with three straight losses. Included were two losses on home ice to Salem 4-2 and Erie 4-3 and a 6-4 road setback in Erie.</p><p>The Rifles did earn an earlier 6-3 conquest of the league-leading Blades, Paul Miller showing the way with a hat trick and two assists. Dave Herbst also added a pair. Ed Smith earned two goals and one assist in the road defeat.</p><p><b>ERIE</b>&mdash;Pierre Aubry continued his record setting performance by adding two more marks to his ever increasing totals. His one goal in an 8-3 drubbing of Hampton gave him 54 for the season and established new EHL and Blade team records for most goals in one season. The marksman had 57 goals and 57 assists for 114 points in 58 games.</p><p>Erie neared its third consecutive EHL regular season title by chalking up four straight victories. Included were a pair of decisions over Hampton 12-4 and 8-3 and wins over Richmond 4-3 and 6-4.</p><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0027-01437/4440252-1-eng-US/f0027-012.jpg" title="f0027-01" width="608" height="900"><figcaption class="caption-body">Henry Taylor came back from the Central League to help Baltimore&rsquo;s run for third place.</figcaption></div><span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span>

f0027-01

Clippers’ Offense Boosted By Taylor’s Return

<div class="byline">BY VIRG FOSS</div><p>MINNEAPOLIS&mdash;Colorado College&rsquo;s Cinderella story has come to an end. but not without a fight from the gutsy Tigers.</p><p>Colorado College, which rallied from an 8-2 deficit the previous week against Wisconsin to pull out the two-game. total goal series 13-12 on Wisconsin&rsquo;s ice, had the Western Collegiate Hockey Association champion Minnesota Gophers envisioning the same sort of fate at Williams Arena, the home of the Gophers.</p><p>Minnesota got goals from seven different players to build a commanding 7-1 lead after the first game of the total goal series.</p><p>But knowing the striking capacity of Colorado College, one can bet Minnesota coach Brad Buetow spent a worried night before the rematch the following day.</p><p>He had reason to worry. Colorado College threw a scare into the Gophers, taking the second game 9-7 but still falling short 14-10 in the total goal series.</p><p>The victory assures Minnesota of one of the four spots from the West in the first round of the National Collegiate Athletic Association playoffs beginning March 20-21, which pits four teams from the West against four teams selected from the East.</p><p>Minnesota will be joined in the final four from the west by Michigan Tech, which beat Michigan in a total goal series 9-2, Northern Michigan, the winner of the Central Collegiate Hockey Association playoffs, and Wisconsin, which was eliminated from the first round of the WCHA playoffs, but had a 24-14 record.</p><p>Tom Rothstein, Jeff Langevin, Kevin Hartzell, Mike Knoke, Jeff Larson, Steve Ulseth and Steve Griffith scored for the Gophers in the 7-1 victory in the series opener with Greg Whyte getting the only CC goal off of Gopher goalie Paul Butters.</p><p>But CC turned up the firepower in the second game as Dale Maksymyk scored four goals as the Tigers tired-desperately to overcome the six-goal deficit of the first game.</p><p>Minnesota matched CC goal for goal until the third period, however, when CC scored the last three goals to take the 9-7 victory. The game was tied 3-3 and 6-6 at the period stops.</p><p>Scott Blugstad gave Minnesota a 7-6 lead and a seven-goal overall bulge at 3:43 of the third period, but CC came back with goals by Greg Hampson, Tom Kelly and Maksymyk to pull it close. Maksymyk&rsquo;s fourth goal came into an empty net with just two seconds left in the game.</p><p>The victory put Minnesota on home ice for the first round of the NCAA tournament the following weekend against the No. 4 team from the East, Colgate.</p><p>Meanwhile, Michigan Tech had a little easier time of it in Houghton, Mich., as the Huskies continued their season mastery over arch-rival Michigan.</p><p>Tony Stiles and Rick Boehm gave Michigan Tech a 2-1 victory in the opening game with Don Krussman replying for Michigan with just 1:32 left in the game. Tech got sound goaltending from Frank Krieber, who finished with 25 saves to 34 for Michigan&rsquo;s Paul Fricker.</p><p>It was all Tech the second night, however, as the Huskies beat Michigan for the sixth time in seven meetings this season.</p><p>Boehm, just back after missing several weeks with an ankle injury, brought some instant offense with him. He scored two goals the second night as Tech won 7-1 to sweep the series 9-2 and advance into the NCAA tourney.</p><p>Krieber helped shut down Michigan&rsquo;s potent offense by making 21 saves in the second game as Michigan lost for only the fourth time in its last 13 games.</p><p>Michigan ran into goaltending problems that helped turn the game into a rout. First, Fricker had to leave the game with a hand injury. His replacement. Rudy Vavari, made just one save before being hit in the face mask and being forced out of the game. Fricker returned to finish with 42 saves, but Krieber kept Michigan at bay at the other end of the ice.<span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span></p>

Gophers, Tech Reach WCHA Finals

<p class="dropcap"><span>D</span>ULUTH&mdash;Pairings for the opening round of the National Collegiate Athletic Association hockey tournament, which will send four teams to the finals on March 26-28, have been announced.</p><p>The first round series, a two-game total goals affair, will be played March 20-22 with (#3 West) Michigan Tech at (#2 East) Providence, (#4 West) Wisconsin at (#1 East) Clarkson, (#3 East) Cornell visiting (#2 West) Northern Michigan and (#4 East) Colgate at (#1 West) Minnesota.</p><p>Then on Thursday, March 26, at Duluth, the winner of the Michigan Tech-Providence game and the winner of the Colgate-Minnesota contest will meet in the semifinals, while the following evening, the winner of the Clarkson-Wisconsin game and the winner of the Northern Michigan-Cornell game will advance into the semifinals.</p><p>The NCAA title game will be held on Saturday, March 28.<span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span></p>

NCAA Pairings Set

<div class="byline">BY TOM BURKE</div><p class="dropcap"><span>B</span>OSTON&mdash;He was sitting there in the interview room, almost as drenched with perspiration as the three players who had accompanied him, still in control but unable to suppress the broad grin that had broken through on so few occasions during the long, uphill battle that was the 1980-81 hockey season.</p><p>But Lou Lamoriello had ample reason to smile at last. His Providence Friars, seventh seeded and nearly eliminated from playoff contention altogether during the final week of regular season play, had just knocked off defending champion Cornell by an impressive 8-4 score to gain their first ECAC playoff crown since 1964.</p><p>Providence, favored to dominate the ECAC East in the pre-season polls, had struggled and sputtered all year, fighting occasional attitude problems and encountering a few disciplinary player suspensions along the way. By the time the post season games arrived, however, their game of slowdown and wait for the enemy mistake was at its peak.</p><p>Result? First, an impressive 5-2 upset of second place Boston College on the Eagles&rsquo; home ice in the quarterfinals. Three goals in the last period to break a 2-2 tie, two of them scored by eventual Tourney MVP Kurt Kleinendorst, were the key to the win. It was on to the Garden.</p><p>All the other home seeds&mdash;Clarkson, Colgate, and Cornell&mdash;won their respective quarterfinal matches. Providence therefore drew Clarkson, a 26-5-2 team that had thrashed the Friars 8-3 during the season. For 58 and a half minutes during the semifinal, it seemed as though form would hold true. Clarkson dominated all the territorial play, allowing PC just seven shots through the first two periods. But the Golden Knights, clearly the East&rsquo;s best team all season long, have been less than spectacular offensively down the stretch, and they only held a 3-1 lead as time ticked away.</p><p>More than a few of the 11,504 fans had already departed when Lamoriello pulled Mario Proulx from the goal with 1:32 to play and inserted goalie Scott Fiske. The rules allow Fiske a few minutes&rsquo; warmup for the Friars to plot strategy and for the Knights to relax, thinking that the foe had thrown in the towel.</p><p>Fiske stationed himself well out of the net. and as soon as play resumed he headed for the bench. Empty net. PC buzzed furiously in the other end and clicked when defenseman Kleinendorst blasted a slapshot past Don Sylvestri with 54 seconds to play. It was 3-2. Providence was afire, and the Golden Knights panicked.</p><p>Following the ensuing faceoff, Clarkson dumped the puck to PC&rsquo;s end, but when the clearing pass came, Proulx headed for the bench again. Inexplicably, nobody was covering freshman Gates Orlando, hanging on the Clarkson blueline where defenders had stood their ground, repulsing rushes for 58 minutes.</p><p>Some claimed Orlando was offside. But he gathered in the long feed from Paul Stasiuk, took three steps and fired a slapshot. Sylvestri saved, but Dan Miele beat all the backcheckers down ice and poked the big rebound in with 25 seconds to play. Pandemonium. Overtime.</p><p>It was almost easy after that. Providence dominated the overtime period, allowed no shots on goal, and completed the shocking upset when sophomore Steve Anderson, unattended at the left post, jammed a lazy rebound from the backboard past Sylvestri&rsquo;s skate.</p><p>The win capped what&rsquo;s come to be expected of the ECAC semifinal, namely the best evening of hockey that Boston has to offer each year. Cornell had won a slightly less surprising upset of its own in the early game, nipping a gutsy but thin Colgate crew by the same 4-3 score, this time in regulation.</p><p>Cornell, as they always have under coach Dick Bertrand, saved their best hockey of the year for the playoffs. They earned fourth seed by winning the Ivy Division and then edged Maine 7-4 in the quarterfinals, scoring three times in the third period.</p><p>It was the third period once again that won the game for Cornell against the Red Raiders, a team making its first appearance ever in the Garden. Cornell&rsquo;s experience and squad depth began to show as the third period&rsquo;s first minute of play brought a power play goal by Brock Tredway at the 0:46 mark. &lsquo;</p><p>Colgate got that one back a few minutes later on a Jim Wallace tally, raising its lead to 3-1, but you could almost smell a Cornell victory anyway. Skating four lines to Colgate&rsquo;s three, and using dump and chase against the smaller and lighter Raiders, Cornell was on the move. The break came halfway through the frame when the Big Red&rsquo;s fourth line scored twice within nine seconds to tie the game.</p><p>Dave Chiappini stuffed the puck past Guy LeMonde from close in at 10:25, and Geoff Dervin poked home a big rebound of a long slapshot at 10:34. Cornell players mobbed Dervin, to the joy of their Wisconsin-like fans.</p><p>The clincher wasn&rsquo;t long in coming, because Tredway slipped behind the defense on his next shift, bore in alone and veered off to the right, then tucked the disc past LeMonde from a bad angle. Colgate didn&rsquo;t quit and had a few good chances thereafter, but couldn&rsquo;t beat last year&rsquo;s MVP Darren Eliot.</p><p>The championship game was almost anticlimactic. Cornell had defeated Providence 5-3 on Friar ice a couple of weeks earlier, and had to be rated a slight favorite entering the final. They would not come very close to a successful defense of their 1980 crown this night, however, even though PC captain Steve O&rsquo;Neill had fractured a small bone in his hand the evening before and was sitting it out. This was simply Providence&rsquo;s turn.</p><p>Again, the goals came in flurries. Kurt Kleinendorst and Steve Evangelista made it 2-0 within 20 seconds of each other in the first period, but Roy Kerling narrowed the gap to 2-1 before the intermission.</p><p>The second period started out sluggishly, with neither team able to do much offensively. All of a sudden it was 4-1, as Gates Orlando and John Sullivan caught the defense napping and scored from the crease area at 10:44 and 10:57. Kleinendorst sealed his MVP honors with a pair of goals in the late stages of the second, and though Cornell rallied a bit and didn&rsquo;t give up in the final frame, PC was never in trouble again.</p><p>Even the consolation game was exciting and worthwhile, because of the NCAA selection committee&rsquo;s deliberations in choosing four playoff participants for the NCAA quarterfinal crossover round this weekend.</p><p>The feeling was that Clarkson could virtually assure itself of first or second seed in the East with a win over Colgate, but the Knights were unable to pull it off. In a chippy game, Colgate held them to a 3-3 tie in overtime, scoring all its goals in the third period after Clarkson had built a 2-0 lead. The key goal came at 9:47 of the third when, after a deliberate offside call against the Knights moved the faceoff to the Clarkson end, Mike Houle put home a rebound of a Ky Roesler slapshot. Neither team could budge the other thereafter.</p><p>Colgate had earned the semifinal berth with a 5-3 win over fading sixthseed Northeastern at Hamilton. In that contest, clever Dan Fridgen netted a hat trick that included a successful penalty shot.</p><p>Clarkson survived a scare from eighth place New Hampshire, edging the Wildcats 3-2 in Potsdam on Colin Patterson&rsquo;s goal at 1:10 of the third period. Once more, the shots were in the Knights&rsquo; favor, 43-17, but they had trouble getting the puck past the goaltender. For the East&rsquo;s best team, it was, unfortunately, a harbinger of more trouble to follow.<span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span></p>

