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.

January 17, 1986

The Hockey News January 17, 1986

<div class="byline">BY VARTAN KUPELIAN</div><h2>DETROIT RED WINGS</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0009-011407/5776528-1-eng-US/f0009-012.jpg" title="f0009-01" width="584" height="172"></div>DETROIT&mdash;Eight months after ending his illustrious 17-year playing career. Brad Park returned to the Detroit Red Wings as their coach and director of player personnel.In the dual roles, Park is in complete control of the Wings&rsquo; fortunes.Park, 37, replaced Harry Neale as coach after a disastrous December slump (nine straight losses) left the Wings with only eight victories in 35 games.&ldquo;Brad&rsquo;s got the owner&rsquo;s ear and a free rein,&rdquo; said Jim Lites, executive vicepresident of the Red Wings.In the front-office shuffle, Jimmy Devellano, general manager the past four seasons, was elevated to vice-president. He&rsquo;ll also keep the title of general manager and had his contract extended through the 1987-88 season. However, there&rsquo;s no mistaking the pecking order in the Wings&rsquo; hierarchy. Park is in charge and he answers only to owner Mike Hitch.&ldquo;Brad Park is in total control of our hockey team, on and off the ice, I want that pointed out very, very clearly,&rdquo; De-vellano himself said.Park said the Wings would &ldquo;do things differently&rdquo; under his direction.&ldquo;Were going to play a more intelligent game of hockey and pick up the tempo and speed with which we make decisions on the ice.&rdquo; said Park, a seventime all-star on defense during his career with the New York Rangers, Boston and Detroit.&ldquo;I don&rsquo;t think the Red Wings are as good as the top four or five clubs in the league, but I think they&rsquo;re as good as the next 16.&rdquo;Devellano said he probably would have hired Park last summer, instead of Neale, had circumstances been different.&ldquo;Certainly, I think he&rsquo;s an excellent choice, based on the fact he&rsquo;s been here, he knows the team, he knows me, he knows Mr. Hitch,&rdquo; Devellano said.&ldquo;He came in here (as a player two years ago) and stabilized our team. He&rsquo;s Fan intelligent guy.&rdquo;Hitch said, &ldquo;I think I&rsquo;II see results in the area of Brad accomplishing what he wants. He&rsquo;s the type that lays it out, whereas I find in the NHL you&rsquo;ve got a lot of people who don&rsquo;t talk too much either way. Brad puts himself on the line.&rdquo;Neale, 48, traced his downfall to the five college free agents signed by the Wings during the summer. He wasn&rsquo;t blaming them, just making an observation.&ldquo;If I had to do anything over again, I would have started all those college kids in Adirondack,&rdquo; Neale said.&ldquo;We tried too hard, wished too hard for them to make the team and we slowly found out they couldn&rsquo;t. By the time we found that out, we were behind the eight ball and whether we think it&rsquo;s the way things should be or not, we didn&rsquo;t have the best players in the organization here.&ldquo;It&rsquo;s easy to get excited about your first-round draft picks or your free agents and we all do. I think&hellip;it hurt our team. It really hurt the chemistry, the attitude. I can&rsquo;t say that&rsquo;s the reason we didn&rsquo;t win as often as we should, but as I look back, that contributed heavily to the slow start. And it certainly didn&rsquo;t help us to start the season without Greg Stefan.&rdquo;Neale signed a two-year contract as the Wings&rsquo; coach last June.&ldquo;You&rsquo;re always mildly surprised but it wasn&rsquo;t a shock,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;You can&rsquo;t lose as often as we did this year and expect them not to do something. Changing the coach, in pro sports, is a habit.&ldquo;To tell you the truth, (the team) is better than they&rsquo;ve played for 35 games but not as much better as most people think.&rdquo;The players, like everyone else, expected a change.&ldquo;Parkie will make a good coach,&rdquo; Steve Yzerman said. &ldquo;But like he said, he can only help us. He can&rsquo;t do it for us.&rdquo;Park is taking it slowly with the Wings, at least for a few weeks.&ldquo;The things I want to do, if we do them well, we will be a better hockey club in three weeks,&rdquo; Park said. &ldquo;You don&rsquo;t just say, okay, you guys are going to be winners. You don&rsquo;t get anything in this league automatically. We have to go out and earn it. What I have to look for, in the next week or two, is assessing and making some quick decisions.&ldquo;One thing I lack right now is coaching experience. I&rsquo;m going to make mistakes.&ldquo;I told them, &lsquo;I&rsquo;m going to learn from my mistakes and so are you. We&rsquo;re going to learn together. I can&rsquo;t do it alone. I&rsquo;m going to need you to go out and do the physical work and I&rsquo;m going to be the mental giant or the mental midget, whatever you want.&rsquo; I&rsquo;m going to make mistakes, they&rsquo;re going to make mistakes but we&rsquo;re not going to make the same mistakes twice.&rdquo;Park retired at the end of last season to the telecast booth as a color commentary for ESPN and CTV. In addition, he owns two pizza stores in the Boston area, perks of the two-year playing contract he signed as a free agent with the Red Wings on Aug. 9, 1983.But the lure to return to the game, plus the Wings&rsquo; attractive offer of complete authority, made the decision easy.&ldquo;We&rsquo;re going to play an intelligent game of hockey,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;If you do the little things right, you&rsquo;re not going to run into big problems. As I told the players. I&rsquo;m going to notice the little things in the other team&rsquo;s end and at center ice that lead to big problems in our end.&ldquo;Any team in the NHL is willing to make changes. We&rsquo;re going to sit down and try to make the right changes. When you&rsquo;re in last place, you&rsquo;re not dealing from strength and it&rsquo;s not easy,&rdquo; he continued.&ldquo;People who are in first place deal from strength. You can ask Glen Sather you can ask Sam Pollock.&ldquo;We&rsquo;ll make changes if we think they are necessary. Right now, I don&rsquo;t have an entire grasp of the situation. I&rsquo;m not willing to give a yes or a no vote on any player changes until I have had a chance to sit down and see this team play a few games.&rdquo; &#9632;

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IN THIS ISSUE

Park Given A ‘Free Rein’ Over Red Wings

<div class="byline">BY JOHN HERBERT</div>Louisville HockeyLouisville HockeyLONDON&mdash;Kelly Cain of the London Knights and other little men around the Ontario Hockey League are proving again this season it&rsquo;s a small world after all.The 17-year-old Cain, now in his second season with the Knights, who made him a third-round minor-midget pick a year ago, is headed for a 50-goal and 100-point season.After 33 games, Cain had 30 goals and 27 assists for 57 points&mdash;good enough for fifth place in league scoring.Not bad totals for a 5-foot-8, 178-pound player who produced eight goals and 17 assists all last season as a rookie. It has become a tradition in London down through their 20 years without a major junior A championship for a little guy to be the big wheel. Scott Morrison. Brian Bradley, Dennis Maruk, Frank Nigro, Wayne Thompson and Dino Ciccarelli are some of the very talented little guys who have graduated from the London program.As a matter of fact, they dominate the club&rsquo;s record book.Ciccarelli&rsquo;s club record of 72 goals still stands while Maruk&rsquo;s three-year career mark of 370 points stood up until last season when Bradley&rsquo;s four-year point total reached 373.Some of the other big little men in the OHL?You won&rsquo;t find many smaller or better than Mario Chitaroni of the Sudbury Wolves, who is listed at 5-foot-7 and 172 pounds. Keith Gretzky, Brian Verbeek, Kingston goalie Chris Clifford, London goalie Scott Cumming, Guelph center Guy Larose, and Hamilton fire hydrant Guy Girouard are other big little guys who come to mind.With players such as Doug Jarvis, Ken Linseman, Dale Hunter, Maruk and Ciccarelli in the NHL&mdash;there&rsquo;s obviously room for the non-giants. A quick glance at the Soviet Red Army team which toured the NHL cities and even the casual observer will note their stars Vladimir Krutov and Sergei Makarov not only skate like the wind but are little guys.Cain is up for draft this year and his coach, Don Boyd, sees absolutely no reason why he shouldn&rsquo;t be chosen by an NHL club.&ldquo;Kelly&rsquo;s the type of player who has been able to contribute in every league he&rsquo;s played in,&rdquo; the London mentor said. &ldquo;Last year he gained a lot of respect in the league because he comes to play every night.&rdquo;With two more years of junior eligibilty after the 1985-86 season, Cain should be a threat for the league scoring title.&ldquo;He has that capability,&rdquo; Boyd said, &ldquo;but I can also see him as a professional hockey player if you look past his physical status&hellip;I&rsquo;ve coached some big and little people in hockey and he&rsquo;s got his heart into it.&ldquo;You need your sprinters and you need your long-distance people. He puts a lot of ice time in for us and I don&rsquo;t think he&rsquo;s one of those little players who will disappear in the rugged going, especially in the playoffs.&ldquo;A lot of scouts have talked to me about Kelly and about his potential. For them it&rsquo;s wait and see how he stands up in the rigors of a big man&rsquo;s game. I think he will be drafted. I think they see him as a more complete player then a flash in pan little guy who scores goals in junior who won&rsquo;t be able to at a higher level.&rdquo;OHL HAPPENINGS&mdash;Ottawa fans got a rare treat from coach Bob Ellett after the 67&rsquo;s lost a 6-3 decision to Cornwall Royals on Dec. 29, which left the clubs tied for last place in the Leyden Division. Upset his club didn&rsquo;t skate hard enough. Ellett took matters into is own hands. As his players left the ice, Ellett sent them back out for stops and starts in front of the crowd&hellip;Cornwall has made yet another move sending Jamie Nadjiwan, acquired earlier from Sudbury, to Hamilton for cash. In a separate deal, the Royals obtained Hamilton defenseman Shayne Doyle for Brad Hyatt and Brent Thompson. Doyle started the season in Belleville&hellip;In another deal, Oshawa complied with a request by defenseman Mark Haarmann and sent him to the Sault for a draft pick. &#9632;

It’s A Small World For OHL’s Little Players

<div class="byline">BY BOB FACHET</div><h2>WASHINGTON CAPITALS</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0027-01683/5777489-1-eng-US/f0027-012.jpg" title="f0027-01" width="592" height="156"></div>LANDOVER&mdash;Just as the Washington Capitals were challenging the Philadelphia Flyers for first place in the Patrick Division, Washington&rsquo;s Al Jensen was nipping on the heels of Flyer Bob Froese in the race for No. 1 goaltender in the National Hockey League.Jensen stopped 30 shots by the New York Rangers to earn his first shutout of ^he season and lower his goals-against work to 2.84. It was his 15th victory and boosted his save percentage to.905. Like his goals against, that ranked second only to Froese.It appeared that Jensen had regained completely his form of two seasons ago, when he led the NHL and was elected the starting goalie for the Prince of Wales Conference in the All-Star Game, only to suffer a back injury that forced him out of action.Most of last year was spent fighting back and knee injuries. At one point, 0hen the knee problem threatened his career, Jensen told a reporter, &ldquo;I just feel like going out there and hanging myself on the nearest tree.&rdquo;Coach Bryan Murray was skeptical, too, and said at about the same time, &ldquo;Al Jensen may be done.&rdquo; But an arthroscopic examination revealed an abnormally thick fibrous band on the left knee and it was eased surgically in time for Jensen to play brilliantly in a double-overtime playoff triumph over the New York Islanders.Jensen has been outstanding since the first day of training camp this season. In fact, he could be even better than before.Asked whether he thought he was back to his past form, Jensen said, &ldquo;It&rsquo;s hard to judge, but I feel good and with the experience I&rsquo;ve had and the way I watch other goaltenders, I&rsquo;m learning more. Maybe it&rsquo;s all coming together.&ldquo;I have been successful this year, but that&rsquo;s because of the style of the team. My teammates give me confidence the way they clear the puck in front of me and let me see the shots. You have to have confidence to be a goaltender.&ldquo;I was so frustrated last year. Nobody likes to get injured and when nobody could seem to tell me what was wrong. I got upset. But I&rsquo;ve tried to put that behind me and build on yesterday. Hopefully, nothing like that will ever happen to me again.&rdquo;Jensen consistently credits his teammates for any success he achieves. But if he truly thinks they had allowed him to see the shots this season, the fact remains that he had seen a lot of them.Four times Washington had faced more than 36 shots in a game. Each time, jensen was in the nets and on each occasion he was a winner.Undoubtedly, his best effort came in a 5-2 triumph at Edmonton, when he made 38 saves.Jensen stopped Wayne Gretzky nine times in the first two periods and at one point, when he was bumped by one of the Oilers, Edmonton public relations director Bill Tuele laughed and said, &ldquo;That&rsquo;s the way to get him out of there. Make them put a human being in goal.&rdquo;Jensen stopped 39 shots in a 4-1 victory at Pittsburgh and afterward Murray said, &ldquo;Al was just unbelievable. He won a game for us tonight that in every other way we deserved to lose.&rdquo;Jensen also blocked 39 shots in a 4-2 triumph at Chicago and stopped 36 in a 7-5 success at Quebec, when the Nordiques&rsquo; 41-shot total was the highest against Washington in 14 months.&ldquo;Al has played extremely well and I think he&rsquo;s back at the same level he was two years ago, when he was the best in the league and got hurt,&rdquo; Murray said. &ldquo;He&rsquo;s giving us the kind of goaltending we need to win in the playoffs, the thing that&rsquo;s been lacking the last three years when Billy Smith did the job for the Islanders.&rdquo;Murray feels that a key to Jensen&rsquo;s fine work has been a more relaxed attitude. Much of the credit for that situation must go to Pete Peeters, who has gone out of his way to be friendly with Jensen since he was acquired from Boston in the Nov. 14 trade for Pat Riggin.&ldquo;Pete&rsquo;s been great,&rdquo; Murray said. &ldquo;He&rsquo;s always giving Al a pat on the back. Al is much looser and he&rsquo;s had some pressure taken off him, not because he won&rsquo;t be challenged for the No. 1 spot, but because he and Pete communicate so well and there&rsquo;s a good feeling between them.&ldquo;Al and Pat Riggin both wanted to be No. 1 and it was an adversary situation. The goaltenders are approaching it differently now, with obviously very different results.&rdquo;Although Jensen will not say a bad word about Riggin or anyone else, he does not hesitate to say nice things about Peeters.&ldquo;It helps me having Pete here,&rdquo; Jensen said. &ldquo;Pete&rsquo;s easy to get along with and we give each other support. He&rsquo;s a quality goaltender and by watching him I can learn a few things, too.&rdquo;After Jensen&rsquo;s performance in Edmonton. Peeters told a reporter, &ldquo;They&rsquo;re waiting outside to arrest Al. They call that being a thief.&rdquo;NOTES&mdash;The Washington hockey community was hit hard by two deaths&mdash;Dan McCoubrey, sports copy editor for The Washington Post, who had enthusiastically followed the sport for 25 years, and Don Connor, highly-respected coordinator of office officials at Capital Centre. &#9632;

