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.

October 9, 1981

The Hockey News October 9, 1981

<div class="image-hero"><img title="f0020-02" src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0020-02443/4411817-1-eng-US/f0020-022.jpg"><figcaption class="caption-body">(Photo by Bruce Bennett)</figcaption></div>Wayne Gretzky of the Edmonton Oilers has a tough act to follow in the approaching NHL season after capturing the league scoring title and winning two individual major awards in 1980-81.The brilliant Oiler center warmed up for the new year by leading the recent Canada Cup &lsquo;81 tournament in scoring with 12 points. Despite a painful arm injury suffered against Sweden, Gretzky played every game for Team Canada and managed to score five goals.Gretzky began the exhibition schedule in fine form, scoring all of Edmonton&rsquo;s goals in a 9-3 defeat at the hands of the Buffalo Sabres. If the Oilers are to move up in the standings this year, Gretzky will again have to carry a big load on offense. &#9632;

f0020-02

IN THIS ISSUE

PLAYER OF THE WEEK

<div class="byline">BY PETER ROFFMAN and BEVERLY SIMPSON</div>&ldquo;We all go through this when the season&rsquo;s over. It&rsquo;s a shock. All of a sudden you wake up one morning and you don&rsquo;t have to go to practice. What do you do with yourself? You&rsquo;re lost. But that&rsquo;s on a lesser scale than retiring. When you retire, you know the season&rsquo;s not going to start again in four months. You know it&rsquo;s over forever.&rdquo;&mdash;Ron Ellis, former Toronto Maple Leaf.Ron Ellis&rsquo; life had centered around the Toronto Maple Leafs since he was 15 years old and left home to play for their Junior B affiliate in Toronto. For nearly two decades he was a mainstay of the team, and one of the finest two-way wingers in the game. Playing out the final year of a lucrative four-year contract, the 36-year-old intended to quit at the end of last season. But 50 games into a disastrous campaign, the Leafs decided they no longer needed his services. Rather than accept a demotion to the minors, he retired.Ellis had prepared himself carefully for the inevitability of retirement and had even left hockey for two years at the height of his professional career to join a realty firm, &ldquo;to prove to myself I could do something else.&rdquo; Still, this sudden break was a difficult one. His attachment to the team tugged at him in the first months of retirement, pulling him back to the Gardens and the fellowship of former teammates. &ldquo;It was really hard not to be with them,&rdquo; he admits. &ldquo;I found myself spending quite a bit of time around the rink, watching the workouts, having lunch with the guys. 1 was happy with the way we settled my contract, but after 50 games, another two months didn&rsquo;t seem like that much to ask&mdash;just to be with the guys.&rdquo;<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0036-01346/4412938-1-eng-US/f0036-012.jpg" title="f0036-01" width="994" height="872"><figcaption class="caption-body">After his mid-season retirement last year. Ron Ellis found himself spending a lot of time at the rink, watching the workouts and having lunch with the guys. (Photo By Robert Shaver)</figcaption></div>Despite his initial disorientation, it seems likely that Ellis will successfully make the final, difficult transition from the insular life of the hockey rink to the &ldquo;real world.&rdquo; An intelligent, intro&mdash;spective man, he always tried to keep the game in perspective, as &ldquo;a means to an end.&rdquo; With a view toward retirement, Ellis continued his university education throughout his career. Working in the off-season, he built up contacts outside the sport and established a reputation as an able businessman. With the final security hockey has given him, his biggest concern now is choosing among many opportunities that have been offered him &ldquo;a nice problem.&rdquo;Ron Ellis is one of the lucky ones. Other sports heroes, less practical, have not been so lucky. Over the last two years, innumerable stories have surfaced recounting how athletes who didn&rsquo;t properly prepare themselves for retirement have fallen from the limelight of the sports arena into hard times and despair. Bobby Hull, once the richest hockey player in the world, declared bankruptcy last year, claiming to the Winnipeg Free Press, &ldquo;I have nothing left. Just my sanity, my health and my memories.&rdquo; Hull is now in the midst of a comeback with the New York Rangers. Steve Durbano, former tough guy defenseman for the St. Louis Blues, was arrested on drug trafficking charges. Bernie Parent, the brilliant goaltender for the Philadelphia Flyers&rsquo; Stanley Cup winners in the mid-70s, revealed not long ago that he was a member of Alcoholics Anonymous.For Bill Heindl, the transition has proved even more tragic. The former international hockey star and journeyman pro couldn&rsquo;t accept a life without hockey. As he told Bob Verdi in a column that ran in this paper, &ldquo;I felt lost, I had no education, no real preparation. After 12 years of playing hockey and being told when to go to sleep, I just couldn&rsquo;t grasp being a real person all of a sudden. I became completely depressed.&rdquo; When a budding career in insurance sales faltered, he began drinking heavily. Finally his wife left him and one day in 1979. Bill Heindl went to a bridge and jumped off. breaking his back. Heindl. who now works for the Canadian Paraplegic Association from his own wheelchair, considers himself lucky to be alive: &ldquo;I felt like a failure. I even failed at suicide. But I was jolted back to life. I realized there was more to life than hockey.&rdquo;Although few athletes have been driven to such a desperate act, there seems little doubt that retirement can be a severely traumatic experience. Sports is the only milieu most professional athletes have ever known, in which they feel really comfortable. Bernie Parent discovered the shock of suddenly finding himself outside the inner circle of pro sports. Attending Flyers&rsquo; games after an eye injury forced him to quit turned out to be a hellish experience. Parent recognized too late that he was no longer in a position to determine the outcome of a game, that he was just another fan. He was overwhelmed with feelings of resentment and guilt: Resentment for not playing, guilt for what he could have been contributing to the team.It has been suggested that the problems of retiring athletes are not much different from those of the average person making a mid-life career change. But pro sports is hardly an ordinary career. The athlete is thrust into a highly competitive, egogratifying and public environment. Fans, coaches, friends and family often encourage the player to believe that he is unique. According to Jim McKenny, former defenseman for the Toronto Maple Leafs, &ldquo;You try to get people to treat you like a regular person, but they don&rsquo;t. They treat you like you&rsquo;re something special, and after a while you start believing them.&rdquo;As McKenny moved up the ranks of organized hockey, he became increasingly egotistical and isolated from the outside world: &ldquo;The more recognition you get, the more of a trip you go on. You go into junior hockey and you&rsquo;re a shooter there. Then if you make pro you get more money and more respect, but you&rsquo;re not developing yourself in other areas. You stay within the sport.&rdquo;Lulled into a false sense of security by a five-year contract his agent, Al Eagleson, negotiated for him, McKenny had no direction or interest in what he&rsquo;d do after his hockey career: &ldquo;You&rsquo;re making $100,000 a year; you figure that&rsquo;s pretty good for an army brat who came out of Ottawa. I figured I&rsquo;d never have to work, so I&rsquo;m not going to worry about it.&rdquo;By the late &lsquo;70&rsquo;s however, McKenny&rsquo;s career had begun to fade. As the Leafs sagged from Stanley Cup champions to perennial also-rans, he became the target for the Gardens&rsquo; boo-birds. He jokes that a lot of people &ldquo;won&rsquo;t have the opportunity to be booed by 17,000 people&rdquo;, but it was a humiliating experience which eroded his self-confidence. &ldquo;You go over to the bench and the guys are laughing,&rdquo; he remembers. &ldquo;My buddy [Borje] Salming&rsquo;s playing with me and he wouldn&rsquo;t go out on the ice. I said, &lsquo;Youing Swede, get out there or I&rsquo;ll break this stick over your head.&rsquo; It was a real low point. I could see the end was near.&rdquo; Soon afterwards, McKenny was traded to the Minnesota North Stars, who promptly sent him down to the minor leagues, &ldquo;where I belonged.&rdquo;At the end of the year, McKenny&rsquo;s contract expired and no NHL team wanted him. The &ldquo;golden years&rdquo; were over and Jim McKenny was completely unprepared. Like many ex-athletes who go out into he job market for the first time in their mid-30&rsquo;s or early 40&rsquo;s, McKenny found himself at a serious disadvantage competing against non-athletes who had years, sometimes decades more experience in their fields. He decided he wanted to be an actor or a model, but jobs were scarce. Once, in desperation, he put in a call to Eagleson, who had helped him so much throughout his playing days. Too proud to directly ask for a job, McKenny broadly hinted to Eagleson that he needed help. &ldquo;Well, the Eagle taught me a real lesson in life&mdash;that it&rsquo;s every man for himself.&rdquo; With McKenny&rsquo;s reputation &ldquo;for being a little flaky&rdquo;, Eagleson declined to be of any real assistance. &ldquo;Eagleson had lots of connections,&rdquo; McKenny realized, &ldquo;but he didn&rsquo;t have the confidence in me.&rdquo;With that, McKenny&rsquo;s already crumbling faith in himself began to topple. He began to think of himself as a loser&mdash;he had nothing to offer &ldquo;them&rdquo;, that is, a potential employer. While his wife supported the family as a home renovator, he would sit around the house and sulk, becoming increasingly withdrawn. McKenny began jogging in the park to keep himself in shape, to kill time. Every day. he&rsquo;d run eight or nine miles, sometimes crying as he ran. Like most Canadians, he&rsquo;d seen the headlines about Billy Heindl jumping off the bridge, and he began to identify with Heindl. He thought that if things didn&rsquo;t start getting better, he too could jump.<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0036-02258/4412931-1-eng-US/f0036-022.jpg" title="f0036-02" width="990" height="948"><figcaption class="caption-body">When Jim McKenny jumped into the job market after his hockey career came to an end, he was at a serious disadvantage competing against non-athletes with years more of experience. (Photo By Bruce Bennett)</figcaption><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0036-03191/4412924-1-eng-US/f0036-032.jpg" title="f0036-03" width="986" height="928"><figcaption class="caption-body">Former Maple Leafs&rsquo; captain George Armstrong gets a feeling of achievement from his scouting work for the Quebec Nordiques, but there&rsquo;s a certain sadness, too.</figcaption></div>That was almost a year ago. After many months of struggling, McKenny&rsquo;s life has finally began to take an upswing. A chance to do some radio shows for a large Toronto station has helped him emerge from his intense depression. Though &ldquo;they haven&rsquo;t offered a $100,000 contract.&rdquo; he is gradually learning to be a professional broadcaster. He has also accepted a job running a hockey school from a businessman &ldquo;who has confidence in me.&rdquo; It&rsquo;s only a start, but McKenny now feels sure that he will succeed in making a career change. &ldquo;If I do well, then there might be something else,&rdquo; he says with enthusiasm. &ldquo;It&rsquo;ll give me the feeling that I&rsquo;m doing something&mdash;the feeling of a win.&rdquo;Perhaps more importantly, this latest opportunity will once again involve McKenny in hockey. He confesses, &ldquo;The game is what I know. I&rsquo;m comfortable on a hockey rink.&rdquo; He is not alone in this sentiment.Former Leaf captain and Hall of Famer George Armstrong never considered taking a job outside the sport which had been his lifelong passion, confident that &ldquo;I&rsquo;d be well enough thought of by somebody in hockey to get a job.&rdquo; After a triumphant term as coach of the Toronto Marlboros, leading the junior team to two Memorial Cup championships. Armstrong decided that he would rather scout for the Quebec Nordiques than continue coaching: &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve had various opportunities to coach in the NHL, but I&rsquo;m not interested,&rdquo; he states flatly. &ldquo;Scouting is the ideal job for me&mdash;I like being involved, I like to know what&rsquo;s going on, but I don&rsquo;t want to be front and center.&rdquo; The Nordiques have treated Armstrong well and he is happy there. &ldquo;They won my allegiance,&rdquo; he says, &ldquo;by treating me like George Armstrong.&rdquo;From the vantage point of a Jim McKenny, Armstrong has achieved everything a professional athlete could hope for. He has gone from a highly successful playing career during which he won four Stanley Cups, to a tailor-made position in his sport after retiring. Still, an undercurrent of sadness is detectable in his conversation. Armstrong says he gets a feeling of achievement from doing a good job for the Nordiques, &ldquo;but nothing in life is comparable to the feeling of winning as a player. Every year at Stanley Cup time I relive the elation. I think back to our elation and get a little choked up.&rdquo; Armstrong is caught in a conundrum. Although each spring calls back for him that exalted feeling, it is only a reminder, for the emotional peak of playing on a winning team is behind him. &ldquo;It&rsquo;s a feeling of loneliness,&rdquo; he says of watching today&rsquo;s winners from the sidelines. &ldquo;It&rsquo;s like the way you feel for a deceased person you really loved. I felt that way when [ex-teammate] Tim Horton died.&rdquo;George Armstrong&rsquo;s sadness reflects a problem facing all former athletes. Though he has made a smooth transition from playing to scouting, Armstrong believes that the best days of his life have passed. There is probably no field that will ever be as fulfilling for him as playing hockey. Unlike many former NHLers who find solace playing for an oldtimers team, George Armstrong refuses to play again: &ldquo;Maybe I&rsquo;m too proud to play. If I thought I would be the best player on the ice I would, but I still have enough ego in myself not to be an Oldtimer. It&rsquo;s been a damn good ego trip but now my time in the limelight is over.&rdquo;Peter Roffman is a Toronto-based writer who has contributed stories to numerous publications. Beverly Simpson, also based in Toronto, has written numerous profiles of Canadian sports figures for the Toronto Star. &#9632;

f0036-01

Retired Players: Is There Life After Hockey?

<h2>SEPTEMBER</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0032-03196/4412487-1-eng-US/f0032-032.jpg" title="f0032-03" width="572" height="116"></div><h2>OCTOBER</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0032-04112/4412480-1-eng-US/f0032-042.jpg" title="f0032-04" width="570" height="1656"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0032-0569/4412473-1-eng-US/f0032-052.jpg" title="f0032-05" width="584" height="524"></div><h2>NOVEMBER</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0032-0649/4412466-1-eng-US/f0032-062.jpg" title="f0032-06" width="576" height="1278"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0032-0738/4412459-1-eng-US/f0032-072.jpg" title="f0032-07" width="578" height="930"></div><h2>DECEMBER</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0032-0832/4412452-1-eng-US/f0032-082.jpg" title="f0032-08" width="574" height="852"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0032-0922/4412445-1-eng-US/f0032-092.jpg" title="f0032-09" width="572" height="1096"></div><h2>JANUARY</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0032-1018/4412438-1-eng-US/f0032-102.jpg" title="f0032-10" width="584" height="684"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0032-1113/4412431-1-eng-US/f0032-112.jpg" title="f0032-11" width="574" height="1688"></div><h2>FEBRUARY</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0032-1212/4412424-1-eng-US/f0032-122.jpg" title="f0032-12" width="542" height="130"></div> &#9632;

f0032-03

Western Hockey League Schedule

<h2>SEPTEMBER</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0033-03189/4412584-1-eng-US/f0033-032.jpg" title="f0033-03" width="544" height="108"></div><h2>OCTOBER</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0033-04143/4412577-1-eng-US/f0033-042.jpg" title="f0033-04" width="565" height="848"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0033-05115/4412570-1-eng-US/f0033-052.jpg" title="f0033-05" width="559" height="583"></div><h2>NOVEMBER</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0033-0693/4412563-1-eng-US/f0033-062.jpg" title="f0033-06" width="557" height="333"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0033-0782/4412556-1-eng-US/f0033-072.jpg" title="f0033-07" width="566" height="1038"></div> &#9632;

f0033-03

Quebec League Schedule

<div class="image-hero"><img title="Cover-01" src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/cover-01719/4413114-1-eng-US/cover-012.jpg"><figcaption class="caption-body">(Photo by Bruce Bennett)</figcaption></div>$1.00 64522THE INTERNATIONAL HOCKEY WEEKLY OCTOBER 9,1981 Vol. 35, No. 2BUTCH GORING: THE ISLANDERS&rsquo;MAN FOR ALL SEASONSWINNIPEG TO DONATE CANADA CUP TO SOVIETSBLUELINES: A NEW REGULAR FEATUREACHL TO COMMENCE SEASON IN NOVEMBERCOMPLETE TV SCHEDULE FOR HOCKEY NIGHT IN CANADA &#9632;

Cover-01

The Hockey News

<div class="byline">FRANK ORR&#x2019;S</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0002-011094/4410835-1-eng-US/f0002-012.jpg" title="f0002-01" width="320" height="368"></div><h2>The Great Trophy Caper</h2>ON SEPT. 13, 1981, the wonderful chaps attached to the national hockey team of the Soviet Union attempted one of the great double steals in the history of sport.The comrades completed the first half of the big swipe when they whipped Team Canada, 8-1, in the final of the Canada Cup international hockey tournament. That earned them a trophy valued at $70,000, a huge slab of Canadian nickel in the shape of half a maple leaf.Now, the Soviets were not happy with merely winning the Canada Cup by humiliating the Canadians. They tried to take the Cup back to the USSR by sneaking it out of the Montreal Forum in an equipment bag.The ever-alert R. Alan Eagleson, the tournament organizer, at that point had had it up to Larry Robinson with the Soviets. When he discovered that they were heading for the steppes with the trophy, he immediately called in six Montreal cops to retrieve the Canada Cup. It has been restored to its proper place in the residence of the Canadian governor-general in Ottawa until the next tournament.The Soviets attempted to laugh it off as a harmless little prank. They had requested the Cup for a few minutes to use in a team picture. They didn&rsquo;t explain that they planned to take the picture in Leningrad.Now the truth of the aborted kidnapping of the Canada Cup can be revealed. Through an exhaustive investigation of the matter conducted by THE HOCKEY NEWS, including an electronic bugging device planted in the Soviet officials&rsquo; hotel room, it is established that the attempted theft of the Canada Cup was a carefully conceived plan devised by the Soviets on the day of the final game.Involved in the discussions were Boris Majorshov, a big wheel in Soviet hockey circles; Andrei Starvingoff, a member of the Supreme Soviet Sports Committee, and Valentin Snitch, another USSR hockey official who is really a secret agent in disguise.Here&rsquo;s a transcription of their planning session for the Canada Cup kidnap.Majorshov: &ldquo;Why do we want the ugly old Canada Cup, anyway? It will just put us over the luggage weight limit on the way home and take up space we could use for good stuff to sell on the black market&mdash;blue jeans, punk rock tapes, windshield wipers, porno films, girly magazines and sparkplugs.&rdquo;Starvingoff: &ldquo;Comrade Majorshov! Have your senses flowed out of your head like the Volga River? Has three weeks in Winnipeg and Edmonton turned you into a capitalist swine, thinking only of personal gain, when we have the chance to accomplish something great for the motherland?&rdquo;Majorshov: No! But a guy has to pick up a ruble or two any way he can. The missus has her heart set on getting a bathtub for our bathroom. Or maybe a sink. We have running water now but nothing to catch it in. Maybe we should try to steal the Stanley Cup. At least, we could use it for a wash basin.&rdquo;<h2>Not Only The Money</h2>SNITCH: &ldquo;THINK OF the honor it will bring us when we return in triumph with the Canada Cup. Not only will we have those hard western dollars for our great victory over the paid mercenaries of Canadian hockey but we will have their great trophy, too.&ldquo;We will all be included in future editions of that greatest Soviet book, Who Was Who? Future generations will play their balalaikas and sing songs to glorify our names.&rdquo;Starvingoff: &ldquo;When we return to Soviet Union with the Canada Cup, I&rsquo;m certain Chairman Brehznev will invite us to the Kremlin and buy us a few vodkas to toast our great victory over the dumbkoff Canuckskies.&rdquo;Snitch: &ldquo;No doubt about it! Thechairman will be overjoyed. Look at the honors bestowed on those who stole from the west the plans for such minor baubles as the atom bomb, the intercontinental ballistic missile, the Big Mac and the address of John Ziegler&rsquo;s tailor. Those achievements will pale in comparison to our masterful taking of the Canada Cup.&rdquo;Majorshov: &ldquo;I just don&rsquo;t understand all this fuss about a lump of metal. To start with there is no guarantee that we will win the hockey game. Don&rsquo;t forget that we&rsquo;ve lost twice to Team Canada already.&rdquo;Snitch: &ldquo;Comrade Majorshov! You are the head of our hockey program and you can talk of not winning the game? You poor dumbkoff! Have you not considered your consequences if our brilliant national side does not emerge in triumphant victory over the inferior Canadian team?&rdquo;Majorshov: &ldquo;Oh, no! Not Siberia! Not the Gulag Archipelago!&rdquo;Starvingoff: &ldquo;No, no, dear comrade! A fate much worse than those horrendous punishments. If our supreme national team does not win the Canada Cup, it has been arranged that you will become coach of the Detroit Red Wings.&rdquo;<h2>Teeth In The Argument</h2>MAJORSHOV: &ldquo;OKAY, comrades, I am confident we will defeat the Canadians in this game. If we should fail, I will dive from the press box in The Forum on to the Canada Cup. But I still don&rsquo;t understand why taking home the Canada Cup is so important and how can we accomplish it?&rdquo;Snitch: &ldquo;You have no imagination, comrade. There are many uses for such a beautiful and original trophy. Don&rsquo;t you think it would make a magnificent hood ornament for my Lada? I would drive through the streets of Moscow and people would bow to it.&rdquo;Starvingoff: &ldquo;Comrade, you have no originality at all. The Canada Cup is made of nickel which is very scarce in the motherland. Also, I read in Pravda the other day that Chairman Brehznev is in need of new teeth. All that borscht he eats has given his group 75 percent more cavities.&ldquo;Think of the gratitude-he will show us when we have the Canada Cup melted and moulded into a new set of teeth for The Chairman. Think of what having nickel choppers will do for him when he has his first summit meeting with President Reagan. We will be awarded The Order Of Lenin, The Chain Of Kruschev, The Medal Of Mikhailov and I&rsquo;ll get an apartment I don&rsquo;t have to share with my mother-in-law.&rdquo;Majorshov: &ldquo;But how can we take it? The Canadians aren&rsquo;t that stupid, you know?&rdquo;Snitch: &ldquo;Please use your imagination, comrade. When we beat them, 8-1, in the hockey game, they will be thrown into disarray. Their journalists have been brainwashed into calling this Team Canada the greatest hockey team ever assembled. There, will be chaos all over Canada and in Quebec, too.&ldquo;We have a very carefully conceived plan to take the Canada Cup, so brilliant in its creation that only the greatest Soviet minds could think of it.&ldquo;We will humbly ask to have this most valued trophy in our own humble hands to allow our athletes to savor the greatest triumph in the history of the Soviet Union.&ldquo;Then we will place it in an equipment bag and run like a sonuvabitch.&rdquo; &#9632;

f0002-01

HOCKEY VIEWPOINT

<div class="byline">BY HELENE ELLIOTT</div><div class="image-hero"><img title="f0003-01" src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0003-011102/4410887-1-eng-US/f0003-012.jpg"><figcaption class="caption-body">Butch Goring has said that winning the Stanley Cup is his only goal. &ldquo;All I really like to collect,&rdquo; Goring admits, &ldquo;are Stanley Cup rings.&rdquo; (Photo By Bruce Bennett)</figcaption></div>The practice unforms are identical, but his looks different. Of all the New York Islanders on the ice, one player seems somehow more rumpled, less glued together than his teammates. It&rsquo;s as if, in street clothes, his shirt tail would be hanging out, His tie askew and his shoelace in peril of being stepped on. His hunched over posture and choppy skating strides are not the kind that appear in hockey instructional books, unless they are on the &ldquo;Don&rsquo;t&rdquo; side of the page.But the beauty of what Robert Thomas (Butch) Goring, 32, does just does not lie in his looks. Goring&rsquo;s selflessness and untiring enthusiasm on a team that has long prided itself on both of those qualities mark him as a winner, and he has two Stanley Cup championships behind him to prove that. But not to worry success could never change Goring. Despite being named the Most Valuable Player of the playoffs in last year&rsquo;s final series, Goring has not been spoiled by the heady aura of success. He&rsquo;s still the one in the rumpled blues, still giving his most honest effort for the team whose name is imprinted on the front of his uniform.&ldquo;What can I do for an encore? Geez, I don&rsquo;t know,&rdquo; Goring said. &ldquo;Definitely, last year was my big year&mdash;the playoffs and being chosen for the Canada Cup and all. Obviously, it was a tremendously successful year, with a few pleasant surprises, but I&rsquo;m not going into this season thinking how I can do better. I&rsquo;m just going in with the attitude that we want to try and win our third Cup. That&rsquo;s my only goal, and I&rsquo;m sure it&rsquo;s the team&rsquo;s, too.&rdquo;But it&rsquo;s entirely possible that without Goring, there would have been no first or second Stanley Cup victories, let alone an excellent chance to make it three in a row in the 1981-82 season. The Islanders, a close-knit team built on wise drafting and the occasional judicious trade, were foundering in the late stages of the 1979-80 season. Much as he hated to do it, Islanders&rsquo; general manager Bill Torrey knew a major deal had to be made: Billy Harris, the Islanders&rsquo; first draft pick ever, and defenseman Dave Lewis were dispatched to Los Angeles for Goring, whom the Islanders had long coveted. Emotionally, Torrey said trading two of his favorite players was a move, &ldquo;I would rather not have had to make,&rdquo; but rationally he knew Goring, then 30, could provide the spark needed by his stumbling hockey club.Goring&rsquo;s arrival gave the Islanders more balanced scoring, taking the pressure off the No. 1 line of Mike Bossy, Bryan Trottier and Clark Gillies. His abilities on faceoffs, at penalty killing and at checking lifted the Islanders out of their doldrums. His desire also boosted his teammates&rsquo; spirits as the playoffs approached that season. &ldquo;I&rsquo;m happy to be here,&rdquo; Goring said soon after his Islanders&rsquo; debut. &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve always said I wanted to come to a team that was used to winning. The Stanley Cup has been my chief goal. It didn&rsquo;t look like that was about to happen in Los Angeles, and I&rsquo;m not getting any younger.&rdquo;His personality played as much of a role as his on-ice skills in making the trade a success. Goring knew he was taking the place of two popular, long-time Islanders, men who had developed warm friendships with the players he would now be calling teammates. Goring realized the delicacy of the situation, but did not try to curry favor or apologize for his presence. Unassuming, with a kind of bullish air that makes his nickname fit like a hockey glove, Goring won quick acceptance by simply being himself.&ldquo;It&rsquo;s tough for them to accept you immediately,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;But I came in&hellip;I was a veteran, I didn&rsquo;t have to prove anything. Everybody knew I checked, I skated, I helped on the power play and the penalty killing units. I wasn&rsquo;t expected to do anything I hand&rsquo;t been doing for 10 years. I really wasn&rsquo;t worried about how I&rsquo;d do.&ldquo;The only thing I worried about was how the team did right away, because if we&rsquo;d lost a couple, maybe I would have been expected to do other things. I&rsquo;m not capable of doing. I didn&rsquo;t come in here to try to change things, just to play my game.&rdquo;He played his game well enough to contribute seven goals and 12 assists for 19 points in the playoffs, and to earn the approval of the critical Nassau Coliseum fans. They couldn&rsquo;t help but love the smallish (5-9 and 165 pounds) center, his blond hair flowing out from beneath his legendary helmet, the same headgear he has worn since he was 11. This guy hustled, putting extra oomph into checks when his size wasn&rsquo;t enough and turning penalty killing into something to look forward to.Yet, even though Goring realized the dream he had nursed since his childhood in St. Boniface, Man., and had his name engraved on the Stanley Cup, he didn&rsquo;t feel a part of the team. Something was missing, through no fault of his own.&ldquo;When I came, I was kind of thrown into things in the heat Of the battle,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;It was the tail end of the season and I didn&rsquo;t have time to get comfortable, to settle in, meet the people on Long Island, get to know my teammates&rsquo; personalities. It was strange for me. That&rsquo;s what made last year better for me. It&rsquo;s still not like being in a place for 11 years, but it was better. And I know it can only keep getting better.&rdquo;Last season was not Goring&rsquo;s most productive in the National Hockey League; he enjoyed a 37-goal season in 1977-78 (the year he was awarded the Bill Masterton Trophy for dedication, perseverance and sportsmanship as well as the Lady Byng Trophy for sportsmanship and gentlemanly conduct) and accumulated 36 goals and a career-high 87 points the following season. Those numbers are higher than his 1980-81 total of 23 goals and 60 points, but what Goring contributed last season cannot be measured in numbers. &ldquo;He really put everything together.&rdquo; said Islanders&rsquo; assistant coach Lome Henning, a former Islanders&rsquo; center and penalty killer. &ldquo;He&rsquo;s always been a great hockey player, but the way he played in the season and during the playoffs made people realize how valuable he is. He&rsquo;s just so tenacious he gets on you. He causes the other team&rsquo;s power play to make mistakes, and on his regular shifts, he&rsquo;s always working.&rdquo;<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0003-02942/4410880-1-eng-US/f0003-022.jpg" title="f0003-02" width="617" height="1170"><figcaption class="caption-body">Goring has had the same helmet since minor hockey, through many repairs and coats of paint.</figcaption></div><div class="figure-block image-bleed"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0003-03637/4410873-1-eng-US/f0003-032.jpg" title="f0003-03" width="1246" height="1168"><figcaption class="caption-body">During Goring&rsquo;s days with the L. A. Kings, his reputation for lack of sartorial splendor was firmly established throughout the NHL.</figcaption><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0003-04377/4410866-1-eng-US/f0003-042.jpg" title="f0003-04" width="1143" height="1170"><figcaption class="caption-body">Modeling a hairstyle somewhat reminiscent of her father, Butch Goring&rsquo;s daughter was on hand for the Islanders&rsquo; second Cup celebration. (Photo By Bruce Bennett)</figcaption></div>Goring spent much of the season with Bob Bourne as his left wing and Anders Kallur on the right, though in coach Al Arbour&rsquo;s system of interchanging wings. Bob Nystrom and Duane Sutter also skated on Goring&rsquo;s right side. &ldquo;I like to play with the same guys.&rdquo; Goring said in what for him is criticism. &ldquo;You can play with different guys all the time, but it&rsquo;s a little tougher. People have definite styles that you get used to, and sometimes, when you&rsquo;re in a situation where there&rsquo;s no time to think, you have to stop and remember if it&rsquo;s Kallur or Sutter who&rsquo;s there.&rdquo;Not even a benching in late February the first of his career and his first after 379 consecutive games could stir Goring to public anger. The Islanders were mired in what seems to be an annual mid-winter slump, and Arbour had Goring sit out a Saturday night game in Chicago. &ldquo;1 didn&rsquo;t like it, but I understood something had to be done,&rdquo; Goring said after the next game, in which he scored one goal and assisted on another to lead the Islanders to a 4-1 victory over Minnesota. &ldquo;I didn&rsquo;t like that it was me, but I understood that, too.&rdquo;His teammates understood the message equally as well. &ldquo;By sitting Butchie,&rdquo; said defenseman Dave Lorimer, &ldquo;Al was telling us that no one was safe. If a guy like that can get benched, anyone can.&rdquo;But if Goring could get benched and come back, so could the Islanders rebound from their problems. Goring was outstanding the rest of the way and exceptional in the playoffs. The Islanders swept the Toronto Maple Leafs in their first round and then did the same to the Rangers, avenging a semifinal loss two years earlier. In Game-Two of the-Ranger series, Goring scored a 45-foot shorthanded goal one of his 10 goals in postseason play to cut an early Ranger lead from 3-1 to 3-2. While that might not seem significant, the goal shook the foundation of the Rangers belief in themselves and started the Islanders&rsquo; resurgence. They went on to win that game, 7-3, but the Rangers most remembered Goring&rsquo;s goal and his persistence all night. &ldquo;We got beat by that shorthanded goal,&rdquo; Rangers&rsquo; defenseman Carol Vadnais said. &ldquo;That&rsquo;s what killed us. &lsquo;Goring, typically, downplayed his feats. &ldquo;Sure we were worried, and we needed something to pick us up,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;1 was just the lucky one to do it.&rdquo;It was skill, not luck, that propelled Goring to a hat trick in the fourth game of the final against the Minnesota North Stars. &ldquo;He&rsquo;s a small guy, but his heart is big,&rdquo; Arbour said. &ldquo;Hey,&rdquo; Goring said, &ldquo;this team is great. We&rsquo;re all playing so well and we can beat you in a lot of ways. To do it in the playoffs, it&rsquo;s exciting.&rdquo;&ldquo;That is what the Stanley Cup is all about. Last year was nice enough, but I had only been with the team five weeks and 1 didn&rsquo;t know a lot of the guys. This is different. I&rsquo;m a Long Islander now.&rdquo;Goring capped his season with two goals in the first period of the Islanders&rsquo; Stanley Cup-clinching 5-1 triumph over Minnesota. He was even asked for his stick as a keepsake by Minnesota&rsquo;s Kevin Maxwell, which honored and surprised him. &ldquo;All I really like to collect.&rdquo; he said with a smile, &ldquo;are Stanley Cup rings.&rdquo;He would have liked to add a Canada Cup championship to his jewelry collection, but, he said, &ldquo;We lost the wrong game.&rdquo; He did not expect to be invited to Team Canada&rsquo;s training camp in the first place, and once there, he didn&rsquo;t expect to stay with the team. Not only did he make Scotty Bowman&rsquo;s final squad, he scored three goals in the tournament and killed penalties with Montreal&rsquo;s Bob Gainey or the Rangers&rsquo; Ron Duguay. &ldquo;I was happy to be picked, and a little disappointed that we didn&rsquo;t win,&rdquo; Goring said of Canada&rsquo;s eventual 8-1 loss to the Soviet Union. &ldquo;But I had fun. I met a lot of people I hadn&rsquo;t met before and I learned from it. The Europeans play a lot different hockey than what 1 was used to they have different ideas about the game and how it should be played, and I was glad to get a chance to be exposed to that. And it was fun seeing the super stars that the other countries have.&ldquo;I had some good experiences along the way, though it took a lot of the summer away. It was demanding on our families and ourselves, but I would say it was worth it.&rdquo;Goring, who has settled into a home on Long Island&rsquo;s North Shore with his wife, Cathy, and their two young daughters, has not relaxed his demands on himself for this season. Before the Islanders won their first Cup, Goring once reflected, &ldquo;as I look back and think about the kind of team I&rsquo;d have wanted to be traded to, the Islanders probably are the team that suits me best. It always was a checking team that worked hard. They might not always have been flashy, but they got the job done. That&rsquo;s my idea of how to play the game.&rdquo; That&rsquo;s still his idea. &ldquo;Whether we win it by a nose or by 10 lengths, it&rsquo;s still the same thing, and we still want to win it.&rdquo; said Goring, who has two years remaining on his contract. &ldquo;Last year well, those were the kind of things I don&rsquo;t expect to happen again. They were nice, but I don&rsquo;t put personal goals in front of the team. Winning the Cup is my only goal.&rdquo; &#9632;