Seventh-Seeded Friars Score ECAC Title Upset

<h2><b>ECAC CONFERENCE</b></h2><p><b>(Final Standings)</b></p><h3>DIVISION I</h3><p><b>East Region</b></p><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0029-01375/4440537-1-eng-US/f0029-012.jpg" title="f0029-01" width="545" height="192"></div><p><b>West Region</b></p><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0029-02280/4440530-1-eng-US/f0029-022.jpg" title="f0029-02" width="550" height="161"></div><p><b>Ivy Region</b></p><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0029-03179/4440523-1-eng-US/f0029-032.jpg" title="f0029-03" width="545" height="192"></div><h3><b>PLAYOFFS ECAC CONFERENCE</b></h3><p>DIVISION I Quarter-Finals</p><p>Providence 5, Boston College 2</p><p>Clarkson 5, N. Hampshire 2</p><p>Colgate 5, Northeastern 3</p><p>Cornell 7, Maine 4</p><p>(Sudden-death games)</p><p>Semi-Finals</p><p>Providence 4. Clarkson 3</p><p>Cornell 4, Colgate 3</p><p>(Sudden-death games)</p><p>Finals</p><p>Providence 8, Cornell 4</p><p>(Providence wins championship)</p><h3>FINAL SCORING LEADERS</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0029-04122/4440516-1-eng-US/f0029-042.jpg" title="f0029-04" width="545" height="653"></div><h3>GOALTENDING RECORDS</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0029-05106/4440509-1-eng-US/f0029-052.jpg" title="f0029-05" width="545" height="467"></div><h2><b>WCHA CONFERENCE</b></h2><p><b>(Final Standings)</b></p><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0029-0684/4440502-1-eng-US/f0029-062.jpg" title="f0029-06" width="545" height="312"></div><h3>FINAL SCORING LEADERS</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0029-0767/4440495-1-eng-US/f0029-072.jpg" title="f0029-07" width="537" height="614"></div><h3>PLAYOFFS</h3><p>Quarter-Finals</p><p>Michigan 5, Denver 2</p><p>Michigan 5, Denver 4</p><p>(Michigan wins two-game total-goals series 10-6)</p><p>Minnesota 5, Minn-Duluth 1</p><p>Minn-Duluth 7, Minnesota 5</p><p>(Minnesota wins two-game total-goals series 10-8)</p><p>Mich. Tech 7, North Dakota 4</p><p>Mich. Tech 4, North Dakota 1</p><p>(Mich. Tech wins two-game total-goals series 11-5)</p><p>Wisconsin 8, Colorado Coll 2</p><p>Colorado Coll 11, Wisconsin 4</p><p>(Colorado College wins best two-game total-goals series 13-12)</p><p>Semi-Finals</p><p>Minnesota 7, Colorado Coll 1</p><p>Colorado Coll 9, Minnesota 7</p><p>(Minnesota wins two-game total-goals series 14-10)</p><p>Michigan Tech 2, Michigan 1</p><p>Michigan Tech 7, Michigan 1</p><p>(Michigan Tech wins two-game total-goals series 9-2)</p><h2><b>CCHA CONFERENCE</b></h2><p><b>(Final Standings)</b></p><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0029-0859/4440488-1-eng-US/f0029-082.jpg" title="f0029-08" width="546" height="251"></div><h3>FINAL SCORING LEADERS</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0029-0954/4440481-1-eng-US/f0029-092.jpg" title="f0029-09" width="542" height="385"></div><h3>PLAYOFFS</h3><p>Semi-Finals</p><p>Bowling Green 3, No. Michigan 3</p><p>No. Michigan 10, Bowling Green 2</p><p>(No. Michigan wins two-game total-goals series 13-5)</p><p>Ferris State 3, Ohio State 3</p><p>Ohio State 5, Ferris State 3</p><p>(Ohio State wins two-game total-goals series 8-6)</p><p>Finals</p><p>N. Michigan 2, Ohio State 2</p><p>N. Michigan 4, Ohio State 2</p><p>(N. Michigan wins two-game total-goals series 6-4 and championship)</p><h3>NCAA TOURNAMENT</h3><p>Eastern Seeds</p><p>No. 1 Clarkson, No. 2 Providence, No. 3 Cornell.</p><p>No. 4 Colgate.</p><p>Western Seeds</p><p>No. 1 Minnesota, No. 2 Northern Michigan,</p><p>No. 3 Michigan Tech, No. 4 Wisconsin.</p><p>First Round</p><p>Fri-Sat. Mar. 20-21</p><p>Michigan Tech vs Providence</p><p>Wisconsin vs Clarkson</p><p>Cornell vs No. Michigan</p><p>Colgate vs Minnesota</p><p>(Two-game total-goals series)</p><h2><b>SCHA CONFERENCE</b></h2><p><b>(Final Standings)</b></p><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0029-1046/4440474-1-eng-US/f0029-102.jpg" title="f0029-10" width="548" height="221"></div><h3>FINAL SCORING LEADERS</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0029-1141/4440467-1-eng-US/f0029-112.jpg" title="f0029-11" width="547" height="220"></div><h3>PLAYOFFS</h3><p>Tennessee 4, Georgia State 1</p><p>Alabama 9, Georgia Tech 0</p><p>Championship Game</p><p>Alabama 7, Tennessee 6</p><p>Consolation Game</p><p>Georgia State 11, Georgia Tech 0</p><h2><b>CALIFORNIA CONFERENCE (Standings on Mon. March 2)</b></h2><h3>DIVISION I</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0029-1237/4440460-1-eng-US/f0029-122.jpg" title="f0029-12" width="544" height="163"></div><h3>DIVISION II</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0029-1330/4440453-1-eng-US/f0029-132.jpg" title="f0029-13" width="542" height="165"></div><h3>LEADING SCORERS</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0029-1427/4440446-1-eng-US/f0029-142.jpg" title="f0029-14" width="548" height="302"></div><h3>GOALTENDING RECORDS</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0029-1523/4440439-1-eng-US/f0029-152.jpg" title="f0029-15" width="544" height="167"></div><h2><b>CANADIAN COLLEGES</b></h2><p>NATIONAL TOURNAMENT</p><p>Pool One</p><p>Moncton 10, Brandon 3</p><p>Calgary 6, Brandon 3</p><p>Moncton 5, Calgary 2</p><p>(Moncton wins round-robin pool)</p><p>Pool Two</p><p>Queen&rsquo;s 3, Concordia 2</p><p>Saskatchewan 5, Queen&rsquo;s 4</p><p>Saskatchewan 8, Concordia 3</p><p>(Sask wins round-robin pool)</p><p>Finals</p><p>Moncton 4,Saskatchewan 2</p><p>(Moncton wins sudden-death game and</p><p>championship)</p><h3>PLAYOFFS</h3><p>ONTARIO CONFERENCE</p><p>Queen&rsquo;s 3, Western 1</p><p>Queen&rsquo;s 6, Western 5</p><p>(Queen&rsquo;s wins best-of-three finals 2-0)</p><p>QUEBEC CONFERENCE</p><p>Concordia 7, T-Rivieres 2</p><p>Concordia 5, T-Rivieres 2</p><p>(Concordia wins best-of-three semi-finals 2-0)</p><p>Ottawa 5, Laval 4</p><p>Laval 3, Ottawa 2</p><p>Ottawa 3, Laval 2</p><p>(Ottawa wins best-of-three semi-finals 2-1)</p><p>Concordia 4, Ottawa 3</p><p>Concordia 8, Ottawa 1</p><p>(Concordia wins best-of-three finals 2-0)</p><p>ATLANTIC CONFERENCE</p><p>Dalhousie 5, UPEI 2</p><p>UNB 4, St. Mary&rsquo;s 0</p><p>(Sudden-death quarter-finals)</p><p>Moncton 8, St UNB 5</p><p>Dalhousie 5, Mt. Allison 3</p><p>(Sudden-death semi-finals)</p><p>Moncton 4, Dalhousie 3</p><p>Moncton 8, Dalhousie 4</p><p>(Moncton wins best-of-three finals 2-0)</p><p>CANADA WEST CONFERENCE</p><p>Saskatchewan 6, Calgary 3</p><p>Calgary 4, Saskatchewan 3</p><p>Saskatchewan 3, Calgary 2</p><p>(Saskatchewan wins best-of-three finals 2-1)</p><p>GPAC CONFERENCE</p><p>Manitoba 5, Regina 3</p><p>(Sudden-death semi-finals)</p><p>Brandon 6, Manitoba 3</p><p>Brandon 7, Manitoba 4</p><p>(Brandon wins best-of-three finals 2-0)</p><h2><b>ONTARIO CONFERENCE</b></h2><p><b>(Final Standings)</b></p><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0029-1621/4440432-1-eng-US/f0029-162.jpg" title="f0029-16" width="542" height="364"></div><h3><b>FINAL SCORING LEADERS</b></h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0029-1719/4440425-1-eng-US/f0029-172.jpg" title="f0029-17" width="544" height="416"></div><h2><b>QUEBEC CONFERENCE</b></h2><p><b>(Final Standings)</b></p><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0029-1819/4440418-1-eng-US/f0029-182.jpg" title="f0029-18" width="540" height="219"></div><h3><b>FINAL SCORING LEADERS</b></h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0029-1914/4440411-1-eng-US/f0029-192.jpg" title="f0029-19" width="546" height="360"></div><h2><b>ATLANTIC CONFERENCE</b></h2><p><b>(Final Standings)</b></p><h3>KELLY DIVISION</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0029-2012/4440404-1-eng-US/f0029-202.jpg" title="f0029-20" width="539" height="168"></div><h3>LEADING SCORERS</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0029-2112/4440397-1-eng-US/f0029-212.jpg" title="f0029-21" width="538" height="279"></div><h3>MACADAM DIVISION</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0029-2212/4440390-1-eng-US/f0029-222.jpg" title="f0029-22" width="542" height="165"></div><h3>LEADING SCORERS</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0029-2311/4440383-1-eng-US/f0029-232.jpg" title="f0029-23" width="544" height="251"></div><h2><b>CANADA WEST CONFERENCE</b></h2><p><b>(Final Standings)</b></p><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0029-2411/4440376-1-eng-US/f0029-242.jpg" title="f0029-24" width="545" height="141"></div><h3><b>FINAL SCORING LEADERS</b></h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0029-2510/4440369-1-eng-US/f0029-252.jpg" title="f0029-25" width="541" height="171"></div><h2><b>GPAC CONFERENCE</b></h2><p><b>(Final Standings)</b></p><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0029-269/4440362-1-eng-US/f0029-262.jpg" title="f0029-26" width="545" height="167"></div><h3><b>FINAL SCORING LEADERS</b></h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0029-279/4440355-1-eng-US/f0029-272.jpg" title="f0029-27" width="535" height="167"></div><div class="sidebar"><p><b>VICTORIAVILLE</b><br><b>Quality sticks from PeeWee to Pro.</b><span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span></p></div>