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Goalie Jensen Better Than Ever For Caps

<div class="image-hero"><img title="f0038-01" src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0038-01633/5778374-1-eng-US/f0038-012.jpg"></div><div class="figure-block image-bleed"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0039-01596/5778367-1-eng-US/f0039-012.jpg" title="f0039-01" width="3100" height="3806"></div> &#9632;

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THN STATISTICS NHL SCORING

<div class="image-hero"><img title="Cover-01" src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/cover-01859/5778837-1-eng-US/cover-012.jpg"><figcaption class="caption-body">(Illustration by Rob MacDougall)</figcaption></div>Putting Soviets&rsquo; World Jr. Title In Perspective/5<h2>INSIDE:</h2>&bull; Park Has Wing And Prayer In Detroit/9&bull; Leafs Spirit Out A Czech Defector/20 &#9632;

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A NEW YEAR’S FORECAST…

In next week&rsquo;s Jan. 24th issue of THE HOCKEY NEWS, we&rsquo;ll profile one of the National Hockey League&rsquo;s truly unsung heroes&mdash;Mark Howe of the Philadelphia Flyers.While much of the hockey world debates the respective merits of Paul Coffey, Raymond Bourque and Rod Langway at Norris Trophy voting time, Gordie&rsquo;s eldest boy just quietly goes about his business of being the Flyers&rsquo; defensive cornerstone.In addition to that, we&rsquo;ll present our annual Guide to Hockey Schools and Camps supplement.If you&rsquo;ve got a boy or girl you&rsquo;re thinking of sending to a summer camp or school, or if you know anyone who&rsquo;s even considering it, then this is an issue you don&rsquo;t want to miss.Simply put, we&rsquo;ve got the most comprehensive listing of hockey schools and camps throughout North America and even Europe. This is an advertising supplement that&rsquo;s got it all. &#9632;

NEXT WEEK IN THN

&ldquo;I haven&rsquo;t decided yet whether to use my nuclear stick or my Star Wars model.&rdquo;&mdash;L.A. King Tiger Williams on preparing to play against the Soviet Red Army Club. See Page 19. &#9632;

QUOTE OF THE WEEK

<div class="byline">BY JAY GREENBERG</div><div class="image-hero"><img title="f0003-01" src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0003-011441/5776253-1-eng-US/f0003-012.jpg"><figcaption class="caption-body">Islanders&rsquo; goalie Billy Smith and the Capitals&rsquo; Bobby Carpenter meet again (and again).</figcaption></div>The National Hockey League board of governors has appropriated $500,000 for a study of its future. Glen Sather claimed a Tarot card reader off the waiver wire, Lou Nanne traded Gord Sherven for Jeanne Dixon and Mike Hitch signed the Amazing Kreskin as a free agent.They put their heads together, suffering multiple contusions, but were still able to make out an outline of hockey&rsquo;s immediate future. THE HOCKEY NEWS has obtained (that means we stole it, stupid) a copy of their predictions for 1986:January 14&mdash;John Ferguson, the Winnipeg general manager, trades Dale Hawerchuk and Randy Carlyle to Detroit for Ron Duguay and John Barrett. Coach Barry Long first notices the absences of Hawerchuk and Carlyle during the pre-game warmup.&ldquo;Gotcha again,&rdquo; Ferguson tells Long.&ldquo;Fergie, you old rascal,&rdquo; replies Long.January 25&mdash;The fans&rsquo; all-star voting is completed. Los Angeles left wing Tiger Williams has gathered enough write-in votes to be named to the Campbell Conference&rsquo;s first team.January 27&mdash;Williams informs Campbell coach Glen Sather he will be unable to play in the game. He is suffering from writer&rsquo;s cramp.Feb. 3&mdash;The longest All-Star Dinner in history runs 21 hours and 45 minutes. Master of Ceremonies Chris Kotsopolous is only halfway through the program when the players have to leave for the game.&ldquo;This is getting out of hand,&rdquo; NHL President John Ziegler says. &ldquo;Last year we made the mistake of referring to (former NHL president) Red Dutton as &lsquo;the late&rsquo;. But only the dinner was late. Mr. Dutton is still alive, although I wouldn&rsquo;t want to bet on his making it through this year&rsquo;s program.&ldquo;Each host is trying to outdo the last one. I&rsquo;m pleased to announce however, that next year we won&rsquo;t have that problem. We&rsquo;ve all been invited to Joe Falls&rsquo; house for dinner.&rdquo;Feb. 4&mdash;After Wayne Gretzky&rsquo;s three pointer at the buzzer gives the Campbells a 145-143 victory over the Wales, the NHL announces a new All-Star format.&ldquo;We considered everything,&rdquo; Ziegler says. &ldquo;A four-division tournament, European players vs. North Americans, Sutters vs. Dineens, even the black players against the white ones. But we think we&rsquo;ve come up with a format that is certain to grab the fans&rsquo; imagination.&ldquo;Next year, the United States of America will play Pat Riggin.&rdquo;Feb. 18&mdash;Todd Bergen announces he is ready to play hockey. &ldquo;The snow isn&rsquo;t off the golf course yet,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;And there&rsquo;s a three-day break coming up between the moose and elk season. If the games are over at a reasonable hour, I&rsquo;ll be happy to join the North Stars for those two games, provided I get all the ice time I want.&rdquo;Feb. 25&mdash;As the Calgary Flames come out onto the St. Louis Arena ice to warm up for their game against the Blues, they discover that St. Louis owner Harry Omest has sold the entire visiting team&rsquo;s bench on a season-ticket basis.Coach Bob Johnson threatens to take his team off the ice until he notices that the Blues&rsquo; bench has been sold too. &ldquo;The rule only says the facilities have to be equal,&rdquo; Omest says. With players having to be summoned from the locker room for every change, the game takes six hours to play.March 5&mdash;John Ferguson is fired and replaced by Barry Long.March 8&mdash;Barry Long is told he has replaced John Ferguson.March 9&mdash;An irate Mike Keenan arrives at the Flyers&rsquo; pre-game skate to discover Ranger coach Ted Sator making Flyer captain Dave Poulin do wind-sprints.&ldquo;I find your work application questionable,&rdquo; the red-faced Keenan says.&ldquo;You know what you are?&rdquo; Sator, a former Keenan assistant, boils, &ldquo;You&rsquo;re locked in.&rdquo;&ldquo;I would expect such coming from someone of your work ethic,&rdquo; Keenan replies as he is being restrained.&ldquo;Shuffle the deck, will you?&rdquo; Sator says as he takes a swing. &ldquo;You know what you have? A monkey on your back.&rdquo;&ldquo;Go and synergize in your hat,&rdquo; Keenan says as he&rsquo;s dragged down the hallway.March 16&mdash;The critically-acclaimed work by Michel Bergeron, the French movie director, wins first prize at the Cannes film festival. It is entitled Kerry Fraser and Ed Hospodar Stink. Second and third place go to two Bergman films, one directed by Thommie, the other by Gary.March 18&mdash;The Winnipeg Jets are moved to Hamilton.March 19&mdash;Barry Long takes his place behind the Jets&rsquo; bench at Winnipeg Arena for the scheduled game against Montreal. &ldquo;Hey,&rdquo; his voice echoes through the darkened arena, &ldquo;Where is everybody?&rdquo;April 2&mdash;Instead of going on his own Hawaii vacation, this year, Glen Sather sends the entire Edmonton team. The Oilers, nonetheless, defeat Vancouver, 6-2.<div class="figure-block image-bleed"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0003-021166/5776246-1-eng-US/f0003-022.jpg" title="f0003-02" width="1527" height="1012"><figcaption class="caption-body">Paul MacLean of the Jets, left, skates a final shift alongside Dale Hawerchuk.</figcaption><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0003-03758/5776239-1-eng-US/f0003-032.jpg" title="f0003-03" width="1525" height="918"><figcaption class="caption-body">Flyers&rsquo; captain Dave Poulin warms up for his wind-sprints.</figcaption></div>April 6&mdash;On the eve of the playoffs, the NHL playoff system has again come under criticism. Four Norris Division teams managed to finish in fifth place. Now there&rsquo;s nobody to play St. Louis.&ldquo;That&rsquo;s alright,&rdquo; Ornest says, &ldquo;there&rsquo;s no place for the players to sit anyway.&rdquo;April 7&mdash;With a rematch of last year&rsquo;s final series likely, Sather and Keenan meet to decide whether water bottles will be permitted on top of the goal nets.Sather holds firm on the fluid issue, but agrees to a menu that includes watercress salad, beef Wellington, lyonnaise potatoes, and peach melba. Flyer goalie Bob Froese predicts victory because, &ldquo;we had a taste of it last year. We may not be better than the Oilers, but we&rsquo;re hungrier.&rdquo;April 9&mdash;Pat Quinn, Kings&rsquo; coachattorney, files a writ of habeas corpus to prevent the Oilers from taking the ice for their first-round series against the Kings. &ldquo;We played like a bunch of corpses all year long anyway,&rdquo; Quinn says. &ldquo;This is our only chance.&rdquo;The Oilers ignore it and take a 1-0 lead on Gretzky&rsquo;s goal :01 into the game. But Quinn quickly produces a temporary restraining order that disallows the goal. &ldquo;It&rsquo;s discriminatory,&rdquo; Quinn convinces the judge. &ldquo;We don&rsquo;t have anybody as good as Gretzky.&rdquo;April 15&mdash;The Kings finish off a three-game sweep of the Oilers. The Oilers vow to appeal. The Jets, who lost the first two games of the Calgary series at the Saddledome&mdash;come back to win by forfeit because the Flames can&rsquo;t find Hamilton for Games Three and Four.The Bruins, who won all 40 of their home games and lost all 40 on the road, lose in the fifth game at Montreal. Hartford wins its first playoff series ever, over Buffalo. The next day the happy Whalers are packing to go home for the summer when a reporter asks them about the Montreal series.&ldquo;What Montreal series?&rdquo; captain Ron Francis says. &ldquo;You mean if you win, you get to play another one?&rdquo;The Flyers beat the Rangers in three straight again. &ldquo;We&rsquo;ll shuffle the deck,&rdquo; Sator says. &ldquo;We&rsquo;ll get over the hump.&rdquo;Islanders rally from two games down to beat Washington again. &ldquo;One of these years,&rdquo; sighs coach Bryan Murray. &ldquo;I wish we could play somebody else.&rdquo;April 27&mdash;Led by the goaltending of Pat Riggin, Canada wins the Gold Medal at the World Championships. &ldquo;This is the greatest moment of my life,&rdquo; Riggin says. &ldquo;Americans, Swedes, Czechs, Russians, Germans, I hate &lsquo;em all.&rdquo; Soviet defenseman Vyacheslav Fetisov is named MVP for the tournament. Riggin is nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize.April 30&mdash;The U.S. Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals rules that the Kings have defeated Hamilton in six games. Quinn&rsquo;s brief argued that Thomas Steen is an illegal alien and should not be allowed to play.Those amazing Whalers defeat Montreal 2-1 in a seventh-game overtime to advance to the semi-finals. It is their first victory at The Forum in 1,374 tries since entering the NHL in 1979. An ecstatic Jack Evans goes home to take a nap.<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0015-011334/5776232-1-eng-US/f0015-012.jpg" title="f0015-01" width="590" height="668"><figcaption class="caption-body">Gord Sherven spends most of his time travelling between Minnesota and Edmonton.</figcaption></div>Islanders become the first team in NHL history to rally from a 4-0 deficit to win a seven-game series, defeating Philadelphia.May 11&mdash;Quinn files a class-action suit preventing the Blues, leading 3-2, from finishing their semi-final series with the Kings. &ldquo;They&rsquo;ve got no class,&rdquo; Quinn argues, &ldquo;so I&rsquo;m taking action.&rdquo;&ldquo;We won&rsquo;t sit still for this,&rdquo; Ornest says, &ldquo;because we have nowhere to sit. I&rsquo;ve rented out all my seats for a wedding and it&rsquo;s standing room only here.&rdquo;May 15&mdash;The Islanders do it again, this time in seventh-game sudden death. A goal by the recently-purchased Steve Tsujiura puts the Whalers out of the playoffs. &ldquo;This is the second-greatest sabotage since Pearl Harbor,&rdquo; a very dissappointed Emile Francis says.May 18&mdash;The Stanley Cup finals are cancelled. The Superior Court of the State of California has the Islanders declared an historical treasure and unfit to meet the Kings.The Islanders file countersuit, arguing age discrimination. &ldquo;This is a travesty,&rdquo; GM Bill Torrey says, &ldquo;We already had our team booked to fly to LA on senior-citizen&rsquo;s fares. What are we supposed to do now, sit around and listen to our pacemakers?&rdquo;Torrey is told a possible Jegal loophole&mdash;the expiration of the statute of limitations&mdash;might still enable the series to be held. &ldquo;Never use the word expire&rsquo; around an old person,&rdquo; he says.May 29&mdash;It&rsquo;s official. The U.S. Supreme Court declares Los Angeles the winner of the Stanley Cup. &ldquo;I think the turning point was back in the Edmonton series when Charlie Huddy was declared inadmissable,&rdquo; coach Pat Quinn said. &ldquo;We were underdogs all the way but we never said die.&rdquo;&ldquo;Don&rsquo;t say die&rsquo; around an old person,&rdquo; Torrey says.&ldquo;Whatever,&rdquo; Quinn says. &ldquo;We sued &lsquo;em in the comers, we sued &lsquo;em in the alleys and we won. This just goes to show you, you never know what you&rsquo;re going to find in your briefs.&rdquo;June 11&mdash;Quinn is named Coach of the Year by the American Bar Association.June 13&mdash;The Pittsburgh Penguins, turned down in their request to move to the Norris Division join the AFC Central.June 14&mdash;With the first pick in the entry draft, the Maple Leafs select Michigan State center Joe Murphy. &ldquo;Perfect,&rdquo; chortles Leaf owner Harold Ballard, &ldquo;this orgnization is run by Murphy&rsquo;s Law. We&rsquo;ll screw him up.&ldquo;First we&rsquo;ll give him nobody to play with. Then we&rsquo;ll make him captain and dump on him when we don&rsquo;t get any better. Then we&rsquo;ll run him out of town and watch him become a star someplace else.&rdquo;June 25&mdash;Petr Klima, the brilliant Red Wing rookie, wins the Detroit Grand Prix.July 8&mdash;The Red Wings announce their newest batch of free-agent signings. Inked to long-term pacts are Bill Quackenbush, Mud Bruneteau, Kirk Gibson, Reggie Jackson Tiger Williams, Sly Williams and Fly Williams.September 19&mdash;NHL players go on strike, cancelling eight exhibition games. Nobody notices.September 26&mdash;The owners and players agree to a new collective bargaining agreement, ending the strike. The key compromise is over free agency.The new compensation formula permits a limited freedom of movement. The Rangers can have all the Europeans they want. Only bad players are allowed to sign with Detroit.November 10&mdash;Calgary&rsquo;s Dan Quinn, who has scored 50 points in his first 15 games, is traded to Chicago. &ldquo;Truth is, he&rsquo;d gotten too good for us,&rdquo; says Flames&rsquo; coach Bob Johnson. &ldquo;We don&rsquo;t want any stars on this team.&rdquo;December 15&mdash;Minnesota GM Lou Nanne re-acquires Gord Sherven from Edmonton and then promptly trades him back to the Oilers for future considerations. Those considerations turn out to be Gord Sherven, who two days later is traded again for the NHL rights to Steve Christoff.&ldquo;I traded Christoff 15 times,&rdquo; Nanne says. &ldquo;I&rsquo;m going for the record with Sherven. Let&rsquo;s deal. I&rsquo;ve got defensemen, goalies, centers, cars, VCRs, stereos. I&rsquo;ve even got a golfer with a bad stomach. I&rsquo;ll beat any price you can find. You interested in any aluminum siding?&rdquo; &#9632;