f0003-01

Butch Goring: Perfectly Fit For All Occasions

<div class="byline">BY GORDON EDES</div>VICTORIA&mdash;Item: Bob Berry, then coach of the Kings, once said he wouldn&rsquo;t trade Dave Taylor &ldquo;for the Empire State Building&hellip;or all of New York state.&rdquo;Item: Cliff Fletcher, Calgary Flames&rsquo; general manager who filled the same role with Team Canada, cut Taylor from the Team Canada squad-but added. &ldquo;I would give my right arm to have a Dave Taylor on my team.&rdquo;Item: With 47 goals and 112 points, Taylor finished fifth in scoring in the NHL. and second among right wingers, trailing only Mike Bossy (68, 119). He was named second-team All Star, again behind Bossy.Puzzle: With all of the above credentials, why would Taylor be saying. in the Kings&rsquo; Victoria, B.C., training camp, that &ldquo;it looks like I&rsquo;ll be playing out my option.&rdquo;Answer: Good question.Taylor says the offer made to him by George Maguire, the Kings&rsquo; general manager, &ldquo;was almost like an insult.&ldquo;I consider myself a valuable part of the team. I really like Los Angeles and don&rsquo;t really want to play anywhere else, but if they don&rsquo;t come forth with what 1 think I&rsquo;m worth. I&rsquo;ll be forced to play out my option.&rdquo;Taylor says he is looking for a longterm contract, of around five years&rsquo; duration, at &ldquo;numbers that are consistent with the best players in the league.&rdquo;It is on the subject of those numbers that Taylor and Maguire diverge. What Taylor is seeking, Maguire said, &ldquo;is totally unreal, and I have no intention of giving it to him.&ldquo;Nobody is offering that kind of money,&rdquo; Maguire said. Asked if Taylor had asked for a figure comparable to that reportedly received by linemate Charlie Simmer ($250,000 for six years, three one-year options), Maguire said: &ldquo;Charlie didn&rsquo;t get what&rsquo;s in the paper and Davey&rsquo;s not getting what he asked for.&ldquo;We have all year to talk to him. They all like to get their way&hellip;Give the boy a lollipop, and he&rsquo;ll be a very happy boy.&rdquo;After four seasons with the Kings, the last three with 90 points or more, Taylor obviously is looking for more than some sugarcoating from the team. Up to this point, he has been somewhat of a bargain, which isn&rsquo;t really surprising, considering he was the 210th player selected in the 1975 draft.&ldquo;My first year I made only $40,000, the second year only $47,500,&rdquo; Taylor said. After that. Taylor signed a two-year contract plus an option year, at a figure of $140,000 for the last two &lsquo;years. He said that he and his agent. Ronnie Salcer, did not hear from the Kings until August 10, the date by which a team must make an offer to a player in his option.&ldquo;No one would like more than me to sign with the Kings before the season starts,&rdquo; Taylor said. &ldquo;I think I&rsquo;ve proven myself up to now, and am worthy Of a long-term contract.&ldquo;There are some players who may tend to go easy with a long-term contract, but 1 don&rsquo;t think I play like that. 1 think I try 100 percent all the time.&rdquo;<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0004-021104/4410973-1-eng-US/f0004-022.jpg" title="f0004-02" width="612" height="1633"><figcaption class="caption-body">There&rsquo;s no doubt in Dave Taylor&rsquo;s mind that he has proven himself, and deserves a long-term pact. (Photo By Ian MacAlpine)</figcaption></div>Such effort doesn&rsquo;t go unrewarded, especially by the Kings&rsquo; owner Jerry Buss. It was Buss, after all, who made Marcel Dionne the highest-paid player in the league last year with a reported $600,000-a-year. six-year contract, and it was Buss who negotiated Simmer&rsquo;s contract. There are those who say Buss is generous to a fault&mdash;like John Pickett, the Islanders&rsquo; chairman of the board, who was quoted as saying last spring that he wouldn&rsquo;t let &ldquo;the lover of Lotusland&rdquo; set the market prices for his stars.Thus far, Taylor has negotiated with Maguire, though there were indications that Buss would enter the proceedings, if necessary. &ldquo;I&rsquo;m not up to date on it [the negotiations],&rdquo; Buss said during his visit to the team&rsquo;s camp. &ldquo;It&rsquo;s all news to me.&rdquo;Is it conceivable that given his value to the club, Taylor would be allowed to go elsewhere?&ldquo;I&rsquo;ll sign Davey Taylor,&rdquo; Buss said.KINGS THINGS-Defenseman Rick Chartraw reported to camp at 233, 18 pounds over his listed weight and 13 pounds over what he played at last season. &ldquo;I&rsquo;m very unhappy,&rdquo; Maguire said. &ldquo;I said to him, &lsquo;Don&rsquo;t you realize how important you are to our plans? For you to come in that way is a disgrace.&rsquo;&hellip;He&rsquo;s like a big tank.&rdquo; Chartraw, whose weight was an issue last season in Montreal, insists he is not out of shape. &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve been pumping weights the last month and a half and have been playing racquetball every day,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;My legs and wind are good; I just have to lose a lot of water weight.&rdquo; Nevertheless, what Maguire has called &ldquo;a very disappointing camp&rdquo; for Chartraw has greatly enhanced the chances of Rob Palmer making the team. &ldquo;He&rsquo;s had a helluva training camp,&rdquo; Maguire said. &ldquo;He came in ready to play, and he&rsquo;s worked real hard.&rdquo;&hellip;Rick Martin continued to have knee problems. The left wing was sent back to LA after the first week of camp when the knee began swelling again. Martin, unable to work out virtually all summer because of soreness and swelling, was examined again in LA and, according to Maguire, doctors feel they have detected the source of his discomfort. &ldquo;It&rsquo;s in the kneecap.&rdquo; Maguire said. &ldquo;There&rsquo;s irritation on the knee joint caused by some small chips of cartilage left over from his operation. Doctors say that they should dissipate.&rdquo; &#9632;

f0004-02

Taylor, Kings Far Apart Deciding Value To Club

<div class="byline">BY GLENN COLE</div><div class="image-hero"><img title="f0004-01" src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0004-011152/4410918-1-eng-US/f0004-012.jpg"><figcaption class="caption-body">Mark Napier scored 35 goals for the Canadiens last year, but decided to play out his option when talks with the club failed to produce an agreement. (Photo By Bruce Bennett)</figcaption></div>MONTREAL&mdash;Managing director Irving Grundman had two new headaches to relieve as the Montreal Canadiens&rsquo; 1981-82 season drew near.Defenseman Larry Robinson wanted a revised contract and the sooner, the better.Left winger/right winger Mark Napier was still unsigned and had decided to play out his option.Then there was the little matter of some of those personnel changes which Grundman promised at the end of last season, but which had yet to be effected.First, the Robinson problem.The 30-year-old two-time Norris Trophy winner as the NHL&rsquo;s best defenseman still has three years plus an option remaining on his contract which is estimated at $290,000 per year, although it may be $10,000 less. There Was some thought that he wouldn&rsquo;t show up to the Canadiens&rsquo; training camp if the matter wasn&rsquo;t resolved and there was even some consideration given to report that he would strike just as Guy Lafleur threatened to do three years ago when he wanted his pact renewed.&ldquo;There is no threat being made at this time,&rdquo; Robinson said, &ldquo;nor has there been one made. I&rsquo;d like to have the contract settled as soon as possible. I have a job to do playing hockey and I don&rsquo;t like playing with other things on my mind.&rdquo;Robinson was. a little disturbed that his contract talks had become a matter of public record, but there was no secret this summer that Robinson wanted a new deal.Teammates Rod Langway and Brian Engblom, the Canadiens&rsquo; best defensemen last season, both negotiated new pacts for themselves during the off-season, leaving Robinson&rsquo;s deal to be settled.Robinson says he is looking for something to build his future on and isn&rsquo;t concerned with the inflated salary someone like Borje Salming of Toronto (a reported $320,000 per year) is making.&ldquo;I&rsquo;m not asking for the moon. I know what I want for me to be happy,&rdquo; Robinson concluded.While Robinson appeared confident he and Grundman could reach an accord, the same optimism was not as prevalent in the Napier case.The 24-year-old Napier, coming off a 35-goal season, decided in early September that he would go the option route after his agent, Gus Badali of Toronto, couldn&rsquo;t come to terms with Grundman.&ldquo;It was a tough decision to make,&rdquo; said Napier. &ldquo;We had our figures, they had theirs. Hopefully before the season gets started, we can get something worked out.&rdquo;Napier, who was a part-time player with the Canadiens during his first two seasons after coming over with Langway from the WHA&rsquo;s Birmingham Bulls, denied allegations that he wanted to leave Montreal because of the pressue from media and fans.&ldquo;I&rsquo;d like to stay here for sure,&rdquo; &ldquo;But I have to think of my future, my wife and my baby [Matthew Mark, born Sept. 15, 1981]&ldquo;I don&rsquo;t think we were asking for anything outrageous. We weren&rsquo;t miles apart, but we weren&rsquo;t exactly all that close either.&rdquo;Meanwhile, training camp got under way in Ste. Agathe, a Laurentian community north of Montreal, with close to 70 players reporting.Robinson, Engblom. Bob Gainey and Guy Lafleur, members of Team Canada, didn&rsquo;t make it up to the Laurentians, although Team USA star Rod Langway reported a few days early.Some of the people rumored on their way out, including centers Doug Jarvis and Pierre Larouche and defenseman Guy Lapointe, were at camp as well as left winger Yvon Lambert, whose future is cloudy indeed.Larouche and Lapointe had better-than-average camps and Lapointe had a two-goal effort in Montreal&rsquo;s 6-2 victory over Philadelphia in a pre-season game at the Forum.Both Jarvis and Lambert struggled through camp and Lambert didn&rsquo;t get a chance to play until the fourth pre-season game, which disturbed the veteran winger.Of the newcomers, center Dan Daoust and winger Craig Laughlin were the most impressive with Laughlin being shifted to the left wing from his natural right spot in the early going. This is seen as a move to get him into Lambert&rsquo;s spot if the 24-year-old graduate from Clarkson College can play consistently.Laughlin, a 32-goaI man with Nova Scotia despite missing eight weeks with an ankle injury, seemed to adapt well to his new spot and had excellent outings against Buffalo and Philadelphia in early exhibition play.Daoust, bypassed in the 1980 entry draft, was signed as a free agent by the Canadiens last season and proceeded to make the first All-Star team in the American League. He appears ready to give Jarvis a run for his spot.First-round draft pick Mark Hunter had a fair first week, although he was dissatisfied with the pre-season effort he furnished against Chicago. Defenseman Gilbert Delorme, another first-round pick, needs some more experience before he is ready to graduate to major league hockey.IN PASSING&mdash;Lafleur was fined $200 for missing an 8:30 a.m. practice on his 30th birthday Sept. 20&hellip;Doug Wickenheiser and defense hopeful Dwight Schofield were tapped for $100 apiece when they missed the club&rsquo;s charter flight to Buffalo. The two, who were travelling together, became lost in traffic and missed the flight by 10 minutes. They each paid $178 to get to Buffalo via Syracuse&hellip;The fines were levied as the result of violations of Bob Berry&rsquo;s training camp 10 commandments which more or less spell out his rules for the team. Aside from demanding punctuality for team meetings, planes and buses, Berry has also banned player agents and other hangers-on from the dressing room. &#9632;

f0004-01

Players Giving Habs’ Grundman A Headache

<div class="byline">BY TOM HENSHAW</div>BOSTON&mdash;The headline said that Gerry Cheevers had learned his lesson&mdash;&ldquo;no more Mr. Nice Guy.&rdquo;The coach of the Boston Bruins disagreed with that assessment only in degree.&ldquo;I wouldn&rsquo;t put it as strong as that,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;but 1 do think I have to be more stern, more intense in my job. 1 have to be more in command. I think I was too passive behind the bench. That&rsquo;s not like me.&rdquo;In his second year as coach of the Bruins, Cheevers is going to be a bit more the disciplinarian, the critic, than he was in his rookie season behind the bench when the Boston club went through its worst season (37-30-13) in 14 years.&ldquo;Right from the start,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;I want the guys to know that this year will be different. I won&rsquo;t carry a whip or a shotgun or anything like that but I want to get them to a level of intensity and keep them there all year long.&ldquo;I was told last year that I shouldn&rsquo;t be friendly with my players. I didn&rsquo;t want to believe that. Maybe 1 approached things wrong. I&rsquo;ll still have a beer with some of the guys but it&rsquo;s not the same at all.&ldquo;Sometimes, when you get too close to your players, you&rsquo;ll sluff off a bad pass or some other mistake on the ice. You don&rsquo;t say anything about it because you might hurt someone&rsquo;s feelings. I can&rsquo;t do that anymore.&rdquo;&ldquo;Sometimes when you get too close to your players,&rdquo; Cheevers said, &ldquo;you sluff off a bad pass or some other mistake&hellip;&rdquo;The most frequent analysis of last year&rsquo;s dismal season was that Cheevers tried to put more skate into the Bruins, failed, and rescued what was left of the season by going back to the old Boston dump and chase style.&ldquo;We probably did that,&rdquo; the coach conceded, &ldquo;but don&rsquo;t forget, we were desperate.&ldquo;We still have all that in mind. We need speed. If we don&rsquo;t have that in our division we will be the doormat. We need more speed and more good passing. We need more skill levels really. I think we have a lot of potential for that.&rdquo;One of those with potential, although it may be a year away from realization, is Normand Leveille, the Bruins&rsquo; first round draft choice last June. He has a couple more years in junior, if he needs them.&ldquo;Leveille is the best forward this team has drafted in a long time,&rdquo; said general manager Harry Sinden. &ldquo;He&rsquo;s the kind of kid this team needs. He is quick and fast. He skates like a Russian. He could make this team.&rdquo;The Bruins drafted four players&mdash;Leveille, Luc Dufour, Armel Parisee and Richard Bourque&mdash;out of Quebec in the last junior lottery. There is more French spoken around the Boston training camp than ever before.&ldquo;We&rsquo;re sick of getting beat by those guys,&rdquo; said Sinden. &ldquo;There is a sense of hockey breeding in those French kids. They love to play hockey.&rdquo;Elsewhere in the training camp at Danvers:Terry O&rsquo;Reilly, the buzz saw right wing who suffered through his worst season (eight goals, 35 assists) as a regular last year, showed up in camp with the reason for his poor showing repaired by surgery. He had a torn rotator cuff in his right shoulder.&ldquo;It&rsquo;s coming along pretty good,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll probably miss a few exhibition games. The doctor compared it to gluing two things back together. If I pushed it too far I could pull it apart by putting pressure on it too soon.&rdquo;O&rsquo;Reilly said the injury made it difficult for him to shoot the puck, to pass and to stickhandle, which didn&rsquo;t leave very much that he could do.Goalie Jim Craig&rsquo;s training camp has been reduced to simple skating drills by a broken knuckle on his stick hand, suffered in training for the United States team in the Canada Cup series. It could require surgery.&ldquo;I feel sorry for Jim,&rdquo; said Sinden. &ldquo;He was having a good Canada Cup camp and he was really ready for this season. After all his problems last year, he was ready to give it a hell of an effort.&rdquo;Rogie Vachon, the No. 1 goalie, has been experimenting with a cage mask after wearing a moulded mask all his goaltending life.&ldquo;There is more protection,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;It doesn&rsquo;t sit flush against your face. There&rsquo;s less impact when the puck hits. The difficulty I&rsquo;m having with it is focusing beyond the bars.&rdquo;On the advice of a 15-year-old goalie Vachon met at a hockey school this summer, he has been wearing the cage around the house in an effort to get used to it. He&rsquo;s still undecided about wearing it during the season.<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0005-011002/4411004-1-eng-US/f0005-012.jpg" title="f0005-01" width="614" height="1382"><figcaption class="caption-body">Gerry Cheevers feels the Bruins need to improve their basic skills and have the potential to do it.</figcaption></div> &#9632;

f0005-01

Cheevers Takes Charge In Boston

<div class="byline">BY CHUCK MOODY</div>PITTSBURGH&mdash;&ldquo;We&rsquo;re in much better shape now than we were a year ago,&rdquo; said Penguin coach Eddie Johnston as he looked forward to his second season at the controls.Off-season interest in hockey in Pittsburgh was truly at an all-time high this summer, primarily because of the way the Penguins finished last season&mdash;a double-overtime loss to St. Louis in the playoffs that was viewed as the team&rsquo;s finest effort in 14 years in the National Hockey League. Johnston hopes that interest will turn into paying customers if his team can pick up where it left off.&ldquo;I know most of the players now and they know me and my system,&rdquo; said Johnston in comparing the start of this season and last. &ldquo;We&rsquo;ve picked up a couple of big, physical left wings in Pat Boutette and Paul Mulvey who can set a much more aggressive tone for us.&ldquo;We have a different type of training camp this eason. We have about 60 players in camp compared to only about 30 last year. You have to have competition to have a good training camp.&rdquo;Johnston is counting on the younger players to give the veterans a run for their money and their position on the team.&ldquo;Last year almost everybody who showed up was given the job,&rdquo; Johnston recalled. &ldquo;There was almost no competition for positions. That wasn&rsquo;t a very good situation but things won&rsquo;t be like that this year. Except for a few players, nobody&rsquo;s got a job guaranteed.&ldquo;We&rsquo;ve lost Dave Burrows, Orest Kindrachuk, Nick Libett, Ross Lonsberry, Greg Millen and Errol Thompson from last year. There are about seven jobs open and I&rsquo;m just going to let everybody battle it out. Some guys are going to play themselves off the club.&rdquo;When Johnston became coach of the Penguins last season, he said the club needed to improve in two areas&mdash;the power play and penalty killing. Pittsburgh improved dramatically on the power play last year but gave up a similar number of power play goals as they scored.&ldquo;We need to cut down our goals-against mark and improve our penalty killing.&rdquo; the 45-year-old Johnston said. &ldquo;We&rsquo;ll concentrate on those two things. I think our goaltending is the most questionable area.&rdquo;In an effort to strengthen their netminding, the Penguins acquired Paul Harrison from the Toronto Maple Leafs for &ldquo;future considerations.&rdquo; The 26-year-old Harrison led the Central Hockey League with a 2.70 goals-against average and four shutouts in 37 games last season and was named to the CHL All Star team.&ldquo;Harrison will help us,&rdquo; Johnston said of the 1975 second-round draft pick of Minnesota who has a 4.06 goals-against average in 90 NHL games with the North Stars and Leafs. &ldquo;He&rsquo;s only 26 and has NHL experience.&rdquo;Harrison gives the Penguins four goaltenders with NHL experience. Michel Dion, Gordie Laxton and Nick Ricci are the others. If Johnston is not satisfied with the performance, the Penguins were expected to pick up another netminder in the NHL waiver draft Oct. 5.&ldquo;We started to turn things around last season but weve got a lot of hard work ahead of us,&rdquo; Johnston said. &ldquo;There&rsquo;s plenty of room for improvement.&rdquo;PENGUIN TRACKS-Norris Trophy winner Randy Carlyle signed a multi-year contract with Pittsburgh. The NHL&rsquo;s best defenseman would have been entering the option year on his old contract&hellip;The Penguins have signed a working agreement with the Muskegon Mohawks of the International Hockey League. Muskegon will receive any Penguin owned player who does not make Pittsburgh or their American League Erie Blades farm club&hellip;The Penguins will be heard on a radio network headed by flagship station KQV in Pittsburgh. Twenty five road games will be telecast by WPTT-TV in Pittsburgh. &#9632;

Johnston Expects Scuffle For Jobs

<div class="byline">BY VARTAN KUPELIAN</div>DETROIT&mdash;If the Red Wings are going to turn things around this season, it&rsquo;ll be players like Dale McCourt who must make it happen.McCourt is a veteran and he&rsquo;s talented, two qualities not in abundance at the Detroit Hockey Club. The Wings need his abilities and his leadership if they are to vacate the list of National Hockey League have-nots.McCourt, 24, is about to begin his fifth year in a Red Wing uniform since turning pro as the No. I pick in the 1977 draft. He was a heralded junior superstar and his career with the Wings has been just as noteworthy&mdash;more for controversy than anything else. But all that&rsquo;s behind him. He&rsquo;s no longer an outstanding young player of vast potential. He&rsquo;s a veteran now and he looks and acts comfortable in the role.McCourt scored 30 goals and added 56 assists in 80 games as Detroit&rsquo;s top scorer last season. His four-year NHL total is 121 goals, or an average of more than 30 a season.Recognizing McCourt&rsquo;s role, coach Wayne Maxner made him one of the coaches for the Wings&rsquo; four-team round-robin tournament in the first week of training camp. McCourt&rsquo;s team went unbeaten&mdash;3-0&mdash;to reach the final but was beaten in overtime of the championship game 6-5 on a goal by Paul Woods, captain and coach of the opposing team. McCourt&rsquo;s team rallied from a four-goal deficit to tie the game before losing. The prize for winning the championship: A steak dinner for each member of the best team.Throughout the tournament, McCourt skated and checked hard. In fact, he looked faster and sleeker than ever before.&ldquo;Anybody who has been here before has a duty to the younger players,&rdquo; McCourt said. &ldquo;The more you&rsquo;ve been around, the more you can help somebody out.&rdquo;McCourt caught fire in mid-season a year ago, soon after Maxner took over the bench duties. He played his finest hockey in the last months of the season while most of the Wings were mired in slumps.McCourt is being cautious about the upcoming season.&ldquo;It&rsquo;s hard to say,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;You never really know what to expect. There&rsquo;s no reason getting everybody&rsquo;s hopes up. Every year we come into training camp and we&rsquo;re optimistic. You can&rsquo;t really tell until you start playing exhibition games and see what the other teams have.&rdquo;Several of the young players have caught the eye of the Wings&rsquo; bosses and Maxner promised that those who excel in camp will get a chance once the season begins.Maxner is impressed with 18-year-old draftee Larry Trader, who will be going back to junior hockey.&ldquo;He&rsquo;s going to be a good one in time,&rdquo; Maxner said.Another training camp surprise is Steve Banonis, a native Detroiter who asked for and was granted a tryout with Detroit. He banged in goals at a rapid pace, including a pair for McCourt&rsquo;s team in the championship game, and Maxner agreed that Banonis would get a longer look.MOTOR CITY SHORTS&mdash;Rejean Cloutier, who enjoyed a splendid season at Glen Falls with the Adirondack Wings of the American Hockey League, is returning at his own pace. He suffered a broken leg in the AHL playoffs. &#9632;

Mature McCourt Becoming Wings’ Motivator

<div class="byline">BY STAN FISCHLER</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0006-011184/4411059-1-eng-US/f0006-012.jpg" title="f0006-01" width="298" height="362"></div><h2>Too Much, Too Soon</h2>I FOUND IT FIARD to believe. A full 20 years had passed since Frank Mahovlich and I dissected a grapefruit and scrambled eggs in the dining room of New York&rsquo;s Commodore Hotel.It was 1961. There were six teams in the NHL. One of them, the Toronto Maple Leafs, had a left wing with the kind of legs on which you could build a skyscraper. In full flight, he had Gulliverian strides that made you believe he could go from end to end with just three steps.They called him The Big M and in that season he had become bigger than big. He was, it seemed, about to break Maurice (The Rocket) Richard&rsquo;s hitherto unreachable 50-goal mark.As I gazed at him over the breakfast table, I couldn&rsquo;t picture him as a terrorizer of goaltenders. Frank seemed so gentle; a reluctant dragon.Yet he already had blasted 38 goals in 35 games and you needed a show-cause order from The Supreme Court to explain why he would not some day be inducted into Hockey&rsquo;s Hall of Fame.The Big M never did get the 50 goals&mdash;he finished the season with 48&mdash;but now he is in The Hall of Fame. Frank and I had a bit of a reunion before the induction ceremonies and I mentioned to him that maybe it was a &ldquo;mistake&rdquo; scoring so many goals so early in his NHL career.&ldquo;Life was never the same after that,&rdquo; said Mahovlich who is now a 42-year-old owner of a Toronto travel agency. &ldquo;Since 1 had scored 48 goals in 1961 a lot of people figured I should score more in 1962. And maybe even more the year after that.&rdquo;The 1981 Mahovlich is in mint condition. He&rsquo;s trim, combs his hair neatly to the side like a 1940 film star and still has the warm conversation that I remember from that breakfast two decades ago. He has managed to cover the scars well&mdash;but not completely. He fought an uphill battle to reach the too-high standard others had set for him.&ldquo;They expected too much from me,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;The year I had 38 goals in 35 games I was on a roll. But we didn&rsquo;t have depth on that Leaf team. All of a sudden four guys got injured and our balance was gone. So the opposition began zeroing in on me and 1 was neutralized.&rdquo;Unfortunately for Frank, neither the Maple Leafs fans nor GM coach Punch Imlach were neutralized. The abrasive Punch nettled The Big M. He mispronounced his name&mdash;calling him &ldquo;Mahalavich&rdquo;&mdash;and he often would treat Frank as if he was The Invisible Man.Hall of Famer Andy Bathgate, who had been Frank&rsquo;s teammate in 1964 once said: &ldquo;Imlach never spoke to Mahovlich or myself for most of the season and when he did it was to criticize.&rdquo;(Imlach, in defense, has written that he could only remember criticizing Mahovlich twice in front of everybody. &ldquo;Once was in the spring of 1967 and another time was in Detroit in the playoffs in 1964 when he&rsquo;d given the puck away for Detroit&rsquo;s winning goal&hellip;I told them: &ldquo;If I swear at you, if I call you a stupid son-of-a-bitch some time, take it as a term of endearment. That&rsquo;s the way it&rsquo;s meant to be taken;.&rdquo;)Looking back today, the sensitive Mahovlich admitted in a remarkable understatement that he was not tuned to Imlach&rsquo;s frequency. &ldquo;My last three years in Toronto,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;were difficult.&rdquo;<h2>Near Nervous Breakdown</h2>THE BIG M SUFFERED from depression then, and seemed on the verge of a nervous breakdown. Because he never scored more than 48 goals and never achieved the level of accomplishment the fans wanted, Mahovlich was unmercifully booed.&ldquo;I think,&rdquo; said Frank, &ldquo;I might have been better off playing elsewhere.&rdquo;Standing next to Frank recently, I was surprised that he didn&rsquo;t look all that big nor awesome. He certainly didn&rsquo;t resemble the galvanic skater who had swooped over the ice like a mustang on the gallop.Ironically, Imlach was the one who best described Mahovlich. He did it in his autobiography Hockey Is A Battle, recalling an episode from a Leaf-Canadien game:&ldquo;Mahovlich was wheeling out of our end with the puck. Henri Richard was corr ng in after him. Frank shot the puck. I don&rsquo;t know to this day what he had in mind when he shot the puck&hellip;He says he was just clearing the puck and I believe him. But it hit Richard in the face knocked him down and out. Canadiens were burr They called Frank a lot of names from the bench, classing he&rsquo;s shot the puck at Richard on purpose.&ldquo;Bernie Geoffrion was yelling at Marcel Bonin to spear Mahovlich and Dickie Moore was trying to get at him, and suddenly Mahovlich just threw down everything and was ready to take on the whole Montreal bench&hellip;Canadiens tried to get him the next time we were in Montreal and he took on anybody who came along that time, too. Wherever the action was, he was right in the middle of it.&rdquo;But not often enought to suit the pewholders at Maple Leaf Gardens. Some observers&mdash;Gordie Howe, for one&mdash;believe those supposedly hockey-wise Torontonians weren&rsquo;t. &ldquo;The mistake,&rdquo; said Howe, &ldquo;was that Frank didn&rsquo;t get the cheers he deserved. Instead of booing him, the fans should have appreciated his talents, then maybe the pressure wouldn&rsquo;t have cooked the guy.&rdquo;Mercifully, Frank escaped Toronto for the Detroit Red Wings in 1967-68. He played brilliantly with Howe and Alex Delvecchio until a shakeup ticketed The Big M for the Montreal Canadiens in January 1971, where he levitated over The Forum ice as if to the manner born. At playoff time the Habs supposedly had no chance against Boston&rsquo;s Big, Bad Bruins. The opening round figured to be four-straight for the Bs.&ldquo;We had Ken Dryden in goal,&rdquo; Frank recalled. &ldquo;He was just out of college, had only played a few games for us and nobody gave him a chance. Well, he was terrific. Jean Beliveau was terrific and we beat the Bruins in seven games.&rdquo;The same Mahovlich, whom Imlach regarded as the Andrea Doria of hockey, merely scored a record 14 goals as the Habs knocked off the Minnesota North Stars and Chicago Black Hawks to win The Cup.In the sixth and last game of the finals The Big M outmuscled defenseman Pat Stapleton to jam the puck past Tony Esposito and give the Canadiens the needed cushion.Talking to Frank in 1981 was just as pleasant an interlude as it was 20 years ago. He is a sweet man, who has difficulty harboring a grudge. And he suffers no agony about being out of the limelight&rsquo;s range. &ldquo;No,&rdquo; he said, simply and honestly, &ldquo;I don&rsquo;t miss the glory. &ldquo;I accept my age. I feel content and happy. I&rsquo;m relaxed.&rdquo;Then, a pause and a grin: &ldquo;You see, I don&rsquo;t have to play hockey anymore!&rdquo;(NEXT WEEK: DID TEAM CANADA CHOKE AGAINST THE SOVIETS?)<h2>Lindsay Still A Terror</h2>NOTES: When oldtime NHL stars convene again next year to play in Gerry Patterson&rsquo;s &ldquo;Original Six&rdquo; televised tournament, you can bet who won&rsquo;t be invited&mdash;Ted Lindsay&hellip;Although the tourney&rsquo;s ground rules forbade slapshots and heavy hitting there were some rough moments&hellip;I&rsquo;m told that some of Lindsay&rsquo;s teammates on the Detroit Red Wings oldtimers privately asked the promoters to get Lindsay out of there before any real damage was done&hellip;Friends of Bobby Orr report, sadly, that he is drifting away from hockey&rsquo;s pro mainstream but remains active with kids&hellip;Here&rsquo;s a scenario for Harold Ballard to consider. Since Punch Imlach&rsquo;s heart condition has convinced everyone that Punch should retire, Pal Hal should hire Don (Grapes) Cherry as his new GM. This way, if Mike Nykoluk doesn&rsquo;t work out behind the bench, Ballard could simply move Grapes in as coach. Cherry would be a superb GM in Toronto because Harold would do all the work for him. Between the two orators, there&rsquo;d be no room for stories about the Leafs&rsquo; losses&hellip;It&rsquo;s about time the NHL picked an expansion superstar for the Hall of Fame. My choice: Red Berenson&hellip;A bombshell is due to explode in the realm of agenting&hellip;Hall of Famer Andy Bathgate and his former teammate Lou Fontinato are partners in a cattle-raising business near Guelph, Ont. &ldquo;We&rsquo;re not making much money.&rdquo; Andy tells me, &ldquo;but we sure have a lot of bull!&rdquo;&hellip;Ex-Ranger Rod Gilbert is looking to open a restaurant&hellip;Bob Berry&rsquo;s biggest mistake in dealing with the Canadiens may be coming in as General Patton (or Montgomery) when a more moderate Eisenhower stance might be appropriate&hellip;This season could signal the end of the guaranteed sellout at Maple Leaf Gardens. Can you imagine having to sell hockey in Toronto?&hellip;The whisper from one NHL governor is that, damn it, John Ziegler isn&rsquo;t tough enough as NHL president. And it&rsquo;s not JZ&rsquo;s fault but rather the inherent league constitutional structure&hellip;The Bobby Hull comeback is one of the most intriguing stories of the new season. Hull&rsquo;s ex-boss, Howard Baldwin of the Hartford Whalers, tells me he thinks The Golden Jet can make it, physically. &ldquo;His only problem,&rdquo; says Baldwin, &ldquo;is his head. If Bobby&rsquo;s thinking positive, he&rsquo;ll be fine.&rdquo;&hellip;Gordie Howe says he&rsquo;s planning another comeback next year: He&rsquo;ll play for the Red Wings Oldtimers in the 1982 Original Six tourney. He missed this year&rsquo;s event because he was filming an Amway commercial.THE HAL AND JOHN SHOW: Harold Ballard and John Ziegler are more like Punch and Judy than Holmes and Moriarty. Their barbs, as demonstrated at The Hall of Fame banquet, are dipped in sugar, not cyanide. Example: When the diminutive Ziegler got up to speak at the dinner Ballard cautioned that JZ should be short and sweet.&ldquo;Well, Harold,&rdquo; squelched the prez, &ldquo;I&rsquo;m already short.&rdquo;MEDIA NOTES:&nbsp;Boston Herald-American columnist Joe Fitzgerald got jobbed when his on-the-nose piece on Gary Cheevers was picked up, but not credited, by a wire service&hellip;Cheesy told Fitz that he won&rsquo;t be Mr. Nice Guy anymore&hellip;&ldquo;I was too passive,&rdquo; said Cheevers&hellip;Phil Esposito will be Rangers&rsquo; color commentator on TV alongside Jim Gordon&hellip;ESPN is expanding its hockey coverage. Sam Rosen and Joe Boyle will do play-by-play while Pete Stemkowski and Lou Nanne (same name as the North Stars GM) will do color&hellip;ESPN also plans other hockey-oriented shows&hellip;Opening ESPN telecast will be the Sabres-Capitals game at Buffalo, Oct. 7&hellip;George Gamester, a sharp feature writer on the Toronto Star for years, has moved into sports and covered the Hockey Hall of Fame shindig&hellip;It was nice that the Toronto Sun&rsquo;s Pat Doyle did a column on new Hall of Famer John Ashley. I like his Ashley quote: &ldquo;I believe the game belongs to the players. I have never heard of anyone paying $10 to see John Ashley referee.&rdquo; To which Doyle added: &ldquo;No, but that&rsquo;s only because nobody knew the guy was Hall of Fame material.&rdquo; &#9632;