f0029-01

How The Playoff Races Stand

<div class="byline">BY MIKE MURRAY</div><p class="dropcap"><span>C</span>ALGARY&mdash;They have been coming from behind all season, so perhaps it was only fitting that Francois Bessette&rsquo;s goal, which broke a 2-2 deadlock with nine seconds to play to give Moncton their first national Canadian college championship, should have originated behind the Saskatchewan net.</p><p>Bessette was attempting to pass it out front but it hit the back of goaltender Bob Dougall&rsquo;s skate and trickled into the net to lift the Aigles Bleus to victory against Saskatchewan, who advanced to the finals by defeating Queen&rsquo;s 5-4 and Concordia, 8-3.</p><p>&ldquo;It&rsquo;s a shame that a goal like that has to end it all but it doesn&rsquo;t tarnish the victory,&rdquo; said Moncton&rsquo;s coach Jean Perron. &ldquo;We didn&rsquo;t perform all that well last year in Regina, but we got the experience, desire and discipline this time around.&rdquo;</p><p>Moncton, ranked the lowest of the tournament teams, survived after giving up the first goal in each of is playoff games in the Maritimes, and they also fell behind in all three games in Calgary, but once they got rolling they were impossible to stop.</p><p>They knocked off No. 3-ranked Calgary in the first game 5-2, scoring three times in an overtime period, bombed Brandon, who had been rated No. 1 (and failed to win a game) 10-3 and then fell behind No. 2 ranked Saskatchewan in the final before pulling into a tie thanks to some standout goaltending by Benoit Fortier, who was selected as the tournament MVP.</p><p>&ldquo;I don&rsquo;t care what it looked like.&rdquo; said Bessette, who added an empty net goal with one second left to make the final count 4-2,&rdquo; it was the most important goal of my life.&rdquo;</p><p>The road to Calgary and the nationals for the six contending teams was accomplished with only one upset of note, although it wasn&rsquo;t a cakewalk for the other teams which each finished with the best conference record.</p><p>The Canada West Conference produced the upset when the second-place Saskatchewan Huskies, who finished three games off the pace, tripped Calgary, two games to one, to earn a spot in the nationals.</p><p>Saskatchewan, coached by Dave King, who built successful junior clubs in Billings and Saskatoon, stunned Calgary with a 6-3 victory in the opener before dropping a 4-3 double overtime in Game Two. The teams looked like they were headed for overtime again in the rubber match as they entered the final seven minutes tied at 2-2, but Saskatchewan&rsquo;s Tim Leier scored his second goal of the game to send the Huskies into the two-pool round robin national finals as the nation&rsquo;s second-highest rated club.</p><p>Another team new to championships is Queen&rsquo;s, which won its first Ontario University Athletic Association hockey title since 1914 with a two-game triumph over the University of Western Ontario.</p><p>Queen&rsquo;s played tight, defensive hockey at home to open the series with a 3-1 victory in Kingston and then showed that they could play a wide-open style, too, as they survived a double overtime game at Western to come out on top, 6-5.</p><p>Queen&rsquo;s captain John McIntyre took a pass from CIAU Player of the Year, Paul Stothart, and blasted a low shot past Western&rsquo;s Rick Pikul to send Queen&rsquo;s to Calgary.</p><p>Andy Chisholm was the star in the Queen&rsquo;s net as he and Pikul matched superlative save after save to keep the verdict in suspense throughout the game.</p><p>In Quebec, another Quebec University Athletic Association pennant must have seemed like old hat to Concordia coach Paul Arsenault (he&rsquo;s had 13 previous ones) but then again it meant another trip to the nationals and a shot at being the top team in the country.</p><p>Arsenault&rsquo;s Stingers escaped Ottawa with a 4-3 victory over the Gee Gees in a game in which Stinger goalie Doug Dragasevich sparkled, particularly against Ottawa sharpshooter Rolly Hedges, robbing him on two breakaways. Back in Montreal for Game Two, the Stingers outshot their visitors, 51-28 and bombed Ottawa 8-1, giving Concordia their sixth consecutive QUAA crown.</p><p>In the other two conferences, two Cinderella teams, Manitoba and Dal-housie, tried to play the role of giantkillers against Brandon and Moncton, but fell a little bit short.</p><p>Manitoba dropped 6-3 and 7-4 contests to the No. 1 ranked Brandon Bobcats, although they threw a scare into Brandon when they twice held one-goal leads in the second game and came into the final period tied at 3-3.</p><p>Dalhousie, which made a remarkable surge over the second-half of the season, and eliminated Mount Allison and UPEI along the way, held a two-goal lead over Moncton in the opener, but the Aigles Bleus players didn&rsquo;t panic and came back for a 4-3 win before taking the second game going away, 8-4.<span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span></p>

Upstart Moncton Reigns As Canadian Champs

<div class="byline">BY JIM SCHNEIDER</div><p class="dropcap"><span>M</span>ARQUETTE&mdash;Junior Steve Bozek scored three goals and added two assists to pace Northern Michigan to its second consecutive Central Collegiate Hockey Association playoff championship and the right to host Cornell in an NCAA regional contest this weekend (March 20-21).</p><p>The Wildcats (26-11-3) defeated Ohio State (24-12-3) 6-4 in the two-game, total-goal series. The first game was a 2-2 tie and the defending CCHA champs, and NCAA runner-up squad from NMU took the second game 4-2.</p><p>The CCHA runner-up, Ohio State, lost out in a bid for the fourth and final NCAA regional bid to Wisconsin. It is interesting to note that in Michigan Tech and NMU, the NCAA will have two future CCHA members in the tournament. Michigan Tech joins the CCHA next season. Another future CCHA member, Michigan, just missed out also.</p><p>The Badgers of Wisconsin were given the fourth spot in the regional on the strength of their overall record that included a 4-4 finish against the teams in the WCHA that finished seventh, ninth and 10th. Michigan on the other hand won nine of their last 13 games of the season knocking Denver out of first place with two weeks to go in the regular season and then knocking the DU Pioneers out of the playoffs on the road. Wisconsin will return to playoff action at Clarkson following a week off after losing a two-game, total-goals series to Colorado College 13-12 on home ice. CC rallied after losing the opener at Wisconsin 8-2 to win the second game 11-4.</p><p>Ohio State lost twice in the final nine games of the season beating Ferris State in the first round of the playoffs before losing at NMU.</p><p>The first period of the OSU-NMU playoff series in NMU&rsquo;s Lakeview Arena was scoreless as Mike Blake made 10 saves for the Buckeyes.</p><p>Larry Marson&rsquo;s goal at 14:15 of the second period assisted by Jim Mroszak and Steve Amoruso pushed the OSU club ahead, but Jeff Pyle tied the game with a power play goal at 18:49 of the second period.</p><p>CCHA player-of-the-week Bozek gave the &lsquo;Cats a 2-1 lead midway in the third period, but OSU&rsquo;s Paul Pooley tied the game at 17:22.&rsquo;</p><p>Blake finished the game with 39 saves, while NMU&rsquo;s Jeff Poeschl collected 20 saves.</p><p>The first period of the second game was also scoreless and the Bucks jumped ahead 1-0 in the second game and 3-2 for the series as Amoruso connected on assists from Mroszak, in his first action in several weeks off the injury list, and Brian Jenks.</p><p>Bozek&rsquo;s power play goal at 11:11 of the second period tied the game at 1-1 and sent the series into its final period tied at 3-3.</p><p>Bozek&rsquo;s second power play goal of the game assisted by Jeff Tascoff at 1:48 of the third period put Rick Comley&rsquo;s Wildcats ahead for good.</p><p>Keith Hensen pushed the lead to 3-1 at 18:40 assisted by Bozek and Dave Mogush, but the Buckeyes didn&rsquo;t die.</p><p>With Blake pulled for an extra skater the Buckeyes cut the margin to 3-2 as Dan Mandich beat Poeschl with a rebound assisted by Paul Pooley at 19:39. Walt Kyle closed the scoring at 19:52 as Blake got caught out of position when he raced for the puck and lost. Pyle and Dave Ikkala assisted on the final goal and the assist keeps Pyle consecutive-game scoring streak alive at 32 games.</p><p>Blake had another sensational night making 38 saves for a two-night total of 78. Poeschl made 27 saves for the win.</p><p>The Northern Michigan-Cornell game will be a rematch of the NCAA semifinal contest last year in Providence, RI, when NMU beat Cornell 5-4. NMU will have home ice in this playoff and it will be a two-game, total-goals series with the winner advancing to the final four series in Duluth, March 26-28.<span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span></p>

Bozek The Edge For Wildcats Over Ohio State

<div class="byline">BY MIKE BROPHY</div><p><b>LOUISVILLE HOCKEY STICKS</b></p><p><b>LOUISVILLE HOCKEY STICKS</b></p><p>TORONTO&mdash;Cathy Lee Crosby, Fran Tarkenton and John Davidson could have a lot of fun doing a feature on the Emms Division of the Ontario Hockey League.</p><p>With just over one week remaining in the regular season, the first place team was playing only .500 hockey; the second place team was just two points back despite losing 15 of their last 16 games and not one of the six teams in the division had scored more goals than they allowed.</p><p>Now, That&rsquo;s Incredible.</p><p>In a somewhat strange series of events, the Windsor Spitfires, Niagara Falls Flyers and the Kitchener Rangers all held first place for a little while in an 11-day period.</p><p>On Feb. 27, Niagara was first with 62 points and in the midst of their worst losing streak of the season; Windsor was second with 61 points, the Brantford Alexanders third with 60 and the much improved Rangers fourth with 57.</p><p>On March 2, Windsor had moved into first, with 64 points, the Flyers were next with 62, Kitchener was third with 61 and Brantford fourth with 60.</p><p>Just one week later, the Rangers&mdash;who earlier in the season appeared to be heading for another dismal finish&mdash;had climbed into first place with 65 points, one ahead of the Spitfires. Brantford and Niagara were tied with 62 points.</p><p>Even stranger was the fact that if all four of those teams lost all their remaining games, and the fifth place Toronto Marlboros won their last three&mdash;the Marlies would finish first. Only the London Knights have assured themselves of a position in the standings&mdash;last. The only thing they have to worry about now is not winning too many games and losing second pick in the midget draft. (The Belleville Bulls, the new entry in the league, will have first pick):</p><p>For a brief rundown on all the teams in the Emms division, their ups and downs, read on.</p><p><b>KITCHENER</b>&mdash;The Rangers are playing great hockey. Of all the teams in the weak Emms Division, they are currently the only one that could knock off a Leyden Division team in the finals. Coach Orval Tessier has placed a great deal of responsibility on the shoulders of rookie Brian Bellows and sophomore Jeff Larmer and both have responded tremendously.</p><p>On their climb to the top, Kitchener defeated Brantford 4-1 and 5-3 and suffered a 5-4 setback to Toronto. The Rangers had won six straight games to move into first.</p><p><b>WINDSOR</b>&mdash;The Spitfires are a mystery team. Some games they look like they could win the Memorial Cup and other times they look as though they &lsquo;should be relegated to Tier II. One thing that has remained constant has been the play of Ernie Godden, who has played in the shadow&rsquo; of Oshawa Generals&rsquo; rookie Tony Tanti all season. While all eyes were on Tanti to see when he would break the league record for most goals in a season, Godden raced past him and tied the OHL mark with two goals in a 7-4 loss to Brantford. Godden then notched four goals in another outing to give him 85 goals on the season, breaking Peter Lee&rsquo;s old mark of 81.</p><p><b>BRANTFORD</b>&mdash;The Alexanders looked like they might hold first place for good a couple of weeks ago but inconsistent play has dropped them back to third place. They could be a playoff threat but only if they get good goaltending from Rick LaFerriere and Glen Ernst and get goal scoring from Mike Bullard.</p><p><b>NIAGARA FALLS</b>&mdash;What&rsquo;s wrong with the Flyers? Nobody seems to know but they keep losing. They dropped a 10-1 decision in Ottawa and the next night blew a 7-6 lead when a defenseman tripped Peterborough&rsquo;s Larry Floyd on a breakaway with just over a minute remaining in the game. Floyd scored on the penalty shot and the Petes won 8-7 in overtime.</p><p>The next night the Flyers were embarrassed 9-5 by the last place Knights and then two nights later were whipped 8-4 by the Leyden Division cellar dwelling Sudbury Wolves. Frustration was mounting as the Flyers cleared their benches three times in two games for fights.</p><p><b>TORONTO</b>&mdash;Captain Wayne Crawford has finally started to do the things that Toronto management expected from him all season. The final year center, who was drafted by the Detroit Red Wings last season, scored three goals in the Marlies&rsquo; 5-4 win over Kitchener.</p><p><b>LONDON</b>&mdash;Basil McRea and Tony MacKenzie scored two goals each as London topped the Flyers 9-5.</p><p><b>SAULT STE. MARIE</b>&mdash;The Greyhounds, who gave up first plate to the Ottawa 67&rsquo;s for a few days, are back on top&mdash;but it&rsquo;s still close. With Ottawa breathing down their necks, the Hounds whipped Sudbury 8-1, beat Oshawa 5-3 and dropped a 6-2 decision to Peterborough.</p><p><b>OTTAWA</b>&mdash;Coach Brian Kilrea was so upset at the team&rsquo;s recent 4-3 loss to Toronto that he kept them out after the game to skate wind sprints for 15 minutes. Kilrea told Ottawa <i>Citizen</i> writer Bob Elliott. Jr. after the game, &ldquo;If I have to wear the embarrassment of their poor play&mdash;the awful way they skated&mdash;standing behind the bench for more than 60 minutes, it shouldn&rsquo;t hurt them to skate afterwards.&rdquo; Ottawa had a game in hand on the Soo but lost 5-3 to Kingston.</p><p><b>KINGSTON</b>&mdash;The Canadians beat Ottawa 5-3 after earlier dropping a 5-4 decision. Ottawa _fired 47 shots at Kingston goalie Mike Moffat.</p><p><b>OSHAWA</b>&mdash;Goalie Greg Stefan was suspended indefinitely after he broke his goal stick over the shoulder of Toronto&rsquo;s Bart Wilson, sparking a brawl. Tony Tanti was held scoreless in three straight games in his quest to beat Lee&rsquo;s scoring record.</p><p><b>PETERBOROUGH</b>&mdash;The Petes have been one of the hottest teams in the-league of late, winning five and tying one of their last seven games. The streak included impressive wins over the Greyhounds (6-2) and the Flyers (8-7) as well as a 3-2 victory over Oshawa. who they will meet in the first round playoffs. Doug Speck scored the overtime winning goal against Niagara.</p><p><b>SUDBURY</b>&mdash;The Wolves decided to inject a little humor into their losing ways by jumping off the bench to congratulate Mike Pederson when he scored their lone goal in an 8-1 loss to the Soo.<span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span></p>