f0003-01

What’s In The Cards For 1986?

<div class="byline">BY RANDY STARKMAN</div>DAVOS, Switz.&mdash;Though it was regarded primarily as a learning experience, the Canadian National Team was not pleased with all the lessons absorbed during their recent European swing.Although only in its formative stages, the young pre-Olympic team displayed some glaring weaknesses at the Izvestia and Spengler Cup tournaments.At the Izvestia&mdash;where Team Canada won a game against Finland (5-4) but was overwhelmed by the Soviets (8-2), Czechoslovakia (7-2) and Sweden (6-1)&mdash;head coach Dave King was disturbed by the sloppy defensive play and lack of big-save goaltending.In the Spengler, the Canadians won a silver medal to reach their goal of finishing among the top two, but were overpowered 6-0 by Spartak Moscow in the final game.&ldquo;I think they (Spartak) had a speed advantage and a strength advantage,&rdquo; said King. &ldquo;You can&rsquo;t give up both of those things to a team and expect to do well. We&rsquo;re a very small team. We need bigger players.&rdquo;The team&rsquo;s performances in the two tournaments reinforced King&rsquo;s suspicions that he will have to do a lot of roster juggling to come up with a winning combination for the Calgary Olympics.&ldquo;We&rsquo;re learning the need for better players,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;We&rsquo;ve got some good players here, but not enough of them. You can&rsquo;t play world-class teams without world-class players. The kids did a good job; I have no complaints with this team, but you see the need for really top talent to play against these top European teams.&ldquo;We&rsquo;ve got some good players we&rsquo;ve discovered here. We feel we have some good prospects for &lsquo;88. Not all of them are prospects for &lsquo;88, but that&rsquo;s fair game.&rdquo;Two of the better prospects for the Olympics, forwards Jeff Greenlaw and Peter Douris, stayed in Canada to participate in the World Junior Championships.For his part, King is uncertain whether he will be able to attract the best young players.&ldquo;The National Hockey League tends to take a lot of the good players. All we can do is try to do the best we can and hope that players want to play for our program,&rdquo; he said.&ldquo;With our program, we can&rsquo;t offer a lot of money, just the opportunity to play for your country and to be an Olympian. If a kid wants that opportunity, it&rsquo;s certainly a good one.&rdquo;Czechoslovakian coach Stanlislav Nevesely, who coached Dukla Jihlava at the Spengler Cup and was an assistant with the national team for five years, believes the Canadian Olympic program is on the right track.&ldquo;It&rsquo;s a good idea. Canada should have a strong team. It (the Calgary Olympics) could be like with the U.S. at Lake Placid,&rdquo; Nevesely said.The Canadians played a disciplined brand of hockey in their first three games at the Spengler, compiling a 2-0-1 record to set up a repeat of last year&rsquo;s gold-medal finale with the Soviets.They were forced to settle for a 2-2 deadlock in their opener with the Czechoslovakians, after holding a 2-0 lead past the midway point of the third period.Keyed by the high-scoring line of Cliff Ronning, Don McLaren and Mike Millar, Team Canada showed some offensive firepower in victories over West German league champions SB Rosenheim (7-2) and the Davos SelectsBut all the self-composure that marked the team&rsquo;s earlier successes in the tournament crumbled against the Soviets.Spartak was in early penalty trouble, giving Team Canada a two-man advantage for a full two minutes. But the Canadians failed to capitalize, and a quick goal thereafter by toward Alexander Kozhevnikov proved to be the only one the Soviets would need.Kozhevnikov, a member of the national team, was the star of the game for the Soviets with two goals and two assists.It was a rough game, in which the Soviets did a fair bit of handiwork with their sticks. The Canadians wound up taking a lot of retaliation penalties.King was upset with the team&rsquo;s loss of composure, saying they had fallen into a trap set by the Soviets.&ldquo;We&rsquo;re young and we&rsquo;re going to have some tough nights. We lost our focus in the game. If we can learn some thing from the whole situation, it&rsquo;s probably a good game for us,&rdquo; he said.&ldquo;But it&rsquo;s going to be a battle. There&rsquo;s no question this is not an easy program for these kids to play in. They play a lot of games on the road. There&rsquo;ll be games like this.&ldquo;They did very well in the tournament. This game we don&rsquo;t feel great about, but that&rsquo;s just one game.&rdquo;Team Canada placed four players on the all-star team, decided before the final game. Goalie John Kemp, defenseman Serge Roy and forwards Ronning and Millar all earned all-star honors.The Davos Selects (2-2) finished third in the tournament for the fourth straight year, upsetting the Czechoslovakians 4-2 in their final game. The selects had seven Canadians in their lineup, including former NHLers Ron Wilson, Lance Nethery, Greg Theberge and Dale McCourt. &#9632;

King Admits The Need For Better Players

<div class="byline">BY BOB McKENZIE</div>HAMILTON&mdash;The Bear is back.But was he ever gone?With its gold-medal performance at the 1986 World Junior Championships, the Soviet Union, for the time being anyway, climbed back atop the international hockey heap.And to listen to the Soviets, you&rsquo;d think they never left.Ask Vladimir Vasiliev, coach of the Soviets&rsquo; national junior team, if this gold-medal effort&mdash;the Soviets&rsquo; seventh since competition began in 1977 and third in the past four years&mdash;signalled a renaissance of the Big Red Machine and he answers with a quizzical glance, as if several Soviet defeats in 1984 and 1985 never happened.Ask Mikhail Tatarinov, the outstanding Soviet defenseman who looks a lot like a young Viacheslav Fetisov, if he and his teammates were under extreme pressure to make amends for recent Soviet failures and he snorts: &ldquo;Personally, I feel no pressure.&rdquo;Maybe, just maybe, they&rsquo;re sincere.There is a school of thought that suggests the Soviets aren&rsquo;t really any different than their North American counterparts&mdash;that is, while fans and media gnash teeth and bemoan each international defeat, the hockey hierarchies and players simply subscribe to the old axiom, &ldquo;You win some, you lose some.&rdquo;So, really, Vasiliev and Tatarinov feel no more responsible for what happened to Soviet hockey in &lsquo;85 than Canadian coach Terry Simpson does for what happened, say, in the 1979 Challenge Cup.If anything, this year&rsquo;s Soviet junior team was simply out to make amends for their bronze-medal showing a year ago in Finland. Ten members of this year&rsquo;s team were there last year when Team Canada pounded out a decisive 5-0 victory.In fact, from the day the Soviets arrived in Canada for the tournament, they expected it all to come down to their one game against the Canadians.&ldquo;It is certain we could have scored more goals against teams like Switzerland and West Germany,&rdquo; said Vasiliev. &ldquo;But we were trying to retain as much strength as possible for the game against Canada.&rdquo;When the showdown materialized, revenge was sweet. And the strength exhibited by the Soviets was more mental than physical.They scored a 4-1 decision, but even more than the outcome, the most interesting aspect of the game was how they won it.It was not a typical Soviet performance. Not once did they exhibit a tic-tac-toe passing play, the type they&rsquo;ve made famous. While they were clearly the quicker team&mdash;&rdquo;I would say the Canadians were inferior skaters this year compared to last year,&rdquo; Tatarinov said&mdash;they rarely unleashed a sustained offensive flurry.Instead, the Soviets did what they had to to win. They never hesitated to ice the puck when they got into trouble or play dump-and-chase. In short, they beat the Canadians at their own game and, of course, on their own smaller ice surface&mdash;the reason the Soviets employed such unaccustomed tactics.And Canada&rsquo;s attempts to physically dominate the Soviets&mdash;the key to the 5-0 win a year ago was when heavy checks by Jim Sandlak and Wendel Clark forced Tatarinov out of the tournament&mdash;backfired when the visitors absorbed the punishment and, in fact, used it to actually slow the Canadians&rsquo; momentum.Each time a Canadian player delivered a hard check, the Soviet player would fall to the ice and remain prone, writhing in contrived agony. While the Soviets were fooling no one with their repeated histrionics, certainly not the sold-out Copps Coliseum crowd or their own trainer for that matter, they did succeed in interrupting the Canadians&rsquo; rhythm.&ldquo;Our players have a different attitude towards physical play than the Canadians,&rdquo; said Yuri Korolev, head of the Soviet delegation at the World Junior Championships. &ldquo;Canadian hockey has a lot of physical play and likes to put pressure on the opposition with forechecking, but as this championship showed, even Canadians don&rsquo;t possess this ability in full.&ldquo;If we can respond to this type of power play (physical intimidation), the Canadians are finished (beaten).&rdquo;That, of course, may be an oversimplification. Still, it&rsquo;s ironic and intriguing that the Soviets, possessing such highly-skilled athletes, used such tactics to upset the Canadians, who were clearly off-balance and unnerved.But the bottom line is that the experienced Soviets finished the tournament with an unblemished 7-0 record to collect the gold and, according to a report in the Hamilton Spectator, $700 (Cdn.) per player to spend as they see fit on a North American shopping spree&mdash;the promised reward if they beat Canada.This isn&rsquo;t the first time the Soviets have been reported to use cash incentives in key games. Two years ago, at the world championships in Sweden, the Soviets reportedly received about $100 (U.S.) per player for winning the gold medal. Which is why the $700 figure reported in the Spectator seemed inordinately large.But after denying knowledge of the team&rsquo;s capitalist leanings, netminder Evgeny Belosheikin, who was named to the tourney&rsquo;s first all-star team with teammates Tatarinov on defense and Igor Vyazmy-kin on right wing, summed it up best when he said: &ldquo;We would try to win against Canada in any case because of the prestige.&rdquo;NOTES&mdash;Czechoslovakia&rsquo;s Michael Pivonka, at center, and Canada&rsquo;s Shayne Corson (left wing) and Sylvain Cote (defense) joined the three Soviets on the tournament&rsquo;s first all-star team&hellip;Switzerland blitzed West Germany 7-1 in each team&rsquo;s final game of the tourney, relegating West Germany to the &lsquo;B&rsquo; pool next year&hellip;Next year&rsquo;s World Junior Championships will be in Prague, Czechoslovakia. &#9632;