f0006-01

ON THE CONTRARY

The International Hockey Weekly Founded in 1947Published by W.C.C. Publishing Ltd.214 King St. West, Suite 314, Toronto, Ont. M5H 1K4<h2>The Free Agency Sham</h2>ALTHOUGH THE BYLAWS OF THE National Hockey League clearly state that when a player&rsquo;s contract is up with one team, he is free to sign with another, don&rsquo;t be deceived: In the NHL, there really isn&rsquo;t such a thing as free agency.Oh, sure, once a player&rsquo;s contract with a specific team runs out and he elects not to exercise his option and re-sign, he is classified as a free agent and is free to shop himself around to his heart&rsquo;s content.Only problem is, the way the system is currently structured, very few, if any, of hockey&rsquo;s free agents have a prayer of signing on with another team for two simple reasons&mdash;compensation and arbitration.Take the case of the New York Islanders&rsquo; Bob Bourne. Except for a 62-game stint in the minors in 1975-76, the 27-year-old Bourne has played for the Islanders since 1974. Up until this past season, Bourne, who is easily one of the fastest skaters in the league and one of the game&rsquo;s premier penalty killers, had his best years in 1977-78 and 1978-79 when he amassed back-to-back 30-goal years. In the 1980 playoffs, he was an awesome force in helping his team win its first Stanley Cup, scoring 10 goals and 20 points. And last year, he enjoyed his best season ever, scoring 35 goals and 41 assists and contributing 10 points in 14 playoff games&mdash;all numbers, Bourne thought, which were deserving of a significant increase in pay.Islanders&rsquo; general manager Bill Torrey disagreed, however, contending that consistency is the true hallmark of a player requesting the salary Bourne was and suggesting that Bourne had not yet attained that desired level of consistency. Torrey also had other things to consider&mdash;specifically, two players named Mike Bossy and Denis Potvin, both of whom are in their option years, both of whom are consistent players, both of whom are going to be demanding&mdash;and undoubtedly getting&mdash;huge contracts from Torrey sometime between now and June 1, 1982, when their current pacts expire. So Torrey knew that if he broke his piggy bank for Bourne, a player he thinks the Islanders can win without, the in expendable Bossy and Potvin&rsquo;s already exorbitant asking prices would escalate even higher.Hence, negotiations between Bourne&rsquo;s agent and Torrey broke down. Bourne went home and very soon word leaked out that Los Angeles Kings&rsquo; owner Jerry Buss was interested in signing Bourne. Then his general manager, George Maguire, explained to Buss what the repercussions might be: If the Kings couldn&rsquo;t come up with a suitable deal to compensate the Islanders for their loss of Bourne, an arbitrator would intervene and decide for them. And the player whose name kept popping up as the most likely to satisfy the Isles was Dave Taylor. Buss suddenly lost interest in Bourne and very few others have picked up where he left off&mdash;mainly because of a legitimate fear of the wrath of the arbitrator. At last word, Bourne, who had reported to and then left training camp, was demanding a multi-year pact worth $200,000 annually. Torrey wasn&rsquo;t budging from $180,000.Bourne wasn&rsquo;t the only free agent who felt he was being repressed as the opening of the 1981-82 season approached. The Rangers&rsquo; Ron Duguay, also a free agent, played in the Canada Cup for Team Canada&mdash;Bourne was invited but left camp there, too&mdash;but did not go to Sweden and Finland with his team for training camp. His agent and Ranger GM Craig Patrick were having problems arriving at an agreeable figure for Duguay&rsquo;s services. The same situation went for Quebec Nordiques&rsquo; goaltender Dan Bouchard, who said he was prepared to sit out the season unless the Nordiques gave him what he wanted&mdash;reportedly $275,000 a year and a $370,000 signing bonus, all in U.S. funds.The guess here is that before too much longer, Bourne, Duguay and Bouchard will all be wearing the same uniforms they took off when they played, their last games last spring. What else can they do? They aren&rsquo;t going to sit out the season and they certainly aren&rsquo;t going to sign with other teams&mdash;not as long as that arbitrator is looming in the background.He&rsquo;ll continue to loom there, too, at least until the NHL Players Association can change the system. Their current collective bargaining agreement with the league expires on September 15, 1982, and until that time, Bob Bourne, Ron Duguay and Dan Bouchard are three free agents with no way to be free. &#9632;

Although there was certainly enough action on the ice during the recently concluded Canada Cup tournament, one of the most spirited battles took place off the ice&mdash;in the victorious Soviet locker room after the final game.The Soviets, thinking that the cup they received on the ice after the game was theirs to keep and take home, were in the midst of spiriting the prize out of the Montreal Porum in an equipment bag when they were caught in the act by tourney organizer Alan Eagleson and a phalnx of police. After being informed by The Eagle that in fact the cup was not going anyplace, the Soviets turned it over, went home and that was that.But not quite.After reading about the incident in the newspapers, George Smith, a Winnipeg-based trucking executive, decided that the Soviets had not only been grossly short changed by Eagleson but that they should have a trophy to keep. In the space below, Smith tells the rest of the story:On the morning following that final game, I saw all the headlines in the paper about the Russians being caught with the trophy in the bag and all that and I thought to myself: How much can this trophy be worth that the tournament people have to act like little children? So I called up the newspapers here and said I thought it would be a good idea if we bought a cup for the Russians and showed Eagleson that we weren&rsquo;t cheapskates. He called the people of Winnipeg that during the Canada Cup because we wouldn&rsquo;t go to oddball games that he couldn&rsquo;t sell anywhere else&mdash;like Sweden vs. Finland at 2 in the afternoon. Well, that game wouldn&rsquo;t have drawn better anywhere else in Canada. And the ticket prices were exorbitant!So I made some inquiries about getting the thing made and found out that the original trophy was 31&frac34; inches high, made out of pure nickel and that it weighs 123 pounds. I also discovered that the cup they were fighting over after the game was not the original, but a replica. And that makes it that much more idiotic! 1 mean, why in the hell would Eagleson be fighting over a replica! I found that out when I called a company here in Winnipeg about making our trophy because we wanted it to be made of Manitoba nickel. The guy 1 talked to told me that they had had a request from the Canada Cup people just prior to the start of the series to produce a replica. They farmed the job out to a foundry in New Hamburg, Ont., and paid them $11,000 to manufacture a replica out of nickel alloy steel&mdash;which reduced the weight of the trophy by about 20 percent. That was why Trudeau [the Canadian Prime Minister, Pierre Trudeau] and all the rest of them were able to handle it so easily after the game.Our trophy is going to run us about $3,000, and we&rsquo;ve been talking to the Soviet embassy in Ottawa and they&rsquo;ve indicated to me that they&rsquo;re willing to get one of their players to come over here on October 3 for the presentation of the trophy on the corner of Portage and Main. And if the player can&rsquo;t make it, the staff from the embassy in Ottawa will. One way or another we&rsquo;ll have a ceremony on October 3.To me, the best part of this whole thing has been the letters that we&rsquo;ve been getting along with the contributions that people are sending in for the trophy. I&rsquo;ll tell you something: If we were selling punches at Eagleson for $5 a shot, we&rsquo;d have half of Canada lined up. Another funny thing is that I understand that Eagleson offered a replica to the Russian embassy and they won&rsquo;t take it.I&rsquo;ve been getting some heat from the people at Hockey Canada, sure, about violating copyrights and things like that. But we&rsquo;re not in this to make a profit or anything like that. We just want to give to that team what they won. Eagleson claims they made a million and a half dollars on the tournament, so they could have had a second replica made for three or four thousand dollars and made the Canada Cup a real class operation by letting the winning team keep the trophy.They can give us the argument that in international competition, trophies aren&rsquo;t given out. But why couldn&rsquo;t we have changed that? Why couldn&rsquo;t we have laid the groundwork for a different policy? I&rsquo;m sure those guys wanted to take that thing back home and show those people what they won in Canada. Just because everybody else is stupid doesn&rsquo;t mean that we have to be, too! Let &lsquo;em keep it for four years! &#9632;

A Canada Cup For The Soviets To Keep

<div class="byline">BY ED CHYNOWETH</div>With graduates of the Canadian Major Junior Hockey Leagues accounting for 82 percent of the players in the National Hockey League, producing the best players possible is a major concern for both the CMJHL and the NHL. Western Hockey League president Ed Chynoweth elaborates on the subject below.<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0008-011170/4411162-1-eng-US/f0008-012.jpg" title="f0008-01" width="446" height="600"></div>What I&rsquo;d like to see is a 60-game schedule where you play 20 games before Christmas and 40 after Christmas.It seems rather strange to me that we start our season before the National Hockey League does and we have to compete with the baseball playoffs, the World Series and football, when in fact, we could have the bulk of our schedule in what is traditionally hockey season&mdash;January, February and March.We might still have to start our training camps in the same time period, but instead of cutting down to 20 players right away, you might have to carry 24 or 26 players. We would play a limited number of exhibition games, probably on weekends, and have more time for practices.One has to keep in mind that players that are signed or drafted usually go to the NHL training camps, so the junior teams are missing these players. That&rsquo;s why it would be better to have a later start to the actual schedule.The biggest stumbling block from our league are from the people who say, &lsquo;Ed, you want to take six home games away from us, and let&rsquo;s say that each home game nets $5,000, that&rsquo;s $30,000 you&rsquo;re taking out of our jeans,&rsquo; Unfortunately, I can&rsquo;t tell them or prove to them that two of those games are probably poor dates where they were forced to take somebody because of a travel situation, that nobody wanted; and two games you can probably write off because it will be 35 below zero that night and TV will be great and everything else. So maybe we&rsquo;re really only talking two dates. It takes a hell of a hockey fan to go to all 36 home games. Maybe if you cut it to 30, the guy that can go to 20 games doesn&rsquo;t mind doling out the difference for 10 games.Obviously, we have to start to try and improve our skill development and I think the NHL has to be prepared to participate in this area. And one way is through specialized coaching. Maybe there&rsquo;s a goaltender coach who works for the league, like a Gump Worsley, or maybe they could have three coaches who could spend two weeks with a league and work with just the goaltenders. Maybe they could have someone come around who was a great defensive defenseman or a great forechecker. Everyone talks about international hockey; that the Europeans do this and that and have these skills. They do some great things and I&rsquo;m the first to recognize that&hellip;let&rsquo;s take the best of what they&rsquo;ve got and adapt it to our way of life to improve our system.We&rsquo;ve discussed this with the NHL, and in all fairness, we&rsquo;ve got to take this step by step, so I&rsquo;m not knocking them. We&rsquo;ve discussed their involvement and we&rsquo;ve just had our agreement finalized and we&rsquo;ll be meeting with them once their season starts to see if we might begin stage two, and stage two might be involved in specialized training.We hope to be talking to the NHL and encouraging them to participate in this type of thing. &#9632;

f0008-01

Less Games, More Practices To Develop Skills

<div class="byline">BY BOB FACHET</div>LANDOVER&mdash;The Washington Capitals neither expect nor desire sympathy for their current status as a member of the tough Patrick Division. For one thing, the Capitals asked for it. For another, they are not at all pessimistic about their prospects.&ldquo;All summer in Canada, everyone was telling me, &lsquo;What a division you&rsquo;re in,&rsquo; &ldquo;said coach Gary Green. &ldquo;We&rsquo;re aware of it. We asked for it. The Islanders reign supreme, and they should, but I don&rsquo;t think we&rsquo;re all that far apart from a team like Philadelphia and we&rsquo;re every bit as good a team, if not better than, the Rangers and Pittsburgh. Of course, that&rsquo;s fine and dandy to say, but we have to go out and prove it.&rdquo;A year ago, the Capitals were 5-10-1 against their four Patrick playmates. They divided four-game series against the Rangers and Philadelphia, had a 1-2-1 deficit against Pittsburgh and lost all four to the Islanders. Oddly, they did not win a home game from Philadelphia or Pittsburgh, nor lose on the road.&ldquo;I think we&rsquo;re in position to move up,&rdquo; Gary Green said. &ldquo;I&rsquo;m sure we have the right character and backbone.&rdquo;&ldquo;I think we&rsquo;re in a better position than Hartford to move, up, for example,&rdquo; Green said. &ldquo;Hartford is in a speed skating division. We&rsquo;ve got a tougher physical division, with lots of speed, too. Maybe they ought to change the title to the black and blue division.&ldquo;We know it won&rsquo;t be easy, but I&rsquo;m sure we have the right character and backbone on this team. The new additions get us over the hump. We don&rsquo;t need to be concerned about going into any building in this league.&ldquo;There&rsquo;s another factor a lot of people seem to be forgetting. We still play all the others three times. Sometimes when you play better teams, you&rsquo;re better prepared for teams equal to you or below you.&rdquo;The Capitals were attracted to the Patrick Division by the presence of the Flyers, who were responsible for most of the sellout crowds of 18,130 at Capital Centre. But there was a feeling the New York teams would become &lsquo;bigger draws with more frequent appearances, so the Capitals managed to slip from Norris to Patrick as part of the merger agreement with the World Hockey Association.With the prospect of better competition and increased attendance comes the specter of continued injury problems. The Patrick will be the most physical division and not necessarily because of the presence of Philadelphia. Washington genera! manager Max McNab is on record as saying that the Islanders create more work in the trainer&rsquo;s room than any other opponent.The Capitals are counting on the acquisition of Orest Kindrachuk, along with the return of Ryan Walter, Mike Gartner and Bob Kelly, to guarantee 100 percent effort in pits like the Spectrum, Nassau Coliseum. Madison Square Garden and Pittsburgh&rsquo;s Civic Arena.&ldquo;Kindrachuk played for me in San Diego,&rdquo; said McNab, the longtime general manager of the old Gulls. &ldquo;We had to go into Portland, with a bunch of big defensemen like Connie Madigan and Jerry Foley, but it didn&rsquo;t bother Kindrachuk. He just banged into them like they were little guys.&ldquo;He is a fine road player. He can go into any building and perform. And one of his strengths wherever he&rsquo;s been has been his ability to help young people. He can be a big influence on Bobby Carpenter, for instance.&rdquo;Besides Carpenter, the Capitals took a high percentage of tough, young candidates on their exhibition tour to Sweden and Finland. Such veterans as Jean Pronovost, Pat Ribble, Pierre Bouchard, Guy Charron, Bob Sirois, and Dennis Ververgaert were left at home, although Pronovost and Ribble, if not some of the others, were still given good chances to open the regular season.&ldquo;We want to take a good &lsquo;look at young guys who performed up and beyond what we expected in Hershey last year,&rdquo; McNab said. &ldquo;Guys like Lou Franceschetti, Greg Theberge and Jay Johnston deserve a good chance to show us what they can do.&ldquo;Some of the veterans whose careers have been very level over the past five-six-seven years, chances are we know that&rsquo;s what we&rsquo;ll see when the season starts. We&rsquo;d rather satisfy ourselves on the young players. We want to win over there [Europe], but not the way we have to win our normal 80th game of the season.&rdquo;He wasn&rsquo;t kidding about having to win that 80th game. Two years ago the Capitals finished by tying Atlanta in a game they needed to win to stay alive. Last season they beat Detroit in their finale, only to be knocked out when Toronto upset Quebec.The only way the Capitals could increase the disappointment for themselves and their fans this year would be to finish among the league&rsquo;s top 16&mdash;even the top 12&mdash;and still not make the playoffs. It is not an implausible script.<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0009-011131/4411193-1-eng-US/f0009-012.jpg" title="f0009-01" width="601" height="788"><figcaption class="caption-body">Washington figures that veteran center Orest Kindrachuk is an asset because of his road play.</figcaption></div><div class="sidebar">COMING SOON HOCKEY NEWS&rsquo; HOTS EAT COLUMN &#9632;</div>

f0009-01

Rugged Division Doesn’t Faze Caps

<div class="byline">BY NEIL MILBERT</div><div class="image-hero"><img title="f0010-01" src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0010-011162/4411224-1-eng-US/f0010-012.jpg"><figcaption class="caption-body">Glen Sharpley found being traded from Minnesota last season was a big strain on him as he yearned to be accepted by his new teammates. (Photo By Bruce Bennett)</figcaption></div>CHICAGO&mdash;Emotionally, physically, and statistically Glen Sharpley went through purgatory on ice during the 1980-81 hockey season.But training camp is the time for starting over and Sharpley stole the show when the Black Hawks began their training camp scrimmage tournament in Chicago Stadium.Scoring two goals, assisting on another, and playing a surprisingly feisty brand of hockey, he led Reggie Kerr&rsquo;s team to a relatively easy 5-2 upset victory at the expense of the team captained by Keith Brown.&ldquo;I feel much more at home,&rdquo; said Sharpley, a blanket statement covering both his status with the Hawks and the fact that coach Keith Magnuson is employing him at center, his pet position.Unhappy in Minnesota where he&rsquo;d played for four and a half seasons, Sharpley was acquired by Chicago last December in the hope that he would fill the void at right wing created when Grant Mulvey shattered his forearm.Not only was Sharpley affected by knee and shoulder injuries, he later found he had mononucleosis.He proved to be a disappointment, winding up with cumulative statistics of 22 goals and 28 assists, his poorest season in the National Hockey League. The previous winter Sharpley had only 47 points but then he missed 29 games and performed brilliantly in the North Stars&rsquo; upset conquest of Montreal in the playoffs.&lsquo;&lsquo;I was happy to get out of Minnesota but mentally it still was hard on me,&rdquo; said Sharpley, who&rsquo;d never before been traded. &ldquo;One of the most difficult things is trying to be accepted as a person by 20 other grown men. I felt a strain.&rdquo;Compounding his adjustment problems were serious shoulder and knee injuries. Then, after the Hawks were swept out of the playoffs by Calgary, Sharpley discovered that he&rsquo;d been playing with mononucleosis.&ldquo;The day after the season ended I felt so drained that I could hardly drag myself out of bed,&rdquo; recalled the 26-year-old forward. &ldquo;In Chicago I was tested for mono but the tests were negative.&ldquo;When 1 went back up to my home in Minnesota I went out and raked some leaves and was totally exhausted. I went to the doctor there for another checkup and this time I tested positive for mono.&ldquo;I dropped 18 pounds and I was totally drained. For two weeks I stayed in bed 20 hours a day. I&rsquo;d get up at 10 in the morning for some juice and I&rsquo;d stay up awhile. Then I&rsquo;d go back to bed and stay there until 8 o&rsquo;clock at night when I&rsquo;d get up to watch TV. By 10 1 was ready to hit the sack again.&ldquo;Eventually, I got back to feeling good. My girlfriend and I got married, we sold my house in Minnesota and came here. I found a new house and started working out, riding the exercise bike and skating. Because of the pounding on my knees, I don&rsquo;t do any running.&rsquo;&ldquo;I also played some golf and did things socially, meeting new people and settling in. It&rsquo;s pretty hard to do that when you come in during the middle of the season.&ldquo;I don&rsquo;t want to make an alibi for the season I had but I think the combination of psychological and physical factors produced the mono and that kept me from doing my best after I came here.&rdquo;HAWK TALK&mdash;Magnuson intends to keep Sharpley at center, which figures to be one of the team&rsquo;s strongest positions with Tom Lysiak, Denis Savard, and Terry Ruskowski also residing on the roster. &ldquo;However, it also depends on where we need him most,&rdquo;&lsquo;the coach added. &ldquo;If other people don&rsquo;t perform the way we hope, he could go back to right wing.&rdquo;&hellip;Lysiak, last year&rsquo;s top scorer with 76 points, has reported to training camp 10 pounds lighter than last year when his playing weight was 196 pounds&hellip;Veteran right wing J.P. Bordeleau, who played in Chicago 1972-80 but was sent back to the minors in New Brunswick last season, is still on the roster but is reporting directly to Moncton for training camp&hellip;Defenseman Brian Young, who played eight games for the Hawks and spent the rest of last season with Dallas, is another training camp absentee. Reportedly, he is going to spend the season in Europe. &#9632;

f0010-01

Sharpley Comfortable Now With Clean Slate As Hawk

<div class="byline">BILL FLEISCHMAN&#x2019;S</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0010-02925/4411255-1-eng-US/f0010-022.jpg" title="f0010-02" width="318" height="360"></div><h2>A Delicate Subject</h2>DRUGS IN SPORTS&hellip; gays in government. Now that we have your attention&hellip;Today&rsquo;s subject may rank up there in delicacy with the above two, at least among hockey people.Are Fench-Canadians discriminated against? Considerable evidence indicates they have been, in such important areas as job opportunities and education. Over the last few years, as francophone pride and determination have grown, the opportunities have improved, as they should. However, backlash has reached the point where English speaking Quebec natives are fleeing the province. Francophone fever has also made English speaking visitors to the marvelous city of Montreal feel uncomfortable. Is this what the Quebecois really want&mdash;an isolated city bankrupt of tourism?Anyway, what I&rsquo;m wondering is: Is Prof. Roger Boileau serious when he insists that French-Canadian hockey players are victims of discrimination in the NHL? In a recent issue of THE HOCKEY NEWS, Prof. Boileau, a Laval University sociologist, wrote, &ldquo;Globally, Quebec hockey players are treated like a minority group&hellip;This means that they are considered for teams as long as they are very, very good. If not, there&rsquo;s always some other people from other parts of Canada that could take their place within a team.&rdquo;In all my years of covering hockey I have never heard&mdash;or heard of&mdash;a general manager deciding to keep an anglophone purely for ethnic reasons. No hockey manager in his right mind would ignore a talented player, whether he is from Quebec, Ontario, Western Canada or Saudi Arabia. From my experience, when a decision must be reached between two players who appear equally talented, the nod goes to the player who can help the team most. Sometimes this means a grinder is chosen over a skater, or vice versa.<h2>Out-Of-Date Study</h2>NOT ONLY DID I disagree with most of Prof. Boileau&rsquo;s points, I was dismayed to see him quoting a study that is almost 10 years old. Whether it&rsquo;s the academic community or the newspaper business, I&rsquo;ve always thought you use the most up-to-date facts to support your argument.If there had been protests over discrimination I figured the logical place to check would be the NHL Players Association office. But, according to an NHL PA spokesman, their &ldquo;Discrimination&rdquo; file is bare.&ldquo;We always hear this, but we never get any official complaints by French-speaking players,&rdquo; said the spokesman. &ldquo;And we&rsquo;ve never made any studies of it, because we never felt we had to.&rdquo;The spokesman said agents have occasionally grumbled, but that&rsquo;s probably because their clients weren&rsquo;t drafted as high as the agent hoped.What the agents, players and fans must recognize is, the Quebec League ranks behind the Ontario and Western Canada leagues in producing quality NHL players. The exceptions have been outstanding&mdash;Lafleur, Perreault, Bossy&mdash;but ask almost any NHL general manager about Quebec League players and, with no trace of anti-French sentiment, he&rsquo;ll say, &lsquo;Most aren&rsquo;t big enough or tough enough.&rdquo;One man&rsquo;s study of the top five amateur draft choices each year since 1975 shows that the only No. 1 from the Quebec League is Dale Hawerchuk, and he isn&rsquo;t French (French-Ukrainian, perhaps?). Since &lsquo;75 the Ontario league has produced four No. Is&mdash;Rob Ramage, Bobby Smith, Dale McCourt, and Rick Green&mdash;while the WCHL has two claims to No. 1 fame&mdash;Doug Wickenheiser and Mel Bridgman. You&rsquo;ll notice there isn&rsquo;t a Lafleur, Bossy or Dionne (from St. Catharines, Ontario)&mdash;among them.<h2>Few In Top Five</h2>THE ONLY OTHER Quebec Leaguers among the top five selections since &lsquo;75 are Denis Savard, Rick Vaive, Robert Picard, Jere Gillis and Glen Sharpley. Only two players chosen below the first five have quickly made scouts mutter &ldquo;Please don&rsquo;t remind me.&rdquo; Bossy wasn&rsquo;t picked by the Islanders until 15th in the 1977 draft, and Ray Bourque was the eighth selection, by Boston, in &lsquo;79. If many more Quebec League products had quickly developed into NHL stars, their supporters would have a thick dossier on discrimination&mdash;or, more accurately, stupidity by NHL teams. But it just isn&rsquo;t so.A friend of mine in the French press who&rsquo;s always been objective sums up the dispute best.:&ldquo;The fans&rsquo; big complaint is NHL teams always seem to look to the Western Canada and Ontario Leagues first&mdash;even Montreal. They think the Canadiens should take care of French-Canadian players. But in the years I covered the Canadiens, I always found they took the best players first.&rdquo;Case closed. &#9632;

f0010-02

HOCKEY WORLD

<div class="byline">BY RANDY SMITH</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0011-011108/4411286-1-eng-US/f0011-012.jpg" title="f0011-01" width="598" height="1128"><figcaption class="caption-body">For Jack Mcllhargey, discipline and hard work are essentials of his NHL existence.</figcaption></div>HARTFORD&mdash;Jack Mcllhargey, in a nomadic National Hockey League career, has scored 10 goals while compiling 1,020 minutes in penalties.To time him accurately on skates, one might use a calendar instead of a stopwatch.&ldquo;If Jack makes an end-to-end rush,&rdquo; Vancouver coach Harry Heale once said, &ldquo;you have to call timeout to get another puck.&rdquo;For all the wisecracks&mdash;Mcllhargey has been known to give as good as he gets&mdash;there&rsquo;s a side to the 29-year-old defenseman that turns on virtually everybody in hockey.&ldquo;Jack has. the absolute, perfect attitude,&rdquo; Neale said. &ldquo;He&rsquo;s happy in his work. He gives the Whalers a dimension they desperately need.&rdquo;The Hartford Whalers&mdash;make no mistake about it&mdash;are using Mcllhargey. Okay, he&rsquo;s getting paid, but he is not in the team&rsquo;s future plans. He is a stop-gap, but he is also a teacher, a leader and a model for younger players. Above all, he is a professional.&ldquo;You have to take pride in yourself and in your team,&rdquo; Mcllhargey said.&ldquo;I think the guys have to be proud that they are Hartford Whalers. That attitude was lacking last year. It has to change.&rdquo;To appreciate fully Mcllhargey&rsquo;s contribution, one might rewrite a scene from any number of World War II movies. You know the one in which the Nazis have strong-armed some innocent-looking factory worker for interrogation.&ldquo;I&rsquo;m worried,&rdquo; says a friend, &ldquo;better men than Jack Mcllhargey have cracked.&rdquo;To which the hero replies, &ldquo;Have faith, there are no better men than Jack Mcllhargey.&rdquo;Mcllhargey is not your basic success story. He has played for the Jersey Devils and in places such as Des Moines and Richmond. Last year in 48 games for Hartford, he scored one goal. Through it all&mdash;the bus rides and the whistle stops&mdash;the word has spread, however. The man is a winner.&ldquo;I don&rsquo;t know if anyone means more to our team than Jack Mcllhargey,&rdquo; said Larry Pleau, the Whalers&rsquo; general manager and head coach. &ldquo;We need his enthusiasm, his leadership. It&rsquo;s good for the younger players just to be around someone like Jack. Every team has a different set of values. On our team, enthusiasm and the willingness to compete mean more than talent.&rdquo;The next step backwards&mdash;to paraphrase&mdash;will be Mcllhargey&rsquo;s first.&ldquo;Discipline and hard work are a lot more important than ability,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;1 know talented players who never made it. The little things add up to a lot in this game.&rdquo;Mcllhargey, who came to the Whalers from Philadelphia for a draft choice, was less than sound a year ago. His neck problems have eased and his knee is fine.&ldquo;Last year was a rough one, but not a wasted one,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;I can contribute more than what the fans saw last year. I&rsquo;ve learned a lot about this organization and what Larry wants to accomplish. 1 can help.&rdquo;There is something splendid about the over-achiever who endures and prevails.&ldquo;Discipline is the biggest part,&rdquo; Mcllhargey said. &ldquo;Some players can&rsquo;t play that way. That&rsquo;s when you have to make changes.The Whalers are sure to make plenty as they attempt to rise from an 18th-place overall finish, but Mcllhargey is staying put.&ldquo;I don&rsquo;t care if we have 20 defensemen,&rdquo; said assistant coach Rick Ley, &ldquo;Mcllhargey will be there. He&rsquo;s a beauty.&rdquo;The underlying ingredient, that which sets Mcllhargey apart, is as basic as it is elusive: He likes his work.&ldquo;If hockey isn&rsquo;t fun, there&rsquo;s no sense playing it,&rdquo; he Said. &ldquo;I can&rsquo;t wait for the season to get going. I&rsquo;m tired of buying my own rounds.&rdquo; &#9632;