Leyden Teams Incredibly Wary Of First Place

<p>Anytime a junior hockey player scores 77 goals in 67 games, he is bound to draw the pro scouts to his door.</p><p>Steve Gatzos of the Sault Ste. Marie Greyhounds has put himself in that position this season in his third Ontario Hockey League campaign after emerging as the No. 3 goal scorer in the league behind Ernie Godden of Windsor and Oshawa&rsquo;s sensational young rookie Tony Tanti.</p><p>Gatzos, a 19-year-old right wing who stands 5-10 and weighs in at 180, went on a four-game scoring spree for the Greyhounds, picking up five goals and five assists to win OHL Player of the Week honors.</p><p>Gatzos broke the Sault club&rsquo;s record for most goals previously set by Brian Gualazzi (who scored 75 in 1978-79) when he counted his 75th and 76th goals of the year in a 5-3 win over Oshawa. He added his 77th the next night against Sudbury and ended up with a productive 10-point week for the Hounds.</p><p>Gatzos is eligible for the 1981 NHL Entry Draft and there isn&rsquo;t much doubt he&rsquo;ll get a lot of attention from the pro scouts this time around.</p><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0031-01385/4440640-1-eng-US/f0031-012.jpg" title="f0031-01" width="555" height="815"><figcaption class="caption-body"><b>STEVE GATZOS Sault Greyhounds</b></figcaption></div><span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span>

f0031-01

OHL Player Of The Week

<div class="byline">BY GREGG DRINNAN</div><p><b>LOUISVILLE HOCKEY STICKS</b></p><p><b>LOUISVILLE HOCKEY STICKS</b></p><p>CALGARY&mdash;Back in June of 1980, when the Western Hockey League finalized its 1980-81 schedule, no one could have predicted what a superb job of crystal ball gazing the board of governors did</p><p>And. what a job it was because, as the regular season neared its conclusion, fierce battles were raging for first place in both Western and Eastern Divisions.</p><p>If there has been a surprise in the league this season, it&rsquo;s that the Portland Winter Hawks have managed to hang in there with the Victoria Cougars in the five-team Western Division.</p><p>But, hang in there they have and, in fact, this one is liable to go right down to the wire, when the Cougars are scheduled to visit Portland on March 22, three nights before the schedule wraps up. It&rsquo;s going to be interesting because both clubs have been red hot.</p><p>The Winter Hawks tied a. league record (set by the Brandon Wheat Kings in 1978-79) by winning their 10th consecutive road game, beating the Breakers 7-6 in overtime in Seattle. That victory came on Gary Yaremchuk&rsquo;s 49th goal of the season, at 3:08 of the extra session.</p><p>Rookie Perry Pelensky, who has really blossomed over the schedule&rsquo;s second half, led the Portland charge with four goals.</p><p>Not to be outdone, the Cougars won three times and moved into a first-place tie with the Winter Hawks, tying a club record for consecutive wins on home ice (10) in the process.</p><p>Torrie Robertson scored three times as the Cougars bounced the New Westminster Bruins 10-4. Then. Barry Pederson and Paul Cyr had two goals each in a 7-3 home-ice win over the Spokane Flyers.</p><p>In between, the Cougars ripped the Bruins 10-2 in Powell River, B.C., with Pederson, Cyr and Stu Kulak getting two goals each.</p><p>The Cougars, though, lost left winger Brad Palmer, who was recalled by the National League&rsquo;s Minnesota North Stars for the rest of the season.</p><p>In the Eastern Division, the Regina Pats and Calgary Wranglers were staging a battle that has been just as fierce. And this one may not end until the season&rsquo;s very last night when the Wranglers play in Regina.</p><p>Calgary, though, has beaten the Pats each of the five times the two clubs have met this season, with the latest being a 5-2 decision in Cowtown that created a tie atop the East&rsquo;s standings.</p><p>The Wranglers then moved into first place for the first time with an 8-3 home-ice victory over the Lethbridge Broncos. Bruno Baseotto, struggling with a sore hand, and Ray Cote had two goals each for Calgary, while Don Keller chipped in with his 20th of the season.</p><p><b>BILLINGS</b>&mdash;Sheldon Currie scored four times, giving him 38, and linemate Marc Chartier added a pair as the Billings dumped the visiting Calgary Wranglers 7-5.</p><p><b>BRANDON</b>&mdash;Center Dave Chartier scored his, 52nd goal and added an assist, giving him 101 points, as the Wheat Kings downed the Blades 7-5 in Saskatoon. Gord Smith, a 16-year-old defenseman, got his first WHL goal in a 5-4 overtime loss to Saskatoon.</p><p><b>LETHBRIDGE</b>&mdash;Right winger Mike Moller was called up for the second time by the National League&rsquo;s Buffalo Sabres. And Brent Sutter, an 18-year-old center, got the call from the New York Islanders, who took him in the first round of the 1980 draft, and had a goal and an assist in his first NHL game and the winner in a 2-1 victory over Los Angeles in his second game. Both players were later returned to the Broncos. Rick Gal scored his 16th goal and set up the winner, by Doug Rigler, as the Broncos scored a home-ice 2-1 win over the Winnipeg Warriors.</p><p><b>MEDICINE HAT</b>&mdash;Tom Adams&rsquo; goal at 9:32 of overtime lifted the Tigers to a 7-6 home-ice win over</p><p>Seattle, which led 6-2 midway through the second period. Coach Pat Ginnell was fined $200 for pushing an official after that game. Steve Tsujiura scored four times, giving him 50, and Bob Fleming reached the 20-goaI mark with three as the Tigers dumped visiting Winnipeg 11-5.</p><p><b>REGINA</b>&mdash;Brian Varga scored his 50th and 51st goals while rookie Dave Michayluk added his 52nd and 53rd as the Pats dumped the New Westminster Bruins 7-2 in Bellingham, Wash. Jock Callander continued to hold a hot hand, as he struck for two third-period goals&mdash;his 54th and 55th&mdash;to give the Pats a 6-5 win over the Flyers in Spokane. Callander, who also had two assists, scored eight times as the Pats split four games on the West Coast and was named the Eastern Division&rsquo;s Player of the Week.</p><p><b>SASKATOON</b>&mdash;Bruce Eakin&rsquo;s 14th goal of the year, at 1:57 of overtime, gave the visiting Blades a 5-4 win in Brandon. Goaltender Mike Bloski was the difference, turning in a splendid 37-save performance. Rookie Mark Habscheid scored his 29th and 30th goals in an 8-2 loss in Winnipeg.</p><p><b>WINNIPEG</b>&mdash;Randy Minoletti got his 19th and 20th goals in an 11-5 loss in Medicine Hat. Dan Sylvester and Randy Taylor both scored their 20th goals and Geoff Wilson got his 37th and 38th as the Warriors dumped Saskatoon 8-2 in Winnipeg.</p><p><b>NEW WESTMINSTER</b>&mdash;The Bruins, continuing to play every game on the road as their home rink is shut down by a labor dispute, lost for the 14th consecutive time, 10-4 to the Cougars in Victoria. One night later, it was 15 in a row as the Cougars won 10-2 in Powell River, B.C. Another New Westminster &lsquo;home&rsquo; game, this one in Bellingham. Wash., with Seattle visiting, was halted after one period due to poor ice conditions.</p><p><b>SEATTLE</b>&mdash;Rookie Renzo Berra hit for his 30th goal as the Breakers lost 7-6 in Medicine Hat.</p><p><b>SPOKANE</b>&mdash;Rookie center Mark Sochatsky reached the 100-point plateau with a goal and two assists as the Flyers dropped a 6-5 home-ice decision to Regina. The Flyers closed to within two points of New&rsquo; Westminster, which holds down the West&rsquo;s fourth and final playoff spot, with a 7-2 win over visiting Seattle.</p><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0032-01396/4440671-1-eng-US/f0032-012.jpg" title="f0032-01" width="604" height="795"><figcaption class="caption-body">Torrie Robertson helped Victoria to keep pace with Portland by scoring three goals.</figcaption></div><span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span>

f0032-01

WHL Divisional Races Schedule Maker’s Dream

<p>Playing with a last-place team often takes the enthusiasm for the game out of a player, but not Ivan Krook of the Spokane Flyers.</p><p>The 18-year-old Krook, who stands 5-8 and weighs 170, will be up for grabs in the NHL entry draft this summer and he is putting on a whirlwind finish to the 1980-81 Western Hockey League schedule to convince the pros he&rsquo;s worth a closer look.</p><p>Krook collected six goals and six assists for a 12-point outburst for the lowly Flyers to capture WHL Player of the Week honors.</p><p>As the WHL season winds down to its closing weeks, Krock is pushing his way towards the league&rsquo;s top 20 scorers with 32 goals and 52 assists for 84 points in Spokane&rsquo;s first 64 games. He has dressed for all of his team&rsquo;s games this season and along with the team&rsquo;s top scorer Mark Sochatsky, the two have valiantly been trying to propel the Flyers into one of the West Division&rsquo;s remaining playoff spots.</p><p>If the Flyers fall short it certainly won&rsquo;t be for lack of trying on the part of young Krook.</p><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0032-02300/4440702-1-eng-US/f0032-022.jpg" title="f0032-02" width="552" height="862"><figcaption class="caption-body"><b>IVAN KROOK Spokane Flyers</b></figcaption></div><span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span>

f0032-02

WHL Player Of The Week

<div class="byline">BY HERB ZURKOWSKY</div><p><b>LOUISVILLE HOCKEY STICKS</b></p><p><b>LOUISVILLE HOCKEY STICKS</b></p><p>QUEBEC CITY&mdash;Quebec Major Junior Hockey League (QMJHL) president Marcel Robert told THE HOCKEY NEWS this week he&rsquo;ll know by the end of April whether the Cornwall Royals will operate next season in the QMJHL or the Ontario Hockey League.</p><p>The Royals, being wooed by the Ontario League, which has already expanded into Belleville, must submit $10,000 by April 30&mdash;along with the other Quebec teams planning to operate next season.</p><p>Should the Royals join the Ontario loop, the QMJHL must then decide on operating with either nine teams or adding an expansion franchise.</p><p>Robert said the leading candidates for expansion are Rimouski, Val d&rsquo;Or, St. Hyacinthe. Longueuil. Victoriaville and Jonquiere.</p><p>Should a new team be added, Robert said the league will adopt an unbalanced schedule. Teams will play 12 games&mdash;six home and away&mdash;within their own division and four&mdash;two home and away&mdash;interlocking matches for a total of 68 games, down from 72.</p><p>Although the Lebel and Dilio Divisions will remain, Robert explained teams will now be grouped geographically, which could result in some teams&mdash;Sorel or Sherbrooke&mdash;switching divisions.</p><p>&ldquo;We want to save on expenses and start forming natural rivalries,&rdquo; Robert explained.</p><p>Eight teams would continue qualifying for the playoffs, but playoffs would now be held within each division with the Lebel and Dilio champs meeting for the right to represent Quebec in the Memorial Cup.</p><p>As matters stand now. the team with the most points plays the team with the least in all playoff rounds, meaning two teams from the same division can play for the title.</p><p>Under the new format&mdash;and Robert realizes this&mdash;there is a possibility of a one-sided final should one of the divisions be superior to the other. There also is a possibility that a team in the Lebel Division with more points than a team in the Dilio Division, won&rsquo;t qualify for the playoffs.</p><p>&ldquo;Even if we don&rsquo;t have the two best teams in the final, we&rsquo;ll have good semifinals and if we have good semifinals. I&rsquo;m hoping we&rsquo;ll have a good final.&rdquo; Robert said. &ldquo;The emphasis now will be put on playing well within your own section.&rdquo;</p><p>In the event a new team is added, Robert said existing franchises will be able to protect a designated number of players, with those remaining going into a collective pool. The new team would also participate in the midget draft. May 30, and would be able to sign junior B players if it wishes.</p><p>&ldquo;I figure if the new team drafts 10 players from other teams and selects three or four good midgets from the draft, they can be as good as anybody else.&rdquo; Robert said. &ldquo;In the first year I think they should choose older players to balance things out.&rdquo;</p><p>In seeking out an expansion team, Robert said the league looks for an arena with a minimum seating capacity of 3,000 and a population of at least 100,000.</p><p>&ldquo;We also want a good, stable organization and a city that&rsquo;s not too far away from others. And an important city. We want the most important cities in the province playing in our league.&rdquo;</p><p>In related matters discussed at the March 7 meetings at Sherbrooke, Robert told THE HOCKEY NEWS the individual team governors met with representatives of the Canadian Cycle & Motor Co. (CCM). about the possibility of using the new uniforms that are being worn by Western junior players.</p><p>The outfits resemble jogging suits and are made of nylon. They have long or short pants, a short sweater (like these worn by baseball players) and offer more protection and are much lighter than the conventional uniforms.</p><p>No decision was reached on the uniforms. Robert said the league will be meeting with the CCM representatives in April, but will attempt to hold off from making a decision until the Memorial Cup. when league representatives can watch the Western entry with the new uniforms.</p><p>Quarterfinal playoffs started March 20, and THE HOCKEY NEWS will preview the four preliminary confrontations in next week&rsquo;s issue. All series are four-of-seven and alternate between each city on a game-by-game basis, unless Chicoutimi and Cornwall eventually hook up, in which case it will be two games at a time.</p><p>It&rsquo;s official: The Montreal Juniors will play all home playoff games at the Laval Sports Centre. The Juniors play out of the Paul Sauve Sports Centre, but ran into a snag when the Sauve arena rented out its ice for April. The Juniors also have decided to return to the Sauve arena for next season, their option year.</p><p>Speaking of the Laval Sports Centre, the Laval Voisins have signed a new contract with the arena. There had been some concern the Voisins might also be looking for a new arena because of difficulties.<span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span></p>