Soviets Use New Tactics To Get Gold

<div class="byline">BY STEVE DRYDEN</div><div class="image-hero"><img title="f0005-01" src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0005-011346/5776332-1-eng-US/f0005-012.jpg"><figcaption class="caption-body">Canadian goaltender Craig Billington thwarts a Soviet scoring attempt while the puck rolls harmlessly past the net and center Joe Murphy moves in to provide defensive assistance. The Soviet Union beat Canada 4-1 in what was the gold-medal game. (Photo by Ted Rhodes)</figcaption></div>HAMILTON&mdash;There was no victory in defeat. Nor, for that matter, after defeat.But, Canada was far from a loser at the World Junior Championships.The defending champions lost but once when it counted, and once more when it didn&rsquo;t, in finishing second to the Soviet Union.Still, it was tough to shake a nagging feeling of failure when all was said and done.&ldquo;Our goal was to win the gold medal and we didn&rsquo;t reach that goal,&rdquo; said Shayne Corson after Canada lost its final game 5-3 to Czechoslovakia.Two days earlier, the Canadians were beaten soundly 4-1 by the Soviets in what was the gold-medal game.&ldquo;The Russians were the better hockey team tonight,&rdquo; said Corson, one of four players back from last year&rsquo;s team. &ldquo;Nobody remembers who finished second. The team is very disappointed.&rdquo;Canada and the Soviet Union entered the decisive game undefeated, each sweeping past five previous opponents with relative ease.Their meeting, the tournament&rsquo;s focal point from day one, was expected to be a classic confrontation. It wasn&rsquo;t. Not by a long, loping shot to the midsection.Overwrought for sure, but hardly the stuff of a classic.It was, in fact, just short of an embarrassment right from the first Canadian cheap shot, through the unending Soviet theatrics to the actions of a small group of boorish fans at Copps Coliseum.In other words, everybody got into the act&mdash;a bad act.The Canadians tarnished a hard-earned image of fair, but hard play by resorting to thuggery; the Soviets faked injury so often and so poorly the team trainer stopped going on the ice, leaving the players to administer to each other; and finally some fans disgraced themselves by hurling pop cans at Soviets who dared celebrate the most significant victory of their young careers.Somewhere in the midst of all that was a hockey game.&ldquo;The Soviet Union beat us fair and square,&rdquo; said coach Terry Simpson, who guided Canada to a 5-0 victory over the Soviets last year. &ldquo;I think they played very well. They certainly deserve full marks.&rdquo;What the Soviets did most of all was parlay outstanding team defense into enough offense for gold.Not that Canada didn&rsquo;t have its moments.&ldquo;I think when we were up 1-0 we should have capitalized on a couple of chances we had,&rdquo; said Corson, a first-team all-star with seven goals and seven assists. &ldquo;That would have changed the game.&rdquo;The chances were there, particularly during the ninth minute of the first period when Corson and linemates Joe Nieuwendyk and Jim Sandlak blitzed Soviet goalie Evgeny Belosheikin.Initiated by two thundering Sandlak hits&mdash;one of which sent little Alexander Semak fully into the penalty box&mdash;the Canadians buzzed Belosheikin.But to no avail.Before period&rsquo;s end, Semak had recovered sufficiently from his unscheduled flight to tie the score while, ironically, Sandlak looked on from&mdash;you guessed it&mdash;the penalty box.In the second period, Sergie Osipov scored the winner against goalie Craig Billington after two Canadians converged on a single Soviet while Osipov was left wide open.Goals by Ravil Khaidarov and Igor Viazmykin, a wonderfully-skilled forward whose flair for the dramatic was reflected every time somebody batted an eyelash in his direction, scored in the third to wrap up the victory.Simpson quietly sought out reasons for the setback in the aftermath of the loss.The Canadian defense, he admitted, was suspect and didn&rsquo;t measure up to last year&rsquo;s unit. Team officials were aware of that shortcoming before the tournament even began.Canada allowed an average of three goals per game, the Soviets a shade under two. One bright spot was defenseman Sylvain Cote, on loan from the Hartford Whalers, who was named to the tournament&rsquo;s first all-star team.The forwards did not play up to snuff against the Soviets.&ldquo;Our speed to the net didn&rsquo;t seem to be as dominant as it was in past games,&rdquo; explained Simpson. &ldquo;And there again you have to give the Russians credit for nullifying it.&ldquo;We didn&rsquo;t get any second shots. We didn&rsquo;t have that extra penetration that was needed. They seemed to take away that second shot.&rdquo;And when they didn&rsquo;t, Belosheikin was there. The tournament&rsquo;s top goalie proved he has more in common with former Soviet goalie great Vladislav Tretiak than just No. 20: He also possesses superlative talent.Belosheikin, however, was not tested as severely as you might expect by the Canadians who seemed to register more cheap shots than shots on goal (29).&ldquo;In the game situation you try to lose as gracefully as you win but sometimes it&rsquo;s difficult to do,&rdquo; admitted Simpson. &ldquo;The kids are young.&rdquo;If the Canadians&rsquo; strong suit was their ability to play a physical game, it was a case of the team overplaying its hand or, in the case of Corson and others, overplaying their fists.Joe Murphy, whose four goals and 10 assists tied him with Corson for the tourament lead, acknowledged Canada was, at times, its own worst enemy.&ldquo;We took a few bad penalties,&rdquo; said Murphy, the favorite to be selected first overall at the National Hockey League&rsquo;s 1986 entry draft. &ldquo;The emotions were running high. But, don&rsquo;t forget they were hitting us back and they were using their sticks, too.&rdquo;True, the Soviets were hardly angelic.The losses were Canada&rsquo;s first in two years after going undefeated (5-0-2) in the 1985 tournament.Czechoslovakia, which lost the gold on goal differential last year in Helsinki, settled for a victory over Canada and fourth place behind the Americans this year.The win over Canada, however, was somewhat hollow. As Billington suggested, with the gold out of reach and the silver safely tucked away, &ldquo;You&rsquo;ve got nothing to win or lose.&ldquo;I know what it&rsquo;s like to win,&rdquo; said Billington, Canada&rsquo;s top player last year. &ldquo;I really feel bad for the guys who didn&rsquo;t get the chance to win and may never get that chance again.&ldquo;It seemed too easy this year. Last year it was very tough&mdash;every second, every day.&rdquo;Team captain Sandlak, another returnee who was selected the tournament&rsquo;s top forward and picked for the second all-star team, looked at the outcome philosophically.&ldquo;You can&rsquo;t feel like a loser,&rdquo; said Sandlak, who rejoined the Vancouver Canucks after the tournament. &ldquo;Finishing second there are five other teams who would like to be in your shoes.&rdquo;The last word, as always, belonged to the loquacious Sherry Bassin, Canada&rsquo;s general manager.&ldquo;I didn&rsquo;t guarantee we&rsquo;d win the tournament,&rdquo; said Bassin. &ldquo;I said it would take a helluva team to beat us. And this (Soviet Union) is a helluva team.&rdquo;Canada&rsquo;s silver was its second in the 10 years the International Ice Hockey Federation has endorsed the tournament. The host team had previously won two gold, one silver and two bronze medals.The event was easily a record setter in terms of attendance (154,172 over 28 games) as Hamilton and area threw its support behind the teams like never before in tournament history.It helped that Canada&rsquo;s games against the U.S., Sweden, Soviet Union and Czechoslovakia were sellouts at the 17,000-plus-seat Copps Coliseum. &#9632;

f0005-01

Canada Has Hard Time Finding Silver Lining

<div class="byline">BY ROD BEATON</div>HAMILTON&mdash;If the 1986 World Junior Champioships were a look into the future of international hockey, you can save a space for the U.S. among the elite.Team USA wanted to improve on last year&rsquo;s sixth-place finish and it did so with a flourish, winning the bronze medal.The Americans had not previously won a medal in an International Ice Hockey Federation tournament except the Olympic golds of 1960 and &lsquo;80 and silver of &lsquo;76.That drought ended when national junior coach Dave Peterson guided his team to a 4-3 record and a tie with Sweden and Czechoslovakia for third place. Because the U.S. had beaten both in head-to-head competition, it was awarded the bronze.&ldquo;This was a big one for us,&rdquo; said Peterson. &ldquo;Our immediate goal was to improve one spot and get a schedule break next year.&rdquo;The improvement was three spots, ending a world junior jinx of never finishing higher than fifth.&ldquo;We kept telling the kids they are world class,&rdquo; said Peterson. &ldquo;They proved it to themselves.&rdquo;The U.S.&rsquo;s losses were to the champions, the USSR, the defending champions, Canada, and Finland. The Soviets were clearly superior. The U.S. matched Canada in skills but not in size, strength, or the ability to play a hitting game. And the Americans would have beaten Finland, but they were betrayed by spotty goaltending in a two-goal (including empty-net goal) loss.A second-game victory against Czechoslovakia, a 5-2 decision the U.S. dominated, indicated the U.S. had medal potential. But when the record was 1-3, the chances looked bleak.&ldquo;We still think we can win a bronze,&rdquo; said center Jimmy Carson, a tournament standout, at that time. &ldquo;We just have to win all three games. That should be no problem. We&rsquo;re better than those teams.&rdquo;The U.S. proved it, sweeping pushovers West Germany and Switzerland before whipping Sweden 5-1 on the final day of the tournament.General manager Art Berglund, Peterson and their staff built the team with an eye towards speed and improved offensive production. As things turned out, the team&rsquo;s key elements were grit and goaltending.The grit was supplied mostly by captain and team high scorer, right winger Steve Leach of the University of New Hampshire. The quality goaltending was supplied by Mike Richter, a freshman at the University of Wisconsin.Leach and goalie Alan Perry were the only Americans playing in the toumament for the third time. Leach led what was to become the team&rsquo;s mostive unit.Left winger Paul Ranheim of Wisconsin, center Greg Dornbach, of Miami (Ohio) and Leach comprised a unit expected to supply checking and brawn. It provided much more. Leach led the club with six goals and five assists and Ranheim matched Leach&rsquo;s team-high goal production.&lsquo;Those three guys were really a key,&rdquo; said Peterson. &ldquo;They set the tone.&rdquo; LU Richter was equally important. Last year he was Perry&rsquo;s caddy, but when Perry struggled against the Soviets, Richter was awarded a start Peterson said would have been his anyway.Richter stoned the Czechs and played well in the loss against Canada, but he found a foe he couldn&rsquo;t beat&mdash;blood poisoning. An infection on a toe became too painful to play and he missed the loss to Finland, the win against the Germans and all but one period against the Swiss.Richter&rsquo;s return for the final game against Sweden gave the U.S. an extra boost for that critical victory.Richter&rsquo;s absence was one of three the U.S. had to overcome. Defenseman Chris Biotti was sidelined for a portion of the tournament and center Craig Janney was rubbed out by a broken collarbone near the end of the game with Canada.Despite their limited duty, Janney and Richter joined Leach as the team&rsquo;s tournament MVP&rsquo;s.&ldquo;The kids had to play hard to overcome some tough luck.&rdquo;According to the armada of scouts on hand, the U.S. performance solidified the high-draft status of Janney, Carson, Brian Leetch, Scott Young, Greg Brown and Mike Wolak. It also improved the chance left winger Dan Shea will be picked in his second year of eligibilty.It was a young team, vulnerable against the physical strength of the Soviets and the Canadians. Only Leach, Ranheim, Young and defenseman Scott Paluch were at home in the heavy going.But the center-ice corps played extremely well. Ranheim, supplemented by Max Middendorf, became the additional threat off the wing the team needed. Shea was a sparkplug in a utility role and Paluch led the defense. That defense was generally mobile, but sometimes abandoned Richter and Perry.&ldquo;Generally I thought they showed good discipline,&rdquo; said Peterson. &ldquo;We told them that if they stayed out of the penalty box, don&rsquo;t retaliate and play with good, sound tactics, they can win. For the most part, they stuck to that.&rdquo; &#9632;

Was U.S. Play Shape Of Things To Come?