f0011-01

McIlhargey Takes Pride In Game He Loves

<div class="byline">BY JIM MATHESON</div>EDMONTON&mdash;Anyway you look at it, five into three doesn&rsquo;t go evenly&mdash;whether you&rsquo;re using new math or old. There&rsquo;s five goalies trying for three spots on the Edmonton Oilers&rsquo; roster and somebody is going to come away with a bruised ego.&ldquo;We&rsquo;ll start with three and be down to two by Christmas,&rdquo; said Oiler coach-GM Glen Sather. The lineup reads like this: Andy Moog, Grant Fuhr, Ron Low, Eddie Mio, Gary Edwards. Maybe in that order.Moog appears to be at the head of the Hockey League games under his belt, can see Sather&rsquo;s rationale. &ldquo;Having three goalies for a month or two would keep a lot of pressure on us and I&rsquo;m not sure it wouldn&rsquo;t be the best way to find out everything Slats [Sather] wants to find out,&rdquo; said Moog, 21.Moog appears to be at the head of the class. Even Edwards admits it: &ldquo;1 think Andy has to get the first shot after the playoff he had last spring,&rdquo; said Edwards, who watched as Moog stoned the Montreal Canadiens and held off the New York Islanders through six games. &ldquo;I can&rsquo;t see why he wouldn&rsquo;t.&rdquo;<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0011-02892/4411317-1-eng-US/f0011-022.jpg" title="f0011-02" width="590" height="1128"><figcaption class="caption-body">A goaltender like Grant Fuhr, above, only comes out of junior hockey once in a while.</figcaption></div>Fuhr, the club&rsquo;s No. 1 draft choice&mdash;eighth overall&mdash;will likely stick, whether he&rsquo;s first, second or third-string. Sather has a wealth of patience in kids; he waited months before last year&rsquo;s first pick Paul Coffey came around. &ldquo;I don&rsquo;t believe in the philosophy which has existed in hockey for 50 years that a young goaltender has to suffer for a year or two in the minors [or in Fuhr&rsquo;s case, back in junior] before starting in the NHL,&rdquo; said Sather.The 18-year-old Victoria Cougar netminder comes with impeccable credentials&mdash;the highest goalie chosen since John Davidson was picked fifth in 1973. &ldquo;I&rsquo;m certainly counting on him,&rdquo; said Oilers&rsquo; chief scout Barry Fraser, who knew two years ago Fuhr was his pick. &ldquo;I&rsquo;m counting on him to be there, now, next week or next month. A goaltender like him only comes out of junior hockey every once in a while. I said he&rsquo;s the best goalie I&rsquo;ve seen out of junior since Bernie Parent and I still say that.&rdquo;Edwards doesn&rsquo;t need to be persuaded, not after seeing the kid in workouts. &ldquo;I can&rsquo;t see a team drafting a goalie in the first round if they didn&rsquo;t have big plans for him,&rdquo; said the 33-year-old veteran.Fraser is sold on the kid. &ldquo;When I drafted him. I believed he could step in and play right away. He is extremely good at directing the puck into the comers and he has the best blocker I&rsquo;ve ever seen at any level. He has a good catching hand and he never has to look over his shoulder to see where the net is. The only thing he lacks is NHL experience.&rdquo;If Moog and Fuhr are almost automatic, the third pick is up in the air. Financially, Low is the odds-on choice as babysitter for the two youngsters. He has a one-way contract that pays him six figures. He may be coming off a frustrating year&mdash;with two broken thumbs&mdash;but he was once a playoff hero himself. When he joined the Oilers in March, 1980, he almost single-handedly beat the Philadelphia Flyers in the playoffs. His heroics earned him a three-year contract, for more than $100,000 per. He doesn&rsquo;t really want to go anywhere else, not after a nomadic career, but if he has to move on he&rsquo;ll do it. &ldquo;When I came here I said I&rsquo;d like to finish my career here, but I know they&rsquo;re looking at youth now. I&rsquo;m not as fast as I used to be but I&rsquo;m a helluva lot smarter. If I&rsquo;m not good enough here, 1 know I can play somewhere else,&rdquo; said Low.Mio played in 43 games last season, assuming the No. 1 role when Low broke his thumb the first time in December. He was KO&rsquo;d by a fractured finger in mid-March, became a free agent in June and was sub sequently re-signed for $85,000-a-year just before camp. He had to agree to a minor-league clause which will pay him $40,000. however, which makes a demotion to Wichita plausible. If Low and Mio are even, economics dictate that Mio is going to the farm.As for Edwards, he fully expects to be traded&mdash;likely before the intraleague draft Oct. 5. &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve heard a few things from some people,&rdquo; said Edwards, who would like to play on an American-based team for tax purposes.ON THE BENCH&mdash;.Oiler center Matti Hagman will be out until midOctober after breaking his foot in a workout&hellip;Oilers signed sixth round draft choice Marc Habscheid to a multi-year contract and will keep the 18-year-old center around for the early part of regular-season. The underager from the Saskatoon Blades can be returned to his junior club as long as he doesn&rsquo;t play 12 games with the Oilers. &#9632;

f0011-02

Oiler Goal Crease Draws Big Crowd

<div class="byline">BY ERIC DUHATSCHEK</div><div class="image-hero"><img title="f0012-01" src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0012-011134/4411348-1-eng-US/f0012-012.jpg"><figcaption class="caption-body">While most of the Flames shed their choker&rsquo;s image in the playoffs, Eric Vail&rsquo;s injuries prevented him from showing his true worth. (Photo by Ian Mac Alpine)</figcaption></div>CALGARY&mdash;The National League&rsquo;s Rookie of the Year in 1975 is thinking&mdash;and talking&mdash;like a rookie again.In his own way, Eric Vail has as much to prove to the Calgary Flames as an untried teenager graduating from junior hockey.Vail is coming off a disappointing 1980-81 season, disappointing from both a performance and a health standpoint.He scored 28 goals and 64 points in 64 games, not bad by some standards, but only adequate by Vail&rsquo;s. Of the 16 games he missed, the majority came in the final month of the season. The seriousness of his groin injuries was not immediately apparent, but as it turned out, they kept Vail out of the lineup the remainder of the year.Consequently, Vail was an outsider during the team&rsquo;s surge to the Stanley Cup semifinals. A lot of Flames&rsquo; players answered questions about themselves during that stretch run. People are still asking those questions about VaiLTrade rumors flourished in the off-season. Vail supposedly was heading to Edmonton, to Winnipeg. The only sure thing was the 28-year-old left winger wouldn&rsquo;t be back, with the Flames.General manager Cliff Fletcher crossed everybody up though&mdash;Vail included&mdash;and now, with training camp underway, the seven-year veteran has an opportunity to make his point.&ldquo;When 1 first heard the trade talks, they bothered me,&rdquo; Vail said. &ldquo;In the first part of the summer, I was just thinking &lsquo;let&rsquo;s get it over with&rsquo;. It&rsquo;s not that I wanted to leave. It&rsquo;s just that if I was going to be traded, I wanted it done sooner rather than later.&rdquo;Part of Vail&rsquo;s problem stems from his reputation as a fun-loving person who&rsquo;d rather party than play.Vail says, the rap goes back to his junior days and is no longer accurate or justified.&ldquo;I have a lot of things to prove to a lot of people,&rdquo; Vail said, &ldquo;but mostly, I have to prove them to myself.&rdquo;&ldquo;I was a rowdy kid.&rdquo; he said candidly. &ldquo;Sure I have fun playing hockey&mdash;and I&rsquo;ll continue to have fun playing hockey&mdash;but that doesn&rsquo;t mean I&rsquo;m not serious when I step on the ice.&rdquo;Three years ago, playing on a line with Guy Chouinard and Bobby MacMillan, the trio formed the second-highest scoring line in the league.MacMillan and Chouinard both finished in the top 10 and Vail&mdash;with 35 goals and 48 assists&mdash;was not far behind.The next year, MacMillan had to have an emergency appendectomy in the pre-season and he never played up to his potential.Last season, Chouinard missed 25 games with a shoulder separation. That injury, plus coach Al MacNeil&rsquo;s propensity to experiment with line combinations, meant the line played together very little.&ldquo;We had one pretty good year together,&rdquo; recalled Vail. &ldquo;I&rsquo;d like to get back with them and do it again.&ldquo;I have a lot of things to prove to a lot of people, but mostly, I have to prove them to myself. I didn&rsquo;t play as well as I could last year.&rdquo;If anything works against Vail in the forthcoming year, it is the status of his lower abdomen. Despite a summer of rest, the injury has not healed completely. And even if Vail isn&rsquo;t worried, the same could not be said for Fletcher.&ldquo;The health of Eric Vail and Ken Houston are our biggest concerns,&rdquo; Fletcher said. &ldquo;Vail&rsquo;s situation is improving, but we won&rsquo;t know for few games for us.&rdquo;&ldquo;It feels pretty good,&rdquo; was Vail&rsquo;s first assessement. &ldquo;I&rsquo;m encouraged. My main goal now is to get healthy and stay healthy.&rdquo;The rest, it is presumed, would follow suit.IN BRIEF&mdash;Two of Flames&rsquo; three Canada Cup competitors reported to camp, after seven days off to recuperate from the tournament. Both Pekka Rautakallio and Kent Nilsson say they&rsquo;re in mid-season shape and are ready to play.However, the injury suffered by Paul Reinhart, originally diagnosed as a twisted ankle, turned out to be torn ligaments, which kept him out at least two weeks.Rautakallio, who played for the winless Finns, is particularly sure until he gets a chance to play a anxious for the season to start. Normally reserved about his team&rsquo;s prospects, Rautakallio predicted: &ldquo;I have one of those feelings that this season is going to be something else, i&rsquo;m confident that we&rsquo;re going to do something we&rsquo;ve never done before on this team and that something will be good. I&rsquo;m interested to see how things look on the ice.&rdquo;Harold Phillipoff, the former Flame, is in camp for a look. Phillipoff, Flames&rsquo; first-round pick in the 1976 amateur draft, was released by Vancouver in the off-season. &#9632;

f0012-01

Vail Eager To Redeem Disappointing Year

<div class="byline">BY DICK BEDDOES</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0012-02967/4411379-1-eng-US/f0012-022.jpg" title="f0012-02" width="320" height="330"></div><h2>A Salute To Ballard</h2>THE TENANT OF this literary flophouse rises to salute an old flamboyant foe, Harold Ballard, the Toronto hockey owner who always plays a merry tune on the cash register in Maple Leaf Gardens.Business is always so brisk that y&rsquo;r ob&rsquo;t servant reveres the Gardens as the Maple Leaf Mint.Mr. Ballard, it says here, is one of the few Canadian hockey promoters who escaped hypocrisy in the recent Canada Cup tournament.He refused to allow the tournament into the Gardens, for reasons explained a few weeks ago in THE HOCKEY NEWS.&ldquo;It&rsquo;s the Russians, mainly,&rdquo; Ballard told this esteemed publication. &ldquo;I don&rsquo;t like the way they&rsquo;ve treated the world and I don&rsquo;t know why the hell we should all welcome them over here with open arms and give &lsquo;em a whole pile of money so that they can come back here and shoot us.&rdquo;This still small voice murmurs hurray.I felt the same way when Jimmy Carter, once the duly ordained Peanut President of the United States, led a Western boycott of the Moscow Olympics last year.Mr. Ballard, like many people in hockey, is essentially apolitical.But if you take him at his word, his refusal to give rink space to the Soviet Union demonstrates disapproval of the brutal trials of Soviet dissidents such as Orlov, Shcharansky and Ginsberg.It indicates a repugnance, for a tyrannical system that imprisons anyone who defies Societ despots by talking back.I would have hoped that R. Alan Eagleson, the Canada Cup czar, might have felt the same way.Mr. Eagleson, after all, once scornfully said, &ldquo;I&rsquo;d sooner be a bum in Toronto than a major-general in Russia.&rdquo;One can only conclude, then, that Eagleson invited a Soviet team to Canada Cup &lsquo;81 for the crassest of reasons. Money.<h2>Politics And Sports</h2>THERE ARE THOSE in hockey, some of whom get their opinions printed on the sports pages, who say don&rsquo;t drag politics into sports.It is not a very smart thing to say because it smacks of ignorance. The fact is that every international involvement is a political confrontation.You can&rsquo;t keep politics out of international athletics any more than you can keep hockey out of the Montreal Forum, sleazy sex out of New York&rsquo;s Times Square, or gasbag wafflers out of the Canadian Parliament and U.S. Senate. Impossible.True, we are in a pitiful plight if the East-West philosophical conflict is symbolized by the childish spectacle of sweaty hockey players heaving up and down in hippodromes.We can, however, abandon the warped concept that sporting encounters promote international goodwill and heal ideological wounds.That proposition is so preposterous that it hardly merits mention, when it is apparent that such encounters are manipulated to magnify national differences and make international blood pressures pop.Why, otherwise, do Canada Cup teams get their nationalism goosed by the interminable playing of national anthems?It is true that this hoary rite of the Eagleson charade had a comic touch in the &lsquo;81 tournament. The Finnish national team was somewhat confused before one game when the boys were saluted by the playing of the Italian national anthem.<h2>Hit In The Pocketbook</h2>HYPOCRISY, ONE ADMITS, is the operative word in international politics. The Olympic boycott was a gossamer thing ripped apart when North American farmers insisted that their surplus wheat be sold to the Soviet Union.And I&rsquo;d feel more supportive of Mr. Ballard&rsquo;s hockey boycott if he also barred the Moscow circus from Maple Leaf Gardens.His blackballing of Canada Cup &lsquo;81 did, however, hit Mr. Ballard and other Maple Leaf shareholders where they live, which is in the wallet. If there had been three tournament games in the Gardens, say, the gates would have exceeded $1 million.Without necessarily meaning to, Harold Ballard jogged the memory of those who have forgotten the tragedy of the Balkans, the genocide perpetrated on the people of the Volga, the subjugation of the Ukraine&mdash;all Soviet crimes that have been obscured by the myth of detente. &#9632;

f0012-02

BEDCLOTHES

<div class="byline">BY TONY GALLAGHER</div>VANCOUVER&mdash;Bad luck is hardly the sole property of any one national hockey league club, but the Canucks are making an excellent start to gain the accompanying sympathy at the start of their training camp.At the end of the sixth day of workouts, they had four players injured and in the first period of their first exhibition game, another would fall. Two of them were serious, and a shoulder injury to Dave Williams would likely be more troublesome were the injured party not accustomed to pain and playing with it.Certain to miss the start of the season are center Gerry Minor and defenseman Harold Snepsts.Minor was working out with his helmet sitting on his head rather than laced when he ran into the imposing figure of Rory Cava. They collided head on and Minor was knocked unconscious for nearly five minutes, blood trickling from one ear. An ambulance was summoned and the gritty little center was taken to Victoria, then flown to Vancouver for tests. He regained consciousness and after about four hours had some idea of where he was and why. Previously, he was completely disoriented and it looked as though he could have been more seriously injured than the small skull fracture he did sustain. He will be out at least two months and as the Canucks&rsquo; best penalty killer, will be sorely missed.Snepsts, meanwhile, will be out for six weeks with knee problems, first thought to be just a hyper-extension.He was caught in traffic in his own corner and a Winnipeg Jet, unidentified, fell on his knee. There is ligament damage and the big left-side defender will make the coaching staff&rsquo;s decision on which defensemen will make the team easier for the moment.Prior to Snepsts going down, it appeared to be something of a logjam at the position, with eight players with NHL experience or the equivalent vying for positions.&ldquo;They&rsquo;re going down like bowling pins,&rdquo; said coach Harry Neale after the Snepsts injury. &ldquo;That&rsquo;s just what we need, to have two guys not ready to play and maybe another two or three ready but having missed training camp.&rdquo;The others with minor problems are Rick Lanz with a bruised elbow and Jiri Bubla with a bruised hip. Both are expected to be ready for the Oct. 6 opener against Colorado. The odd part about the injury to Minor was that he was already out of scrimmages as a result of a badly scraped elbow, the result of a collision with the screen at the end of the rink in Duncan B.C It will have plenty of time to heal now.Williams has a jammed shoulder and will be ready to start the season, unless he continues trying to make premature comebacks. He&rsquo;s already rushed it once, so that is less likely to happen again.The defensive battle for playing time is a horse race, with Kevin McCarthy, Lanz, Colin Campbell, Doug Halward, Lars Lindgren, Anders Eldebrink and Bubla all trying to get into uniform every game. This is without Snepsts, of course, and the traffic will be worse when he comes back.Vancouver is most certainly in the trade market for a right winger and possibly a goaltender, with defensemen likely the trade bait. Snepsts, who has been mentioned in as many trade rumors as Philadelphia&rsquo;s Mel Bridgman, is again the prime candidate, mainly because he is a known quantity and in demand, never having been traded before. Left winger Curt Fraser is often enquired about, though Canucks would most certainly be reluctant to part with either of them. Losing Fraser would also leave them mighty thin on left wing, where former Cornwall Royals&rsquo; captain Marc Crawford is trying to muscle onto the roster to give the team four left wingers.The club is attempting to make center Lars Molin a right winger to augment the side where only Stan Smyl and Blair MacDonald are expected to be regulars, with Jerry Butler handy for penalty killing and spot duty. Molin, who weighs only 166 pounds, is not exactly looking like Dave Taylor up the right side and he has much to learn, though time to learn it as the experimenting continues. The Canucks are also involved in the concept of a European line and maybe even a five-man European unit, but it&rsquo;s all the idea stage at the moment. Neale did throw together the line of Ivan Hlinka between Per-Olov Brasar on the left and Molin on the right, but taking Brasar out of the middle is like having your best forward contact polio. Brasar, Gradin and Hlinka seem certain to have grabbed at least three of the center shots, especially with Minor flat on his back with a headache.<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0013-011085/4411410-1-eng-US/f0013-012.jpg" title="f0013-01" width="606" height="670"><figcaption class="caption-body">A collison with a teammate left Gerry Minor out of the lineup with a fractured skull.</figcaption></div> &#9632;

f0013-01

Canucks Plagued By Bad Luck In Early Going

This feature, which is appearing for the first time ever in THE HOCKEY NEWS, will run in the paper every week from now on, containing all the latest gossip, trade rumors and hockey bits and pieces.HOW LOW-KEY CAN YOU GET? Jack Krumpe, the man who make things go for Sonny Werblin at Madison Square Garden, is the new president of the Rangers. But you&rsquo;re not likely to read about him in the papers. Staten Island-born Jack, like his predecesor Bill Jennings prefers to work completely in the shadows. It&rsquo;s unlikely that the Rangers will even announce that Krumpe&rsquo;s the new king of the Blueshirts&hellip;The NHL was so displeased with the oldtimers televised TV tournament, &ldquo;The Original Six,&rdquo; that teams were telexed not to cooperate&hellip;League honchos were invited to the dinner thrown for the old boys&mdash;including the likes of Rocket Richard, Bobby Hull, Eddie Giacomin, et al.&mdash;but all declined except Clarence Campbell, who showed up and was warmly received&hellip;Al Eagleson didn&rsquo;t earn any brownie points from the NHL governors over the Canada Cup debacle&hellip;Low gates, too many injuries and the general no-win situation has turned off a lot of the puck barons&hellip;Some Mike Liut-lovers would like to take a temporary leap off his bandwagon to determine if the most-hailed goalie of the 1980s still has the stuff It isn&rsquo;t only the Canada Cup performance that has skeptics wondering&mdash;Mike&rsquo;s third period was especially unfortunate&mdash;but they also remembered how he turned sieve against the Rangers in the playoffs last spring&hellip;In an age of goliaths like Larry Robinson, the Rangers have a David in Finnish defenseman Reijo Ruotsalainen, who measures only 5-8,170 pounds. Already, they&rsquo;re nicknaming him Tolouse Lautree&hellip;Rangers&rsquo; GM Craig Patrick wanted to play down Ruotsalainen but coach Herb Brooks has been talking up the Finn so much it may just be getting Craig&rsquo;s goat&hellip;SPEAKING OF GOAT-GETTING, there&rsquo;s a certain NHL p.r. man who has been bugging folks around the circuit. When he discovered that one of his colleagues had gone the way of the toupee, the flack sent a phony telex, purporting to rep a wig company. He suggested that the publicist with the rug do ads for the hairpieces now that Doug Mohns (ex-Bruin) has stopped modelling the toupees&hellip;Power skating beauty Laura Stamm has contracted to do her second book on how to make hockey playing tortoises into hares. Laura says the best skater she&rsquo;s ever seen was Bobby Orr in his prime. Of the present NHLers she likes Guy Lafleur&rsquo;s strides the best&hellip;Stamm has been working with the Hartford Whalers&hellip;Randy Boyd arrived at the Pittsburgh Penguins&rsquo; camp, figuring he was the top defensive prospect but coach Eddie Johnston took a dim view of his attitude and Boyd will have to do considerable convincing to show E.J. he belongs in the bigs&hellip;Minnesota North Stars-watchers may be surprised at the number of names not considered shoo-ins to make the varsity. The list includes Mike Polich, Paul Shmyr, Tom Younghans, and Tom McCarthy&hellip;International Hockey League prexy Jack Riley was on hand at the Hall of Fame dinner when defenseman Allan Stanley was inducted. Riley was a forward with the Washington Lions when Stanley played defense with the Boston Olympics in the old Eastern League&hellip; &ldquo;Allan hit me with the hardest check of my life,&rdquo; said Riley. &ldquo;I tried to go around Fernie Flaman and Stanley came across and nailed me so hard he knocked all the snot out of my nose!&rdquo;A NOT-TO-BELIEVE RUMOR had the Maple Leafs dealing Borje Salming to Broadway for Ron Duguay. The hitch is that Doogie doesn&rsquo;t dig Leaf coach Mike Nykoluk and the ill-feeling is mutual&hellip;Washington&rsquo;s wunderkind Bobby Carpenter isn&rsquo;t the first NHLer from Danvers, Mass, Bill Moe&mdash;old number 21&mdash;one of the most spectacular over-the-hop checkers of all time was a Danvers grad&hellip;On Thin Ice, which could be the hot hockey book of 1981-82, won&rsquo;t be available until March. A number of delays have stalled publication&hellip;Hockey Night In Canada exec&nbsp;Ralph Mellanby warned Don Cherry when he hired him, &ldquo;Don&rsquo;t turn professional on me.&rdquo; A year later, Grapes comments: &ldquo;And I&rsquo;ve done a great job obeying him, haven&rsquo;t I!&rdquo;&hellip;Cherry says he&rsquo;s tired of listening to hockey people at banquets always giving thanks to their wives for putting up with them for so long. Cherry recently introduced his wife, Rose, chortling &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve put up with her for 25 years!&rdquo;&hellip;Ron Duguay&rsquo;s burning-the-candle-at-both-ends routine apparently doesn&rsquo;t annoy his teammates. One notes: &ldquo;Doogie can stay up til all hours of the night as long as he produces for us.&rdquo;&hellip;Eddie Giacomin played so well in &ldquo;The Original Six&rdquo; he could have convinced some scouts he&rsquo;d make a good NHL back-up goalie&hellip;Moscow Red Army has retired the jersey worn by late great Valery Kharlamov, who was killed in a car accident in Moscow just before the start of the Canada Cup. Kharlamov wore No. 17&hellip;As the 21 NHL teams continued their jockeying for the best position to grab the Kitchener Rangers&rsquo; Brian Bellows in the 1982 Entry Draft, this was the latest trade rumor to surface: Montreal Canadiens swap Yvon Lambert, Mario Tremblay and Doug Jarvis to any willing lowly team for its first round pick in the draft. Winnipeg was being mentioned the most&hellip;Czech sensation Jiri Dudacek will probably be playing for the Sabres by next season&mdash;but not after he defects. According to club, their first round choice in 1981 draft will arrive through &ldquo;proper channels.&rdquo;&hellip;After Toronto&rsquo;s Rick Vaive fought Kim Clackson during an intrasquad scrimmage at training camp, Vaive tossed Clackson&rsquo;s helmet toward a trainer and said, &ldquo;Clean the cement out of this thing.&rdquo; &#9632;

BLUELINES

<div class="byline">BY GARY MUELLER</div><div class="image-hero"><img title="f0014-01" src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0014-011115/4411465-1-eng-US/f0014-012.jpg"><figcaption class="caption-body">Several St. Louis draft choices took quite awhile to make it into the Blues&rsquo; lineup, including center Mike Zuke. a 1974 choice who joined the Blues in 1978.</figcaption></div>ST. LOUIS&mdash;Ever since Emile Francis arrived in St. Louis in the spring of 1976, the Blues have enjoyed uncanny success in uncovering blue-chip players in the annual entry draft.Few, if any, teams can match the quality of such first-round draft picks as Bernie Federko, Wayne Babych and Perry Turnbull.But the Blues&rsquo; No. 1 pick in the 1980 draft, defenseman Rick wilson, was one of only four first-round choices who failed to play a game in the National Hockey League in the 1980-81 season.And even before training camp opened, Francis admitted that he did not expect the Blues&rsquo; No. 1 choice in the 1981 draft, defenseman Marty Ruff, to have much of a chance of playing in the NHL in 1981-82.But does that mean that Francis and his two long-time scouting lieutenants, Steve Brklacich and Lou Passador, have lost their touch?Not at all. &ldquo;Our draft is becoming more like the baseball draft,&rdquo; said Francis. &ldquo;Since we&rsquo;ve started taking 18-year-olds, you&rsquo;re drafting for long-range, rather than immediate, help. You&rsquo;re going to see three, maybe four, players each year step right into the NHL and play regularly. You used to expect almost every first-round pick to play right away, but that isn&rsquo;t the case anymore. You&rsquo;re drafting on potential, and you&rsquo;re going to see more first-rounders who don&rsquo;t make it and more third-and fourth-rounders who really surprise.&rdquo;With the track record of a scouting staff that has selected Federko, Babych and Turnbull in recent years, the Blues are hopeful that they&rsquo;ll come up with a few of those third-or fourth-round surprises, along with continued success from their first-round choices.Indications&rsquo; are that that could be just the case as far as the 1980 draft was concerned. Wilson, after being returned to his Junior A team last season, is expected to claim a spot on the Blues&rsquo; roster this season. He was the first 18-year-old selected in the 1980 draft, as Francis clearly committed the Blues to some long-range planning with his draft picks.But as high as the Blues are on Wilson, the biggest accolades seem to be reserved for center Alain Lemieux, the Blues&rsquo; fourth selection in the 1980 draft. Lemieux also was returned to his Junior A team last season and responded with a 67-goal, 98-assist performance for Three Rivers in the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League.&ldquo;We got him 96th overall, but he would have been the second or third player taken this year [1981], in what would have been his normal draft year,&rdquo; said Francis. &ldquo;He&rsquo;s going to be a good one, but I just don&rsquo;t know which of our four centers he can beat out right now.&rdquo;With Federko, Blake Dunlop, Larry Patey and Mike Zuke all ahead of him on the Blues&rsquo; depth chart, Lemieux appears ticketed for Salt Lake City this season. But Francis is confident Lemieux will prove to be a bargain as a fourth-round draft pick.He wouldn&rsquo;t be the first surprise uncovered in the draft by the&rsquo; Francis-Brklacich-Passador team. Mike Liut, the Blues&rsquo; All-Star goaltender, was a fifth-round choice in 1976, and winger Tony Currie, a 20-goal scorer last season, was a fourth-round pick in 1977.The Blues&rsquo; drafting success was evident at training camp, with 31 of the players on hand having joined the St. Louis organization via the draft.If the NHL did not permit trades or signing of free agents, the Blues could put together as good an all-draft team as anyone in the league.In goal, they would have Liut, of course. On defense they would have such players as Jack Brownschidle (No. 5 choice in 1975), Scott Campbell (No. 1 in 1977) and Rick Wilson (No. 1 in 1980). Centers would include Federko, Lemieux and Mike Zuke (No. 2 in 1974), while the wings would be manned by Babych, Turnbull, Currie and Brian Sutter (No. 2 in 1976).Other draftees such as goalie Paul Skidmore: defenseman Steve Harrison, Neil Labatte and Dick Lamby; and forwards Mark Reeds, Denis Houle and Jim Nill all played last season for Central, Hockey League champion Salt Lake City and will be trying to beat out the Blues&rsquo; veterans for jobs in the NHL.BLUESNOTE-All three St. Louis exhibition games scheduled for the 6,800-seat Agridome in Regina, Sask., were sellouts. In addition to Francis and coach Red Berenson, Saskatchewan natives on the St. Louis roster include Federko, Blair Chapman and Ralph Klassen&hellip;The Blues have declined to pick up the option on the contract of veteran Hartland Monahan, who saw action in only 25 games a year ago. Monahan thus became a free agent eligible to sign with any other NHL team, with no compensation owed to the Blues&hellip;Free agents invited to the Blues&rsquo; camp included centers Jean Savard and Rick Adduono. Savard, after breaking some of Guy Lafleur&rsquo;s junior scoring records with the Quebec Remparts, was Chicago&rsquo;s second-round draft choice in 1977, but was claimed by Hartford in the 1979 expansion draft. He scored 13 goals and had 27 assists for the Whalers&rsquo; Binghamton farm team last season. Adduono, a third-round draft choice of the Boston Bruins in 1975, scored six goals and had 12 assists for New Haven last season&hellip;Jim Pavese, the Blues&rsquo; No. 2 pick in the 1980 draft, was bothered by an infected cut on his hand, suffered in a precamp altercation while working out with his junior team in Sault Ste. Marie. &#9632;