Royals To Decide On Future In QMJHL

<div class="image-hero"><img title="f0033-01" src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0033-01364/4440757-1-eng-US/f0033-012.jpg"></div><p><i>&ldquo;Where readers get together to do business</i></p><p>RINK EQUIPMENT</p><p>PERSONALS</p><p>FAN CLUBS</p><p>OPPORTUNITIES</p><p>POSITIONS WANTED</p><p>PLAYER EQUIPMENT</p><h2>PERSONALS</h2><p><b>PLAY HOCKEY</b> with ordinary playing cards. Rules, cards, scoreboard in unique folder just $3.50 ppd. Valgames, 960 Round Swamp Rd., Old Bethpage, N.Y. 11804.</p><p><b>HOCKEY BOOKS:</b> New, used out-of-print hockey books, guides, programs. Write for free list. Book, Box 547 Streetsville, Mississauga, Ontario, Canada, L5M 2C1</p><p><b>CARDS:</b> 10% off all sets till April 30th. Free price list Also have comics. Send specific wants: Ab D Cards, Box 103, Station F, 187 Henderson Hwy., Winnipeg, Manitoba, R2L2A5.</p><p><b>PHOTO SALE:</b> 621 Bee Hive, 150 Rare $1,000, will consider trades. Send want and spare lists to: Marshall Semenchuk, Box 396, Vermilion, Alberta, Can. Phone 1-403-853-5839. Also lot sales on 5x7 glossy Mounted</p><p><b>WANTED:</b> Rare California Seals official NHL puck. Write: Rob Camenisch 4513 Weld County Road 32, Longmont, Colorado, 80501.</p><p><b>WANTED:</b> Collector looking for used, postmarked team business envelopes, with logo, of defunct NHL, WHA, minor league, OMUAHL, QMUAHL teams. Buying all regardless of condition. Eric Miller, 116 E. Lakeview, Flint, Michigan, 48503.</p><h2><b>TOURNAMENTS</b></h2><p><b>WANTED:</b> Team located in Fort Lauderdale, Florida is looking for teams to challenge them to a series of games. Glorious opportunity for a fun filled weekend or a week of hockey. Fort Lauderdale night life scene and beach hotel accommodations can be obtained through the team Write: Rosaire Paiement, Coral Plaza Motel, 2701 N. Federal Hwy, Ft. Lauderdale, Fla., 33306. Phone (305) 565-6658.</p><h2>OPPORTUNITIES</h2><p><b>WANTED FOR EUROPE:</b> Non-Import players for the 1981-82 season. If you were born in Europe or if your father held European citizenship at the time of your birth (even if you were born elsewhere) you may qualify as a non-import player for the country in question.</p><p>Good salaries and benefits if you have played for equivalent of junior &lsquo;B&rsquo; or better An experience of a lifetime. All information will be kept in strictest confidence Send details of birth records and hockey resume to:</p><p>European Co-ordinator</p><p>CAN AM Hockey</p><p>Group</p><p>P.O. Box 634</p><p>Guelph. Ontario</p><p>N1H 6L4</p><p>(519)824-3515</p><p><b>WANTED:</b> Players of Jr. B caliber who are interested in playing professionally in Europe. A team will travel through Europe in Aug/Sept on 5 nation tour to promote their hockey skills in front of European Scouts. Write The Hockey News Box 26, 214 King Street West, Suite 314, Toronto, Ontario, M5H 1K4.</p><p>WHAT&rsquo;S YOUR MESSAGE?</p><p><i>Just use the handy word-counter at the right, and be sure to indicate the date(s) you want your ad to appear. Then,</i></p><p>Clip and mail to.</p><p>The Hockey News</p><p>Classified</p><p>214 King St. West, Suite 314</p><p>Toronto, Ont. M5H 1K4<span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span></p>

f0033-01

CLASSIFIED

<h2><b>MARCH</b></h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-1928/4441043-1-eng-US/f0034-192.jpg" title="f0034-19" width="604" height="958"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-2027/4441036-1-eng-US/f0034-202.jpg" title="f0034-20" width="601" height="962"></div><span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span>

f0034-19

WHERE NHL TEAMS PLAY

<p><b>Including Sun. March 15)</b></p><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-1439/4441074-1-eng-US/f0034-142.jpg" title="f0034-14" width="576" height="788"></div><span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span>

f0034-14

THE NHL’S POINT RACE

<p><b>(Standings on Mon. March 16)</b></p><h2>ADAMS DIVISION</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-1538/4441126-1-eng-US/f0034-152.jpg" title="f0034-15" width="545" height="162"></div><h2>NORRIS DIVISION</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-1638/4441119-1-eng-US/f0034-162.jpg" title="f0034-16" width="536" height="161"></div><h2>PATRICK DIVISION</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-1732/4441112-1-eng-US/f0034-172.jpg" title="f0034-17" width="533" height="168"></div><h2>SMYTHE DIVISION</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-1829/4441105-1-eng-US/f0034-182.jpg" title="f0034-18" width="539" height="194"></div><h3>GAMES COMPLETED</h3><p>Montreal 1 at Minnesota 1</p><p>Tue. March 10</p><p>Rangers 4 at Quebec 6</p><p>Vancouver 2 at Calgary 11</p><p>Colorado 3 at Washington 4</p><p>Hartford 4 at Detroit 4</p><p>Wed. March 11</p><p>Colorado 4 at Rangers 3</p><p>Islanders 6 at Winnipeg 3</p><p>Washington 5 at Hartford 2</p><p>Montreal 2 at Pittsburgh 1</p><p>Chicago 4 at Los Angeles 4</p><p>St. Louis 5 at Quebec 5</p><p>Boston 4 at Toronto 4</p><p>Buffalo 1at Minnesota 3</p><p>Thu. March 12</p><p>Islanders 5 at Edmonton 0</p><p>Detroit 4 at Philadelphia 9</p><p>Minnesota 3 at Calgary 6</p><p>St. Louis 3 at Montreal 4</p><p>Fri. March 13</p><p>Boston 7 at Washington 1</p><p>Chicago 3 at Vancouver 5</p><p>Buffalo 5 at Winnipeg 2</p><p>Sat. March 14</p><p>Hartford 2 at Rangers 6</p><p>Philadelphia 3 at Islanders 3</p><p>Washington 3 at Toronto 5</p><p>Colorado 1 at Montreal 2</p><p>Quebec 3 at Pittsburgh 3</p><p>Detroit 3 at St. Louis 5</p><p>Minnesota 4 at Los Angeles 10</p><p>Buffalo 1 at Vancouver 2</p><p>Sun. March 15</p><p>Toronto 4 at Philadelphia 4</p><p>Edmonton 3 at Calgary 3</p><p>Hartford 2 at Boston 4</p><p>Chicago 8 at Winnipeg 2</p><p>Colorado 0 at Quebec 3<span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span></p>

f0034-15

NHL SCOREBOARD

<p>BOSTON - O&rsquo;Connell 11,12, Middleton 38, 39, 40, 41. Jonathan 12, McNab 31. 32, 33, Cashman 24, 25, Redmond 14, Gillis 13, Crowder 10.</p><p>BUFFALO&mdash;Ramsay 19, 20, Gare 37, Ramsey 3, Schoenfeld 6. 7, 8.</p><p>CALGARY - MacMillan 23, 24, 25. 26. Lever 24, 25, Houston 14, Nilsson 40, 41, 42, Vail 27, 28, Lavallee 13. 14. Plett 34, 35, Chouinard 28, 29, 30, Russell 5.</p><p>CHICAGO - Murray 10, Sutter 35, 36, 37, Secord 11, Bulley 16, Marsh 9, Lysiak 21, Brown 8, Savard 24, Ruskowski 9, Wilson 9. 10, Marks 7, Higgins 21.</p><p>COLORADO - Gagne 17, 18. Ramage 17, 18, DeBlois 22, 23, Tambellini 20, 21.</p><p>DETROIT - Foligno 27, Peterson 4. 5, McCourt 21,22, Ogrodnick 31,32, McAdam 7, Smith 8, Korn 5, Patterson 2.</p><p>EDMONTON - Coffey 7, Semenko 11. Gretzky 50.</p><p>HARTFORD - Debol 9,10,11. Rowe 11,12. Keon 11. Howe 18, Stoughton 35, 36, Mcllhargey 1.</p><p>LOS ANGELES - St. Laurent 5, Kelly 1, Jensen 15, L. Murphy 13, Hopkins 7. Dionne 52, 53, Taylor 36. 37, 38, 39. M. Murphy 14. Luce 16. Korab 9.</p><p>MINNESOTA&mdash;Hartsburg 13, Ciccare 9, 10, Christoff 22, 23, 24, 25, Palmer 2. G. Smith 5, Younghans 4, Polich 6.</p><p>MONTREAL Shutt 32,33, 34, Lafleur 23,24, 25, 26, Langway 10, Jarvis 14.</p><p>N.Y. ISLANDERS - D. Potvin 19. Bossy 62, 63. Kallur 34. Bourne 28, 29. 30, 31, Gillies 27, 28, Tonelli 18. Trottier 26, 27, Merrick 11.</p><p>N.Y. RANGERS - Beck 8. 9, Greschner 23. Hospodar 5, Hedberg 26, 27, Nilsson 11. 12, Allison 24. Vickers 18, Duguary 12, Wallin 1, Gillis 8.</p><p>PHILADELPHIA - Propp 23, 24. 25, Flockhart 3. Leach 31.32, 33, Clarke 18. Barber 42. Linseman 14, 15. MacLeish 33, 34, Gorence 22,23. Murray 1.</p><p>PITTSBURGH - Goulet 29, 30, Hunter 15, Richard 41. 42, 43. 44, Cloutier 8, 9, 10, P. Stastny 30, A. Stastny 34, Tardif 18, Ftorek 20, 21. Hoganson 3, Weir 6.</p><p>ST. LOUIS - Petterson 33, 34, Patey 21, Maxwell 2, LaPointe 8. Currie 20, Hart 3, Babych 50, Zuke 22, 23, Chapman 20, Federko 26, Turnbull 31.</p><p>TORONTO - Vaive 26, 27. 28, Sittier 36, 37, 38, 29, 40. Martin 15,16, Derlago 24, Turnbull 18, Paiement 35.</p><p>VANCOUVER - Minor 8, MacDonald 20, 21. Gradin 18, Williams 29, Brasar 16, Smyl 23, Rota 21,22.</p><p>WASHINGTON - Currie 2, 3, 4, Gartner 38, 39, Pronovost 21, 22. Maruk 41, 42. Kelly 23, Ververgaert 13, Rausse 1, Tookey 3.</p><p>WINNIPEG - Lindstrom 18. 19. Plantery 1. Wilson 17, Trimper 11, Dupont 26. Manery 9.</p><p>Four-goal games&mdash;Taylor. Los Angeles.</p><p>Hat tricks&mdash;Schoenfeld. Buffalo, MacMillan, Calgary. Debol, Hartford, and Sittier, Toronto, 1 each.<span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span></p>