<div class="byline">Frank Orr</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0007-011371/5776411-1-eng-US/f0007-012.jpg" title="f0007-01" width="387" height="429"></div>BACK ON DEC. 14, Ron Wicks did a scries of stretching exercises, donned his black pants and striped sweater, took whistle in hand and was the referee in a National Hockey League game at the Met Center in Bloomington, Minn., between the Toronto Maple Leafs and Minnesota North Stars,Nothing unusual about that because refereeing is Wicks&rsquo; profession. Except that it was a special day, both for Wicks and the NHL. Wicks approached it with his usual matter-of-fact outlook. The NHL, in a somewhat surprising move, even for a league with as puny a public relations sense as it has, almost ignored the event.That game was No. 1,034 for Wicks as an NHL referee, the most ever officiatied by a zebra. Some linesmen have worked more but Wicks became the leader among referees that day. Bruce Hood, another good one who retired at the end of the 1983-84 season, had been the most-worked arbiter with 1,033 games.NHL headquarters sent a wire to Wicks congratulating him on a splendid achievement. But&mdash;and this is really mind-boggling to consider&mdash;no member of the NHL hierarchy, not the upper echelon or the men who control the officiating staff, was on hand to celebrate, or even note, the occasion.Because the North Stars are first-class in the PR area, the event didn&rsquo;t pass without notice. The Stars had a plaque prepared to note the occasion and the team captains, Craig Hartsburg and Rick Vaive, presented it to Wicks in a brief pre-game ceremony.But league people were very noticeable in their absence, a fact mentioned by assorted folks, including a couple of players.&ldquo;You would have thought that one NHL bigwig, even a supervisor of officials, would have been there to shake Wicksie&rsquo;s hand, present him with a tea cup and buy him a beer after it was over,&rdquo; said one veteran player.Wicks has been around the NHL long enough&mdash;he worked his first game as a linesman in 1960 at 20, made his refereeing debut in 1967&mdash;to understand how things work all too well and if he were disappointed at the lack of recognition for his record, he didn&rsquo;t show it. Instead, he mused on 25 years in pro hockey with the same wry outlook that has helped him to be such a first-rate official.&ldquo;A short memory and a sense of humor are the best qualities an official can have,&rdquo; Wicks said. &ldquo;Of course, it helps if you can skate like the wind and have exceptional eyesight&mdash;it really is a job where eyes in the back of the head would be a big asset&mdash;but not many of us do so we try to get by with what we&rsquo;ve got.&ldquo;Other than the things you learn about players and file away, you can&rsquo;t carry anything from one game to the next in this business. You clean the slate when one game ends, assess your performance in your own mind and move on to the next one.&ldquo;I&rsquo;ve always tried to keep things low-key with the players. Exchanging a laugh, or even a smile, with them is better than confrontations.&rdquo;Wicks is renowned among the players as an official with whom needles and jokes can be exchanged. For instance, he was perhaps the first official to give delay-of-game minors to players who dropped their gloves, struck a John L. Sullivan pose with the bare first up, looked fierce but threw no punches.The biggest change Wicks has noticed in his time in stripes is that the players are much younger now on average than when he started and there are more good skaters and shooters.&ldquo;When I started in the league, most players were 24 or 25 when they got to the NHL,&rdquo; Wicks said. &ldquo;Now, they&rsquo;re much younger, bigger and stronger. Back in the &lsquo;60s, each team would have three or four guys who had big shots. Now just about every kid has a cannon.&ldquo;A guy like Mark Messier (Edmonton Oilers) is a very awesome sight, a little frightening, in fact, coming straight at you in full flight because he&rsquo;s so big and so fast.&rdquo;Wicks, who hopes to continue on the job for a few seasons yet, wouldn&rsquo;t mind a little electronic aid in doing his job but only in one area.&ldquo;It would help if the referee, at his discretion, could check the television replays on whether a goal was in or not,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;But that&rsquo;s absolutely the only situation when it should be used.&rdquo;If Ron Wicks were a baseball umpire at 45 years of age, a time when he had seen, heard and coped with it all, he could look forward to another 15 years in the barrel. But hockey officiating, a most strenuous occupation because of the skating involved, places a man at his age well along the trail. &#9632;

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Senior Zebra Recalls His Life In Zoo

<div class="byline">BY JEFF Z. KLEIN AND KARL-ERIC REIF</div>Over the last few years, more and more attention has been paid to the scoring done in man-advantage and shorthanded situations.This makes good sense because how successful a team is in taking advantage of its opponent&rsquo;s penalties, and in shutting down the opposition&rsquo;s power play, is integral to a team&rsquo;s ability to win.But the tight focus on offense and defense with men in the penalty box has distracted attention from the circumstances of most goal scoring in the game&mdash;during the major portion of the game when both teams are at even strength.There were 6,530 goals scored in the National Hockey League last year during the regular schedule, 1,497 of them on the power play and 235 while a man down&mdash;leaving an overwhelming 73.5 per cent of the goals a product of even-up situations. In both &lsquo;82-83 and &lsquo;83-84, the figure was 73 per cent.Who&rsquo;s scoring all these even-strength goals? Not surprisingly, it&rsquo;s the same guys who are the big shooters on the power play, as the accompanying table shows. Of the NHL&rsquo;s top 20 goal-scorers in &lsquo;84-85, only three&mdash;Brian Propp, Paul MacLean and Dave Taylor&mdash;depended too much on power-play and shorthanded goals to appear in the even-strength Top 20.In this Age of Air Hockey, when crowds are delighted by the awful spectacle Of teams regularly combining for double-digit scores, and when defense is regarded as a novelty item from an era long past, it&rsquo;s startling to hear a skeptical word tossed at the NHL&rsquo;s venerated big guns.Yet one of the biggest of them came in for some half-baked criticism during last year&rsquo;s playoffs. Philadelphia&rsquo;s mammoth Tim Kerr, who banged home 54 goals during the regular season, strained his right knee and missed most of the semi-finals. He saw limited action in only three games of the Stanley Cup final against Edmonton.Some experts, noting that Kerr had tallied 21 times with the manpower advantage, pegged him as merely a power-play specialist whose absence would not seriously hurt Philadelphia&rsquo;s chances.A prolific scorer of power-play goals, the experts opined, is more easily replaced than a good goal scorer in general. But they didn&rsquo;t realize that a good powerplay scorer is almost always a good evenstrength scorer.Kerr, a power-play sniper, was also an even-strength sniper (in &lsquo;84-85, he ranked sixth in total goals and seventh in even-strength goals). The experts blew it. Without a healthy Tim Kerr, Philly managed just 14 goals in the final&mdash;only three on the power play&mdash;and lost to the Oilers in five games.Some players&rsquo; total-goals figures would be even more impressive if you took away only the power-play markers and left the even-strength and shorthanded goals in. As if Wayne Gretzky needed any more promotional material, it&rsquo;s worth noting that of the Brantford native&rsquo;s 73 goals in &lsquo;84-85, 11 came with his Oilers a man down and a mere eight on the Edmonton power play. That&rsquo;s 65 non-power-play goals.THE MUSEUM OF THE HARD-TO-BELIEVE&mdash;In &lsquo;84-85, there was an average of 8.03 power-play situations per game, 4.19 of which went to the home team and 3.84 to the visitors (52.2 per cent of all advantages went to the home team). Of all shorthanded goals, 60.4 per cent were scored by the home team&hellip;Now that Brad Park and Butch Goring have retired to their Canadiens have won the most Stanley Cups (22), and that Toronto, as Leafs, St. Pats and Arenas have won the second most (14). But which city has the third-highest number of Cup wins? Detroit? No! It&rsquo;s Ottawa, which as the Senators and Silver Seven, won nine.<h2>LEADERS IN EVEN-STRENGTH GOALS</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0007-02940/5776442-1-eng-US/f0007-022.jpg" title="f0007-02" width="986" height="700"></div> &#9632;

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Even Strength Deserves Emphasis

<div class="image-hero"><img title="f0008-01" src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0008-011458/5776473-1-eng-US/f0008-012.jpg"></div>The International Hockey &lsquo;A/eekly Founded in 1947Published by W.C.C. Publishing Ltd85 Scarsdale Road, #100, Toronto, Ontario, Canada M3B 2R2.<h2>International Overload</h2>THE HOLIDAY SEASON is over for another year and so are most of the international exhibition games and tours that have dominated so much of our hockeyscape.The World Junior Championships in Hamilton&hellip;Central Red Army and Moscow Dynamo&rsquo;s 10-game tour through National Hockey League cities&hellip;the Esso Cup in Quebec (an international midget tourney involving top players from the Soviet Union and Canada)&hellip;the Izvestia Cup in Moscow&hellip;the Spengler Cup in Davos, Switzerland&hellip;the World University tourney (for collegiate players) in Battle Creek, Mich&hellip;.the list goes on and on.That doesn&rsquo;t even include the countless number of minor and amateur tournaments conducted throughout Canada, the United States and Europe.Now, international hockey is all well and good, but forgive us if we&rsquo;rejust a little numbed by all of it. Call it international overload.Which is not to say international hockey should be eliminated, or for that matter, even reduced. It&rsquo;s too easy to say, &ldquo;Cut it out&rdquo; because when you analyze who&rsquo;s playing who at what level, you realize international hockey competition covers a broad spectrum from the youngest amateur teams to the most-seasoned professional clubs.And international hockey, as we see it, is a valuable experience for participants and fans on both sides of the ocean.So without decreasing the quantity, it&rsquo;s still possible to upgrade the quality. Specifically, we&rsquo;re talking about games involving Soviet and NHL club teams. This type of series has evolved to the point where something more than an educational experience has to be on the line.NHL governors should take the necessary steps to incorporate a visiting Soviet team&rsquo;s tour into the regular-season schedule.For example, why not have Moscow Dynamo or Red Army play each team in one division, say the Smythe, and have the points count in the standings? You need not have a Soviet team play through the entire NHL. One division per year would be sufficient to maintain equity in the schedule and standings.Otherwise, these Soviet-NHL exhibitions, staged to help fill NHL Players&rsquo; Association pension coffers, pale in comparison to the only truly meaningful (best-on-best) international tournaments&mdash;the World Junior Championships and the Canada Cup. &#9632;

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The Hockey News

<h2>FAN FORUM</h2>Let your voice be heard! Send your comments to Fan Forum, THE HOCKEY NEWS, 85 Scarsdale Rd., Suite 100, Don Mills, Ontario, Canada M3B 2R2. THN reserves the right to edit all submissions.AS A VOICE through which hockey fans can express their views, I submit two recommendations to the National Hockey League: (1) In the wake of the Glenn Anderson, Dave Silk and Greg Stefan suspensions (re. stick swinging), I wish to appeal to NHL president John Ziegler, NHL governors and the Players&rsquo; Association to get tough with these perpetrators of dirty hockey.What I would like to see is not only tougher penalties but a set of guidelines to handle future offenses. For instance anybody guilty of a match penalty for deliberate attempt to injure should get a minimum 20-game suspension. And for a second offense, 40 games. And so on.(2) Ban fighting in the NHL! We can&rsquo;t, it serves as a useful release valve for the players. Also, some fans like it.Heard the above argument before? So have I.Well, I have a compromise solution. Let&rsquo;s allow the occasional fisticuffs but outlaw the habitual fighters, those players who have 20 to 30 fights a year.My suggestion is that every player be allowed five fights per season. For every fight beyond that, tack on a one-game suspension.This wav I believe both sides gain. The release valve of fighting is still there and for those fans of fisticuffs, there is still the occasional fight.However the habitual fighters would be phased out of the game.Terry Walker,&nbsp; Stayner, Ont.(We agree it&rsquo;s time to scrub clean the game of dirty play. We recommend Mr. Bubbles.)<h2>FACING UP TO IT</h2>I see in the Dec. 20th issue of THN, cartoonist Dave Elston is the latest to criticize linesmen for insisting on perfect faceoffs.Let&rsquo;s place the blame where it belongs&mdash;on the players.If the average player started playing hockey in peewee, then he has been playing for approximately 15 years. If they don&rsquo;t know the rules and regulations by now, something is wrong. The problem is, they do know the rules and regulations and try to circumvent them by gaining an edge through improper positioning of their stick or body.Imagine the howls of protest if a goal was scored as a result of a player cheating on the faceoff. Let&rsquo;s face it, the linesmen are in a no-win position. Let&rsquo;s give them credit for enforcing the rule and doing their jobs.Tom Cummings, Middleton, NY(Cheaters, in this case, can prosper. Right?)<h2>GETTING A FAN&rsquo;S GOAT</h2>I recently went to a Whalers-Flyers game in Hartford.The tickets were $ 16 each and we sat with the mountain goats. I wouldn&rsquo;t mind coping with the thin atmosphere except for the fact that the lower-level seats were half empty.The Whalers are owned by insurance companies, which give their managers tickets whether they like hockey or care about the sport. It&rsquo;s a shame that you have to know somebody whose father works at Aetna or The Hartford of Travelers to get decent seats.I think they should let the real fans of the game move down after the second period. All of us who go to watch the games don&rsquo;t mind if we have to sit next to men in three-piece suits.Maureen Egan, New Britain, CT(Do you think the mountain goats would mind sitting beside the men in three-piece suits?)<h2>VOTE IN FAVOR OF FANS</h2>Should the fans be the ones&rsquo; voting for the all-star teams? I enjoyed the chance to vote this year and I think it&rsquo;s a good idea.But it&rsquo;s obvious some things haven&rsquo;t changed. There are still some mysterious selections. At the time of this writing, Grant Fuhr was the leading goalie in votes for the Campbell Conference. I&rsquo;m confused. My pick is Reggie Lemelin.Let&rsquo;s give some recognition where it&rsquo;s deserved. Maybe it should start with THE HOCKEY NEWS. When are we going to see a cover story on Reggie&rsquo;s rags-to-riches story?Allan Hansen,&nbsp; Brandon, Man.(Now is not the time to fan any of the Flames, who are in the midst of a team record 10-game losing streak.) &#9632;