f0014-01

Blues Display Patience Awaiting Draft Results

<div class="byline">BY CHARLIE HALPIN</div>TORONTO&mdash;Everyone loves a winner and as far as the hockey media is concerned, the New York Islanders are a team possessed with the unmistakable qualities of a champion.The romance between the Islanders and the press began last season when the New Yorkers won the Stanley Cup for the first time and with the approach of another season, the affair continues unabated.In a special pre-season poll conducted by THE HOCKEY NEWS of 20 of its NHL correspondents, the Islanders were chosen 13 times to repeat their championship performances of 1979-80 and 1980-81.Neither the new NHL divisional realignment nor an unbalanced schedule for 1981-82 could deter the selectors from picking the Islanders as the No. 1 team again. They received 19 of 20 votes to dominate the Patrick Division race and nearly three-quarters of the ballots in the poll to repeat as cup champs.There was even a hint among the hockey media that a replay of last spring&rsquo;s championship final between the Islanders and Minnesota is a distinct possibility. In the poll, the North Stars received the second highest number of first-place votes after the Islanders to finish on top of the new-revamped Norris Division. In the poll the North Stars were chosen 14 times to end first and received another four votes to upset the Islanders and win the cup.While the Islanders and North Stars were overwhelming favorites to win their respective races, the NHL&rsquo;s other two divisions will be more competitive&mdash;in the opinion of the hockey writers.The media is predicting a dogfight in both the Adams and Smythe divisions: The Buffalo Sabres were given 12 votes to finish first and eight for second in the Adams balloting. The Montreal Canadiens were picked eight times to grab first place ahead of Buffalo and received 10 for second in the Adams Division.The story is pretty much the same in the Smythe Division where the Calgary Flames, last year&rsquo;s big playoff surprise, were named 12 times to finish first and received another seven to end up no worse than second. The Los Angeles Kings grabbed six first-place votes and another 10-to finish in second place behind Calgary.And how did the media feel about last year&rsquo;s playoff also rans? Unfortunately they haven&rsquo;t changed their minds in most cases. The Hartford Whalers, who were No. 18 last season and missed the playoffs, have been given the dubious honor of ending up last again on 19 of the 20 ballots. The reasoning being if the Whalers couldn&rsquo;t make it last year in the easier Norris Division there&rsquo;s no chance they are going to improve their position this season in the tougher Adams Division.The Colorado Rockies were conceded hardly any better a fate as they collected 16 last-place votes in the Smythe Division. The Detroit Red Wings, who were No. 20 in 1980-81, also appear to be doomed to another cellar finish. They received 13 of 20 votes to end up on the bottom of the Norris Division. However, there is some hope for the other two non-playoff qualifiers of last season&mdash;Washington and Winnipeg.The Caps received 11 last-place votes, indicating they could get involved in a battle with the Pittsburgh Penguins for the fourth and final playoff in the Smythe race. The Jets, too. received an encouraging return in the poll, getting 11 votes to finish fifth, ahead of Detroit and quite possibly put them in a position to challenge Toronto for fourth place.Here briefly is how the hockey media expects the four races to progress this season:Adams Division&mdash;The Sabres for top spot with Montreal, Quebec and Boston in that order and the Hartford Whalers a distant last.<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0015-011068/4411503-1-eng-US/f0015-012.jpg" title="f0015-01" width="622" height="1419"></div><div class="figure-block image-bleed"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0015-02826/4411496-1-eng-US/f0015-022.jpg" title="f0015-02" width="1404" height="1420"><figcaption class="caption-body">Yes, the Islanders will be No. 1 again, as New York fan indicates at left, after publication of THE HOCKEY NEWS&rsquo; annual poll. The media selectors figure the Islanders have too much depth again and it will be a repeat of this scene as Wavne Merrick hoists the CUP in victory after last spring&rsquo;s second playoff triumph. (Photos by Bruce Bennett)</figcaption></div>Patrick Division&mdash;The Islanders easily for first place with the Philadelphia Flyers second and the Rangers third. Pittsburgh will fight off Washington for fourth place unless the Caps surprise.Norris Division&mdash;The North Stars for No. 1 with St. Louis second. Chicago should end third with no trouble and Toronto fourth with the Jets fifth but likely to keep the Maple Leafs looking over their shoulders. Detroit for last.Smythe Division&mdash;The Calgary Flames will nudge the L.A. Kings for first place with Edmonton slated for third and Vancouver for fourth spot with Colorado confined to the basement and another year outside the playoffs.Stanley Cup winner&mdash;The Islanders, of course. They are a one-sided pick with 13 votes. The North Stars received four votes, St. Louis two and the Buffalo Sabres one.Writers&rsquo; selections can be found on page 30. &#9632;

f0015-01

1981-82: A Rerun Of Islanders’ Cup Triumph

<h2>PRINCE OF WALES CONFERENCE</h2><h3>Adams Division</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0015-03637/4411555-1-eng-US/f0015-032.jpg" title="f0015-03" width="795" height="173"></div><h3>Patrick Division</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0015-04478/4411548-1-eng-US/f0015-042.jpg" title="f0015-04" width="801" height="167"></div>Votes for Stanley Cup winner: NY Islanders 13, Minnesota 4, St. Louis 2, Buffalo 1.<h2>CLARENCE CAMPBELL CONFERENCE</h2><h3>Norris Division</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0015-05356/4411541-1-eng-US/f0015-052.jpg" title="f0015-05" width="875" height="197"></div><h3>Smythe Division</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0015-06298/4411534-1-eng-US/f0015-062.jpg" title="f0015-06" width="798" height="168"></div> &#9632;

f0015-03

How NHL Races Will Finish

<div class="byline">BY FRANK FONTAINE</div><div class="image-hero"><img title="f0016-01" src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0016-01919/4411586-1-eng-US/f0016-012.jpg"><figcaption class="caption-body">Michel Plasse, now No. 1 among Quebec goaltenders, says he&rsquo;s paid to do the best he can and not to worry about whether teammate Dan Bouchard ends his holdout. (Photo By Ian MacAlpine)</figcaption></div>QUEBEC&mdash;The man of the hour in Quebec, right now, is Michel Plasse. Not that the veteran goalie has done anything particularly outstanding. It&rsquo;s just that with Dan Bouchard still holding out, Plasse is the only net-minder with the Nordiques who has any NHL experience. The other three goalies, Guillaume Abbatiello, Clint Malarchuk, and Michel Dufour, are all out of junior hockey, and none of thenf appears to be even remotely ready for regular NHL competition.In a sense. the situation is not new to Plasse. Last year, at this time, the Nordiques thought they had one of the best young backstoppers in the game, in Michel Dion. However, Dion was unable to withstand the pressure and Plasse wound up playing virtually all the Nordiques games until Bouchard came along. The journeyman goalie, who had been signed strictly as a backup man. wound up playing 37 games. He may play even more this season, if Bouchard and the Nordiques can&rsquo;t come to terms. Plasse is ready for such a situation.&ldquo;I&rsquo;ve played between 50 and 60 games a season in Pittsburgh and in Colorado. I&rsquo;m ready to do it again.&rdquo; says Plasse. who is starting his 10th season in the Big Time. He feels he&rsquo;s had his best training camp in the last five or six seasons.&ldquo;I can&rsquo;t remember the last time 1 was this well prepared to start a new season. It has nothing to do with Bouchard&rsquo;s absence. I received a physical training program from Charlie Thiffault this past summer, and I followed it to the letter. As a result, my legs are stronger than they&rsquo;ve been in the last few years,&rdquo; said Plasse, as he went on to point out that because of his style, he uses his legs more than most goalies to stop the puck. He has no alternative, of course, since his glove-hand is not very sure. In fact the puck bounces out of his catching glove almost as often as it bounces away from the biscuit on his stick hand.Plasse is not particularly concerned as to whether or when Bouchard will be back. &ldquo;Haven&rsquo;t you noticed that no one on the club is talking about that,&rdquo; he asks pointedly. And he adds: &ldquo;It&rsquo;s the best way to handle the situation. 1 do my best. That&rsquo;s what I was hired for&hellip;not to worry as to whether Bouchard would show up or not.&rdquo;The fact is, Plasse has never been know to worry too much about anything. He&rsquo;s an easy-going guy who likes to look at the happy side of life&hellip;which is a good way to be if you&rsquo;re a goalie&hellip;particularly if you&rsquo;re a sub-goalie. Plasse knows full well what the Nordiques&rsquo; management, the press and fans are thinking&mdash;that the Nordiques can&rsquo;t begin to think about being a contender for their division title with him in the nets. But for Plasse, such talk is beside the point. What matters is to go out on the ice and stop the puck any way he can. Or if you have to sit at the end of the bench while someone else is doing the job, you just have to work at being the best gate-keeper in the league. You see, Plasse has a theory about the importance sub-goalies have to their teams, as openers and closers of doors at the end of players benches. He claims to have developed new techniques which allow players to get on and off the ice more quickly, more efficiently. There is no telling what this can mean to the success of a team!NORDIQUES NOTES: There is nothing new on the Bouchard situation. Neither he nor management will say anything&hellip;which is the best way to handle the deadlock&hellip;Michel Dufour has been the most impressive among the new goalies with the team&hellip;He&rsquo;s only 5-6, but as coach Michel Bergeron points out, he sure uses every inch in front of the net. &ldquo;He&rsquo;s quick as a cat.&rdquo; says Bergeron. There was another 5-6 cat who managed to do quite well in the NHL. Emile Francis&hellip;Like Dan Bouchard, Dufour is from Val d&rsquo;Or, Quebec&hellip;General manager Maurice Filion is beginning to be worried about Michel Goulet&rsquo;s shoulder. The brilliant young leftwinger was injured early during training camp and has not played since. Filion says Goulet will not start competition until he is completely recovered&hellip;John Wensink is back in the Nordiques organization. He was on loan to the Philadelphia Flyers, but was forced to return to the Nordiques when both teams were informed by NHL headquarters that a player under contract with one team could not train with another club&hellip;Wensink was immediately shipped to the Fredericton Express, the Nordiques&rsquo; new AHL farm team. Marian Stastny continues to have back problems&hellip;ditto Dale Hoganson. Robbie Ftorek has also missed a lot of action because of an injury sustained during the Canada Cup Tournament. &#9632;

f0016-01

Nordiques’ Plasse Ready For Full-Time Duty

<div class="byline">BY REYN DAVIS</div>WINNIPEG&mdash;Magic. It&rsquo;s a powerful word, reserved for the truly marvellous.Training camp had barely begun and already someone had used the word to describe Dale Hawerchuk, the 18-year-old whiz kid signed by Winnipeg Jets.&ldquo;And there he was, coming out of a corner, delaying, setting up his wingers, doing his magic,&rdquo; said Moe Mantha, a 20-year-old defenseman graced with the rich experiences of a year in the National Hockey League.Admittedly, Mantha has not seen everything. But he believes he&rsquo;s seeing something special when he watches his new teammate who doesn&rsquo;t look a day over 15.&ldquo;He&rsquo;s so good,&rdquo; drooled Mantha. &ldquo;Everybody wants to play with him. He does things with a puck that make your head spin. I&rsquo;m telling you, he&rsquo;s going to be great.&rdquo;The Jets think so too. But calling him the franchise is grossly premature, dangerous and pressure-building.&ldquo;Really, I don&rsquo;t even think about the pressure,&rdquo; said Hawerchuk. &ldquo;All I&rsquo;m trying to do is play to the best of my ability.&rdquo;Described by his coach, Tom Watt, as a &ldquo;Number one-one&rdquo;&mdash;meaning the first choice in the first round of the entry draft&mdash;Hawerchuk&rsquo;s saving grace may be his composure.He is terribly young but he has the deportment of a 25-year-old.<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0016-02761/4411624-1-eng-US/f0016-022.jpg" title="f0016-02" width="596" height="1602"><figcaption class="caption-body">New Jets&rsquo; defenseman Bryan Maxwell says Dale Hawerchuk is tough to hit and deceptively fast.</figcaption></div>&ldquo;I&rsquo;m getting more confident every day,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;At the start I was afraid of making a mistake. Now I&rsquo;ll try anything.&rdquo;In street clothes, he looks as if he&rsquo;s been raised on mother&rsquo;s milk, roast beef and new potatoes.Yet he is a glowing tribute to Big Macs, fries and shakes&hellip;the diet of his generation.He&rsquo;ll score goals this season but it&rsquo;s rather obvious he enjoys the role of a playmaker more. Making others better seems to be his credo.Hawerchuk, it&rsquo;s safe to say, will be one of as many as 10 new faces in the Jets&rsquo; lineup when the season begins.Another will be Bryan Maxwell, a 26-year-old defenseman acquired from St. Louis Blues in the Scott Campbell trade.&ldquo;Hawerchuk is hard as hell to hit,&rdquo; said Maxwell. &ldquo;He&rsquo;s a little bit like Wayne Gretzky, always spinning away He doesn&rsquo;t seem that fast either. But try to catch him.&ldquo;He has a lot of ideas. He makes his wingers rush to the holes. And he gets the puck to them.&rdquo;The Jets were pleased when Hawerchuk reported at 177 pounds. Two years ago, he weighed 157.&ldquo;I swear he&rsquo;s grown an inch and gained 10 pounds over the summer,&rdquo; said Billy Sutherland, the Jets&rsquo; assistant general manager and aide to Watt.&ldquo;We were a little afraid he&rsquo;d be scrawny. We knew he would fill out some day. But we were thinking about this season. Now I wouldn&rsquo;t be surprised if some day he weighs 190.&rdquo;Already, Hawerchuk is 12 pounds heavier than Gretzky was at the start of last season. At 5-11, they are the same height.Comparisons to Gretzky can&rsquo;t be helped. Both were sensations in junior hockey, packing arenas wherever they went. Their linemates always flourished. And their hockey was clean, artistic and effective amid the hacking, hooking and other annoyances of opponents&mdash;who believed, probably correctly, that to stop them was to stop their teams.It&rsquo;s more than a coincidence that they are the hand-picked clients of Toronto agent Gus Badali.Hawerchuk had never set foot in Winnipeg until early August when the Jets brought him out from his home in Oshawa to play two softball games and formally sign.Now he&rsquo;s getting to know his way around this city of 650,000 when he isn&rsquo;t busy on the ice.sHas he ever been lost?&ldquo;NaW,&rdquo; he replied. &ldquo;Long as you know where Portage and Main is, you&rsquo;ll never get lost in Winnipeg.&rdquo;The famous intersection will always have a warm place in his heart and a lump in his pocket bookIt was there he signed a five-year contract believed to be worth $800,000, a bargain according to Badali.&ldquo;You&rsquo;ll see,&rdquo; he warned. &ldquo;The Jets may want to re-negotiate sooner than you think.&rdquo;BENCH BITS-The Jets bowed to the wishes of Tulsa citizens and agreed to send a coach other than Mike Smith to their Central Hockey League farm club&hellip;&ldquo;Smith&rsquo;s an excellent hockey man,&rdquo; said general manager John Ferguson, annoyed that new operators in Tulsa objected to his choice&hellip;Don&rsquo;t be surprised if the Jets move their farm club to Saint John, N.B., next year&hellip;They have looked into the Maritime city and like what they see&hellip;Former Jets&rsquo; defenseman Al Cameron, selected early in the 1979 expansion draft, is now working in a sporting goods store in Edmonton&hellip;Guy Fournier, a high-scoring center from Shawinigan, Que., was an early casualty during training camp&hellip;Fournier, who would be welcomed back by Shawinigan, went down with a knee injury expected to keep him out for a week&hellip;Also out with knee injuries were Swedish center Thomas Steen and 31-year-old left winger Rick Dudley&hellip;Ferguson is demanding compensation from the New York Rangers, believing that the Blueshirts have already signed Bobby Hull&hellip;&ldquo;He refused to go to Europe for training camp unless he signed,&rdquo; said Ferguson&hellip;Hull, however, denied he had&hellip;Bryan Maxwell absored the hardest hit in the training camp during an intra-squad game&hellip;The 6-3, 204-pound Maxwell was rushing down the left side, reaching for a pass, when he was hit by Barry Legge&hellip;&ldquo;I haven&rsquo;t been hit that hard for years,&rdquo; said Maxwell&hellip;&ldquo;Did anyone catch the licence number on that truck?&rdquo;&hellip;This is the year of decision for 22-year-old right winger, Jimmy Mann&hellip;A year in the minors has changed his outlook&hellip;&ldquo;I guess I didn&rsquo;t play the role they wanted last year,&rdquo; said Mann, who held off-season meetings with the Jets&hellip;&ldquo;They have explained to me that they want me to go up and down my wing, take the man out when the time comes and try to help my teammates. If I have to take 200 minutes in penalties to be effective, then I&rsquo;ll take them.&rdquo;<div class="figure-block image-bleed"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0026-02352/4411617-1-eng-US/f0026-022.jpg" title="f0026-02" width="1223" height="995"><figcaption class="caption-body">Injuries have already visited the Jets&rsquo; training camp as both Rick Dudley, above, and Swedish newcomer Thomas Steen have been sidelined by mishaps. (Photo by Ian MacAlpIne)</figcaption></div> &#9632;

f0016-02

Hawerchuk Wows ‘Em In Jets’ Camp

<div class="byline">BY MIKE DENNIS</div><div class="image-hero"><img title="f0017-01" src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0017-01811/4411655-1-eng-US/f0017-012.jpg"><figcaption class="caption-body">Stewart Gavin worked on his puckhandling and his shooting over the summer and could be one of several newcomers to make his way into the Leafs&rsquo; lineup. (Photo By Robert Shaver)</figcaption></div>TORONTO&mdash;The paths which lead into a secure spot in the Maple Leafs&rsquo; lineup are as varied as the backgrounds of the players who travel them. But a common thread runs through their quest for a starting position&mdash;the exhibition games will determine who does and does not make it.Leafs&rsquo; coach Mike Nykoluk has liberally sprinkled his exhibition game lineups with rookies, mixing in the established veterans who will have jobs when the season opens and the other veterans who will match up with the newcomers in an effort to remain with the club. By the mid-point of the camp. Nykoluk was saying things like: &ldquo;We&rsquo;ve got some pretty tough decisions to make, and I like that,&rdquo; and &ldquo;there are some pretty classy kids who aren&rsquo;t too far away.&rdquo;The exhibition games, then, would tell the story and the story of the Leafs&rsquo; first exhibition game victory, a 4-3 triumph over the Montreal Canadiens, featured three players very much in the running to crack the Leafs&rsquo; lineup&mdash;one, attending his first Toronto camp, but entering his sixth year of professional hockey: the other two, each attending their second Leafs&rsquo; camp, with varying degrees of a success a year ago and now back as matured and improved players.Bob Manno, who turns 25 on Oct. 31, but who left his Halloween costume in Vancouver, departing the Canucks&rsquo; organization after five years of yo-yolike existence, has been a pleasant surprise. Paired with Borje Salming, Manno&rsquo;s offensive skills give Salming an opportunity to hang back once in a while, saving his breath for when it&rsquo;s most needed. Manno saw action on the Leafs&rsquo; power play and responded with a 35-foot goal when he closed in from the point to beat Richard Sevigny.Although he was offered two contracts to play in Europe, Manno had pretty well decided to go to the Canucks&rsquo; training camp in September. He had refused their initial contract offer in June of 1981, but the club, Manno said, wanted him to come to camp and then sign a new contract. In late August, with his chances for Europe gone by the wayside, the Canucks suddenly bought out the remainder of Manno&rsquo;s contract and he was a free agent.Winnipeg, Edmonton and Toronto invited him to camp and he chose the latter &ldquo;because I knew they were wanting to make changes in their defense.&rdquo; So off he went to St. Catharines, Ont. and the Leafs&rsquo; rookie camp.&ldquo;I really needed those 10 days in camp,&rdquo; said Manno, who looks sleek at 6-0,185 pounds. &ldquo;1 was in shape, but not playing shape. At first I thought, this is my sixth year of pro hockey and I&rsquo;m with the rookies&hellip;but then I said to myself &lsquo;Quit bitching and get ready for the exhibition games. That&rsquo;s where the jobs are.&rsquo;&rdquo;As for his parting with the Vancouver organization, which always seemed to send him down to the minors and then bring him up for the second half of the season where &ldquo;I played 35, 40 minutes a game,&rdquo; Manno attributed it to a personality problem with coach Harry Neale, a not uncommon occurrence.&ldquo;Harry always seemed to be on the young guys or the guys whose lifestyle he didn&rsquo;t like,&rdquo; Manno said. &ldquo;Look at the two young guys here from Vancouver, Rick Vaive and Bill Derlago; they each had 30-something goals last year and are playing great. Well, in Vancouver, Neale nearly ruined Vaive. The kid was dead and he kept playing him game after game until he finally got checked and was knocked out on the ice.&rdquo;Another Leaf who is in the running and who had some problems with a coach last year is left winger Stewart Gavin, who picked up three assists against the Canadiens, his passing leading to pair of short handed goals by Pat Hickey and Derlago, the latter, the game-winner.&ldquo;I did a lot of practice on my puckhandling and shooting this summer,&rdquo; said Gavin who started last year with the Leafs under coach Joe Crozier, but was sent to New Brunswick during the second month of the season.&ldquo;Last year, my job was to go up and down my wing and make sure I was always the first man back on our line,&rdquo; said Gavin. &ldquo;I was the checker on the line and Darryl [Sittler] and Wilf [Paiement] were to go in on the attack. I just did what I was told, but you don&rsquo;t have much of a chance when you&rsquo;re always the third man in and the first to go back.&ldquo;I think you have to be offensive, that&rsquo;s the name of the game,&rdquo; said Gavin. 21. &ldquo;I try to be a two-way player, combine both the offense and defense.&rdquo;When Gavin went down to the minors, he didn&rsquo;t sulk or worry about his first unsuccessful exposure to the pro game. Instead he kept his eyes open and prepared for doing well in his next try at the Leafs.&ldquo;In Moncton. I got a chance to do some penalty-killing, which I had never done before,&rdquo; Gavin explained. &ldquo;And 1 also played on the right wing, which was different. But I learned a lot and Doug Carpenter was a good coach for me.&rdquo;Nykoluk was obviously pleased with Gavin&rsquo;s showing during training camp and said: &ldquo;I watched him play in the American League playoffs last year and I have always liked the way Stewart has played. I said earlier that I&rsquo;ll be disappointed if he doesn&rsquo;t make this hockey club. He knows what the game is about and he&rsquo;s ready; he obviously worked hard all summer.&rdquo;For his part, Gavin says that he must play &ldquo;two-way hockey, play the body and help out with the odd goal to make the club. I&rsquo;m a good skater, I can do the job defensively, so I&rsquo;ve got to play well offensively to make it.&rdquo;Last season, defenseman Bob McGill, then 18, didn&rsquo;t really get the chance to show what he could do. The Leafs brought him to camp, but he didn&rsquo;t play in any exhibitions and was returned to junior hockey in Victoria of the Western League.&ldquo;They told me that I had good potential and a good attitude and that they wanted me to concentrate on moving the puck quickly,&rdquo; said McGill, who has been impressive in camp and his first two exhibition games. &ldquo;My game is to play it tough in front of the net, to keep the crease clear, something which the Leafs need.&rdquo;Indeed, they do. Toronto ranked 19th in goals-against last year, surrendering 367 goals and many were the result of either sloppy puckhandling within the Leafs&rsquo; zone or failure to clear opposing forwards out of the goalmouth.McGill, 6-0. 202 pounds, racked up 295 penalty minutes for Victoria as he helped them to the WHL championship and a berth in the Memorial Cup. And in camp, he&rsquo;s been continuing his hard-nosed play, taking the man out no matter who the opposition is.&ldquo;We&rsquo;ve been skating hard and my legs feel really good,&rdquo; said McGill. &ldquo;When you have a chance for a job, you just play your ass off.&rdquo;Several people have been doing pretty close to that for the Leafs thus far.LOOSE LEAFS&mdash;The last weekend in September proved to be the cut-down date for the Maple Leafs as three separete cuts sent players to their farm clubs in the Central and American Leagues. Ticketed for Cincinnati of the Central League in the first wave of cuts were defenseman Christian Thelland and Mike Waghorne. along with forwards Rick Blight, John Smrke, Benoit Laporte and Tim Coulis. The latter refused to report, however, and the Leafs boughtout his contract&hellip;A second batch of players were assigned to New Brunswick in the American League where the Leafs share a team with Chicago Black Hawks. Goaltender Curt Ridley, plus defenseman Mel Hewitt and forwards Jean-Gaston D&rsquo;Ouville, Kim Davis and Russ Adam, were assigned&hellip;A third paring reduced the Leafs&rsquo; camp to 30 players when goaltender Bob Parent, defenseman Dave Logan and Greg Hotham, and forwards Ernie Godden, Bill McCreary, Bruce Boudreau and Rick Blight were dropped to Cincinnati&hellip; Injured players remaining in Toronto are defenseman Kim Clackson (cracked wrist), center Mike Kaszycki (bruised foot) and right winger Frank Nigro (injured knee)&hellip;Left winger Ron Sedbauer was released by the Leafs. If he had made the club, the Leafs would have been obligated to give the Chicago Black Hawks a draft choice. &#9632;

f0017-01

Impressive Training Camps Road To Leafs’ Lineup Spot

<h2>PRINCE OF WALES CONFERENCE</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0017-02680/4411693-1-eng-US/f0017-022.jpg" title="f0017-02" width="934" height="259"></div><h2>CLARENCE CAMPBELL CONFERENCE</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0017-03519/4411686-1-eng-US/f0017-032.jpg" title="f0017-03" width="933" height="297"></div> &#9632;

f0017-02

New NHL Alignment

<div class="byline">BY JOHN GILBERT</div><div class="image-hero"><img title="f0018-01" src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0018-01829/4411724-1-eng-US/f0018-012.jpg"><figcaption class="caption-body">Minnesota&rsquo;s most devastating line is made up of, from left to right, Neal Broten. Steve Christoff and Brad Palmer. (Photo by Bruce Bennett)</figcaption></div>LOUISVILLE HOCKEY STICKSLOUISVILLE HOCKEY STICKSBLOOMINGTON&mdash;They are three players with exceptional, but different, hockey skills. They may seem like a match made in heaven, as far as North Stars-fans are concerned, but it occurred more because of coincidence and Minnesota coach Glen Sonmor&rsquo;s hunch.Steve Christoff, a strong, hard-skating winger with jerky, deceptive moves and an amazing quick-release shot, has always scored in bundles, through Richfield High School (which is in view of Met Sports Center) and the University of Minnesota. After the 1980 Olympic triumph, Christoff joined the North Stars and set a rookie playoff Scoring record with eight goals.Brad Palmer, Minnesota&rsquo;s first draft pick in 1980, was up and down with the big club from his Victoria, B.C., junior team. It took him a while to get acclimated, but nobody questioned his electrifying speed and the velocity if not the accuracy&mdash;of his shot.Neal Broten was a prize, being brought along slowly. When people described Wayne Gretzky&rsquo;s astonishing sense of what was happening and what should happen in any given situation. they could also be describing Broten, whose uncanny playmaking, coupled with deceptive speed (he was the fastest skater in dash tests on the U.S. Olympic team) made him a star at Roseau, Minn., High School and at the University of Minnesota. He came back from the Olympics to gather an armful of college records at the university before joining the Stars, three games before the end of last season.It was then that the merging of the three rookies took place, but not without coincidence. Sonmor had planned to put Tom McCarthy with Broten and Christoff, but McCarthy suffered an injury to his arm at the day-of-the-game skate on that March 31 afternoon.So Palmer went in. playing his natural left wing. Christoff, who had been enormously effective with his right-handed shot on the left side, was moved back to right wing. Broten choreographed the plays, and the line was frequently Minnesota&rsquo;s most impressive through the long playoff surge to the Stanley Cup finals.As training camp opened this year, Sonmor tried something different. &ldquo;I noticed,&rsquo;&rsquo; he said, &ldquo;by watching Team USA in the Canada Cup, that Christoff was much more effective on his off-wing when he played with Broten (and Dean Telafous). So we&rsquo;ve decided to try Palmer on his off-wing, just to see if he can handle that. We may play them both on their off-wings.&rdquo;The merging of the three rookies took place not without coincidence. Tom McCarthy injured his arm so Palmer went in with Christoff and BrotenChristoff, whose sudden moves can beat a defenseman, can also gain a millisecond of opening when he doesn&rsquo;t, and that&rsquo;s all he needs to cut loose with his stunning shot. Palmer, who practiced on the right side before Broten and Christoff returned from the Canada Cup, blew two rockets past Don Beaupre in his first scrimmage at that spot. Both came because his quickness gave him the room and his off-wing slant gave him lots of angle.The top three lines for the North Stars meshed immediately in camp. Along with the Broten line (Broten and Palmer are both still rookies this season), Mike Eaves centered Steve Payne and Al MacAdam. and Bobby Smith centered McCarthy and Dino Ciccarelli.That leaves quite a herd battling for spots on the fourth line, including Mike Polich. Tom Younghans, Kevin Maxwell, Jack Carlson, Ken Solheim, Kent-Erik Andersson and, an aggressive newcomer who was Andersson&rsquo;s Team Sweden teammate, Anders Hakansson. Jim Dobson also has a chance. And Tim Young is sitting out for a month with three screws in his broken ankle, then he&rsquo;ll return.Whoever makes the fourth unit, the competition among the top three lines alone will be interesting to watch. Off-hand, the kid line may be the most interesting.STAR DUST&mdash;General manager Lou Nanne, finalizing his own contract-for a six-year term believed to be in six figures&mdash;though far less than the $175,000 per term reported in a St. Paul newspaper&mdash;signed up several of his troops during the first week of camp. Curt Giles, Andersson and the unretiring Bill Nyrop, who is still recovering from a long bout with pneumonia, all agreed to new contracts.The North Stars have started off as if they plan to extend their record for injuries. Last year the club had 322 man-games lost, second only to Washington&rsquo;s 347, and the year before they also contended for those dubious league honors. When they held an intrasquad scrimmage before opening the exhibition trek. Young and Gary Sargent (recovering from back surgery) were out. naturally. But so were McCarthy (infected blister on his heel), Paul Shmyr (back injury), Mike Polich (flu). Nyrop (slow to regain his lung capacity), and Ron Meighan (bad ankle bruise).It looks like Giles, the runaway players&rsquo; choice as the team&rsquo;s most valuble player last year, might have his toughest competition this year from trainers Doc Rose and Larry Ness. &#9632;

f0018-01

Sonmor’s Hunch Creates Sensational Combo

<div class="byline">BY RICHARD FRIEDMAN</div><div class="image-hero"><img title="f0019-01" src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0019-01793/4411755-1-eng-US/f0019-012.jpg"><figcaption class="caption-body">Eddie Johnstone scored two goals in the Rangers&rsquo; first European victory, and celebrated by signing a new contract.</figcaption></div>NEW YORK&mdash;It was the Rangers&rsquo; first exhibition game of 1981, against a. well-trained Finnish team in Helsinki. It was Bobby Hull&rsquo;s first exhibition game as well, and a first for new coach Herb Brooks.But not Brooks&rsquo; first stint behind the bench. That honor went to assistant coach Walter Tkaczuk. the veteran center whose career was cut short late last season by a deflected puck in the eye.&ldquo;At this stage of the season,&rsquo;&rsquo; Brooks expalined, &ldquo;it is important to me to assess individuals, and see how our team system is coming along. But the coach has the worst seat in the house.&rdquo;Which is why Brooks and general manager Craig Patrick sat high in the stands and watched the Rangers lose to the Helskinki IFK, 4-1, and then rebound the next night and beat Djurgarden, the Swedish team that is Anders Hedberg&rsquo;s alma mater, 5-1, in Stockholm.John Davidson was in the nets against the Finns, and Steve Weeks against the Swedes. Skating a regular shift with Hedberg was Bobby Hull, who reacted with cautious optimism that first night.&ldquo;I&rsquo;m not throwing any parites about the way I played, but I&rsquo;m getting my skating muscles back in shape,&rdquo; said Hull over the conference-call hookup to the Rangers&rsquo; offices here. &ldquo;Being back with Anders of course is like old times, but it felt good to be playing hockey, period.&rdquo;Hull went on to discuss his premature retirement&mdash;a stressful time for a number of reasons&mdash;and the decisions that led to his return.&ldquo;The real factor was that I realized that possibly the Rangers would be interested in me,&rdquo; said Hull, &ldquo;and possibly re-unite me with Ulf and Anders. When I quit, I didn&rsquo;t want to be out of hockey, but certain circumstances made it impossible for me to give 100 percent to the game.&rdquo;Hull revealed himself as a fan of Brooks&rsquo; philosophy and coaching style, having watched the Olympic team win at Lake Placid&mdash;on TV.&ldquo;Being away from the game, 1 didn&rsquo;t find that enjoyment doing anything else,&rdquo; Hull recalled. &ldquo;I was busy trying to get a lot of things behind me&mdash;a divorce, and a gal close to me was involved in an auto accident and I was trying to nurse her back to a human being.&rdquo;Hull said that he wouldn&rsquo;t know his role as a Ranger until after training camp&mdash;&ldquo;all things being equal, I think I can help the club a number of ways, help score some goals and score some myself&rdquo;&mdash;but ruled out a role as an assistant coach.Brooks praised his charges for putting up a valiant effort against the Finns, and, when asked, singled out Hull. &ldquo;He played a couple of shifts there,&rdquo; said the coach, &ldquo;and once he came down the left wing, took a step inside and left them in their tracks.&rdquo;Brooks was asked about reports that some Rangers had reported to camp in less-than-peak shape. &ldquo;Ask any coach, and they&rsquo;ll tell you that some guys do and some guys don&rsquo;t,&rdquo; said Brooks about individuals&rsquo; meeting fitness requirements. &ldquo;But look at what they&rsquo;re doing to rectify it&mdash;that&rsquo;s the important thing.&rdquo;To be sure, the team has its hands full adapting to Brooks&rsquo; system, a hybrid of the European and the Canadian games.&ldquo;We&rsquo;re in more fluid motion, all the time.&rdquo; said Eddie Johnstone after the victory over Djurgarden, in which Johnstone scored two goals and celebrated the signing of a multi-year contract before he entered his option year. &ldquo;We&rsquo;re going off our wings and that&rsquo;s going to take a bit of time; I&rsquo;m used to going up and down my wing.&rdquo;Johnstone was asked to assess Tkaczuk&rsquo;s coaching style, and put it this way: &ldquo;He coaches like he plays&hellip;he never gets excited, and seems to always know what he&rsquo;s doing.&rdquo;NOTES&mdash;The Rangers clinched the championship trophy of the Dagens-Nyheter tournament in Sweden with a 4-1 victory over Stockholm AIK, winning four straight games following an exhibition loss to the Finns and giving up just one goal in each game. Club also captured several individual trophies, with Eddie Johnstone (six goals, one assist) being named tournament&rsquo;s top forward and Reijo Ruotsalainen top defenseman and MVP of tournament&hellip;With Ron Duguay&rsquo;s contract negotiations dragging on, the Rangers received a shortlived scare at center-ice when Peter Wallin injured his knee and flew home early for examination. Initial reports indicated surgery and a four-to-six-week layoff, but final diagnosis was a sprain, with Wallin resuming skating in the closing week of the exhibition season&hellip;With Duguay cooling his heels, Barry Beck replaced him on the gossip pages of Big Apple&rsquo;s tabloids by making the disco-and-watering-hole scene with tennis ace John McEnroe and Yankees&rsquo; Rick Cerrone&hellip;Phil Esposito was named Rangers&rsquo; TV color commentator, replacing veteran Bill Chadwick, who will handle marketing and promotions for Madison Square Garden Broadcast Network. Espo joins Jim Gordon and former Olympic captain Mike Eruzione in booth. Espo who also drilled young centers at &ldquo;rookie&rdquo; camp in Rye (which for all practical purposes was, as one player put it, the training camp for the Springfield farm team) has a hard act to follow in Chadwick, but knowing him, he&rsquo;ll be outspoken and a perfectionist at the job. &ldquo;I&rsquo;m a learner and a listener,&rdquo; says Esposito, who did a weekly sports interview show on local TV during the summer. &ldquo;1 pick people&rsquo;s brains.&rdquo; &#9632;