NHL Scorers This Week

<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-01396/4441005-1-eng-US/f0034-012.jpg" title="f0034-01" width="258" height="377"></div><h2><b>Sun. March 8 ST. LOUIS 7, COLORADO 0</b></h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-02324/4440998-1-eng-US/f0034-022.jpg" title="f0034-02" width="579" height="639"></div><h2><b>DETROIT 4, RANGERS 4</b></h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-03236/4440991-1-eng-US/f0034-032.jpg" title="f0034-03" width="579" height="802"></div><h2><b>PHILADELPHIA 4. BUFFALO 8</b></h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-04152/4440984-1-eng-US/f0034-042.jpg" title="f0034-04" width="581" height="1053"></div><h2><b>CALGARY 5, HARTFORD 4</b></h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-05111/4440977-1-eng-US/f0034-052.jpg" title="f0034-05" width="609" height="736"></div><h2><b>EDMONTON 4, PITTSBURGH 6</b></h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-0685/4440970-1-eng-US/f0034-062.jpg" title="f0034-06" width="607" height="856"></div><h2><b>LOS ANGELES 4, WINNIPEG 1</b></h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-0776/4440963-1-eng-US/f0034-072.jpg" title="f0034-07" width="597" height="602"></div><h2><b>VANCOUVER 1, BOSTON 4</b></h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-0869/4440956-1-eng-US/f0034-082.jpg" title="f0034-08" width="599" height="653"></div><h2><b>CHICAGO 3, QUEBEC 2</b></h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-0959/4440949-1-eng-US/f0034-092.jpg" title="f0034-09" width="608" height="937"></div><h2><b>Mon. March 9 MONTREAL 1, MINNESOTA 1</b></h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-1056/4440942-1-eng-US/f0034-102.jpg" title="f0034-10" width="599" height="448"></div><h2><b>Tue. March 10 RANGERS 4, QUEBEC 6</b></h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-1151/4440935-1-eng-US/f0034-112.jpg" title="f0034-11" width="608" height="928"></div><h2><b>VANCOUVER 2, CALGARY 11</b></h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-1249/4440928-1-eng-US/f0034-122.jpg" title="f0034-12" width="598" height="980"></div><h2><b>COLORADO 3, WASHINGTON 4</b></h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-1342/4440921-1-eng-US/f0034-132.jpg" title="f0034-13" width="589" height="757"></div><h2><b>HARTFORD 4, DETROIT 4</b></h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0036-01354/4440914-1-eng-US/f0036-012.jpg" title="f0036-01" width="578" height="698"></div><h2><b>Wed. March 11 COLORADO 4, RANGERS 3</b></h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0036-02262/4440907-1-eng-US/f0036-022.jpg" title="f0036-02" width="584" height="772"></div><h2><b>ISLANDERS 6, WINNIPEG 3</b></h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0036-03195/4440900-1-eng-US/f0036-032.jpg" title="f0036-03" width="576" height="864"></div><h2><b>WASHINGTON 5, HARTFORD 2</b></h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0036-04125/4440893-1-eng-US/f0036-042.jpg" title="f0036-04" width="615" height="681"></div><h2><b>MONTREAL 2, PITTSBURGH 1</b></h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0036-0590/4440886-1-eng-US/f0036-052.jpg" title="f0036-05" width="616" height="592"></div><h2><b>CHICAGO 4, LOS ANGELES 4</b></h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0036-0671/4440879-1-eng-US/f0036-062.jpg" title="f0036-06" width="596" height="628"></div><h2><b>ST. LOUIS 5, QUEBEC 5</b></h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0036-0767/4440872-1-eng-US/f0036-072.jpg" title="f0036-07" width="602" height="810"></div><h2><b>BOSTON 4, TORONTO 4</b></h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0036-0862/4440865-1-eng-US/f0036-082.jpg" title="f0036-08" width="608" height="820"></div><h2><b>BUFFALO 1, MINNESOTA 3</b></h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0036-0956/4440858-1-eng-US/f0036-092.jpg" title="f0036-09" width="596" height="620"></div><h2><b>Thu. March 12 ISLANDERS 5, EDMONTON 0</b></h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0036-1053/4440851-1-eng-US/f0036-102.jpg" title="f0036-10" width="598" height="578"></div><h2><b>DETROIT 4, PHILADELPHIA 9</b></h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0036-1150/4440844-1-eng-US/f0036-112.jpg" title="f0036-11" width="610" height="1030"></div><h2><b>MINNESOTA 3, CALGARY 6</b></h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0036-1246/4440837-1-eng-US/f0036-122.jpg" title="f0036-12" width="606" height="744"></div><h2><b>ST. LOUIS 3, MONTREAL 4</b></h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0036-1343/4440830-1-eng-US/f0036-132.jpg" title="f0036-13" width="576" height="977"></div><h2><b>Fri. March 13 BOSTON 7, WASHINGTON 1</b></h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0036-1439/4440823-1-eng-US/f0036-142.jpg" title="f0036-14" width="580" height="624"></div><h2><b>CHICAGO 3, VANCOUVER 5</b></h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0036-1539/4440816-1-eng-US/f0036-152.jpg" title="f0036-15" width="582" height="855"></div><h2><b>BUFFALO 5, WINNIPEG 2</b></h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0037-02215/4440809-1-eng-US/f0037-022.jpg" title="f0037-02" width="578" height="658"></div><h2><b>Sat. March 14 HARTFORD 2, RANGERS 6</b></h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0037-03155/4440802-1-eng-US/f0037-032.jpg" title="f0037-03" width="584" height="996"></div><h2><b>PHILADELPHIA 3, ISLANDERS 3</b></h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0037-04124/4440795-1-eng-US/f0037-042.jpg" title="f0037-04" width="578" height="668"></div><h2><b>WASHINGTON 3, TORONTO 5</b></h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0037-05103/4440788-1-eng-US/f0037-052.jpg" title="f0037-05" width="572" height="870"></div><span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span>

f0034-01

NATIONAL LEAGUE SUMMARIES

<h2><b>AMERICAN LEAGUE (Standings on Tue. March 17)</b></h2><h3>NORTHERN DIVISION</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0035-01374/4441279-1-eng-US/f0035-012.jpg" title="f0035-01" width="542" height="142"></div><h3>SOUTHERN DIVISION</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0035-02301/4441272-1-eng-US/f0035-022.jpg" title="f0035-02" width="545" height="264"></div><h3>GAMES COMPLETED</h3><p>Tue. March 10</p><p>Adirondack 2 at Nova Scotia 1</p><p>Wed. March 11</p><p>Maine 5 at N. Brunswick 4</p><p>Binghamton 6 at New Haven 3</p><p>Fri. March 13</p><p>Adirondack 1 at New Haven 5</p><p>Maine 5 at Nova Scotia 3</p><p>Binghamton 3 at Rochester 4</p><p>Hershey 3 at Springfield 6</p><p>Sat. March 14</p><p>Rochester 4 at Binghamton 7</p><p>N. Brunswick 6 at Hershey 4</p><p>Adirondack 3 at Springfield 4</p><p>Sun. March 15</p><p>Springfield 1 at Adirondack 5</p><p>Binghamton 5 at New Haven 3</p><p>Maine 3 at Nova Scotia 7</p><p>N. Brunswick 4 at Rochester 2</p><h3>LEADING SCORERS</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0035-03229/4441265-1-eng-US/f0035-032.jpg" title="f0035-03" width="542" height="384"></div><h3>GOALTENDING RECORDS</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0035-04184/4441258-1-eng-US/f0035-042.jpg" title="f0035-04" width="543" height="91"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0035-05144/4441251-1-eng-US/f0035-052.jpg" title="f0035-05" width="545" height="450"></div><h2><b>CENTRAL LEAGUE (Standings on Tue. March 17)</b></h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0035-06125/4441244-1-eng-US/f0035-062.jpg" title="f0035-06" width="549" height="387"></div><h3>GAMES COMPLETED</h3><p>Mon. March 9</p><p>Salt Lake 1 at Indianapolis 5</p><p>Fri. March 13</p><p>Tulsa 1 at Dallas 4</p><p>Okla. City 2 at Indianapolis 6</p><p>Sat. March 14</p><p>Fort Worth 2 at Dallas 3</p><p>Salt Lake 6 at Wichita 4</p><p>Sun. March 15</p><p>Tulsa 4 at Dallas 2</p><p>Okla. City 3 at Indianapolis 4</p><p>Salt Lake 1 at Wichita 6</p><h3>LEADING SCORERS</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0035-07116/4441237-1-eng-US/f0035-072.jpg" title="f0035-07" width="538" height="306"></div><h3>GOALTENDING RECORDS</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0035-0897/4441230-1-eng-US/f0035-082.jpg" title="f0035-08" width="574" height="516"></div><h2><b>INTERNATIONAL LEAGUE (Standings on Tue. March 17)</b></h2><h3>EAST DIVISION</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0035-0993/4441223-1-eng-US/f0035-092.jpg" title="f0035-09" width="537" height="137"></div><h3>WEST DIVISION</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0035-1083/4441216-1-eng-US/f0035-102.jpg" title="f0035-10" width="548" height="249"></div><h3>GAMES COMPLETED</h3><p>Tue. March 10</p><p>Saginaw 5 at Milwaukee 5</p><p>Wed. March 11</p><p>Flint 1 at Saginaw 5</p><p>Muskegon 1 at Kalamazoo 7</p><p>Port Huron 6 at Milwaukee 4</p><p>Fort Wayne 2 at Toledo 3</p><p>Fri. March 13</p><p>Fort Wayne 1 at Port Huron 4</p><p>Sat. March 14</p><p>Saginaw 4 at Port Huron 5</p><p>Fort Wayne 0 at Kalamazoo 7</p><p>Toledo 4 at Muskegon 7</p><p>Flint 5 at Milwaukee 6</p><p>Sun. March 15</p><p>Saginaw 1 at Fort Wayne 2</p><p>Milwaukee 6 at Flint 1</p><p>Toledo 3 at Kalamazoo 6</p><p>Port Huron 4 at Muskegon 3</p><h3>LEADING SCORERS</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0035-1178/4441209-1-eng-US/f0035-112.jpg" title="f0035-11" width="557" height="310"></div><h3>GOALTENDING RECORDS</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0035-1268/4441202-1-eng-US/f0035-122.jpg" title="f0035-12" width="572" height="526"></div><h2><b>EASTERN LEAGUE (Standings on Tue. March 17)</b></h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0035-1359/4441195-1-eng-US/f0035-132.jpg" title="f0035-13" width="559" height="277"></div><h3>GAMES COMPLETED</h3><p>Tue. March 10</p><p>Hampton 2 at Salem 3</p><p>Thu. March 12</p><p>Baltimore 5 at Hampton 4</p><p>Fri. March 13</p><p>Richmond 7 at Baltimore 4</p><p>Sat. March 14</p><p>Erie 6 at Hampton 5</p><p>Salem 4 at Baltimore 1</p><h2>Sun. March 15 Salem 3 at Hampton 6</h2><h3>LEADING SCORERS</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0035-1448/4441188-1-eng-US/f0035-142.jpg" title="f0035-14" width="544" height="305"></div><h3>GOALTENDING RECORDS</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0035-1544/4441181-1-eng-US/f0035-152.jpg" title="f0035-15" width="542" height="335"></div><span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span>

f0035-01

MINOR SCOREBOARD

<p>1&mdash;Montreal</p><p>2&mdash;Chicago</p><p>3&mdash;Boston</p><p>4&mdash;Rangers</p><p>5&mdash;Detroit</p><p>6&mdash;Toronto</p><p>7&mdash;Philadelphia</p><p>8&mdash;Los Angeles</p><p>9&mdash;St Louis</p><p>10&mdash;Minnesota</p><p>11&mdash;Pittsburgh</p><p>12&mdash;Islanders</p><p>13&mdash;Vancouver</p><p>14&mdash;Buffalo</p><p>15&mdash;Calgary</p><p>16&mdash;Washington</p><p>17&mdash;Colorado</p><p>18&mdash;Edmonton</p><p>19&mdash;Hartford,</p><p>20&mdash;Quebec</p><p>21&mdash;Winnepeg</p><h2>OTHER AFFILIATIONS</h2><p>22&mdash;Chicago&mdash;Toronto</p><p>23&mdash;Pittsburgh&mdash;Hartford</p><p>24&mdash;Boston & independent</p><p>25&mdash;Minnesota&mdash;Rangers&mdash;Philadelphia</p><p>26&mdash;Chicago&mdash;Montreal</p><p>27&mdash;Winnipeg&mdash;Vancouver&mdash;Islanders</p><p>28&mdash;Edmonton&mdash;Toronto&mdash;Quebec</p><p>29&mdash;Colorado&mdash;Calgary</p><p>30&mdash;Buffalo&mdash;Washington&mdash;St. Louis</p><p>31&mdash;Los Angeles&mdash;Boston&mdash;Hartford</p><p>32&mdash;Quebec&mdash;Buffalo</p><p>33&mdash;Winnipeg&mdash;Rangers</p><p>34&mdash;Boston&mdash;Detroit</p><p>35&mdash;Toronto&mdash;St. Louis<span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span></p>