Limit The Number Of Fights Allowed Per Player

<div class="byline">By Bruce Hood</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0010-011489/5776559-1-eng-US/f0010-012.jpg" title="f0010-01" width="368" height="460"></div>Q: I recently attended a CCHA game between Western Michigan and Lake Superior State and saw two occasions when a team rushed into the other&rsquo;s zone and took a shot which rebounded off the goalie. While the puck was still in play, the referee blew his whistle and the faceoff was held outside the blueline. Why was the faceoff outside?John A. Hamm Oshtemo. Ml.A: I assume that the attacking team hadn&rsquo;t caused a highstick of the puck, or something of that nature to move the faceoff outside, as you don&rsquo;t indicate that. The other possibility is that the linesman was blocked out of the play and the play was offside and the referee made the offside call.Q: It appears that players holding other players&rsquo; sticks with their hands are not often called for a holding penalty. Why not?Harvey Fem Lanham. MD.A: This is an area of judgment by the referee that often differs with the average fan. It happens most often in front of the net. usually by the defenseman who grabs the forward&rsquo;s stick as soon as he arrives and generally has control of the player&rsquo;s movements. The guideline is that any action by a player to impede the movement of an opposing player, whether it be by holding his stick, jersey, or whatever, to keep that player from taking part in the actual play, is an infraction. Players grab each others sticks all the time and sometimes it is hard to tell who is at fault, therefore the referee generally will only call the infraction that has obviously kept the player from getting to the puck or to make a check.Q: What nature of verbal activity to the referee will inspire an unsportsmanlike conduct penalty? Often players cuss and use expletives after a call and are not penalized.Harvey Fern&nbsp; Lanham. MD.A: The use of foul language by a player anywhere on the ice is not condoned and either an unsportsmanlike minor or a misconduct will be called, depending upon the circumstances. However, you are right, you see it happen many times and wonder why it isn&rsquo;t called and it is usually when the referee has left the actual vicinity of the player. Players have a tendency to use the officials to vent their frustrations, maybe not because of a call that was or wasn&rsquo;t made, but because of the way they are playing. Referees and linesmen have to use a certain amount of judgment in each situation, but where they are being belittled unnecessarily, they will usually react with the call.If you want your questions answered, write to:ASK THE REFEREE 16 Martin Street Milton, Ont. L9T 2P9All questions will be considered, but only those published will be answered. Personal responses are not possible. &#9632;

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ASK THE REFEREE

<div class="byline">BY BOB DUFF</div><div class="image-hero"><img title="f0010-03" src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0010-03722/5776590-1-eng-US/f0010-032.jpg"></div>that the following players had the best shooting percentage in the NHL last season. (Minimum 80 shots on goal). &#9632;

f0010-03

Did You Know…

<div class="byline">BY RANDY SCHULTZ</div><div class="image-hero"><img title="f0010-02" src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0010-021130/5776621-1-eng-US/f0010-022.jpg"><figcaption class="caption-body">Willie Marshall holds the American League for goal scoring with 523 over his career&mdash;one more than Fred Glover.</figcaption></div>Willie Marshall is to the American Hockey League what Gordie Howe is and Wayne Gretzky eventually will be to the National Hockey League.Like Howe in the NHL, Marshall holds the American League record for most goals with 523&mdash;an accomplishment of which Marshall is justifiably proud.&ldquo;That record means a lot to me, especially in light of the fact of how the structure of the game is today,&rdquo; said Marshall, who played 20 AHL seasons (1952-72) in Pittsburgh, Hershey, Providence, Baltimore and Rochester. &ldquo;I think that is a record that is going to stand for a long time because you aren&rsquo;t going to find players playing 20 years in the minors any more.&ldquo;If they are any good at all they will go up to the NHL. If not, they will play a few years in the minors and then retire. The pay just isn&rsquo;t that good.&rdquo;Why did Marshall stay around so long in minors?&ldquo;It&rsquo;s like anything you like to do,&rdquo; said Marshall, who also played in parts of four different seasons with the Toronto Maple Leafs. &ldquo;I enjoyed playing hockey and life for me wasn&rsquo;t so bad in the AHL.&ldquo;And longevity wasn&rsquo;t so strange in any of the minors back in the days I played. There weren&rsquo;t that many of us that stayed around, but those of us that did made the most of it.&ldquo;Remember, too, that for the most part of my career, there were only six teams in the NHL and competition was pretty tough. You just didn&rsquo;t go in and make an NHL team.&rdquo;Marshall feels that because of that, the style of play in the AHL was almost as good as the NHL.&lsquo;&lsquo;Because some teams were so stockpiled with talent from the parent team in the NHL, they could go two or three seasons of playing good, competitive hockey before using some of that talent,&rdquo; recalled Marshall, a 53-year-old native of Kirkland Lake, Ont. &ldquo;In fact there were some players who were good enough to play in the NHL but never really got the chance and ended up spending most of their careers in the AHL.&ldquo;One such player was Zellio Toppazzini, who spent part of his minor league days in Providence. He was a good goal scorer as well as assist man. He could really rack up the points.&ldquo;Unfortunately, he just never made it in the NHL. Talent-wise, I thought he was one of the best I ever played against. But he could never really break that barrier into the NHL.&rdquo;Marshall recalled the time when he wanted to stay in the AHL one more season just to break the goal scoring record of 522 held by another AHL great, Fred Glover.&ldquo;At the beginning of my final season I was only a couple of goals short of breaking Glover&rsquo;s record. But nobody in the NHL wanted me,&rdquo; said Marshall who lives in Tonawanda and is an owner of a Canadian mining company.<h2>WHERE ARE THEY NOW</h2>&ldquo;Finally Rochester took a chance on me and I played for the Amerks as a utility player. It took me quite awhile during that final season (1971-72) to break the record, only playing a few shifts at a time.&ldquo;But I finally broke it by one. I struggled to do it. I missed so many times, hitting posts and crossbars.&ldquo;But I&rsquo;m glad I did it. It will stand for a long time. I know I&rsquo;ll never see it broken. Maybe no one else will either.&rdquo; &#9632;

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AHL Scoring King Marshall Fondly Remembers His Past

<div class="byline">BY BOB DONNELLY</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0011-011351/5776652-1-eng-US/f0011-012.jpg" title="f0011-01" width="576" height="163"></div><h2>QUEBEC NORDIQUES</h2>QUEBEC CITY&mdash;Talk about going from the top to the bottom in a hurry,Quebec Nordiques&rsquo; coach Michel Bergeron was justifiably proud when his team handed Central Red Army a 5-1 defeat late in December.He was all smiles in claiming no National Hockey League team could have played a better game or even as well as his team on that particular night.But while the Nordiques were beating the Soviets, they were also plummeting to last place in the Adams Division. Because on the same night both Hartford and Buffalo were winning games that counted in the standings.And as is becoming clear, a moral victory is not nearly as important as two points in the Adams Division these days.The first-rate effort against Central Red Army followed fast on the heels of a dreadful performance against the cellardwelling Detroit Red Wings 5-1 one night earlier.&ldquo;It has been so rare that we win a game that I hardly know how to react,&rdquo; said Harry Neale, who was relieved of his duties as head coach of the Wings just three days after the triumph over the Nordiques. For the Red Wings, it was their first win in 10 starts.Bergeron, for his part, decided that the time had come to take action because he knew he could not afford to get behind in the Adams Division.&ldquo;If you look at the standings, you see that five of the top eight teams in the league are in our division,&rdquo; said Bergeron. &ldquo;I know it is going to go down to the wire and that all of the teams in our division should be in there until the very end.&rdquo;Bergeron decided to make some changes and he sent Mark Kumpel and defenseman Gord Donnelly to the&rsquo; Fredericton Express to start the new year. Kumpel was not getting enough ice time in Quebec and Donnelly became a victim of the numbers game when Normand Rochefort returned to the Quebec lineup against Hartford.The coach also had a special message for Wilf Paiement, whom he did not even dress for the Soviet game. Paiement had been having problems on the ice in recent months and not dressing for the Soviet game was the first time he had not been used by Bergeron since his arrival from Toronto in March of 1982.&ldquo;I told him what I wanted him to do on the ice and that I was not satisfied with what I had been seeing,&rdquo; said Bergeron. &ldquo;I am not trying to shake up the team or to scare anyone else but the time for talking is over as far as I am concerned.&rdquo;Although Paiement had six goals and nine assists in 28 games, what Bergeron wanted to see was more aggressiveness. He recently said that Paiement should forget about trying to score 40 goals a season and that he would be more valuable to the team scoring only 20 goals a year but by using his body in the corners and along the boards.While Bergeron was unhappy with the play of Paiement, and with his team losing five of games through late December, he did find small consolation (literally) in the remarkable play of diminutive Jean-Francois Sauve on the power play and Clint Malarchuk in goal.Sauve had an impressive 21 points in his last 11 games through New Year&rsquo;s Eve. He had six goals and 15 assists in that stint, 20 of those points coming on the power play. He had established himself as one of the top scorers on the team alongside Peter Stastny and Michel Goulet.&ldquo;I know that December has been a really good month for me,&rdquo; said Sauve. &ldquo;I&rsquo;m also happy to get a regular shift now and then as well. I&rsquo;m not used to thinking defense and playing at even strength because I am usually only on the power play.&rdquo;Malarchuk had established himself as the No. 1 goaltender in Quebec over the last two months. Although Mario Gosselin remained the favorite with fans voting for the All-Star game, Malarchuk enjoyed the confidence of his coach.His goals-against average was one of the best in the league and he was playing as well at home as he did on the road. Up until this year Malarchuk was always more nervous when he played at the Colisee than on the road. &#9632;

f0011-01

Coach Says To Paiement, ‘Nuet, Nyet Soviet’

<div class="byline">BY TOM HENSHAW</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0011-02991/5776683-1-eng-US/f0011-022.jpg" title="f0011-02" width="579" height="163"></div><h2>BOSTON BRUINS</h2>BOSTON&mdash;Yes, that was Barry Pederson watching from the press box Dec. 28 as the Boston Bruins broke a 10-game winless streak on the road with a 5-1 victory over the St. Louis Blues.He wasn&rsquo;t injured or ill. He was benched for not playing up to expectations with only 13 goals in 36 games and only four markers in the last 17 contests.He was not happy about the turn of events.&ldquo;No,&rdquo; he said tersely, &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve never been benched before. It&rsquo;s never something you like, but it&rsquo;s their decision.&rdquo;&ldquo;Barry is a very important part of our team,&rdquo; said coach Butch Goring. &ldquo;He&rsquo;s a guy who plays 20 minutes a game, a guy we need to have playing well. He&rsquo;s not performing the way he can.&ldquo;When you have the responsibility of being a key person, a star, you have to step up and accept that responsibility. A lot is expected and if it doesn&rsquo;t happen you have to shoulder a lot of the blame.&ldquo;This is not to say that Barry&rsquo;s the only one of our key players not doing it. But obviously we can&rsquo;t sit down 10 guys.&rdquo;Pederson, the 24-year-old centerman who has had three seasons of 39 or more goals for the Bruins, has an excuse of sorts since he missed all but 22 games last season, mostly due to two bouts with serious surgery.He was operated on in August, 1984, for what was thought to be a lump of scar tissue on his upper right arm. It turned out to be a non-malignant tumor, and on Jan. 11, 1985, a piece of his upper arm four by six inches square was surgically removed.When training camp opened, he thought he was ready. He really wasn&rsquo;t. In mid-December, he scored two goals to beat the New York Rangers 4-2 and he was sure that this was it. It really wasn&rsquo;t.&ldquo;I&rsquo;ve been happy with the fact that I&rsquo;m playing again,&rdquo; he said after the Ranger game. &ldquo;But I&rsquo;m not totally happy offensively with the way my season&rsquo;s been going.&rdquo;The Bruins were not totally happy with his offensive play either. Goring was reluctant to say it in so many words but the sense of it was clear from the coach&rsquo;s words.&ldquo;I think Barry has basically played pretty well,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;He has had some great moments and he has had some other games that haven&rsquo;t been as good. But overall he has been all right. Of course, you always hope that everyone plays a little better.&rdquo;Pederson tried to analyze what had happened to his game.&ldquo;After the first 20 games,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;my intensity wasn&rsquo;t as high as I wanted it to be. I think I worked so hard physically during the off-season and in training camp that I left my mental game at home.&ldquo;I came into the season positive, in fact, too positive. I was thinking it was going to be a lot easier. It was my first time on the injured list and I didn&rsquo;t really know what to expect. I wasn&rsquo;t mentally tough on my game.&ldquo;After 20 games, Butchie and Mike Milbury and I sat down and we reevaluated everything. They felt that where I really had to improve was in my intensity. I pride myself on my consistency and to be consistent you have to be intense every game.&ldquo;I went back to basics. I&rsquo;ve been really concentrating on my defensive game, faceoffs, taking the body. Now I&rsquo;ve got to concentrate on offense and become a threat again offensively.&rdquo;Physically, said Pederson, he is fine.&ldquo;It&rsquo;s the first time in about 18 months that I&rsquo;ve really felt good physically,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;My legs are feeling good. My wind is good. There has been absolutely no pain in my arm or my hand.&ldquo;It&rsquo;s the first time I can remember in a long time that I&rsquo;ve felt good physically.&rdquo;Rick Middleton, who was Pederson&rsquo;s right winger during the years when he averaged more than 42 goals a year, can sympathize with him.&ldquo;I know he&rsquo;s not happy with the way he&rsquo;s played most of this season,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;He&rsquo;s not coming along as quickly as he would like. But he&rsquo;s working hard and skating well and it&rsquo;s a long year.&ldquo;His confidence level is not as high as he would like. When that happens you tend to second-guess yourself. You fool with your stick, you try different things that maybe you shouldn&rsquo;t.&ldquo;But give him a week or two of good solid hockey and he&rsquo;ll be on his way.&rdquo; &#9632;