f0019-01

Rangers Watched Closely In Transitional Period

<div class="byline">BY FRED PIETILA</div><div class="image-hero"><img title="f0020-01" src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0020-01625/4411786-1-eng-US/f0020-012.jpg"><figcaption class="caption-body">Chico Resch is optimistic that the Rockies will have a much better club this season. &ldquo;We don&rsquo;t have the most talent in the league,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;but I think we&rsquo;re only going to get better.&rdquo; (Photo By Bruce Bennett)</figcaption></div>DENVER&mdash;When Glenn &ldquo;Chico&rdquo; Resch decided to re-sign a contract with the Colorado Rockies in early May and pass going on the free agent market, it was a decision that was made with &ldquo;my heart, rather than my head.&rdquo;The 33-year-old goalie, who had been traded from the Stanley Cup champion New York Islanders to the lowly Rockies in a shocking transaction in March, quickly adjusted to life in Colorado, but his contract was to expire the end of May and he was to become a free agent June 1. Surprisingly to many, he chose to re-sign with the Rockies.Resch, who along with Phil Myre will give the Rockies the best goaltending in their short history, explained some of his motives.&ldquo;I thought the best thing to do was to go free agency. That was my initial thinking. But it started evaporating as soon as I got to Colorado and I felt Colorado was more and more the place I&rsquo;d like to play. But I realized this was the only chance I&rsquo;d have at free agency so I pursued other avenues.&ldquo;When I made my decision, Billy [MacMillan] was the coach and my friend. I made the decision with my heart rather than my head, but I figured this would be the best place for me,&rdquo; Resch said.Resch doesn&rsquo;t regret his decision and for the first time in his National Hockey League career arrived considerably before training camp started. &ldquo;1 had a chance to come here early and get to know the guys,&rdquo; Resch said.Resch, a popular figure on Long Island, has taken a liking to Colorado and purchased a home in Castle Rock, a community south of Denver. He was one of 17 additions to the Rockies&rsquo; roster last season and in training camp he was one of 17 new faces&mdash;faces who weren&rsquo;t around for last year&rsquo;s camp&mdash;but he spoke like a veteran of past Colorado hockey wars.The Rockies have been an NHL doormat for the most part. It&rsquo;s been no secret and a losing attitude has permeated the franchise.&ldquo;I guess the thing is, whenever you&rsquo;re trying to change, the first thing you do is change the attitudes. It doesn&rsquo;t matter what it is, hockey, business or school,&rdquo; Resch said. &ldquo;Everyone realized that it had to be done here and it isn&rsquo;t easy to do in a hurry. But the management here has done a good job. They&rsquo;ve not only revitalized the team physically by changing players, but revitalized it mentally.&ldquo;Everyone is anxious to be here. We&rsquo;re all looking forward to it. You look back and you know how demoralizing those losing seasons can be. The guys that have been here want to change that because they&rsquo;re tired of losing. And the new guys want to help out with the change. They&rsquo;re coming from different streams, but they all want to change the attitude here.&ldquo;I think physically the team is much better this year,&rdquo; Resch said. &ldquo;I saw it happen with the Islanders. You have to have depth and competition at every position. Coaches can threaten you and you can threaten yourself, but realistically if there&rsquo;s no one behind you to push you, it&rsquo;s not really a challenge. That&rsquo;s been the change here, there&rsquo;s an abundance of bodies, but they&rsquo;re players that can play and not just bodies.&rdquo;&ldquo;There&rsquo;s no secret formula for success. You&rsquo;ve got to have strong leadership from the top. We&rsquo;ve got that guy at the top [enthusiastic new owner Peter Gilbert] and we&rsquo;ve got Billy as GM. When you know you&rsquo;ve got a GM who makes the right decisions&mdash;decisions that are good for everyone, it makes things a lot better.&ldquo;And we&rsquo;ve got two coaches [Bert Marshall and Marshall Johnston] who are going to have us prepared. We know we&rsquo;re going to be prepared. We know we&rsquo;re going to be in condition. We don&rsquo;t have the most talent in the league, but we have sufficient talent and with the preparation, I think we&rsquo;re only going to get better.&ldquo;Take guys like Merlin Malinowski. He&rsquo;s got a vast amount of talent. And guys like Rob Ramage and Steve Tambellini. All those guys, you don&rsquo;t know how good they can be,&rdquo; Resch said.&ldquo;And we&rsquo;ve got leadership in the dressing room in Lanny McDonald,&rdquo; Resch added.And the Rockies have Resch and Myre in goal, depth and talent they&rsquo;ve never had before in that do-or-die position. &#9632;

f0020-01

Home Is Where Heart Is For Rockies’ Resch

<div class="image-hero"><img title="f0022-01" src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0022-01516/4411848-1-eng-US/f0022-012.jpg"><figcaption class="caption-body">The injury jinx continues to strike the Minnesota North Stars. With three players already slated to miss the season opener, the Stars have now lost young Tom McCarthy, above, with a broken ankle. (Photo by Bruce Bennett)</figcaption></div><h2>North Stars Hit</h2>BLOOMINGTON&mdash;Hoping to make their best start ever, the Minnesota North Stars have run into an unexpected rash of injuries that could slow the team at the outset of the season.Left winger Tom McCarthy is the latest casualty to hit the North Stars after he sustained a broken ankle in a pre-season exhibition game that will sideline him for up to two months.McCarthy will join other Minnesotans like center Tim Young and defensemen Gary Sargent and Paul Shmyr on the sidelines. Center Kevin Maxwell is another North Star in the doubtful category. Maxwell has been playing in tgraining camp with a back problem and could face surgery in the near future if the injurfy doesn&rsquo;t go away.<h2>Rangers Richer</h2>STOCKHOLM&mdash;The New York Rangers are $100,000 richer after winning the Dagens-Nyheter Tournament in Sweden with a perfect 4-0 record against top Swedish teams and the Washington Caps.The Rangers&rsquo; captain, Barry Beck, was presented with a check by Swedish officials after the New Yorkers ended the tournament by beating Stockholm AIK 4-1. Previously, the Rangers defeated Djurgardens 5-1, Washington 4-1 and Vastra Frolunda 7-1 to sweep the tournament schedule.Rangers&rsquo; rookie defenseman Reijo Ruotasalainen was chosen the MVP of the event. Washington finished with a 1-3 recorfd, losing twice to European teams.<h2>Waiver Draft Set</h2>MONTREAL&mdash;The NHL&rsquo;s annual waiver draft is scheduled to begin Monday Oct. 5 with all 21 teams participating over a country-wide telephone hookup between the league&rsquo;s head office and the various league cities.Each NHL team will be allowed to protect two goalies and 18 skaters and all unprotected players, with the exception of rookies and first year pros, are eligible for the draft. The cost of drafting a player depends on the number of years the drafted player has spent in the league.If past drafts are any indication, no more than a half dozen players will change clubs. It was reported that Edmonton would be looking for a left winger in the draft and Pittsburgh was believed ready to take the first experienced netminder who is left unprotected.<h2>Govs Approve BEP</h2>TORONTO&mdash;At a meeting on Sept. 15 the National Hockey League&rsquo;s Board of Governors agreed to lift the free equipment demand of the Branded Equipment Program (BEP), but held firm on the fees that equipment manufacturers will have to pay if they want their logos to be visible on equipment during NHL games. The governors also agreed to extend the deadline for manufacturers to comply with the BEP until January 15, 1982.<h2>New NHL Owner</h2>DENVER&mdash;Subject to the approval of the NHL&rsquo;s board of governers, the Colorado Rockies will have a new 50 percent owner.Peter Gilbert, who bought the Rockies during the off-season, has confirmed that an agreement in principal has been arranged to sell a 50 percent interest in the NHL club to communications executive Donald Reed of Edmonton.Under the proposed ownership format, Gilbert remains as the chief executive officer and league governor of the franchise while Mark Hogan remains as chairman of the board.The principal reasons for the proposed dual ownership are to provide additional finances in making the franchise viable and financially successful at all levels of operation in professional sports as well as the business community.Reed owns and operates Reed Communications Ltd., the largest and most experienced producer of large scale video series in North America. Reed&rsquo;s information service and libraries company is one of North America&rsquo;s leading innovators in the rapidly growing field of video software for educational, consumer and nonbroadcast markets. Currently, Reed products are in major distribution throughout Canada and the United States as well as other countries internationally.In commenting on the transaction Gilbert said, &ldquo;Donald Reed is a young and talented executive who I am proud to be partners with in the development of this vibrant franchise.&rdquo; Further commenting, Gilbert said, &ldquo;It takes more to operating a successful hockey franchise than by putting a winning team on the ice and to do this we feel that two heads are better than one! This proposed transaction only revamps the Colorado Rockies&rsquo; internal structure. It will have no effect on the Colorado Rockies&rsquo; NHL Charter; the team remains stable in Denver.&rdquo;<h2>Striking It Rich</h2>LOS ANGELES&mdash;Murray Wilson hasn&rsquo;t played in the NHL for two years because of injuries but the former winger of the Los Angeles Kings has been compensated for his forced retirement to the tune of $230,000.An arbitrator ordered the Kings to pay Wilson that amount after he retired following one season with the Kings because of foot and back injuries. The Kings had argued that they were not obligated to pay the balance of Wilson&rsquo;s contract because he was hurt before they obtained him from the Montreal Canadiens in 1978. The Canadiens received a first-round draft choice for Wilson, who was hurt after the start of his first season with the Kings and never was able to play again.<h2>TV Can Be A Pain</h2>ST. LOUIS&mdash;Defenseman Gerry Hart of the St. Louis Blues missed the first few days of training camp workouts with a mysterious injury.It seems Hart arrived at the Blues&rsquo; training camp wearing a neck brace. When doctors asked him to explain the problem. Hart said he suffered a stiff neck&mdash;while watching television at his mother&rsquo;s home.The injury eventually cleared up and Hart was able, to resume workouts.<h2>Durbano Trial Set</h2>TORONTO&mdash;Former NHL defenseman Steve Durbano, charged with importing durgs into Canada, has been ordered to trial later this year.Durbano, who saw NHL action with St. Louis, Pittsburgh, Kansas City and Colorado from 1972-1978, waived his preliminary hearing and the trial date will be set in the near future.The 30-year-old Toronto native was charged on Feb. 7, 1981 at the Toronto International Airport upon returning from Miami. The RCMP drug squad charged him with importing a pound of 99 percent pure cocaine and possession of cocaine for the purpose of trafficking.If convicted on the importing charge, Durbano could face up to seven years in prison. The possession charge carries a maximum sentence of life imprisonment. &#9632;

f0022-01

SLAPSHOTS

BOSTON&mdash;Normand Leveille, LW, 1st draft pick in the 1981 draft from Chicoutimi of QHL, signed to multi-year contract.DETROIT&mdash;Perry Miller, D, and Dennis Polonich, RW, assigned to Adirondack of AHL.HARTFORD&mdash;Paul Fnicker, G, Ken Holland, G, Jay Palladino, G, all assigned to Binghamton of AHL along with defensemen Jeff Brownschidle, Mike Cerrone, Marty Howe, Kevin Lovitt, Steve MacDougall, Mike Martin, Mark Renaud and Mickey Volcan. Also sent to Binghamton were Mark Asleson, C, Mario Cerri, C, Gerry Curley, C, Mark Fidler, C, Michel Galarneau, C, Francois Lecompte, C, Jeff Pyle, C, Ross Yates, C, Paul Crowley, RW, Don Gillen, RW, Randy MacGregor, RW, Steve Ulseth, RW, Brent DeNat, LW, Joe Crespi, LW, Dennis Martin, LW, Dave McDonald, LW, and Bobby Sullivan, LW. Joe Kowal, LW, released outright. John Mokosak, D, returned to Victoria of WHL, Ron Francis, C, to S.S. Marie of OHL, Paul MacDermid, C, to Windsor of OHL, Denis Dore, RW, to Chicoutimi of QHL, Dan Bourb-onnaise, LW, to Calgary of WHL, and Mike Hoffman, LW, to Brantford of OHL. Fred Armstrong, D, returned to Acadia College in Toronto.LOS ANGELES&mdash;Richard Martin, LW, placed on injury list to start season with knee problems.MINNESOTA&mdash;Gary Sargent, D, and Tim Young, C, both on injury list to start new season. Robbie Moore, G, Lance Breault, D, and Nelson Burton, LW, assigned to Nashville of the CHL. Barry Gibbs, D, declined option to become asst, coach and play with Nashville, announcing his retirement. Roger Wolfe, D, and Paul Marsh, D, released.MONTREAL&mdash;Moe Robinson, D, informed Canadiens he was retiring from hockey. Ric Natrass, D, and Mark Rusin, D, assigned to Flint of IHL. Francois James, D, Ed Small, D, Dave Orleski, LW, and John Chabot, C, sent to Nova Scotia of AHL. Dan Bolduc, C, signed as free agent and assigned to Nova Scotia.N.Y. ISLANDERS&mdash;Frank Beaton, D, Darcy Regier, D, Peter Steblyk, D, Scott Howson, C, Neil Hawryliw, LW, and Kevin Devine, LW, assigned to Indianapolis of CHL. Greg Gilbert, LW, 5th draft pick in 1981, and Dan Revell, RW, 7th draft pick in 1981, signed to pro contracts.N.Y. RANGERS&mdash;Ulf Nilsson, C, to start season on injury list. Peter Wallin, LW, returned to Sweden to undergo knee surgery. Ed Smith, RW, Kevin Ginnell, RW, and Gary Conn, RW, all released outright. Mark Morrison, C, 4th draft pick in 1981, returned to Victoria of WHL, Jim Malone, 1st draft pick in 1980, returned to Toronto of OHL, and John Vanbriesbrouck, G, 5th draft pick in 1981, returned to S.S. Marie of OHL.PHILADELPHIA&mdash;John Wensink, LW, returned to Quebec Nor-diques after tryout.PITTSBURGH&mdash;Stan Gulutzan, LW, Ron Hansis, RW, Pierre Lagace, RW, and Jim Cowell, C, all released outright. Ross Lonsberry, LW, announced retirement. Tom Thornbury, D, 2nd draft pick in 1981, returned to Niagara Falls of OHL, Dean De Fazio, LW, 8th draft pick in 1981, returned to Brantford of OHL, Mitch Lamoureaux, C, 7th draft pick, returned to Oshawa of OHL and Geoff Wilson, RW, 6th draft pick, sent back to Winnipeg of WHL.QUEBEC&mdash;Clint Malarchuk, G, 3rd draft pick from Portland of WHL, and Sylvain Cote, LW, signed to pro contracts. Cote was free agent. Both players assigned to Fredericton of AHL.ST. LOUIS&mdash;Jean Savard, C, and Rick Adduono, C, signed as free agents. Adduono, Jim Lockhurst, G, Brian Varga, LW, and Dean Willers, RW. later released after tryouts. Blaine Peerless, D, Real Paiement, D. Doug Robb, RW, Mike Hickey, C, Kelly Rissling, LW, and Greg Whyte, C, all assigned to Milwaukee in IHL. Following underage juniors were returned to their teams: Jim Pavese, D. to S. Ste. Marie of OHL, John Smyth, D, to Calgary of WHL, Dan Wood, RW, to Kingston of OHL, Gord Donnelly, D, To Sherbrooke of QHL, Richard Zemlack, C, to Spokane of WHL. Renzo Berra, RW, to Seattle of WHL, and Marty Ruff, D. to Lethbridge of WHL. Kim Bosch, LW, returned to lethbridge of WHL and John Callendar, C, returned to Regina of WH1 to play as overage juniors. Steve Blue, RW, sent to Flint of IHL. Stu Birenbaum, G, returned to college to continue his education.TORONTO&mdash;Kim Clackson, D, out four weeks with broken wrist. Craig Muni, D, 1st draft pick in 1980, returned to Windsor of OHL, Normand Lefrancois, LW, 4th draft pick in 1981, will be returned to T-Rivieres of QHL after recovering from broken jaw, Barry Brigley, C, 5th draft pick in 1981, returned to Calgary of WHL, Greg Barber, D, 8th draft pick in 1981, returned to Victoria of W&rsquo;HL, and Paul Higgins, RW, 10th draft pick in 1980, sent back to Toronto of OHL. Ron Dennis, G, 6th draft pick in 1980, returning to Princeton Unversity. Bob Parent, G, and Martin Maglay, G. defensemen Greg Hotham. Dave Logan, Brian McCafferty, Mike Waghorne, Chris Thelland and Kim Clackson, and Bruce Boudreau, C. Ernie Godden. C, Bill McCreary, LW, Reg. Thomas. LW. John Smrke, LW, Rick Blight, RW, Blair Stewart, LW, and Benoit Laporte, RW, all assigned to Cincinnati of CHL. &#9632;

PLAYER TRANSACTIONS

<div class="byline">BY JAY GREENBERG</div><div class="image-hero"><img title="f0023-01" src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0023-01486/4411903-1-eng-US/f0023-012.jpg"><figcaption class="caption-body">Pressured by the feeling he wasn&rsquo;t supposed to make mistakes, Pete Peeters started changing his style and lost all his confidence. (Photo By Ian MacAlpine)</figcaption></div>PHILADELPHIA&mdash;With three goalies and two chairs, Pat Quinn puts the needle to the record to start the music. Pin the tail on the donkey this isn&rsquo;t. A lot of teams wish they had the Flyers&rsquo; problems in goal.Not every coach, however, wishes he was Pat Quinn. The ghost of Phil Myre haunts him nightly; the Flyers&rsquo; ghoulish season of a year ago is, in part, testimony to Quinn&rsquo;s indecision.&ldquo;We&rsquo;re not going to go through that again,&rdquo; said Quinn during the Flyers&rsquo; opening week of training camp. &ldquo;If Pelle Lindbergh beats out either Rick St. Croix or Pete Peeters, he&rsquo;ll play. I would then ask Keith [GM Keith Allen] to get us some help in another area.&rdquo;What one training camp is going to prove is questionable. As anxious as Quinn is to resolve the situation, you can bet Keith Allen will not do anything rash. Lindbergh playing himself back to the Maine Mariners to start the season will only buy the Flyers&rsquo; brain trust more time. It won&rsquo;t settle anything.What do you do?If Lindbergh is as promising as other NHL GM types think he is, you don&rsquo;t trade him. If Peeters can get his head together and play the kind of dominant goal we&rsquo;ve seen in stretches of his first two NHL seasons, you don&rsquo;t dare move him either and if St. Croix is as competent and professional and as well suited for a 25-30 game ride as he appeared to be last season, then you&rsquo;re taking a chance moving him, too.In his first exhibition start Peeters, whose second-half slump a year ago yielded his starting job to St. Croix, played like Georges Vezina and sounded like Norman Vincent Peale. Last year, after a tremendous October and November, Pete played like Wayne Rutledge and sounded like Joe Bftsplk.Peeters&rsquo; prophetic misgivings were fulfilled during the second half of his sophomore seasonDid our ears deceive us? Read these quotes:&ldquo;There will be ups and downs,&rdquo; said Peeters. &ldquo;You have to shake them off. You can&rsquo;t just ho-hum the good ones, you have to appreciate them. And the bad ones just make for a more interesting life.&rdquo;Peeters spent his fine rookie year worrying about what it would be like when things went badly. As in any self-fulfilling prophecy, he was destined to find out. For two months he was unbeatable, for the next few he was human and for the last few Quinn, turned to St. Croix while the Flyers&rsquo; management cast anxious glances to Lindbergh&rsquo;s progress in Maine.This year begins with Pete realizing that three into two doesn&rsquo;t go and putting up a brave front that he welcomes the challenge.&ldquo;I&rsquo;m here to win a job,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;What happens, happens and 1&rsquo;11 accept it. The Flyers have what every team wants. We have no say in the matter.&rdquo;A summer back home in pastoral Edmonton helped clear out his head, but even if his late-season play didn&rsquo;t reflect it Peeters credits his observance of St. Louis&rsquo; Mike Liut at last year&rsquo;s All Star game with his new perspective.&ldquo;If anybody can shake off what happened at the Canada Cup, Liut can,&rdquo; said Peeters. &ldquo;He&rsquo;s quite an individual. He seemed to have a positive attitude. He realizes that you&rsquo;re going to have a lots of bad nights and you have to bounce back.&ldquo;As I look back on it, I forgot how little experience I&rsquo;ve had. It was like because I wasn&rsquo;t a rookie anymore, 1 couldn&rsquo;t make any mistakes. Some of those goals scored on me were great goals. I realize that now.&rdquo;Because he didn&rsquo;t then, Peeters began tinkering with different ways of positioning himself. And a slump that really wasn&rsquo;t that bad got a lot worse.&ldquo;A lot of the problems were mental,&rdquo; said Quinn. &ldquo;He was experimenting and creating some doubts. He set such high standards the year before that our expectations were way up.&ldquo;He lost some perspective. The key to being a goalie with a long, successful career is shaking these things off.&rdquo;ICEBERGS: Having dramatized his point, Reggie Leach returned to camp, while discussions on his new contract continued. &ldquo;He wants a long-term contract,&rdquo; said Allen, &ldquo;and he&rsquo;s 31 years old. I&rsquo;m not saying he&rsquo;s had it, but Jean Ratelle, for instance, worked on one-year contracts the last few years of his career. That seems to be the point of contention.&rdquo; Leach is entering the option year of a contract which has a base salary of about $100,000 per year&hellip;Bill Barber and Bob Dailey were both cleared by Dr. Joe Torg to begin playing exhibition games, but Paul Holmgren, who suffered a separated shoulder during Team USA&rsquo;s camp, may need surgery. He was due to be re-examined. If Dr. Torg decides to cut, the recuperation would take about six weeks&hellip;John Wensink, acquired conditionally from Quebec was returned to the Nordiques after the NHL ruled the deal between the two teams illegal. Allen had stipulated that Wensink be returned to the Nordiques should he not make the Flyers (so as not to get stuck with a hefty minor-league salary), so John remained on Quebec&rsquo;s reserve list while training with the Flyers. &#9632;

f0023-01

Flyers Cautious Of Three Goaltender System

<div class="byline">BY HELENE ELLIOTT</div><div class="image-hero"><img title="f0024-01" src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0024-01504/4411934-1-eng-US/f0024-012.jpg"><figcaption class="caption-body">One of the centers Brent Sutter must beat is speedy Bill Carroll who became a regular last season displacing Lome Henning (Photo By Bruce Bennett)</figcaption></div>LONG ISLAND&mdash;Even without the players who had participated in the Canada Cup tournament, the Islanders&rsquo; training camp was crowded. When the Canada Cup players officially reported after a week&rsquo;s grace given them by Islanders&rsquo; general manager Bill Torrey&mdash;Anders Kallur and Stefan Persson from Team Sweden, Ken Morrow and Dave Langevin from Team USA and Mike Bossy, Bryan Trottier, Clark Gillies, Butch Goring and Denis Potvin from Team Canada (goalie Billy Smith, who missed the Canada Cup series with an injured finger, had already checked in)&mdash;the ice at Hicksville&rsquo;s Cantiague Park overflowed.The Islanders are coming off two consecutive Stanley Cup championships, and there will not be many openings on the 1981-82 squad. So. as talented as a newcomer might be, training camp is more a change to get noticed for the future, rather than a chance to win a job now.Brent Sutter, though, is trying to recalculate all those numbers and hoping he can come up with a different answer. &ldquo;I&rsquo;m not thinking about going back to juniors or Indianapolis [the Islanders&rsquo; top farm club] or anything,&rdquo; said the 19-year-old center, who was the team&rsquo;s first pick (17th overall) in the 1980 draft. &ldquo;All I want to do is give it my best shot here. Whatever they decide after that, fine. As long as I know I gave it my best shot.&rdquo;Sutter is the No. 5 son of the Sutter family, which has already contributed three of its members to the National Hockey League. Brian is with the St. Louis Blues, Darryl in Chicago with the Black Hawks, and Duane is a member of the Islanders. It was Duane&rsquo;s spirit and determination that helped persuade Torrey to draft Brent, a formula Torrey employed later in the same draft when he chose a center named Monty Trottier, younger brother of Islanders&rsquo; team leader Bryan.Though the Islanders usually prefer to let their young players mature in the minor and junior leagues, Duane was called up two months after he had been returned to junior play. Brent followed the same pattern. In the process of collecting 54 goals and 55 assists for his junior team in Lethbridge, Alta., Brent took a break in mid-February to join the Islanders. The brief glance coach Al Arbour got of him was tantalizing: Sutter scored two goals and two assists in two games and impressed Arbour considerably.With Trottier, Goring, Merrick and Carroll ahead of him, Brent Sutter has his work cut out.But Arbour is a realist. With Trottier, Goring, Wayne Merrick and Billy Carroll ahead of Sutter, he knows the youngster has his work cut out for him if he wants to catch on as the Islanders&rsquo; fifth center.&ldquo;I don&rsquo;t want to raise his hopes and I don&rsquo;t want to destroy them,&rdquo; Arbour said, &ldquo;but 1 will say I like his determination. You can see he as the knack for getting the job done, whatever it takes. He&rsquo;s not flashy, but he&rsquo;s deceiving the way he moves. And he doesn&rsquo;t telegraph a pass. He gets it off before you realize it&rsquo;s happened. I like that.&rdquo;Sutter will use every ounce of determination in his 5-11, 175-pound body to earn a place on the team, and that determination is considerable. Growing up with six brothers develops that. If he doesn&rsquo;t make it right now. it won&rsquo;t be for lack of effort.&ldquo;I have to work as hard as I can,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;I&rsquo;m not blessed with a lot of talent. I have a lot to learn&mdash;I know that. I&rsquo;m just going to work as hard as I can.&rdquo;ISLAND NOTES: Potvin was expected to miss the entire exhibition schedule because of a severely pulled left groin. He was examined by club physician Dr. Jeffrey Minkoff after his return from the Canada Cup series, where the pull occurred. It&rsquo;s actually an aggravation of the injury he suffered in the final game of the Stanley Cup playoffs. &ldquo;There is no cause for alarm,&rdquo; Torrey said. &ldquo;We just want to make sure the injury heals properly before we begin the season. If things go well, there is no reason Denis can&rsquo;t be ready for the opener.&rdquo;&hellip;There was little progress in Bob Bourne&rsquo;s contract talks with Torrey. Bourne, a free agent, had not reported to camp and was scheduled to return to his Saskatchewan home when it became apparent neither side would budge. Reportedly, Bourne and his agent, Gary Wichard, have agreed with Torrey that the contract would be for five years plus an option year, but they were still far apart on money&hellip;Bossy has begun negotiations on a new contract, and might be aiming to become the highest paid player in the NHL. Bossy, who is in his option year (as are Potvin and John Tonelli), might be asking as much as $1 million per year over six years, though the 24-year-old right wing refused to confirm or deny those figures. Bossy earned approximately $185,000 plus bonuses last season, when he was the league&rsquo;s fourth-leading scorer off 68 goals and 119 points. Bossy also set a playoff record with 35 points last season. Torrey said &ldquo;the lines are open&rdquo; with Potvin, Bossy and Tonelli, but little else.Helene Elliott, who also wrote the page 3 feature on Butch Goring, is a writer with Long Island&rsquo;s Newsday. &#9632;