Who They’re Affiliated With…

<h2><b>ONTARIO LEAGUE (Final Standings)</b></h2><h3>LEYDEN DIVISION</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0035-1639/4441460-1-eng-US/f0035-162.jpg" title="f0035-16" width="537" height="191"></div><h3>EMMS DIVISION</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0035-1728/4441453-1-eng-US/f0035-172.jpg" title="f0035-17" width="548" height="190"></div><h3>GAMES COMPLETED</h3><p>Tue. March 10</p><p>Ottawa 3 at Kingston 5</p><p>Niagara Falls 4 at Sudbury 8</p><p>Wed. March 11</p><p>Niagara Falls 3 at S. Ste. Marie 6</p><p>Thu. March 12</p><p>Toronto 0 at Peterborough 8</p><p>London 5 at Windsor 12</p><p>Kingston 6 at Oshawa 7</p><p>Fri. March 13</p><p>Windsor 6 at London 3</p><p>Oshawa 7 at Ottawa 5</p><p>Niagara Falls 3 at Kitchener 5</p><p>S. Ste. Marie 5 at Sudbury 2</p><p>Peterborough 4 at Toronto 5</p><p>Brantford 7 at Kingston 5</p><p>Sat. March 14</p><p>Sudbury 8 at Brantford 2</p><p>Sun. March 15</p><p>Toronto 4 at Brantford 5</p><p>Sudbury 3 at Kingston 5</p><p>Windsor 6 at Oshawa 7</p><p>Peterborough 2 at Kitchener 3</p><p>London 3 at Ottawa 5</p><h3>FINAL SCORING LEADERS</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0035-1825/4441446-1-eng-US/f0035-182.jpg" title="f0035-18" width="542" height="627"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0035-1922/4441439-1-eng-US/f0035-192.jpg" title="f0035-19" width="542" height="122"></div><h2><b>WESTERN LEAGUE (Standings on Mon. March 9)</b></h2><h3>WEST DIVISION</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0035-2021/4441432-1-eng-US/f0035-202.jpg" title="f0035-20" width="546" height="165"></div><h3>EAST DIVISION</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0035-2115/4441425-1-eng-US/f0035-212.jpg" title="f0035-21" width="546" height="246"></div><h3>GAMES COMPLETED</h3><p>Mon. March 9</p><p>Spokane 7 at Calgary 5</p><p>Tue. March 10</p><p>Portland 4 at Victoria 5</p><p>Billings 6 at Brandon 7</p><p>Spokane 2 at Medicine Hat 7</p><p>New Est 3 at Seattle 7</p><p>Wed. March 11</p><p>Victoria 9 at New West 2</p><p>Winnipeg 4 at Regina 7</p><p>Saskatoon 1 at Lethbridge 7</p><p>Brandon 2 at Calgary 3</p><p>Thu. March 12</p><p>Billings 3 at Winnipeg 3</p><p>Fri. March 13</p><p>Brandon 4 at Calgary 7</p><p>Victoria 7 at Seattle 3</p><p>Medicine Hat 5 at Lethbridge 4</p><p>Regina 10 at Saskatoon 7</p><p>Sat. March 14</p><p>Portland 5 at Seattle 4</p><p>Brandon 4 at Medicine Hat 3</p><p>Spokane 1 at Victoria 10</p><p>Billings 4 at Winnipeg 3</p><p>Sun. March 15</p><p>Victoria 7 at New West 1</p><p>Lethbridge 4 at Regina 5</p><p>Brandon 5 at Saskatoon 4</p><h3>LEADING SCORERS</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0035-2212/4441418-1-eng-US/f0035-222.jpg" title="f0035-22" width="539" height="329"></div><h2><b>QUEBEC LEAGUE (Standings on Mon. March 16)</b></h2><h3>DILIO DIVISION</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0035-2312/4441411-1-eng-US/f0035-232.jpg" title="f0035-23" width="552" height="163"></div><h3>LEBEL DIVISION</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0035-2411/4441404-1-eng-US/f0035-242.jpg" title="f0035-24" width="541" height="165"></div><h3>GAMES COMPLETED</h3><p>Mon. March 9</p><p>Sorel 6 at Laval 3</p><p>Montreal 3 at Quebec 0</p><p>Tue. March 10</p><p>Cornwall 3 at T-Rivieres 8</p><p>Thu. March 12</p><p>Montreal 4 at Hull 2</p><p>Fri. March 13</p><p>Chicoutimi 4 at Montreal 2</p><p>Laval 1 at Quebec 8</p><p>Cornwall 5 at Shawinigan 7</p><p>Sorel 1 at Sherbrooke 2</p><p>Sun. March 15</p><p>Montreal 7 at Chicoutimi 2</p><p>T-Rlvieres 4 at Cornwall 5</p><p>Quebec 4 at Laval 7</p><p>Shawinigan 3 at Sherbrooke 4</p><p>Hull 2 at Sorel 8</p><h3>LEADING SCORERS</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0035-2511/4441397-1-eng-US/f0035-252.jpg" title="f0035-25" width="547" height="330"></div><h2><b>OHA INTERMEDIATE</b></h2><p><b>(Final Standings)</b></p><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0035-2610/4441390-1-eng-US/f0035-262.jpg" title="f0035-26" width="549" height="224"></div><h3>LEADING SCORERS</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0035-278/4441383-1-eng-US/f0035-272.jpg" title="f0035-27" width="546" height="440"></div><h3>GOALTENDING RECORDS</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0035-288/4441376-1-eng-US/f0035-282.jpg" title="f0035-28" width="535" height="250"></div><h3>PLAYOFFS</h3><p>Quarter-Finals</p><p>Collingwood 7, Barrie 4</p><p>Collingwood 6, Barrie 4</p><p>Collingwood 6, Barrie 1</p><p>(Collingwood wins best-of-five series 3-0)</p><p>Owen Sound 3, Port Elgin 1</p><p>Owen Sound 7, Port Elgin 4</p><p>Owen Sound 6, Port Elgin 3</p><p>(Owen Sound wins best-of-five series 3-0)</p><p>Semi-Finals</p><p>Owen Sound 7, Collingwood 5</p><p>Owen Sound 6, Collingwood 4</p><p>Collingwood 6, Owen Sound 4</p><p>(Owen Sound wins best-of-seven series 4-2)</p><p>Georgetown 7, Orillia 3</p><p>Georgetown 4, Orillia 3</p><p>Georgetown 8, Orillia 1</p><p>Georgetown 7, Orillia 5</p><p>(Georgetown wins best-of-seven series 4-0)</p><p>Finals</p><p>Georgetown 9, Owen Sound 6</p><p>Georgetown 7, Owen Sound 2</p><p>(Georgetown leads best-of-seven series 2-0)</p><h2><b>UNITED STATES LEAGUE (Standings on Sat. March 7)</b></h2><h3>NORTHERN DIVISION</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0035-298/4441369-1-eng-US/f0035-292.jpg" title="f0035-29" width="544" height="134"></div><h3>SOUTHERN DIVISION</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0035-308/4441362-1-eng-US/f0035-302.jpg" title="f0035-30" width="540" height="140"></div><h3>LEADING SCORERS</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0035-318/4441355-1-eng-US/f0035-312.jpg" title="f0035-31" width="545" height="413"></div><h2><b>ONTARIO SENIOR LEAGUE (Final Standings)</b></h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0035-328/4441348-1-eng-US/f0035-322.jpg" title="f0035-32" width="538" height="223"></div><h3>LEADING SCORERS</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0035-338/4441341-1-eng-US/f0035-332.jpg" title="f0035-33" width="544" height="629"></div><h3>GOALTENDING RECORDS</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0035-347/4441334-1-eng-US/f0035-342.jpg" title="f0035-34" width="541" height="280"></div><span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span>

f0035-16

AMATEUR SCOREBOARD

<div class="byline">BY CHARLIE HALPIN</div><p class="dropcap"><span>T</span>ORONTO&mdash;If the National Hockey League achieves the ultimate and establishes a new attendance record&mdash;and the chances are good they will&mdash;then much of the credit for the new crowd surge belongs to the new expansion teams.</p><p>Buoyed by turnstile increases in Edmonton. Hartford. Quebec and Winnipeg, the NHL continued to push towards an attendance high after the 21 teams registered an 134,832 box office gain for the first 30 home games of the 1980-81 season.</p><p>In the third of four quarterly attendance reports published and compiled by THE HOCKEY NEWS and covering the first 30 home games of each of the 21 teams, the NHL&rsquo;s total crowd figure reached 8,382,621, up from 8,247,789 at the same time in last year&rsquo;s schedule. The hefty boost puts the NHL in a position of needing only 2,152,000 fans in the final quarter of the season to surpass the league&rsquo;s turnstile high of 10,533,623 for an 840-game schedule set last season.</p><p>All indications point towards a new attendance mark for the NHL primarily because league crowds have been moving steadily upwards since the season began last October. The NHL drew 2,700,612 for the first 10-game quarter, 2,789,395 for the second 10 and 2,892,614 for the recently-completed third 10-game quarter. With playoff positions still up in the air, NHL crowds tend to inflate at this time of the year as the April 5 schedule closing date approaches. Speculation is that the NHL will probably pull in 2,900,000 fans for its final 210 home games to finish the year with a new mark of approximately 1 1,283,621, well above last year&rsquo;s record figure.</p><p>The Edmonton Oilers and New York Rangers continued to run neck-and-neck for the box office lead in the NHL with both teams over 500,000. The Oilers, who barely nudged the Rangers from the top this season and have managed to hold firm in first place, were the 30-game quarterly leaders again, with 522,527 fans. The Rangers were right behind with 520,595.</p><p>But the significant change in the league&rsquo;s upward trend lies with the NHL&rsquo;s newest teams. Hartford attracted 351,061 to its first 30 home games, which is a whopping 105,149 fans more than the Whalers managed last season at this time. Edmonton was 60.040 ahead; the Quebec Nordiques, with their newly extended seating capacity in the Colisee. showed an increase of 17.244 and Winnipeg was up by 4.884.</p><p>Still, the league needed a helping hand from St. Louis, Washington, Minnesota and Los Angeles to establish its overall fan raise over last season. The Blues, who ranked 12th in attendance at the midway point in the schedule, jumped into 10th spot with 405,778 fans, a total of 60,844 more than last year&rsquo;s attendance after 30 home starts in the Checkerdome. The Washington Caps, who have strengthened their playoff hopes in recent weeks after compiling a 13-game winless streak, are delighting their owners at the box office. The Caps drew 356,898 fans, an increase of 58,580 over 1979-80. Minnesota was up by 30.732 and the contending L.A. Kings were 20.708 ahead of last season.</p><p>As they have in the past, the NHL continues to depend on its box office giants to maintain its healthy box office picture. Teams like Montreal. Toronto, Buffalo. Philadelphia and the two New York clubs, the Rangers and Islanders, are repeatedly playing before sold-out crowds. The NHL reported 275 sellouts in the first 630 home games.<span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span></p>

New Teams Give NHL Shot At Crowd Record

f0037-01

How NHL Attendance Looks

<div class="byline">BY MARY-LESLIE ULLMAN</div><h2>Johnson Named Coach</h2><p class="dropcap"><b><span>B</span>OB JOHNSON, COACH</b> at the University of Wisconsin, and formerly of the 1976 U.S. Olympic hockey team, will replace Herb Brooks as coach of the 1981 U.S. national team, which is scheduled to compete in the 1IHF (International Ice Hockey Federation) World Championships in Sweden, April 12-26.</p><p>Brooks, who had offered his services to the AHAUS (Amateur Hockey Association of the United States) as coach of this year&rsquo;s national team several months ago, had declined the position due to personal reasons.</p><p>Johnson remarked of his appointment, &ldquo;I am delighted to be involved again in international hockey. I found it a very rewarding experience in previous years.&rdquo;</p><p>Johnson, a native of Minneapolis, Minn., coached the 1976 U.S. Olympic Team to a fourth place finish in Innsbruck. From 1973 through 1975, Johnson coached the U.S. national team and in 1976 received the Meritorious Service Award from AHAUS. He currently serves as a consultant to the President&rsquo;s Commission on Olympic Sports.</p><p>Johnson recently completed his 15th year of coaching the University of Wisconsin Badgers. In those years he has compiled a 328-163-21 record.</p><p>Five of his teams made it to the NCAA tournament, with the 1973 and 1977 teams capturing national titles.</p><p>Nine of Wisconsin&rsquo;s players under Johnson&rsquo;s coaching have been honored by being named to the All-American team 12 times. Johnson was honored by his peers in 1977 by being named WCHA &ldquo;Coach of the Year.&rdquo;</p><p>The 1981 World Championships will commence on Sunday April 12, with the USA meeting Czechoslovakia in first-round, Pool B action at Gothenburg. Following that match-up, the USA will face Sweden on Tuesday, and Germany on Wednesday. Teams in the Pool A include Russia, Holland, Canada, and Finland. They will play their preliminary games in Stockholm. At the conclusion of the opening &ldquo;A&rdquo; and &ldquo;B&rdquo; rounds, the final round will get underway in Gothenburg on Friday, April 17.</p><p>The 1981 U.S. national team is once again open to both amateur and professional players, as a result of the return to an &ldquo;open&rdquo; format for the 1981 Tournament. Among the candidates for the American squad will be members of the five NHL teams who do not qualify for the Stanley Cup playoffs.</p><p>The National Team will depart for Europe on April 5, after one week&rsquo;s practice, to play two exhibition games before the championships.</p><p>&ldquo;I am looking forward to the challenge of coaching the national team,&rdquo; said Johnson. &ldquo;It is always difficult to select a team at the last minute, especially when you&rsquo;re going to a world tournament with the calibre of teams present. Those teams are the finest in the world.&rdquo;</p><h2>Upcoming Clinics, Camps</h2><p><b>AHAUS WILL HOLD</b> its second Advanced Level Clinic in the Coaching Achievement Program this summer in Colorado Springs from August 16-23. Last year&rsquo;s clinic included over 130 top coaches from around the country.</p><p>AHAUS will also hold three Midget Regional Camps in August in Colorado Springs and its Midget National Camp from July 5-11. The Midget classification includes boys from age 16 and under.</p><p>AHAUS Junior Olympic Trials will be held from June 20&mdash;July 4 at the U.S. Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs.</p><p>The 1981 AHAUS National Championships will be held at the following sites: Pee Wee, Lansing, Michigan; Bantam, Indianapolis, Indiana; Midget, Tonawanda, New York; Junior C, King of Prussia, PA, all from April 3-5; Junior B, Totawa, New Jersey, from March 26-29; Junior A, Green Bay, Wisconsin, April 9-12; U.S. Mens Intermediate, Fond-du-Lac, Wisconsin, to be announced; Girls, Lake Placid, New York, April 3-5.</p><p>The AHAUS&rsquo; Executive Committee, upon the recommendation of the Rules and Safety Committees, has approved the Easton Aluminum hockey stick shaft.</p><p>Easton Aluminum, a division of Jas. D. Easton, Inc. of Van Nuys, Calif., is seeking a manufacturer to market the shaft with their blade.</p><p>Results from the pros who have tried the revolutionary aluminum shafts have been, according to Easton&rsquo;s John Magadini, &ldquo;really good, in fact, outstanding.&rdquo;</p><h2>Awards For Olympians</h2><p><b>RECOGNITION AWARDS</b> for the 1981 U.S. Olympic hockey team have been pouring in during the past few weeks as the month of February marked the anniversary of the squad&rsquo;s gold medal finish in Lake Placid.</p><p><i>Sports Illustrated&rsquo;s</i> &ldquo;Sportsmen of the Year&rdquo; award was given to the hockey team and announced in that magazine&rsquo;s year-end issue. An update of the whereabouts of the team members highlighted the commemorative piece by E. M. Swift.</p><p>The Associated Press awarded the Olympic Team their Jesse Owens Memorial Award for &ldquo;Outstanding Male Athlete(s) of the Year.&rdquo; Co-sponsored by the Tampa (Florida) Sports Club, the award will be presented in March by Mrs. Owens.</p><p>The National Sportswriters and Sportscasters Association will present its &ldquo;Headliner of the Year&rdquo; award to both the U.S. Hockey Team and Kansas City Royals&rsquo; star, George Brett.</p><p>ABC Sports, the network which televised the 1980 Olympics and will televise both the 1984 Winter and Summer games, will present their &ldquo;Athlete of the Year&rdquo; award to the U.S.A. Team in April.</p><p>In addition, Pro Comfort, a division of Scholl, which makes accessories for the weekend athlete, presented its &ldquo;Great Feats&rdquo; of 1980 gold medal to the hockey team.<span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span></p>