f0011-02

Pederson Struggles To Regain Form

Hockey Hall of Fame member Bruce Norris is dead at age 61.The former owner of the Detroit Red Wings died of liver failure Dec. 31 at the University Hospital in Stony Brook, N.Y.Norris sold the Red Wings to current owner Mike Hitch on June 22, 1982 to end 50 years of family ownership in Detroit.James D, Norris, Bruce&rsquo;s father, began the dynasty in 1932 when he purchased the Detroit Falcons and Olympia Stadium. The elder Norris renamed the club and presided over seven Stanley Cup champions in 23 years.Bruce Norris, a Chicago native, took over the club when he was 31 and in his first year&mdash;the 1954-55 season&mdash;watched the Wings win the Stanley Cup.Since then the Red Wings have had trouble making the playoffs much of the time, let alone winning the Stanley Cup.&ldquo;I and all of hockey,&rdquo; said NHL president John Ziegler in a prepared statement, &ldquo;have lost one of our great friends and one of the greatest contributors to the National Hockey League that the game has ever known.&rdquo;Norris, a two-time past chairman of the NHL&rsquo;s board of governors, was awarded the Lester Patrick Trophy for outstanding service to U.S. hockey in 1976.The Boston Bruins&rsquo; Charlie Simmer and New Haven Nighthawks&rsquo; Tony Feltrin are the latest hockey players to be touched by a recent spate of eye injuries.Simmer had to be taken from the ice on a stretcher after, being struck in the right eye&rsquo;by Gates Orlando&rsquo;s stick Jan. 4 in a game against the Buffalo Sabres.The 6-foot-3 left winger, playing his fifth game since returning from a knee injury that cost him 19 games, was reported in improved condition but was to be kept in hospital to ensure total rest.A club spokesman said Simmer&rsquo;s vision had improved to 20-30 and the prognosis for complete recovery was good.Bruins&rsquo; general manager Harry Sinden said he was &ldquo;sure&rdquo; the incident was unintentional but criticized college-trained players and NHL officials for permining players to be careless with their sticks.&ldquo;The kid didn&rsquo;t mean to hit him in the eye but he&rsquo;s been helmeted and visored all his career and he&rsquo;s got no respect for what can happen when your stick up like that,&rdquo; said Sinden.&ldquo;Before this league had players running around looking like the Knights of the Round Table, players had respect for injuries they could cause.&rdquo;Feltrin, a defenseman who had played 10 games with the New York Rangers this season, was clipped in the left eye by a high stick in an American League game between the Nighthawks and Nova Scotia Oilers on New Year&rsquo;s Eve.Following surgery at Victoria General Hospital to repair two tears in the retina, a Rangers&rsquo; spokesman said Feltrin would be flown to New York for further examination provided there were no complications.&ldquo;(This is) A serious situation with his eye,&rdquo; said the spokesman, who called Feltrin&rsquo;s condition guarded but optimistic.USA Today says that the Soviet Red Army hockey club didn&rsquo;t bring top center Igor Larionov to North America for a six-game tour of NHL cities because it feared he would defect.Larionov, one of the world&rsquo;s top pivotmen and a 1985 draft choice of the Vancouver Canucks, is said to be highly Westernized.He speaks some English and is a big fan of rock music, according to USA Today&rsquo;s&nbsp;Rod Beaton.A spokesman for the Canucks said that general manager Jack Gordon was told that Larionov didn&rsquo;t accompany the team for medical reasons.Beaton wrote, however, that a Soviet translator said &ldquo;family problems&rdquo; were at the root of Larionov&rsquo;s absence.This has got to be a first!The Fort Wayne Komets have published a beefcake calendar for 1986, featuring their players in various barechested poses and nattily-attired coachmanager Rob Laird leaning on a Porsche (we think).It&rsquo;s a must-buy for those whose interest in hockey players extends beyond goals and assists.Among the players photographed are defenseman Dan Ryder, center Dale Oxbow, left wingers Randy Gilhen and Steve Salvucci and center Ron Leef.The calendars are available from the Komets for $8.50 (U.S.). Their address is P.O. Box 5419, Fort Wayne, IN, 46895.Team Quebec doubled the Soviet Union 6-3 to win the Esso Cup midget hockey championship and salvage some pride for Canadian hockey.Pierre Turgeon, who scored 11 goals in six tournament games, led the winners with one goal and three assists. Quebec goalie Jimmy Waite was outstanding with 45 saves.The Jan. 5 victory in Verdun, Que. stood out against a backdrop of several Soviet triumphs over Canadian-and American-based teams during the Christmas season.Bowling Green was the victim of a close shave despite the best efforts of Don Barber.Glen Murphy&rsquo;s goal at 3:15 of the third overtime period gave the University of Toronto a 5-4 victory over Bowling Green in the championship game of the Lake Placid College Classic.Neither team could score during the first two 10-minute sudden-death overtime periods of a game which began Dec. 29 and ended in the early hours of Dec. 30.Former Canadian Olympian Darren Lowe scored two goals and two assists for U of T. Barber accounted for three of BGU&rsquo;s goals. &#9632;

Past NHL Owner Dead At Age 61

<div class="byline">Stan Fischler&#x2019;s</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0012-011452/5776738-1-eng-US/f0012-012.jpg" title="f0012-01" width="350" height="449"></div>As we rapidly approach the half-way mark in the season, it&rsquo;s time to reflect on what&rsquo;s been going on around us. All aboard? Here we go!&bull; The Vancouver Canucks should revert to their original 1970 hockey rink uniforms.&bull; Now I know the hockey world has caught up to Lou Nanne. I have moved him from my &ldquo;Overrated&rdquo; list to the &ldquo;OverOverrated&rdquo; section.&bull; Why do I keep thinking the Ray Neufeld deal will work out for John Ferguson?&bull; Is Esa Tikkanen Finnish or Finished?&bull; Here&rsquo;s a deal that leaves me hard-pressed to pick a winner&mdash;Curt Fraser for Tony Tanti. Each is having a helluva year.&bull; Can&rsquo;t say the same for the Dave Richter-Bo Berglund for Ed Hospodar-Todd Bergen. Nanne lost that by a lot. Make that a house and a lot.&bull; You can appreciate how powerful the Oilers are this way: They&rsquo;re loping along in three-quarter time and still running away with the kit and kaboodle.&bull; The Sabres&rsquo; uniforms have to go, too.&bull; Every time I watch Phil Housley, I say to myself there&rsquo;s a player I&rsquo;d like on my team. Ditto Peter Zezel, every Sutter and Kevin McClelland.&bull; Mario Lemieux is a better player at this point in time than Jean Beliveau was at the same age. (The unanswered Lemieux question remains: Can he keep the fire burning consistently the way Beliveau did?)&bull; People ask me why Bobby Carptenter isn&rsquo;t running away with the Caps&rsquo; scoring lead and I tell them the new contract made him a lazy fat-cat.&bull; If I had to pick one guy I never figured to make it this far it would be Pat Price of the Nordiques. Ditto Mike McEwen and Joel Quenneville.&bull; You gotta like the coaching job Doug Carpenter has done with the Devils. Ditto Butch Goring and Jacques Demers.&bull; You don&rsquo;t have to like what&rsquo;s going on with the Black Hawks&rsquo; coaching.&bull; When will Warren Young stop laughing?&bull; With all of Mark Messier&rsquo;s talents, how come he doesn&rsquo;t score like a Lemieux?&bull; I&rsquo;m getting Herbie Brooks&rsquo; withdrawal pangs. Ditto Don Cherry.&bull; Since the NHL produces a new trophy just about every month, how about one for Tiger Williams on general principles. (Or unprinciples.)&bull; What is it with Rick Vaive?&bull; The most consistently mediocre player over the past four years has to be Dwight Foster.&bull; And to think I once figured Eddie Mio would be as good as John Davidson.&bull; If the Flyers meet the Oilers in the finals, I want to see how tough Dave Brown is with Kevin McClelland.&bull; I&rsquo;ve got to hand it to Harry Sinden for coming up with those Kraig Nienhuis&rsquo;, Dave Pasins and Randy Burridges every year.&bull; It took a while but I&rsquo;m getting to like Rob Ramage as a player.&bull; If Al lafrate can survive the Maple Leafs&rsquo; menagerie, he&rsquo;s going to be one dandy defenseman.&bull; It&rsquo;s fashionable for some male writers to put the knock on their female counterparts but you won&rsquo;t find a harder worker than Newsday&rsquo;s Helene Elliott.&bull; Three years ago I figured Joe Cirella would be a superstar by 1986.&bull; Wouldn&rsquo;t it be something if Pete Peeters put down the legion of Pete Peeters-knockers by having a super season with Washington?&bull; Remember what I said about Harry Sinden. The same goes for Serge Savard. Good job!&bull; Did you ever stop to think that Tim Kerr gets more goals with less energy than any NHL superscorer.&bull; Maybe the Winnipeg Jets aren&rsquo;t that good after all.&bull; If I owned the Buffalo Sabres, I&rsquo;d hold up those Hamilton people for a fortune in indemnification fees before I&rsquo;d let them take one step into the NHL. (And I&rsquo;d hire John McMullen as an advisor.)&bull; The only way Scotty Morrison can justify his job is by not rereading the officiating comments of NHL coaches after just about every game.&bull; By the way, just what does Scotty Morrison do? Ditto John McCauley.&bull; I noticed that Dan Kelly didn&rsquo;t shake my hand last time I offered it to him. (Is he still mad about the Al Albert-is-better item from last year?)&bull; I&rsquo;m beginning to believe that the personality of a GM has a direct bearing on the personality of a team&mdash;with the exception of Winnipeg.&bull; By the way, who is the general manager of the Canucks?&bull; Are you listening Tim Moriarty and the rest of the Hockey Hall of Fame selectors? This year, vote in Ken McKenzie, founder of THE HOCKEY NEWS (put him in the builders section) and Ben Olan, who put hockey on the map at The Associated Press. That&rsquo;s in case you forgot what I wrote last time. While you&rsquo;re at it, don&rsquo;t forget Dean Prentice for left wing.&bull; You can put Hakan Loob in the Bobby Carpenter category.&bull; Has there ever been a dirtier Swede in the NHL than Tomas Sandstrom?&bull; Isn&rsquo;t it amazing that the L. A. Kings dealt for Rollie Melanson when he wasn&rsquo;t even healthy?&bull; Emile (Cat) Francis gains a lot of points for stiffing the Leafs with Chris Kotsopoulos and coming up with Stew Gavin. Matter of fact. The Cat gets another gold star for the Dave Babych deal.&bull; I&rsquo;ve got an idea that ought to make the Hartford Whalers happy: How about a special amendment to the NHL constitution that allows all Adams division teams to qualify for the playoffs and only three from the Norris?&bull; Give me one good reason why the Oilers obtained Jeff Brubaker from Toronto.&bull; So where does Harry Neale go from here?&bull; Here&rsquo;s a surprise scouting report: The Islanders&rsquo; Bill Smith lauds Dave Semenko for having one of the best shots in the league.&bull; The Red Wings&rsquo; defense gets dumped on something awful but I do like the way John Barrett throws his weight around.&bull; If you really want to know why the Los Angeles Kings will never become a real contender whether they bring in Pat Quinn, Don Cherry, Herb Brooks, Glen Sather or God, it&rsquo;s the climate. Pure and simple.&bull; That&rsquo;s right, I still think Bob Froese is every bit as good a goalie as Pelle Lindbergh was. Remember this: Lindbergh had one and only one truly exceptional season.&bull; Some day when we have a bit more time I&rsquo;ll tell you why Denis Potvin should get more credit in the Bobby Orr comparisons.&bull; I don&rsquo;t fault Jimmy Devellano for the Adam Oates-Ray Staszak fiasco, but I do for being conned by Bobby Clarke in the Darryl Sittler deal. (Look at how Murray Craven has developed in Philly.)&bull; Speaking of blunders, did Rogie Vachon blow it or didn&rsquo;t he blow it in letting Terry Ruskowski go to Pittsburgh?&bull; My friend Vic Morren says Ken Wilson is the best play-byplay man on ESPN.&bull; Why is Bob McGill in the NHL?&bull; The more I see Michel Goulet, the more he reminds me of Camille Henry around the net. (And was there ever a more dangerous man around the crease than Camille The Eel?)&bull; I think the time has come for us to stop doubting Bryan Murray&rsquo;s ability as a coach.&bull; Mats Hallin is another chap I figured for a better career than he&rsquo;s had. Ditto Dino Ciccarelli.&bull; The night I saw Greg Millen he looked like the best goalie in the league.&bull; I&rsquo;m surprised that Scott Stevens hasn&rsquo;t come on stronger as a Norris Trophy candidate.&bull; Right now it&rsquo;s Paul Coffey for the Norris with Ray Bourque right up there. It&rsquo;s hard to overlook Rod Langway just on defensive principles and how about Mark Howe. (Well, how about Mark Howe!)&bull; Ron Caron has done more with less than any other GM in the league (even though his title is &ldquo;vice-president-director of hockey operations.&rdquo;)&bull; It&rsquo;s no longer fashionable to laugh at Max McNab who, with dignity and patience, has developed a competitive team in the Meadowlands. (Now if he could only develop some fans.)&bull; Those magnetic nets aren&rsquo;t so bad after all.&bull; Vancouver had my two favorite names of 1986&mdash;Moe Lemay and Jiri Bubla.&bull; Utica would be a good city to add to the American League.&bull; And so would Providence.&bull; And Syracuse.&bull; I&rsquo;m betting that Gil Perreault will hang in there longer than Marcel Dionne.&bull; As an experiment I&rsquo;d like to see the NHL ban helmets for two weeks. Guaranteed there&rsquo;d be fewer head injuries than there are now. Another experiment I&rsquo;d like is the abolition of the slapshot.&bull; Columnist Larry Tucker of the Calgary Sun is the only sportswriter other than Alan Greenberg of the Hartford Courant to come down extremely hard on Pelle Lindbergh. It takes a lot of courage for a Tucker to write as he did, &ldquo;What Lindbergh did showed no more good and common sense than that possessed by a gopher.&rdquo;&bull; In a couple of weeks we&rsquo;ll be celebrating the third anniversary of Saskatoon&rsquo;s ill-fated bid for the Blues and the bigs.&bull; What ever happened to Wild Bill Hunter?&bull; Wouldn&rsquo;t it be something if Dave Schultz, now GM-coach of the New York Slapshots (with no home rink), eventually made it as an NHL coach in Philly!&bull; If Jim Schoenfeld has succeeded&mdash;as promised&mdash;to make his Sabres more offensive, it must be happening behind closed doors.&bull; The uniform switching (wearing home uniforms away and vice versa) is a neat idea, except for the Sabres and the Canucks, whose uniforms really don&rsquo;t matter, home or away.&bull; Glenn Anderson is playing the way Mark Messier&rsquo;s press clippings say Messier should be performing.&bull; Better Craig Coxe should duke it out with his GM than Dwight Schofield.&bull; The foghorn at Chicago Stadium is my kind of toy. &#9632;