f0024-01

Brent Sutter Determined To Battle For Isles’ Job

<div class="byline">BY CHARLIE HALPIN</div>TORONTO&mdash;It seems incredible that the National Hockey League will commence its 63rd season on October 6 with seven 18-year-olds, including an unknown 18-year-old high school phenom in the starting lineups.Dale Hawerchuk, the NHL&rsquo;s No. 1 draft in 1981, heads the cast of 18-year-old players making their debut in the bigs this season while Bobby Carpenter, an 18-year-old Danvers, MA., whiz who hasn&rsquo;t played any higher than New England high school hockey, will skate out with an NHL team on opening night.Hawerchuk, Canada&rsquo;s top junior player of 1980-81, will be at center for the Winnipeg Jets, a team desperately in need of offense after trailing the league last season. Carpenter, also a center, will be making his pro hockey debut with the Washington Caps and for the fuzzy-cheeked youngster, it makes him the youngest American-born player ever to play in the NHL. In an interesting twist, both Hawerchuk and Carpenter will wear No. 10 on their jerseys.There is a definite upswing in youth around the NHL this season with many of the 21 teams foresaking aging veterans for the springy legs of 18, 19, and 20-year-old skaters. The Winnipeg Jets, after two last-place finishes in two years, have cleaned house and could begin the new season with no less than 15 youngsters in the lineup. Many, like Hawerchuk, will be playing their first ever NHL game.Although the NHL will have less first-round drafts picks opening the season than in the last three years, there will still be at least 11 who will likely open the &lsquo;81-82 campaign on the rosters of NHL teams.Other top draft picks who will make their pro debut in addition to Hawerchuk and Carpenter are center Doug Smith with the Los Angeles Kings, who was the No. 2 draft in 1981, defenseman Joe Cirella, the fifth choice, who will start with Colorado and Jim Benning, another rearguard, whom Toronto picked sixth. No. 7 pick, right winger Mark Hunter with the Montreal Canadiens, No. 8 choice, goalie Grant Fuhr with the Edmonton Oilers, 11th draft defenseman Randy Moller with the Quebec Nordiques, 12th draft choice Tony Tanti, who will start at right wing with the Chicago Black Hawks, Normand Leveille, a left winger whom the Boston Bruins drafted 14th and 16th pick Steve Smith may open on the Philadelphia defense if some of the injured Flyer veterans, like Bob Dailey and Jim Watson, don&rsquo;t make it through training camp.Many pro scouts viewed the 1981 draft crop with skepticism and some are convinced that when the NHL teams actually go to the Oct. 6 starting line, no more than six of the first round picks will be in uniform. They insist it wasn&rsquo;t a good year for drafting and in a sense if only six do open with NHL clubs, then the scouts&rsquo; judgement can&rsquo;t be questioned.There is a definite upswing in youth&hellip;Many teams are foresaking aging veterans for the springy legs of 18, 19 and 20-year-old skaters.At any rate, while there will be many new faces in the opening NHL lineups, nothing is likely to match last season when the NHL introduced a total of 119 new players to big league hockey for the first time. This season the number could be under 100.Even though they weren&rsquo;t selected in the first round, there are another half dozen junior graduates who will probably step up with NHL teams this year. This group would include center Claude Loiselle, who was drafted 23rd, and goalie Corrado Micalef, a 44th draft choice, both of whom could start with the downtrodden Detroit Red Wings.<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0025-01439/4411972-1-eng-US/f0025-012.jpg" title="f0025-01" width="589" height="1342"><figcaption class="caption-body">Dale Hawerchuk will make his bow with the Winnipeg Jets after being the No. 1 1981 draft pick.</figcaption></div>The Edmonton Oilers may experiment with Todd Strueby, drafted 29th, at left wing, where the Oilers are desperately seeking a portsider to complement scoring ace Wayne Gretzky. The Pittsburgh Penguins may also insert Steve Gatzos, a right winger who was chosen 28th, into the lineup and the Toronto Maple Leafs are leaning towards opening with a pair of 20-year-old junior centers, Gary Yaremchuk and Ernie Godden, who were picked 24th and 55th respectively.In addition to all the 17 junior draft picks who could be in the openingnight lineups, there is the usual influx of European players, who have grown in numbers this season.In 1980-81, the NHL had a total of 32 Europeans on its 21 team rosters. This season the number could reach as high as 45.Among the likely new European players who will make the NHL this season are defenseman Jiri Bubla and center Ivan Hlinka with the Vancouver Canucks, defenseman Reijo Ruotsalinen and center Mikko Leinonen with the Rangers, defenseman Anders Brostrom with Boston, Kari Suoraniemi, also a defenseman, and left winger Kai Suikkanon of Buffalo, Kari Eloranta, another backliner, with Calgary, Tapio Levo, a defenseman, center Veli-Pekka Ketola and left winger Christer Kellgren, all with Colorado. Tomas Jonsson, a young Swedish defense hope with the Islanders, left winger Marian Stastny, the Czech defector who will join brothers Anton and Peter with the Quebec Nordiques to form an ail Czechoslovakian line, defenseman Timo Blomqvist with Washington, and finally speedy left winger Bengt Lundholm of the Winnipeg Jets.<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0025-02324/4411965-1-eng-US/f0025-022.jpg" title="f0025-02" width="604" height="1448"><figcaption class="caption-body">Bobby Carpenter is expected to start with the Washington Caps making him the youngest U.S. born player ever in the NHL.</figcaption></div> &#9632;

f0025-01

Youth Taking Over As NHL Shows New Faces

<div class="image-hero"><img title="f0026-01" src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0026-01452/4412003-1-eng-US/f0026-012.jpg"></div> &#9632;

f0026-01

Hockey Night In Canada’s 1981-82 TV Schedule

<div class="byline">BY PATRICK LYON</div>LOUISVILLE HOCKEY STICKSLOUISVILLE HOCKEY STICKSROCHESTER&mdash;Americans fans have suffered through three losing seasons in a row and coach Mike Keenan is hoping to turn the franchise around after a successful camp with the parent Buffalo Sabres in Lake Placid.After two straight fourth place finishes in 1978-79 and 1979-80, the Americans skidded to fifth place in the southern division last year with a 30-42-8 record and missed the playoffs once again.Keenan would like to return the New York club to the top of the American Hockey League like when they were a dominant force in the early and middle 1970&rsquo;s. Rochester strung together six conecutive winning seasons in those years and Keenan would like nothing better than to start another winning tradition with the Americans.The second-year coach figures to have his hands full again this year since the Americans will compete in the Southern Division with the likes of Calder Cup champ Adirondack, Binghamton, Erie, Hershey and New Haven.The Americans could be the beneficiaries of three free agents provided they don&rsquo;t end up in Sabres uniforms. Dave Gorman. Mal Davis and Dean &ldquo;The Hulk&rdquo; Turner could provide just what Keenan needs to turn Rochester in the right direction. Gorman, who came over from Nova Scotia, was the number four scorer in the AHL a year ago. while Davis tied for the goal scoring leadership with Adirondack last year. Turner could supply help to Rochester on the physical aspect of the game, as his nickname dictates.Rochester could also benefit with the return to form of former All Star defenseman John Bednarski, who reported to Lake Placid 15 pounds lighter and eager to make Rochester a winner.The Americans will play 17 Sunday games this season along with 13 Friday contests. The club plays their first three games of the regular season on the road before opening at home against Maine.ADIRONDACK&mdash;The Red Wings will have a new look this season following their stunning Calder Cup victory over the Maine Mariners last May.The new look starts on the bench, with Doug McKay replacing cocoaches J. P. LeBlanc and Tom Webster. Adirondack will also have to replace goalie Al Jensen after he was traded to the Washington Capitals for Mark Lofthouse.Jensen may be hard to replace since he played in more games (60) than any other AHL goalie and also had the second best goals against average, with a 3.84 mark.BINGHAMTON&mdash;The Whalers have never had a winning season in their three previous years in the AHL and coach Larry Kish will try to improve on a third-place finish of a year ago.Kish is counting on Paul Crowley to help put more offense into the club with the right winger returning to Binghamton after two seasons with Rochester. It is hoped that Crowley will combine his talents with Randy MacGregor to form what the Whalers&rsquo; are counting on to be one of the top penalty killing tandems in the AHL.Binghamton is also pleased with their schedule, which will find them playing 33 of their 40 home games on weekends. The Whalers will also start the season with five of their first seven games on the road.In the first cuts by the parent Hartford Whalers, goalies Paul Fricker, Ken Holland and Jay Palladino were sent down along with defensemen Jeff Brownschidle, Mike Cerrone, Marty Howe, Kevin Lovitt, Steve MacDougall, Mike Martin, Mark Renaud and Mickey Volcan as well as forwards Mark Asleson, Mario Cerri, Gerry Curley, Mark Fidler, Michel Galarneau, Francois Lecompte, Jeff Pyle, Ross Yates, Don Gillen, Randy MacGregor, Steve Ulseth. Brent DeNat, Joe Crespi, Dennis Martin, Dave McDonald, Bobby Sullivan and Crowley.HERSHEY: Gary Inness, -a veteran AHL goaltender, was named assistant coach and trainer by general manager Frank Mathers. Inness will assist coach Bryan Murray on the Hershey bench.Inness first came to Hershey in February of 1980 and combined with Dave Parro in the Bears&rsquo; drive to the Calder Cup championship. The 32-year-old was again assigned to Hershey in January of 1981 and played during the regular season with a 3.52 goals against average in 10 games and also participated in the Calder playoffs when the Bears were eliminated by Adirondack.Following four straight losing seasons, the Bears made a mockery of the regular season race in the southern division last year with a 47-24-9 record, good for 103 points, Hershey was the only team in the south with a winning record and finished 28 points ahead of second place Adirondack.NOVA SCOTIA&mdash;The Voyageurs feel that hockey interest will be at its peak in the Maritimes with the addition of Fredericton to the AHL. Nova Scotia will compete with the Express and New Brunswick&rsquo; for a special trophy to be presented to the winner of the special Maritime rivalry.Bert Templeton is gone and coach John Brophy has replaced him at the helm. Brophy, a native of Nova Scotia, will seek to improve on the Voyageurs record of 38-37-5.NEW BRUNSWICK&mdash;The Hawks will be entering their fourth AHL season with their fifth coach during that time span. Eddie Johnston, Joe Crozier, Lou Angotti and Doug Carpenter are departed and Orval Tessier has left junior hockey for his first shot at the pros.Tessier is taking over a team that has never had a losing season in their three previous AHL campaigns and has never finished worse than second in their division. Tessier will also be gunning for a playoff spot since the Hawks have reached the playoffs every year since joining the AHL.FREDERICTON&mdash;One of two expansion clubs, the Express will be looking to get off to a fast start with the first year team playing 22 of their 40 home games in the first three months of the season.The Express figure to be putting a youthful team on the ice with the parent Nordiques owning many fine quality young hockey players.MAINE&mdash;The Mariners have been one of the finest franchises in the AHL in their short four-year existence and there is no reason to believe that the same pattern won&rsquo;t continue again with the parent Philadelphia Flyers supplying the players.In just four years Maine has two Calder Cups to their credit and last year reached the finals before bowing to Adirondack.Bob McCammon, who has been with the club since its inception, will again be back to direct the Mariners behind the bench. McCammon, the reigning AHL Coach of the Year, has captured over 150 victories and his club has never finished a season with less than 93 points.The Mariners will get much of their road schedule out of the way early in the season as they play 23 away games in the first three months compared to 14 home games in the same time frame. Maine will then be home for nine games in January, eight in February and seven in March.<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0027-01432/4412034-1-eng-US/f0027-012.jpg" title="f0027-01" width="608" height="796"><figcaption class="caption-body">Scoring Ace Dave Gorman has joined Rochester as a free agent after playing for Nova Scotia.</figcaption></div>ERIE&mdash;Six Blades who played on championship teams in Erie received tryouts with the parent Pittsburgh Penguins in training camp, but four were given their walking papers in the first cut made at Erie County Fieldhouse. Stan Gulutzan, Ron Hansis, Jim Cowell and Pierre Lagace were all released, while Steve Stockman and Brad Rhiness remained.The Blades will play nine of their 11 October games in front of the home crowd so Erie coach Lou Angotti will be hoping to get a fast start in his new position behind the bench.Stockman continued to impress the Penguins&rsquo; coaching staff as he scored a goal in the annual Black-Gold scrimmage which completed the Penguins first week of training camp, which was held in Erie. &#9632;

f0027-01

Rochester Looking To Regain Winning Ways

<div class="byline">BY PATRICK LYON</div>NEW HAVEN&mdash;Teams coming into the Veterans Memorial Coliseum may find it even more difficult to leave with a victory after the Nighthawks curtained off part of their vast arena.The seating capacity of 8,765 has been pared down to some 6,000 seats with the aid of curtains and could spell trouble for opposing teams if New Haven can fill the area to capacity.The Nighthawks have never won a Calder Cup title, but they are hoping their new agreement with the Los Angeles Kings will help them win a championship as they celebrate their tenth year in the AHL.Last season was a disappointment to New Haven fans after the success they achieved the previous two seasons. New Haven was first in the south in both 1978-79 and 1979-80 with 46-25-9 marks, but fell to fourth place a year ago with a record of 29-40-11.The return of coach Don Perry is another reason that interest should be high once again in the New Haven area.SPRINGFIELD&mdash;The Indians are another team who are counting on a coaching change to instill new life and bring better results to their club.The five-time Calder Cup kings acquired the services of Tom Webster after he was relieved of his duties after sparking Adirondack to the title last season. Webster will inherit a fourth place team that ended at 34-41-5 and was eliminated in the first round of the playoffs.With newcomer Webster in the fold the Indians can also boast of a new working agreement with the New York Rangers. With 23 Saturday games plus 14 more on Friday night the Indians are expecting a banner season. &#9632;

Nighthawks Have Drawn Curtains

<div class="byline">BY TOM LOBAUGH</div>LOUISVILLE HOCKEY STICKSLOUISVILLE HOCKEY STICKSINDIANAPOLIS&mdash;The last week in September most Central Hockey League coaches were still awaiting word from the parent club on assignment of personnel.Fred Creighton, new general manager-coach of the Indianapolis Checkers, already knew of seven players the parent New York Islanders had signed specifically for the farm club.CHL All Star left wing Neil Hawryliw was in this category along with experienced left wings Kevin Devine and Frank Beaton, goalie Rob Holland and defenseman Darcy Regier. Add to these rookie center Scott Howson and defenseman Peter Steblyk, both signed out of junior ranks, and Indy was beginning to have the nucleus for another strong club.Howson, who scored 57 goals and 140 points for the Kingston Canadians, was signed as a free agent. Steblyk, from the Medicine Hat Tigers, was a 1980 draft choice. He was with the Checkers during the playoffs last spring, but didn&rsquo;t get into any of the games.Holland finished up at Indy last season (15 games, 2.91 average) on loan from the Pittsburgh Penguins, who had previously shipped him to Binghamton in the American League. He was signed as a free agent this summer. Regier played his second season for Indy, after previous CHL stops in Salt Lake, Phoenix and Fort Worth. In 1979-80 he received the league&rsquo;s Iron Man Award.Hawryliw also played his second season for the Checkers last winter, a 37-goal season that topped his previous output of 26.Devine, last year&rsquo;s Checker captain, has had 27 and 28 goals, respectively, in two seasons with the club. Beaton had eight goals in 41 games for the Birmingham CHL entry before the team folded in February.The Tulsa Oilers, who had a coach when training camp started in Winnipeg, were without one three days later, as the parent Jets reneged on an earlier statement that Mike Smith would return as Tulsa mentor. Jets&rsquo; general manager John Ferguson said Smith would continue as coach through training camp and the preseason games, but then would become director of recruiting for Winnipeg. A new Oiler coach would be named within 10 days, Ferguson said.Co-general managers Mark Eben-hack and Jeff Nix, who spearheaded the formation of a limited partnership to buy out the former Oiler owners, drove the 1,800 miles from Tulsa to Winnipeg to confer with Ferguson, and the coaching change was made shortly afterward.Salt Lake coach Jack Evans, in camp with the parent St. Louis Blues at Regina, was pleased with the performances of right wings Bobby Crawford and Mark Reeds and goalie Doug Grant, but wasn&rsquo;t sure if they would return to Salt Lake. Reeds, who was switched to left wing last winter, was looking sharp at his old spot on the right side.The first changes in the 1981-82 CHL schedule were announced when the Nashville South Stars rescheduled a pair of home dates against the Dallas Black Hawks. As originally scheduled for Oct. 25 and 27, the games apparently would conflict with the baseball World Series, being played a week later than usual this season as a result of the mid-season players&rsquo; strike. So the games in Nashville were rescheduled for Dec. 6 and 8. Other CHL clubs are reported considering similar moves.In the South Stars&rsquo; training camp with the parent Minnesota North Stars at Bloomington, Nashville coach Gene Ubriaco was expecting to get big defenseman Lance Breault, who played for Salem and Baltimore in the Eastern League, winger Nelson Burton, an &ldquo;enforcer&rdquo; for Erie in the same circuit, and goalie Robbie Moore, who has been with Maine in the AHL the past two years.This was the picture around the Northern Division of the OHL as coaches awaited assignment of players for the League&rsquo;s 19th season.CINCINNATI TIGERS&mdash;One of two expansion clubs this season, backed by the Toronto Maple Leafs. Coach Doug Carpenter, formerly at New Brunswick in the American League, was hoping to have some of his players from that club. Cincinnati has had two previous CHL entries, withdrawing after the league&rsquo;s inaugural season of 1963-64, and giving up halfway through the 1979-80 campaign, The Tigers will open the season in Indianapolis, Oct. 7, and play their first home game against the same rivals, Oct. 9.<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0028-01418/4412089-1-eng-US/f0028-012.jpg" title="f0028-01" width="596" height="606"><figcaption class="caption-body">One of the first players assigned to Racers&rsquo; coach Fred Creighton was left winger Kevin Devine.</figcaption></div>INDIANAPOLIS CHECKERS&mdash;Starting their third CHL season, backed by the New York Islanders. Fred Creighton, who formerly coached at Atlanta and Boston in IHL, is new general manager-coach. The Checkers were third in one-division league last season, but lost in the first round of playoffs. Home opener is Oct. 7 against neighboring Cincinnati.NASHVILLE SOUTH STARS&mdash;The other new club in the league, is backed by Minnesota North Stars, who had an operation in Oklahoma City last winter. Coach is Gene Ubriaco, formerly with Milwaukee in U.S. and International Leagues. South Stars will open the schedule in Tulsa, Oct. 8, and won&rsquo;t play at home until Oct. 15 against Indianapolis.SALT LAKE GOLDEN EAGLES&mdash;In eighth CHL season, the Big Birds placed second last season but won the Adams Cup playoff title for the second straight year. Jack (Tex) Evans returns as coach. The parent club is the St. Louis Blues. The Eagles will open the schedule at home against Cincinnati, Oct. 10. &#9632;

f0028-01

Racers Get Fast Start In Manpower But Most CHL Clubs Await Players

<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0028-02308/4412120-1-eng-US/f0028-022.jpg" title="f0028-02" width="588" height="1084"><figcaption class="caption-body">Calgary hired Tommy McVie, who coached in Winnipeg last year, to run their Oklahoma City farm.</figcaption></div>DALLAS&mdash;The Black Hawks are starting their 15th consecutive season in the Central League, now backed by the Vancouver Canucks, and still smarting from their playpff upset a year ago.Dallas ran away with the regular season championship last year, but lost out in the playoff semifinals, an occurrence returning coach Danny Belisle, who was named CHL Coach of the Year for 1980-81, would just as soon forget.With their rink occupied by the Texas State Fair, the Black Hawks must play their first six games on the road before finally playing before the home town crown at the end of the month, when Fort Worth visits on Oct. 31.Here&rsquo;s a roundup on the other Southern Division CHL clubs.FORT WORTH TEXANS&mdash;Also beginning their 15th straight season, the Texans are backed by the Colorado Rockies. Andy Laing, coach of the Sudbury Wolves of the Ontario Hockey League for four seasons, is making his pro coaching debut. The Texans finished last among the seven surviving clubs last season, and bowed in the first play-off round.OKLAHOMA CITY STARS&mdash;Starting their 13th year in the CHL, but only the third in their latest stint. The Stars have a new coach in Tommy McVie, formerly with the Winnipeg Jets, and a new parent club in the Calgary Flames, who backed the ill-fated Birmingham Bulls last year. Oklahoma City finished fourth last season, but was upset in the first round of the playoffs. The Stars will open at home against Dallas, Oct. 9.TULSA OILERS&mdash;Starting 16th consecutive season in the league, the Oilers are now backed by the Winnipeg Jets. Although Mike Smith was running the club in training camp, he won&rsquo;t be the coach and the Jets have yet to announce who will fill the role. The Oilers were fifth in the regular season race last year, and lost in the playoff semifinals. They&rsquo;ll open at home against Nashville, Oct. 8.WICHITA WIND&mdash;Ready for their second CHL season, the Wind has the same parent club, the Edmonton Oilers, but a new coach in John Muckier who coached Dallas to the Adams Cup championship in 1978-79. In their first campaign, the Wind finished sixth in the regular season, but went to the finals in the playoffs. Wichita will open at Fort Worth. Oct. 9. with their first home game against Tulsa, on Oct. 15. &#9632;

f0028-02

Dallas Defense Opens On The Road

<div class="byline">BY BUD GALLMEIER</div>LOUISVILLE HOCKEY STICKSLOUISVILLE HOCKEY STICKSTOLEDO&mdash;By his own admission, Bill Beagan is opinionated. And those who know him well will admit he isn&rsquo;t short on energy or drive.The combination just might make Toledo one of the most successful minor league hockey franchises in the game. If not, it won&rsquo;t be because Bill Began didn&rsquo;t give it his best shot.A former NHL official and for nine years commissioner of the International Hockey League, Beagan is now an owner&mdash;of the Toledo Goaldiggers. After his tenure as IHL commissioner, Beagan briefly served the Ontario Hockey League as commissioner and last season ran the Eastern Hockey League.Now he&rsquo;s back in the IHL; in a new role. But he doesn&rsquo;t feel uncomfortable. Bill Beagan seldom feels uncomfortable.&ldquo;I&rsquo;m getting an opportunity to take the bull by the horns, and do things my way. If I screw up, I&rsquo;ve got nobody to blame but myself,&rdquo; Beagan said about his new station in life. &ldquo;I&rsquo;m going to fight like hell for this hockey club.&rdquo;Beagan has his own ideas of what will make a hockey club go. So far, his game plan has received favorable reaction in Toledo and he&rsquo;s very optimistic about the business aspect of the franchise. &ldquo;And we won&rsquo;t be a last place club, either,&rdquo; Bill promises.The one area where minor league hockey has been weak, according to Beagan, is at the market place. &ldquo;The running boards are off the cars. We&rsquo;ve put a man on the moon. It&rsquo;s time we put minor league hockey into the 20th century also,&rdquo; Beagan stated.&ldquo;Hockey has not been-active in the market place, especially at the minor league level. The NHL isn&rsquo;t super in this area, either,&rdquo; Beagan points out.In an effort to market his product more successfully, Beagan has hired three people who specialize in this area. Laurie Linvil has been hired as director of group sales. Judy Wolfe is director of corporate sales and Mark Brink is director of advertising and season ticket sales.Talking about the Digger operation, Beagan says, &ldquo;We are first class all the way. Bill Inglis [Digger coach] is a first-class person and the three NHL teams we are working with are all first-class, also.&rdquo;The Diggers are working with the New York Islanders, the Philadelphia Flyers and the Minnesota North Stars. &ldquo;You can&rsquo;t do any better than that.&rdquo;Opening night will have a touch of class also says Beagan. &ldquo;We&rsquo;re going to have John Ziegler [president of the NHL] here, that&rsquo;s real class.&rdquo;Early returns indicate Beagan&rsquo;s game plan is working. The office phones have been busy for a month. Interest in the team appears quite high. This is most encouraging since Toledo is one of three clubs which following the 1980-81 season, appeared ready to fold. Toldeo, along with Port Huron, actually announced it was putting its franchise in escrow for at least a year. Port Huron did just that. But Beagan kept Toledo in the hunt.Beagan has some pretty impressive numbers to back up his enthusiasm. He points out, &ldquo;A year ago Toledo sold 1101 season tickets for a total of $133,000. The tickets were sold for $120 a pop. The average ticket last season was $2.97. I raised the prices 80 percent.&ldquo;The average price per ticket this season is $5.47. and my answer is simple. You can&rsquo;t bank people, you bank dollars.&rdquo;So far, Beagan reports the Diggers have sold 480 season tickets for $106,000 and that&rsquo;s just a month.&ldquo;What we&rsquo;ve sold is the equivalent of 864 tickets at last year&rsquo;s prices,&rdquo; Beagan noted.The Diggers will open their training camp on Oct. 1. That&rsquo;s a day later than most of the clubs. He anticipates business will get even better when the hockey club becomes visible in Toledo.It looks like an interesting season for Toledo fans. If not. it won&rsquo;t be because Bill Beagan didn&rsquo;t try.<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0029-01369/4412151-1-eng-US/f0029-012.jpg" title="f0029-01" width="602" height="1048"><figcaption class="caption-body">New Toledo franchise owner Bill Beagan has promised that the club will go first-class.</figcaption></div> &#9632;

f0029-01

Beagan Introducing ‘Diggers To Marketplace

<div class="byline">BY BILL HIGDON</div>LOUISVILLE HOCKEY STICKSLOUISVILLE HOCKEY STICKS<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0030-01412/4412189-1-eng-US/f0030-012.jpg" title="f0030-01" width="601" height="1183"><figcaption class="caption-body">Pat Kelly, coach of Salem, remained with the club in its switch from the Eastern to the Atlantic Coast League.</figcaption></div>UTICA&mdash;Seven cities from four Eastern states are set to skate in the new Atlantic Coast Hockey League, and several more would-be franchises are waiting in the wings.League officials, headed by president Victor Ehre, have invited inquiring cities to &ldquo;monitor our league this season&rdquo; and then decide if they wish to participate in an expansion for 1982-83.The ACHL grew out of the Eastern Hockey League, two of whose members, the Salem-Virginia Raiders and Baltimore, Md. Skyjacks (formerly Clippers) formed the nucleus.Also in the fold are two of the cities which originally planned to enter the Intercontinental Major Hockey League, the Schenectady, N.Y., Chiefs and the Fitchburg, Mass., Trappers. The IMHL never got off the ground for lack of membership.Rounding out the ACHL are the Winston-Salem, N.C., Thunderbirds, Cape Cod, Mass. Bucaneers and the Mohawk Valley Stars, of Utica.By its example of a tightly-run financial ship, the league hopes to rise to a position where expansion to eight or 10 teams, thus creating a two-division lineup, is feasible. Executive director John E. (Jack) Timminssaid the league will operate as a single division this season, with a 20-week schedule beginning Oct. 23 and ending early in March, followed by playoffs.Meanwhile, member clubs have been busy arranging working agreements and recruiting coaches, conducting a draft of the 54 players from the Richmond Va., Rifles, Hampton, Va., Aces and Erie, Pa., Blades, teams from the defunct EHL who are not operating in the new league. The Baltimore and Salem rosters were frozen except for four players each.Coaches appointed thus far are Pat Kelly, who returns to Salem, Bill Horton, Mohawk Valley; Jim Troy, Cape Cod; Peter Crawford, Schenectady and Morris (Moose) Lallo, Baltimore.In a unique arrangement, it was decided that the Chiefs and Trappers both would train at &ldquo;Center City,&rdquo; the Schenectady Civic Center. Jim Salfi, who formerly coached at the University of Pennsylvania and Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and now operates the arena at Schenectady, is advisor to both teams.Fitchburg and Schenectady officials said they do not plan any ties with National Hockey League teams.Winston-Salem has pending agreements. Kelly said Salem will cull players from the Toronto Maple Leafs and the Quebec Nordiques. Baltimore will draw from the Minnesota North Stars and the Chicago Black Hawks. And Mohawk Valley from the Hartford Whalers, Philadelphia Flyers and the Buffalo Sabres.Utica&rsquo;s reintroduction to pro hockey came in the form of an exhibition game between the Whalers and the Pittsburgh Penguins. Sept. 21 in Utica Memorial Auditorium. The game attracted 2,612 fans.Bill Higdon, of Utica, N.Y., begins his coverage of the Atlantic Coast Hockey League for THE HOCKEY NEWS, with this article.<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0030-02321/4412182-1-eng-US/f0030-022.jpg" title="f0030-02" width="604" height="898"><figcaption class="caption-body">Veteran minor league coach Moose Lallo will be in charge of the recruits of the Baltimore Skyjacks of the ACHL.</figcaption></div> &#9632;

f0030-01

ACHL Suggests Standby Franchises Monitor Loop For Future Expansion

<div class="image-hero"><img title="f0030-03" src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0030-03224/4412220-1-eng-US/f0030-032.jpg"></div> &#9632;

f0030-03

How The Selectors Picked The NHL Races

<div class="byline">BY MIKE BROPHY</div>LOUISVILLE HOCKEY STICKSLOUISVILLE HOCKEY STICKSCORNWALL&mdash;Can the Dale Hawerchuk-less Royals pull off the pure hat trick&mdash;that is win a third straight Memorial Cup?Of course only time will tell, but early indications are the Royals, who are in a sort of rebuilding stage, will challenge for supremacy in junior hockey once again this time based in a different league.After winning the Memorial Cup twice as the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League&rsquo;s representative, Cornwall is now a member of the Ontario Hockey League and will try for number three in a row.Despite having to replace the likes of Hawerchuk (&ldquo;you can&rsquo;t replace a guy like Hawerchuk,&rdquo; said Royals&rsquo; coach Bob Kilger), captain Mark Crawford (Vancouver), defensemen Fred Arthur (Philadelphia via Hartford) and Robert Savard (Detroit), the Royals managed to win six of their seven exhibition games. The victories also came without top stars Scott Arniel and defenseman Fred Boimis-truck, both away at professional training camps.Cornwall got off on the wrong foot, dropping a 13-2 decision to Hull but rebounded with six straight wins.&ldquo;We&rsquo;ve been really pleased with the kids in training camp,&rdquo; said Kilger. &ldquo;I think we have an abundance of new raw ability.&rdquo;All the raw ability in the world won&rsquo;t replace Hawerchuk, however, and Kilger knows that.&ldquo;There&rsquo;s no question that losing a player of Dale&rsquo;s ability is going to hurt,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;You just don&rsquo;t replace that type of player. Guys with his ability only come along every so often. We were just lucky to have him in Cornwall to help us win two Memorial Cups.&rdquo;What Kilger is banking on is that returnees like goalie Joe Mantione, center Doug Gilmor and defenseman Eric Calder can come into their own and lead the Royals. Kilger has also been very pleased with the play of 16-year-old second round draft choice Todd Sepkowski, a 6-1, 180-pound left winger drafted from the Sault Ste. Marie Legion midgets and first rounder Jim Kyte, a 6-3, 200-pound defenseman.&ldquo;Todd is a very intelligent hockey player,&rdquo; said Kilger. &ldquo;In comparison to the other minor midgets I&rsquo;ve seen in exhibition games, I&rsquo;d say he was as good if not better than the rest.&rdquo;Because of junior hockey&rsquo;s unpredictability Kilger feels the 1981-82 Royals have as much chance of repeating as Memorial Cup champions as anyone else, despite the loss of Hawerchuk.&ldquo;We have a team philosophy that guides us as far as the type of players we draft,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;Once we get them to training camp, we see the chemistry of players and mold our style from there.&ldquo;As for the change in leagues, I think there is a small difference in that the checking is a lot closer in the Ontario league. But the difference isn&rsquo;t as great as when I played. Back then, Quebec had a better skating league and Ontario was a grinder&rsquo;s league.&rdquo;NOTES: Following their 13-2 loss to Hull, Cornwall won the rematch 8-3, beat the Kingston Canadians 4-3 and 9-1, topped the Belleville Bulls (the other new OHL team) 6-4 and 3-1 and also defeated the Ottawa 67&rsquo;s 2-1&hellip;In other exhibition action, the London Knights, who are trying to forget last season&rsquo;s disaster, beat arch-rival Windsor Spitfires 9-1; Kingston pounded Ottawa 11-3 and the defending OHL champions Kitchener Rangers outscored the Knights 9-7. &#9632;

Cornwall Attempting Memorial Cup Hat Trick

NIAGARA FALLS&mdash;As predicted in this space last week&mdash;if Peterbrough Petes&rsquo; coach Dave Dryden wasn&rsquo;t the Ontario Hockey League coach most under the gun, then it probably was Paul Gauthier of the Niagara Falls Flyers.Was is the right description as Gauthier, who came to the Flyers last season, resigned his coaching duties with the club before the team had even completed their training camp.As expected, club vice president and general manager, Bert Templeton now has expanded his role with the club to include the coaching portfolio as well.Templeton is returning to junior hockey after two years as the coach of the Nova Scotia Voyageurs of the American League and rumors began almost immediately that Gauthier&rsquo;s status was shaky if the club got off to a slow start.Gauthier, apparently decided to leave before that situation had a chanee to occur.Last season, the Flyers had a strong first half and were in front in their division, but faded at the end of the season, winning only three of their last 19 games. They were subsequently eliminated in the second round of the playoffs by OHL champion Kitchener after getting past the Toronto Marlboros. &#9632;