THE U.S. AMATEUR SCENE

<div class="byline">BY STEVE WINTER</div><p class="dropcap"><span>L</span>ANDOVER&mdash;Four weeks ago, the Capitals&rsquo; first playoff berth in their seven-year existence was seemingly in the bag. Nestled securely in the thick of the National Hockey League standings with 52 points after 55 games, coach Gary Green&rsquo;s guaranteed playoff projection of 69 points by season&rsquo;s end appeared within easy reach.</p><p>But now, as the season winds down toward that infamous &ldquo;stretch run,&rdquo; the Washington Capitals find themselves facing the possibility of history repeating itself. With 14 games to play, the Capitals sat tied with Toronto and Edmonton for 15th place with 56 points; and technically out of the playoffs on the basis of fewer wins than the others.</p><p>What were the reasons behind this rapid decline?</p><p>First of all. the Capitals hit a disastrous slump which saw them go 13 consecutive games without a win&mdash;their longest winless streak all season long.</p><p>Secondly&mdash;and in part a chief contributor to that 13-game skein&mdash;was their disastrous goals-against. In one 12-game stretch, they allowed 72 goals, an average of 6.00 per game, two of which were ties. To their credit, the club has been scoring goals in bunches, but often they&rsquo;ve been scored after the outcome has long since been determined. And anyway, a high-powered offense and a porous defense never took a team past the first round of the Stanley Cup playoffs, let alone a berth therein.&rdquo; We have had some bad goals scored against us.&rdquo; said Gary, Green, following a 6-3 home loss to the) Calgary Flames - the 12th non-win during the streak. &ldquo;And that&rsquo;s something we can&rsquo;t have if we are to get this monkey off our backs and get out of this slump.</p><p>&ldquo;Right now. this team can&rsquo;t take those bad goals scored against us. They should be able to though, under normal circumstances.&rdquo;</p><p>These, however, are anything but normal circumstances. Case in point is the recent play of goaltenders Mike Palmateer and Dave Parro. Solid and steady if not spectacular at times during the course of the season, both goalies have allowed questionable goals during the slump. Against the Flames. Parro&mdash;normally a stand-up goaltender&mdash;flopped to the ice and looked bad while Guy Chouinard scored easily on a breakaway. A few moments later, he waved at a Kent Nilsson slapshot from center ice and Calgary had a 2-0 lead.</p><p>Palmateer. meanwhile, has fared no better. He allowed eight goals in the first two periods of an 11-7 loss to Quebec, and later permitted seven in two periods as the Capitals lost, 7-5, to Pittsburgh.</p><p>&ldquo;I can&rsquo;t seem to put my finger on the goaltending situation,&rdquo; Green said, &ldquo;outside of possibly a lack of concentration.</p><p>&ldquo;I guess that&rsquo;s the biggest item that&rsquo;s seemingly lacking, because all our goaltenders have the ability. But right now. we need good goaltending to pull out of this. Our players have to have the confidence that they don&rsquo;t have to back in; that the shot is going to be stopped by the goaltender. It has to start just like when you try to build your hockey club. You&rsquo;ve got to try to build from the pipes out. and whenever you go into a slump, that&rsquo;s where you have to start as well. The guy between the posts has to start it for you, and he has to play one helluva hockey game. The confidence sifts out from there.&rdquo;</p><p>Despite the problems, Green has managed to maintain his air of confidence, claiming all was not as yet lost, and the end to their prolonged slump was clearly in sight.</p><p>And many of the players on the club still share Green&rsquo;s confidence.</p><p>&ldquo;We just can&rsquo;t give up,&rdquo; said defenseman Howard Walker, &ldquo;We&rsquo;ve just got-to keep going; from game-to-game and day-to-day, until we break out of it.</p><p>&ldquo;It&rsquo;s not over for us. We&rsquo;re not dead. We&rsquo;ll break out of it.&rdquo;</p><p>Perhaps it was best said by Green himself as he left the post-game news conference following the loss to the Flames:</p><p>&ldquo;I haven&rsquo;t given up hope, gentlemen. It still can be done.&rdquo;</p><p>The Caps took a step in the right direction when they scored a 7-3 triumph over the Maple Leafs in Landover to grab a tie for 15th place in the standings. Dennis Maruk led the way with three goals, including his 40th of the season, establishing a new Caps&rsquo; record by surpassing the 38 scored by Guy Charron in 1977-78.</p><p>Then they won 5-2 in Hartford before running into the Bruins and a 7-1 loss.<span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span></p>

Capitals Losing Grip On ‘Easy’ Playoff Berth

<div class="byline">BY HARVEY ROSEN</div><div class="image-hero"><img title="f0039-01" src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0039-01346/4441656-1-eng-US/f0039-012.jpg"><figcaption class="caption-body">Peter Sullivan&rsquo;s age, 29, is a factor which mitigates against the youthful Jets employing him.</figcaption></div><p class="dropcap"><span>W</span>INNIPEG&mdash;Game in and game out, media members in the Jets&rsquo; press lounge may, if they so desire, help themselves to pieces of chicken as a snack. Many complain that there ought to be some variety in the bill of fare.</p><p>Players, not suited up for the game, often drift into the lounge and avail themselves of the opportunity to bite into a succulent leg or wing and are rarely heard making a disparaging remark, since for that group it&rsquo;s a rather novel and infrequent circumstance.</p><p>One Jets&rsquo; skater who has made an inordihate number of visits to the press box area, somewhat reluctantly, is center Peter Sullivan. And like the members of the press, he too must be a mite miffed at the limited menu.</p><p>The Toronto native isn&rsquo;t a complainer, but he craves ice time more than he does fowl. He dressed for but 36 of the club&rsquo;s first 65 games. And even those numbers are deceiving since in so many instances he has been limited to a shift or two per match.</p><p>A rather strange and unpredictable situation since the diminutive but muscular veteran scored 24 goals and added 35 assists for 59 points last season. His total points and goal production ranked second on the &lsquo;79-80 squad.</p><p>In sharp contrast, this campaign has been one bad trip. Peter has but two goals and 14 assists. On November 27, he scored a meaningless goal in Hartford with only nine seconds left in the game in an 8-4 setback.</p><p>On February 6 in Edmonton, he added an equally insignificant marker as the Oilers thrashed the Jets 10-4.</p><p>All season long he has been caught in one of those frustrating &ldquo;Catch 22&rdquo; situations. He isn&rsquo;t being played since he isn&rsquo;t scoring. And he can&rsquo;t score if he isn&rsquo;t playing.</p><p>Many have suggested that Sullivan is a luxury that the Jets can ill afford.</p><p>But while in most NHL rinks when a player isn&rsquo;t producing, the &ldquo;boobirds&rdquo; usually make life miserable for the unfortunate, such is not the case in hockey-hungry Winnipeg, where if Peter ran for mayor he&rsquo;d win the. election by a landslide.</p><p>In a February 3-2 loss to Pittsburgh, the 5-9, 170-pounder drew assists on both of the Jets&rsquo; power play goals. Had an applause meter been employed to measure the sound level when Sullivan&rsquo;s name was announced, it surely would have shattered the instrument.</p><p>On the weekly Hockey Hotline Show on CJOB, the broadcaster and guest coaches, either Mike Smith or Bill Sutherland are constantly bombarded with the identical query. &ldquo;Why aren&rsquo;t you playing Sullivan?&rdquo;</p><p>&ldquo;You&rsquo;re not giving me a straight answer. Smith,&rdquo; bellowed one irate caller. &ldquo;You&rsquo;re giving me the runaround just like you give everyone else who complains about Sully not playing.&rdquo;</p><p>The tactful associate coach finally professed: &ldquo;Peter does not fit into the future plans of the Jets.&rdquo; Hedging a bit, he continued, &ldquo;I mean about three years down the road.&rdquo;</p><p>Smith also added that &ldquo;in fairness to Peter, he&rsquo;s in extremely good condition. Amongst the 29-year-olds in the league, he&rsquo;s in the top two or three percent&hellip;but, yes, his age is a definite factor.&rdquo;</p><p>One might argue that Sullivan should play regularly since he is a graceful, shifty, and slick skating performer&hellip;and he entertains.</p><p>Whenever he sets up behind the net and strides up ice he causes a stir amongst the crowd and there is electricity in the air. Many fans view his rushes as the highlight of the evening in a season when there has been little to cheer about.</p><p>Oh, he has a few detractors too. Many occupy the Jets&rsquo; offices. It is oft stated that he doesn&rsquo;t take out the man; his checks score too frequently; his passes are often intercepted, and he is rarely aggressive. Jets&rsquo; GM John Ferguson suggests &ldquo;check his plusminus figures sometime.&rdquo;</p><p>There have been trade reports and it was rumored that Sullivan&rsquo;s name was placed on the waiver list in March. Calgary was apparently offered the flashy center who was the Canadiens&rsquo; 12th choice, 95th overall in 1971. But nothing materialized by the March 10 trade deadline.</p><p>Sullivan discloses that &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve never been in this position before. It&rsquo;s a help less feeling. You don&rsquo;t feel like you belong to anybody or anything.&rdquo;</p><p>He has no desire to leave the city he has dwelled in since 1975, the locale where he scored 46 goals and added 40 assists in the 78-79 World Hockey Association Avco Cup winning campaign. But he may have to. The latest word is that Sullivan just cleared waivers and could be on his way to Tulsa.</p><p>A community man who works hard for a cause, Sullivan says &ldquo;I don&rsquo;t think I can hurt the club playing regularly.&rdquo;</p><p>And game in and game out the debate continues. So does the bill of fare in the press lounge&mdash;Sullivan or no Sullivan.</p><p><b>JETS JABBER</b>&mdash;Following losses of 10-1 to Philadelphia and 9-3 to the Canadiens on the previous night, Ferguson held a meeting with the players. Citing that Fergy was upset would be an understatement&hellip;Winnipeg&rsquo;s No. 10 draft last June, 19-year-old Dave Chartier of the Brandon Wheat Kings of the WHL, figured in all his team&rsquo;s seven goals, scoring a hat trick, in a 7-4 win over Regina recently. He has 56 goals and 54 assists.<span class="end-marker"> &#9632;</span></p>

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March 27, 1981

Leafs Put All Their Eggs In Bunny Larocque’s Basket

SLAPSHOTS

NHL, COLLEGES ON U.S. TV

Late Swap Returns Quebec City Native Marois