Templeton Coach Again As Gauthier Quits Falls

<h2>SEPTEMBER</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0031-01378/4412355-1-eng-US/f0031-012.jpg" title="f0031-01" width="537" height="81"></div><h2>OCTOBER</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0031-02280/4412348-1-eng-US/f0031-022.jpg" title="f0031-02" width="589" height="1952"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0031-03209/4412341-1-eng-US/f0031-032.jpg" title="f0031-03" width="575" height="167"></div><h2>NOVEMBER</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0031-04159/4412334-1-eng-US/f0031-042.jpg" title="f0031-04" width="591" height="1872"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0031-05138/4412327-1-eng-US/f0031-052.jpg" title="f0031-05" width="580" height="461"></div><h2>DECEMBER</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0031-06111/4412320-1-eng-US/f0031-062.jpg" title="f0031-06" width="583" height="769"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0031-0797/4412313-1-eng-US/f0031-072.jpg" title="f0031-07" width="600" height="1292"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0031-0887/4412306-1-eng-US/f0031-082.jpg" title="f0031-08" width="578" height="96"></div><h2>JANUARY</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0031-0973/4412299-1-eng-US/f0031-092.jpg" title="f0031-09" width="584" height="1160"></div> &#9632;

f0031-01

Ontario Hockey League Schedule

<div class="byline">BY GREGG DRINAN</div>LOUISVILLE HOCKEY STICKSLOUISVILLE HOCKEY STICKSCALGARY&mdash;At the beginning of the 1981-82 Western Hockey League season, a number of clubs were active at the marketplace. And, perhaps surprisingly, some productive players were being shopped around.<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0032-01390/4412393-1-eng-US/f0032-012.jpg" title="f0032-01" width="592" height="876"><figcaption class="caption-body">Cam Sebastian joined his third WHL camp of the season when he wound up traded to Kamloops.</figcaption></div>Perhaps the biggest surprise, happened in Regina as the Pats dealt 18-year-old Todd Strubey, a left winger, to the Saskatoon Blades in exchange for 17-year-old Lyndon Byers, a right winger.Strueby, who started slowly last season and blossomed into an extremely effective winger come playoff time, was a second-round selection of the Edmonton Oilers in the National Hockey League&rsquo;s 1981 draft. Byers, meanwhile, spent last winter in Wilcox, Sask., playing for the Canadian midget champion Notre Dame Hounds. He stands 6-2 and tips the scales at 195 pounds. With the Hounds, Byers picked up 104 points, including 44 goals. At the same time. Strubey finished with 18 goals and 45 points in 71 games.It seems that Regina general manager Bob Strumm would like to reunite Byers with his Notre Dame linemates, center Dale Derkatch. the Most Valuable Player in the Air Canada midget tournament and left winger Gary Leeman, who was the 76th player picked in the Ontario Hockey League midget draft. Leeman was taken by the Niagara Falls Flyers.The Lethbridge Broncos, meanwhile acquired Ivan Krook, one of the league&rsquo;s most exciting players, from the Spokane Flyers. In return, the Broncos sent 18-year-old James McEwen, a first-year forward from Edmonton, to the Fivers.Krook, one of the WHL&rsquo;s speediest skaters, picked up 100 points for the Flyers last season as he scored 41 goals and set up 59 others.The acquisition of Krook by Lethbridge was really no surprise because the 19-year-old spent the 1979-80 season playing under Broncos&rsquo; coach John Chapman for the Alberta Junior League&rsquo;s Red Deer Rustlers, who went on to win the Centennial Cup.Meanwhile, the deal between the Calgary Wranglers and the Medicine Hat Tigers fell through, before leading to another trade between Kamloops and Saskatoon.It all started when the Wranglers dealt goaltender Cam Sebastian and forward Greg Dickie to the Tigers for 17-year-old center Rob Hamill, the Alberta Junior League&rsquo;s Rookie of the Year last season. The deal was conditional on Sebastian and Dickie making the Tigers&rsquo; roster, and that didn&rsquo;t happen.So. Sebastian and Dickie rejoined the Wranglers, but it wasn&rsquo;t long until the goaltender made his way to Kamloops.That started when Saskatoon acquired 19-year-old defenseman Darryl Stanley. 6-2 and 190 pounds, from Kamloops in exchange for 19-year-old right winger Ron Propp and Mike Spencer, an 18-year-old left winger.The Oilers then turned around and dealt Spencer to Calgary for Sebastian, rookie left winger Al Fenton and a player to be named later. Stanley had 34 points and 127 penalty minutes with the Bruins, while Propp&mdash;whom the Blades acquired from the Regina Pats just prior to last season&mdash;scored 30 goals and set up 43 others in Saskatoon.Spencer started last season with the Portland Winter Hawks and was dealt to Saskatoon for center Lome Boksho-wan before he ended up finishing the season with the Saskatchewan Junior League&rsquo;s Weyburn Red Wings.And Hamill eventually ended up back in Calgary, but it took an involved four-team multi-player deal to get him there.This one had Brandon acquiring 19-year-old defenseman Darryl Mulvenna from Calgary. The Wheat Kings, in turn, shipped rookie Darryl Lamb, an 18-year-old center to Medicine Hat and Kerry Poole, an 18-year-old first-year goaltender, to Regina.Medicine Hat then sent Hamill back to Calgary and the Wranglers shipped forward i8-year-old Bill Vince and two unnamed youngsters to the Tigers.Next, the Pats completed it all by sending three players&mdash;18-year-old defenseman Mike Dreger, 19-year-old forward Rob Proudfoot and 18-year-old right winger Colin Docherty&mdash;to Medicine Hat.<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0032-02297/4412386-1-eng-US/f0032-022.jpg" title="f0032-02" width="604" height="738"><figcaption class="caption-body">Defenseman Darryl Mulvenna wound up in Brandon in one of many deals by Calgary.</figcaption></div>Brandon got a hardnosed defenseman in Mulvenna. who totalled 198 panalty minutes with Calgary. At the same time, he scored one goal and added 16 assists.The Tigers picked up two players&mdash;Vince and Proudfoot&mdash;with some WHL experience. Last season, Vince dressed for 70 games for the Wranglers. scoring seven times and adding 13 assists. Proudfoot got into 48 games with the Pats, banging in eight goals and 14 points. &#9632;

f0032-01

WHL Clubs Show No Reluctance For Trades

<div class="byline">BY HERB ZURKOWSKY</div>LOUISVILLE HOCKEY STICKSLOUISVILLE HOCKEY STICKSMONTREAL&mdash;It&rsquo;s early in the season, so let&rsquo;s not get carried away over what has transpired in the Quebec Major Junior League&rsquo;s first weekend of play.But. Io and behold, the Montreal Juniors, not expected to exactly tear the league apart, are in first place with an unblemished 3-0 record, after defeating Quebec 4-2, Laval 4-3, and Granby 12-2.Granted, the latter three are not expected to be around come Memorial Cup time, but for a team which only placed seventh overall of 10 teams last year, a quick start is nothing to laugh at.The Juniors and Remparts kicked off the league&rsquo;s 13th season before only 1.299 fans at the Colisee. incredibly small considering a Hockey Showdown competition involving former Remparts now playing with the Nordiques. was held between periods.Eddy De Boer and Jean-Paul Lariviere gave Quebec a 2-0 lead by the four-minute mark of the second period, only to see the Juniors&rsquo; Marc Lemay. Marc Chamard and Benoit Lafleur beat goalie Roberto Romano before the period came to an end.Tony Fiore scored the Winning goal early in the final period, ruining the coaching debut of Normand Meunier.The next night the Juniors again overcame a two-goal deficit against the Voisins in Montreal&rsquo;s home opener before another small crowd&mdash;1,117.Claude Vilgrain and Jean-Marc Lanthier gave the visitors their cushion in the game&rsquo;s opening 13 minutes, before Denis Daze and Robert Dore tied matters at 2-2. still in the first.The teams exchanged scores in the second period&mdash;Francois Tremblay scoring for Montreal: Francois Legare for Laval&mdash;before Gaetan Malo scored the winner 8&frac12; minutes into the final period.Montreal goalie Jeff Barratt&mdash;as many times last year&mdash;kept his team in the game. Laval outshot the Juniors 31-23.Finally, against the Bisons&mdash;who were to be the Verdun Black Hawks after shifting operation from Sorel&mdash;the Montreal shooters went to town.Gaetan Malo led the Juniors with four goals, Tony Fiore and Mario Leblanc added a pair, with singles to Taras Zvtynsky. Alan Sommerville.Denis Daze, and Alain Tousignant. Serge Tessier and Jacques Sylvestre scored for the Bisons. not anticipated to be a major force in the league after losing nine players in a dispersal draft.The Juniors allowed seven goals in the three games, giving them the best average so far. That&rsquo;s not surprising; Montreal&rsquo;s defense was to be its strong suit this year.But the team has also scored 20 goals. Having lost Denis Cyr, Francois Lecompte and Constant Priondolo to graduation. Montreal is also missing 150 goals from last season.Hot on Montreal&rsquo;s tails are the Sherbrooke Beavers and Shawinigan Cataracts, both of whom should ice strong sides and both with 2-0 records.Sherbrooke outscored TroisRivieres 10-7 in the opener on home ice, bombing the Sagueneens 11-4 in Chicoutimi, where the latter rarely loses.Shawinigan topped the Hull Olympics 7-3 in the opener on home ice, defeating the Draveurs 5-3 at Trois-Rivieres.Richard Bourque and Mario Dore paced the Beavers with two goals. Singles went to Alain Gilbert. Luc Bachand. Daniel Campeau, Paul Boutilier. Dave Kasper, and Gerard Gallant. Claude Verret and Patrice Masse had two each for the Draveurs. with singles from Jean-Rerfe Tapia, Claude Gosselin and Mario Chouinard.Against the Sags. Mike Fafard and Daniel Campeau both scored a hat trick. Alain Menard added a pair.Sylvain Charland scored three goals and Alain Lavigne added a pair in the Cats&rsquo; win over Hull. Against the Draveurs, off to a surprising 0-2 start after reaching last season&rsquo;s finals, the team was paced by Rejean Vignola&rsquo;s three goals.Chicoutimi. 1-1, having edged Granby 3-2. has been led by Roberto Lavoie, who has two goals in as many games.Hull, also 1-1, had two goals from Sylvain Turgeon.Laval. 0-1, Granby and Quebec, both 0-2 in addition to Trois-Rivieres, bring up the rear.<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0033-01358/4412525-1-eng-US/f0033-012.jpg" title="f0033-01" width="612" height="890"><figcaption class="caption-body">Gaetan Malo had a big week for Montreal, with one game-winning goal plus four goals against Granby.</figcaption><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0033-02263/4412518-1-eng-US/f0033-022.jpg" title="f0033-02" width="598" height="732"><figcaption class="caption-body">Goaltender Jeff Barratt kept Montreal in the game, leading them to a 4-3 triumph over Laval.</figcaption></div>AROUND THE LEAGUE&mdash;Defenseman Daniel Naud, property of the Buffalo Sabres, has reported to the Bisons. after holding out throughout training camp&hellip;Rempart&rsquo;s goaltender Roberto Romano has been traded to Hull for goalie Daniel Sanscartier, another player who failed to report to training camp, defenseman Alan Bremner, formerly of Laval, and the old standby&mdash;future considerations. &#9632;

f0033-01

Montreal Off To Unexpected Start Winning Three Times In First Week

<h2>NATIONAL LEAGUE</h2>(Standings on Mon. Sept. 28)<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-01388/4412622-1-eng-US/f0034-012.jpg" title="f0034-01" width="548" height="642"></div><h2>EUROPEAN TOUR</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-02318/4412615-1-eng-US/f0034-022.jpg" title="f0034-02" width="554" height="134"></div><h2>GAMES COMPLETED</h2>Helsinki IFK 4, Rangers 1Chicago 4, Montreal 3Gothenberg VF 7. Washington 4Rangers 5. Djurgardens IF 1St. Louis 8, Calgary 5Montreal 4. Buffalo 2Boston 4. Philadelphia 4Vancouver 5. Dallas (CHL) 4Minnesota 2, Toronto 0Stockholm AIK 6. Washington 1Winnipeg 3. Vancouver 1Calgary 6. St. Louis 6Colorado 4. Los Angeles 2Edmonton 3, Detroit 3Philadelphia 3, Boston 2Minnesota 5. Quebec 4Toronto 3, Hartford 3Winnipeg 6. Vancouver 3Chicago 9, Islanders 2St. Louis 5. Calgary 4Buffalo 5. Boston 2Edmonton 8. Minnesota 5Quebec 5. Pittsburgh 3Rangers 4. Washington 1Los Angeles 3, Winnipeg 2Buffalo 9. Edmonton 3Islanders 7, Chicago 2Pittsburgh 9, Hartford 2Quebec 6. Detroit 2Montreal 6, Philadelphia 2Washington 5. Djurgardens IF 2Rangers 7, Vastra Frolunda 1Los Angeles 4. Vancouver 2Edmonton 5. St. Louis 3Calgary 5. Winnipeg 5Detroit 3. Quebec 1Philadelphia 5. Islanders 2Toronto 4, Montreal 3Boston 6. Hartford 1Rangers 4. Stockholm AIK 1Chicago 4. Minnesota 4Colorado 5. Calgary 3Detroit 5, Buffalo 1Quebec 5, Fredericton (AHL) 3Washington 5. Karpat 3Vancouver 3, Colorado 2Chicago 3, Minnesota 2Winnipeg 3, St. Louis 3Philadelphia 7. Montreal 6Calgary 6. Edmonton 4Boston 5. Islanders 3St. Louis 6. Winnipeg 4Los Angeles 9, Colorado 2Buffalo 6. Toronto 6Montreal 5. Minnesota 3Pittsburgh 11, Quebec 6Islanders 10. Boston 7Detroit 4, Hartford 4Minnesota 6. Quebec 1Islanders 2. Buffalo 1Chicago 6. Montreal 3Winnipeg 2. St. Louis 1Los Angeles 4. Vancouver 3Calgary 6. Edmonton 3Rangers 4, Philadelphia 2Pittsburgh 3. Washington 3 &#9632;

f0034-01

EXHIBITION SCOREBOARD

<div class="image-hero"><img title="f0034-03" src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-03231/4412660-1-eng-US/f0034-032.jpg"></div><h2>SEPTEMBER</h2><h2>OCTOBER</h2><div class="figure-block image-bleed"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-04147/4412653-1-eng-US/f0034-042.jpg" title="f0034-04" width="1234" height="736"></div> &#9632;

f0034-03

Exhibition Schedule

<h2>ONTARIO HOCKEY LEAGUE</h2>(Standings on Tue. Sept. 29)<h3>Emms Division</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-05106/4412726-1-eng-US/f0034-052.jpg" title="f0034-05" width="535" height="228"></div><h3>Leyden Division</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-0680/4412719-1-eng-US/f0034-062.jpg" title="f0034-06" width="540" height="226"></div><h3>GAMES COMPLETED</h3>Wed. Sept. 23Kingston 7 at Belleville 12Thu. Sept. 24Brantford 2 at Peterborough 4S.S. Marie 6 at Windsor 1Niagara Falls 2 at Cornwall 7Fri. Sept. 25S.S. Marie 4 at Kitchener 6Oshawa 5 at London 10Cornwall 2 at Kingston 4Peterborough 6 at Brantford 4Sat. Sept. 26Niagara Falls 5 at Sudbury 3Ottawa 3 at Belleville 4Sun. Sept. 27Peterborough 3 at Windsor 8Niagara Falls 2 at S.S. Marie 5Ottawa 3 at Oshawa 4Sudbury 4 at Kitchener 6Toronto 1 at Brantford 0Kingston 4 at Cornwall 9<h2>WESTERN HOCKEY LEAGUE</h2>(Standings on Tue. Sept. 29)<h3>EASTERN DIVISION</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-0771/4412712-1-eng-US/f0034-072.jpg" title="f0034-07" width="538" height="249"></div><h3>WESTERN DIVISION</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-0864/4412705-1-eng-US/f0034-082.jpg" title="f0034-08" width="548" height="167"></div><h3>GAMES COMPLETED</h3>Fri. Sept. 25Lethbridge 0 at Regina 3Calgary 2 at Billings 4Sat. Sept. 26Lethbridge 5 at Medicine Hat 6Calgary 5 at Billings 4Sun. Sept. 27Brandon 6 at SaskatoonMedicine Hat 1 at Lethbridge 8<h2>QUEBEC HOCKEY LEAGUE</h2>(Standings on Mon. Sept. 28)<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-0954/4412698-1-eng-US/f0034-092.jpg" title="f0034-09" width="536" height="285"></div><h3>GAMES COMPLETED</h3>Thu. Sept. 24Montreal 4 at Quebec 2Fri. Sept. 25Granby 2 at Chicoutimi 3Laval 3 at Montreal 4Hull 3 at Shawinigan 7T-Rivieres 7 at Sherbrooke 10Sun. Sept. 27Sherbrooke 11 at Chicoutimi 4Quebec 3 at Hull 5Granby 2 at Montreal 12Shawinigan 5 at T-Rivieres 3<h3>LEADING SCORERS</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-1052/4412691-1-eng-US/f0034-102.jpg" title="f0034-10" width="539" height="253"></div> &#9632;

f0034-05

AMATEUR SCOREBOARD

<h2>NATIONAL LEAGUE</h2><h3>OCTOBER</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-1147/4412862-1-eng-US/f0034-112.jpg" title="f0034-11" width="580" height="1468"></div><h3>NOVEMBER</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-1245/4412855-1-eng-US/f0034-122.jpg" title="f0034-12" width="582" height="1468"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-1338/4412848-1-eng-US/f0034-132.jpg" title="f0034-13" width="592" height="1554"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-1435/4412841-1-eng-US/f0034-142.jpg" title="f0034-14" width="592" height="1561"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-1534/4412834-1-eng-US/f0034-152.jpg" title="f0034-15" width="562" height="985"></div><h2>AMERICAN LEAGUE</h2><h3>OCTOBER</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-1634/4412827-1-eng-US/f0034-162.jpg" title="f0034-16" width="565" height="357"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0037-01304/4412820-1-eng-US/f0037-012.jpg" title="f0037-01" width="598" height="1112"></div><h3>NOVEMBER</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0037-02209/4412813-1-eng-US/f0037-022.jpg" title="f0037-02" width="576" height="360"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0037-03151/4412806-1-eng-US/f0037-032.jpg" title="f0037-03" width="586" height="1456"></div><h3>DECEMBER</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0037-04120/4412799-1-eng-US/f0037-042.jpg" title="f0037-04" width="582" height="140"></div><h2>CENTRAL LEAGUE</h2><h3>OCTOBER</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0037-0599/4412792-1-eng-US/f0037-052.jpg" title="f0037-05" width="576" height="1074"></div><h3>NOVEMBER</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0037-0679/4412785-1-eng-US/f0037-062.jpg" title="f0037-06" width="558" height="384"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0037-0761/4412778-1-eng-US/f0037-072.jpg" title="f0037-07" width="582" height="786"></div><h2>INTERNATIONAL LEAGUE</h2><h3>OCTOBER</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0037-0854/4412771-1-eng-US/f0037-082.jpg" title="f0037-08" width="580" height="640"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0037-0945/4412764-1-eng-US/f0037-092.jpg" title="f0037-09" width="556" height="334"></div><h3>NOVEMBER</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0037-1039/4412757-1-eng-US/f0037-102.jpg" title="f0037-10" width="568" height="1236"></div> &#9632;

f0034-11

PRO HOCKEY GAMES TO COME

<div class="image-hero"><img title="f0035-01" src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0035-01367/4412893-1-eng-US/f0035-012.jpg"></div> &#9632;

f0035-01

STARTING NHL TEAM ROSTERS

<div class="image-hero"><img title="f0037-11" src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0037-1128/4412969-1-eng-US/f0037-112.jpg"></div>&ldquo;Where readers get together to do businessRINK EQUIPMENTPERSONALSFAN CLUBSOPPORTUNITIESPOSITIONS WANTEDPLAYER EQUIPMENT<h2>POSITIONS WANTED</h2>AVAILABLE: Radio station sports&rsquo; director desires position as PBP announcer. Willing to assume PR duties for minor league or junior team. Will relocate. Contact The Hockey News, Box 35,214 King Street West, Suite 314, Toronto, Ont., M5H 1K4.<h2>OPPORTUNITIES</h2>HOCKEY PLAYERS WANTED: The Grand Rapids, Ml. entry in the Continental Hockey League is looking for players. Call Jack or Norm at (616) 949-9451.JUNIOR HOCKEY TEAMS WANTED: Fifth annual CAN/AM Invitational Junior hockey tournament, Leamington, Ontario, Dec. 26-30 1981. Openings available for teams in this prestigious international hockey tournament. Open to all OHA Jr. C teams and Jr. teams from other provinces and the United States. For further information contact:Bob Johnson, 154 Erie Street North Leamington, Ont. Canada (519) 326-5749TOURNAMENT: Major Atoms, Peewees, Bantams November 26, 27, 28, 29 North Bay, Ontario. Deadline, Oct.15th. For more information, call: (705) 472-7997, or write: AAA Tournament, Box 1501 North Bay, Ont. P1A 3P5.<h2>PERSONALS</h2>FAN CLUB: The Anders Kallur Fan Club is accepting members for the 1981-82 season. For more information, send a self-addressed stamped envelope to: Anders Kallur Fan Club, P.O. Box 492, Cedarhurst, NY 11516. TODAY!!WANTED: Pictures of New York Ranger players from 1973 to present. Also want pictures of yearbooks of now defunct Rhode Island Reds from 1970 to 1977. Posed or action pictures. Please inclose price lists. Write to: Maryann Lancia, 217 Bretton Woods Dr, Cranston, Rl 02920.WANTED: Hockey pen pal. I love NHL history, trivia; I follow the Bruins. Please write: Michaela Charron, 56 Wilder Ave., Hoosick Falls, NY. 12090.WOMEN&rsquo;S COLLEGE ICE HOCKEY NEWSLETTER: 20 issues per year $10.00 (U.S.) everything on U.S. and Canadian women&rsquo;s hockey and then some. Send cheque or money order to: WCIHA, Circulation department, 5 Warwick Road, Belmont, MA. 02178.SPORTS COLLECTION: Start your very own. Great for all ages. Learn how to get black and white-color photos of your favorite athletes, team souvenirs, media guides, sports magazines, etc. Collectors paying top money for collections. Send $5.00 for booklet to: Empire Sports, North York Sheridan Mall, 1700 Wilson Avenue, Suite 201, Downs view, Ont. M3L 1B2.<h2>RINK EQUIPMENT</h2>WANTED: WHA authentic game worn jerseys. Also WHA programs, media guides, pictures. Send list of items and prices to: Jeff Humphries, 6780 Friars Road, #257, San Diego, CA. 92108.<h2>EQUIPMENT</h2>SKATE SALE: Bauer Supreme (sizes 6, 6&frac12;, -7, 7&frac12;, 9&frac12;) price $99.00. Bauer Special Pro: (sizes 6, 6&frac12;, 7). price $60.00. Bauer Jnr. Black Panther (sizes 1-5&frac12;) $45.00. Micron M1 (size 3&frac12; 4) $39.00. All the above with clear Tuuk blades. Micron M1 (size 3&frac12; and 4) with steel blades. $9.99. We ship anywhere. Contact Reliable Hockey Service, 73 Bloomfield Street, Springfield, MA. 01108. Telephone (413) 736-6188. &#9632;

f0037-11

CLASSIFIED

<div class="image-hero"><img title="f0038-01" src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0038-01361/4413021-1-eng-US/f0038-012.jpg"></div><div class="figure-block image-bleed"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0038-02286/4413014-1-eng-US/f0038-022.jpg" title="f0038-02" width="1814" height="1454"><figcaption class="caption-body">(Photo by Jerry Hobbs)</figcaption></div><h2>Take Off With Tammy</h2>Saturday, Oct. 17 will be a very special day for the Easter Seal Society and its 1981 Tammy, 13-year-old Nancy Kralovic of Toronto, shown at left with Maple Leafs&rsquo; owner Harold Ballard. The day will feature six 45-minute CP Air flights from Toronto&rsquo;s International Airport over the Niagara Peninsula with an expected 1,400 slated to participate. Proceeds will be presented to the Eastern Seal Society. At a dinner announcing plans for the project, above, Nancy sat down with Whipper Billy Watson, left, a staunch Easter Seals&rsquo; supporter, and chairman Glenn Hunnings, right, vice-president of CP Air&rsquo;s public relations department and Maple Leaf players Laurie Boschman, back left, and Borje Salming.<div class="figure-block image-bleed"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0038-03215/4413007-1-eng-US/f0038-032.jpg" title="f0038-03" width="1516" height="1550"><figcaption class="caption-body">(Photo by Bruce Bennett)</figcaption></div><h2>Cracking A Few Heads</h2>When Montreal Canadiens oldtime scoring great Aurel Joliat was called on to drop the first puck during the recent Canada Cup game in Ottawa between the Soviets and the Czechs, Joliat took matters into his own hands and attempted to crack the heads of Valery Vasiliev of the Soviet Union, left, and Czechoslovakia&rsquo;s Milan Novy, at center ice. He didn&rsquo;t succeed but the crowd went crazy over Joliat&rsquo;s antics.<div class="figure-block image-bleed"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0038-04151/4413000-1-eng-US/f0038-042.jpg" title="f0038-04" width="1508" height="1554"></div><h2>Welcoming Committee</h2>Bobby Clarke, the veteran center and assistant coach of the Philadelphia Flyers, was on hand to greet the team&rsquo;s No. 1 draft pick, Steve Smith, right, a defenseman who played last season with the Sault Ste. Marie Greyhounds in the Ontario Hockey League. The Flyers are predicting a bright NHL future for Smith, who could possibly open the 1981-82 season with the Flyers. &#9632;

f0038-01

HOCKEY PEOPLE

<div class="byline">BY DICK JOHNSTON</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0039-01339/4413052-1-eng-US/f0039-012.jpg" title="f0039-01" width="590" height="1624"><figcaption class="caption-body">Sabres&rsquo; goalie Bob Sauve, never having attained No. 1 status, is playing out his option.</figcaption></div>BUFFALO&mdash;The Sabres have a tradition of good goaltending.There was Roger Crozier, the man who kept the scores respectable in the early years. And Joe Daley, who proved he could step in to relieve Crozier.Dave Dryden, the third-stringer behind Crozier and Daley the Sabres&rsquo; first year, 1970-71, eventually came along well enough to play in the National Hockey League All Star game.That game was a great moment for Dave, now coaching Peterborough in the Ontario Hockey League, because he was the unheralded older brother of hockey&rsquo;s best-known and most-quoted goaltender of the time, Ken Dryden of the Montreal Canadiens.Some Buffalo fans remember that a trip to Buffalo was instrumental in Dave Dryden&rsquo;s becoming a pro hockey player. Dave, then a schoolteacher in Toronto, and playing senior hockey, was one of 10 men called upon to fill in when the old Buffalo Bisons of the American Hockey League were having goal tending problems one year. He did so well that the Chicago Black Hawks, then the Bisons&rsquo; parent club, offered him a contract.Another of those 10-fiIl-ins, incidentally, was Roger Crozier, then a 17-year-old junior netminder.Later in the Sabres&rsquo; net parade came Gary Bromley, noted as the fellow who was the winningest goaltender in theJeague one season but did not play a minute in the Stanley Cup playoffs. That was because Gerry Desjardins was wooed out of the World Hockey Association by Buffalo and took over in the nets.There were a couple of merry backups, too, Al Smith and Rocky Farr, who, you might say, followed the beat of a different drummer.Eight goaltenders were in camp when the netminders of the present, Bob Sauve and Don Edwards, reported in 1975. Sauve was the Sabres&rsquo; first draft choice that year and Edwards was picked sixth.It was Edwards&rsquo; good fortune to receive first call when Desjardins suffered an eye injury in February, 1976. Don moved in and has been top man since.Sauve has divided time with Edwards the last three seasons but never has he played as many games as Don.And that&rsquo;s why Sauve, feels it&rsquo;s time to move on. He has said is playing out his option in 1981-82. His contract ran out after last season and he did not sign the new pact the Sabres presented to him.He will be a free agent at the end of the upcoming season.Bob says it isn&rsquo;t the money and &ldquo;I like the team and I like Buffalo but I&rsquo;m 26 years old and&hellip;&rdquo;And he figures it&rsquo;s time to become No. 1 for some NHL club, as he could be. Bob wants to play a lot more games than the 35 of last season.Edwards wants to work more than the 45 he was in. Don has said he would like &ldquo;to play &lsquo;em all.&rsquo;&rsquo;Sauve has divided time with Edwards the last three seasons but never has he played as many games as Don.Because there appears to be another pair of topflight netminders in the wings, Sauve might go sooner than the end of this season.Jacques Cloutier was the Sabres&rsquo; fourth draft pick in 1979. Rick Knickle was seventh and last. Both look like future NHLers from their performances to date.They both did well while the Sabres were training in Lake Placid. They divided the netminding job in an 8-2 exhibition win over Edmonton before the home folks in Buffalo. Cloutier has played well in other exhibition games, dividing time with Sauve.Knickle, according to assistant coach Nick Polano, was a major part of Erie&rsquo;s winning the Eastern Hockey League championship last season. Polano was coach and general manager of Erie through three straight championship years.&ldquo;Pressure never seems to bother Knickle,&rdquo; Polano mentioned.Maybe if Cloutier or Knickle does real well at Buffalo&rsquo;s Rochester farm club, where they are ticketed to go, general manager and coach Scotty Bowman will decide to trade Sauve. Better to work out what you will get for a player in a trade than to wait and see what the compensation is when he signs with another club after becoming a free agent. &#9632;

f0039-01

Goaltending Continues As Sabres’ Deep Spot

<div class="byline">BY TOM BURKE</div><div class="image-hero"><img title="C0004-01" src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/c0004-01142/4413083-1-eng-US/c0004-012.jpg"><figcaption class="caption-body">Teams like Harvard University will confine themselves to bigger Ivy League schedules to trim travel costs and will rarely play outside their conference. (Photo by Steve Babineau)</figcaption></div>BOSTON&mdash;The balanced schedule. It was fun&mdash;and fair&mdash;while it lasted.Eastern college hockey has succumbed to the national trend towards geographic contraction in the name of economy. Following the 1981-82 season, the 17-team ECAC Division One will no longer comprise three divisions wherein everyone plays every divisional foe twice and every other league member at least once.Instead the six-team Ivy League has gone its own way and forced a realignment. The Ivy Schools&mdash;Brown, Dartmouth, Harvard, Cornell, Yale, and Princeton&mdash;will schedule three games with one another, making up a total of 15 games. The rest will be played mostly with Division One teams located near the respective Ivy Schools.The move, by fiat of the members of the nation&rsquo;s most exclusive club, the Ivy League presidents, was ostensibly made to save travel costs. It forces the 11 other major hockey schools to reshuffle their own schedules, and will cause a revamping of the playoff structure.The six members of the ECAC East&mdash;Boston College, Boston University, Maine, New Hampshire, Providence, and Northeastern&mdash;will schedule home-and-home series with one another and with the five members of the ECAC West&mdash;RPI, Vermont, Clarkson, Colgate, and St. Lawrence. That will account for a 20-game schedule, with the balance of the contests to be against Ivy opposition.There will again be an eight-team playoff tournament, but with some new twists. The top four teams will have home ice for the quarter-final round, which will be a two-game, total goals series on the first Friday and Saturday of March.The regular season champion of each division will get a home ice berth, based on the results against members of its own division. Thus, the first and second seeds comprise one member from ECAC East and one member from ECAC West. The third seed will be that member of those two divisions with the next best winning percentage based on the 20-game formula.The Ivy winner will be seeded fourth. No other Ivy League team will make the tournament, despite Ivy insistence that the league be allowed at least two slots.Beyond the total goals series quarterfinal, the semis and finals will revert to a single elimination Friday-Saturday affair at Boston Garden.<h2>NCAA Site Set</h2>Meanwhile, the ECAC playoffs will get under way March 19 with a winner ready for the 1982 NCAA playdowns, which will be staged in the Providence, RL, CivicCenter, March26 to 28, involving the ECAC, WCHA and CCHA champions in a four-day knockout competition.With the three big Michigan universities. Michigan State, Michigan Tech and Michigan, along with Notre Dame, moving from the WCHA to theCCHA this season, the spotlight will be on the Central College Hockey Association, a relatively new hockey conference that has been knocking on the door in recent years while competing in the national championship tournament.Last year&rsquo;s NCAA titleholder, Wisconsin, will remain in the WCHA. which this season will be reduced.to six teams while the CCHA will swell its ranks to 11 teams. &#9632;

Search for your favorite player or team

October 9, 1981

PLAYER OF THE WEEK

Retired Players: Is There Life After Hockey?

Western Hockey League Schedule

Quebec League Schedule