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Is Nanne Overrated Or Over-Overrated?

<div class="byline">BY MICHAEL A. BERGER</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0013-011365/5776769-1-eng-US/f0013-012.jpg" title="f0013-01" width="578" height="168"></div><h2>NEW YORK RANGERS</h2>NEW YORK&mdash;This should have been a nice easy piece, a simple review of the first half of the New York Rangers&rsquo; first season under the helm of Ted Sator.But no, Dave DeBusschere, executive vice-president of the National Basketball Association&rsquo;s New York Knickerbockers had to go and get himself fired.Now you may be asking yourself, &ldquo;What do basketball and DeBusschere&rsquo;s firing have to do with hockey and the New York Rangers?&rdquo;Everything, my friends, everything.For you see. the Knicks and the Rangers are both part of Madison Square Garden Corp., a wholly-owned subsidiary of Gulf & Western. And at G & W, the bottom line is everything.Now consider this: Within the past several months, MSG Corp, has replaced its vice-presidents of boxing, MSG Cable company, several administrative veeps and finally, its vice-president of basketball. The moves coincided with the appointment of Alan Fields as MSG&rsquo;s chief operating officer.But what has this to do with hockey?, you ask. Be still, it&rsquo;s coming.When Fields was made Garden head of operations, Jack Krumpe, the former boss who used to be in charge of boxing and all those other things, remained president of just the Knicks and Rangers.To say there is a power struggle going on between Fields and Krumpe. according to solid MSG sources, would be a gross understatement.Fields, say the sources, wants Krumpe out. Krumpe, naturally, wants to stay. By firing DeBusschere (the Knicks were 11-22 at the time of his dismissal), it is said Krumpe hoped to save face by showing he&rsquo;s decisive enough to make the tough decisions.But Knick sources say that Krumpe had to receive approval from his G & W higher-ups to fire DeBusschere and that that approval most likely came fromArthur Barron, G & W&rsquo;s veep of entertainment, the corporate division to which MSG belongs. Word is, also, that Krumpe didn&rsquo;t want to fire DeBusschere anyway.But what&hellip;?Hang on, almost there.The same Knick sources say that DeBusschere was axed because of his inactivity, his passivity as a general manager.Now there&rsquo;s another vice-president in MSG who is a &lsquo;Krumpe&rsquo; man, a vicepresident who has been criticized consistently in the media for his own inactivity and that man, of course, is Rangers&rsquo; veep Craig Patrick.There, see how this all fits together.Fields allegedly wants Krumpe, and any vestige of him, out. Patrick is on the last year of his contract and the G & W powers-that-be have already shown their predilection for removing executives in mid-term.Patrick&rsquo;s job is hanging by a thread and Fields is willing to wait and let Patrick and Krumpe hang themselves, according to the MSG sources.Patrick might be able to squeeze out of this if a) his team wins or b) the MSG behind-the-scenes power struggle proceeds in his favor.But what makes all this so compelling, so possible and so realistic is the fact that Patrick&rsquo;s potential successor is already close to the Ranger situation as an MSG employee&mdash;Phil Esposito.According to corporate sources, Esposito has had informal discussions with G & W officials. Esposito maintains that he has not had any disussions with the president of the Rangers regarding a management position with the team. Krumpe&rsquo;s office concurs. No one else will comment.Again, according to corporate sources, Krumpe will never hire Esposito. Esposito, for his part, is not presenting himself as a candidate to replace Patrick, let alone actively trying to unseat him, but is listening to those corporate voices.But with each passing Ranger game&mdash;nay, period&mdash;the seats at Madison Square Garden get emptier faster as fans hasten for the exits while the Rangers founder below .500.To the bottom-line minds at Gulf & Western that is not good news. &#9632;

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Will Patrick Be Victim Of Power Struggle?

<div class="byline">BY TIM MORIARTY</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0013-02987/5776800-1-eng-US/f0013-022.jpg" title="f0013-02" width="584" height="168"></div><h2>NEW YORK ISLANDERS</h2>LONG ISLAND&mdash;It was Denis Potvin Appreciation Night, but it was Mike Bossy who stole the show.Potvin said he didn&rsquo;t mind. &ldquo;It was just a thrill to be there,&rdquo; the Islanders&rsquo; team captain said.Presumably most of the 16,169 fans in attendance at Nassau Coliseum on the night after New Year&rsquo;s Day felt the same way. Bossy, providing an astonishing finish to an astounding game, scored the 499th and 500th goals of his National Hockey League career in the final 2:22 to earn the Islanders a 7-5 victory over the Bruins.Bossy&rsquo;s 500th goal was delivered into an empty net with 17 seconds left toplay. Butch Goring, the Bruins&rsquo; rookie coach and former Islander, had pulled goalie Doug Keans for an extra attacker with 31 seconds remaining. Following a faceoff to the right of Islander goalie Bill Smith, the puck squirted loose in the neutral zone. It was captured by John Tonelli, another Islander hero on this night, near the Bruins&rsquo; blue line and he relayed it to Bossy.Now the near-capacity crowd was on its feet, screaming for Bossy to shoot at the open net before time ran out. But Bossy didn&rsquo;t rush his shot.&ldquo;I wasn&rsquo;t going to miss that chance,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;I thought I heard a whistle, so I took the time to look at the linesman to see if I was onside.&rdquo;He was. By this time, Bossy had reached the right faceoff circle. That&rsquo;s when he nudged the puck into the vacant net while the fans roared their appreciation, mindful that Bossy had become the 11th player in NHL history to reach the 500-goal mark. And he did it in the fewest number of games (647). He also was the first of the 11 players to score No. 500 into an empty net.Bossy also brought the crowd to its feet at 17:38 of the final period when he broke a 5-5 tie by converting a pass from Bryan Trottier, his longtime linemate. It was Bossy&rsquo;s 25th goal of the season and extended his latest point-scoring streak to 15 games.Keans offered a salute to Bossy at the game&rsquo;s windup.&ldquo;He didn&rsquo;t really hurt us all night, then he comes up with two goals like that in the final minutes,&rdquo; the Bruins&rsquo; goalie said. &ldquo;But that&rsquo;s the type of player he is. So explosive.&rdquo;Said Bossy: &ldquo;This means a great deal to me, of course. It&rsquo;s a milestone, but it&rsquo;s not the type of record you have to get in a specific amount of time or games. There are a lot of guys I can pass before the end of the season to be one of the top five or so.&rdquo;Among the NHL&rsquo;s all-time goal scorers, Bossy started the current season in 15th place. He has since vaulted into 11 th place, passing three retired players&mdash;Darryl Sittier (484), Norm Ullman (490) and Jean Ratelie (491)&mdash;and Gil Perreault (495). Among those ahead of Bossy are Jean Beliveau (10th at 507) and Guy Lafleur (9th at 518) and, of course, Gordie Howe (No. 1 at 801).Bossy scored his first goal in the first period of his first NHL game against Don Edwards, then with the Sabres, at Buffalo on Oct. 13, 1977. It came on a rebound shot. The Islanders lost the game 3-2.He scored his first Nassau Coliseum goal in his next game vs. the Bruins, beating goalie Ron Grahame with a second period shot that earned the Islanders a 3-1 victory.Bossy totaled 20 goals in his first 24 games and finished the season with 53 goals, still a league record for rookies.The 28-year-old right winger reached a career high of 69 goals the following season (1978-79) and has posted a league-record eight consecutive 50-goal seasons.Potvin, who broke Bobby Orr&rsquo;s alltime point-scoring record for defensemen (915 points) against the Rangers Dec. 20, was presented with a 1986 Chevrolet Blazer in pre-game ceremonies. General manager Bill Torrey also presented the Islanders&rsquo; team captain with a silver tray commemorating his achievements. Torrey then read a congratulatory wire to Potvin from Orr. Among the special guests were Potvin&rsquo;s mother Lucille, and brother Robert, who traveled from Ottawa for the occasion.ON THE ISLE&mdash;The Islanders suffered two casualties against the Bruins. Mikko Makela sustained a Charley horse and Bobby Nystrom bruised his right ankle. Three days later, Nystrom suffered lacerations above and below his left eye when he was accidentally high sticked by Gerald Diduck at practice&hellip;Roger Kortko was recallad from Springfield of the American League as Makela&rsquo;s replacement and played well in the Islanders&rsquo; 4-1 loss to the Black Hawks &#9632;

f0013-02

Bossy Stops Show On Potvin Night

<div class="byline">BY STAN FISCHLER</div>Some NHL sources insist that the expansion issue is inexorably linked with the future of St. Louis and Pittsburgh as viable NHL sites. Although Blues&rsquo; owner Harry Ornest has infused fresh money to rehab The Arena, ices a competitive team and put a freeze on ticket hikes, St. Lou attendance has slipped while the city&rsquo;s business leaders and politicians have been lukewarm to the Blues. So far, Ornest has remained mum about suggestions that he might move. Unlike the Penguins, who threatened to leave Pittsburgh&mdash;before winning concessions&mdash;the Blues have refused to play that game. The Penguins currently are out-grossing the Blues at the gate. Blues&rsquo; coverage also took a beating with the folding of the St. Louis Globe-Democrat, which leaves the city with only one major daily&hellip;Talking about superior coaches, Gordie Howe put in a vote for one he never played for&mdash;Scotty Bowman. &ldquo;I like the way he goes about things,&rdquo; Howe tells BLUELINES. While the Kings have been militantly mediocre this season, it apparently does not terribly disturb owner Jerry Buss, who remains obsessed with his NBA Lakers. Buss is said to be pulling in a cool $1-million-a-year with the new cable outfit he shares with Denver-based Bill Daniels&hellip;The American Broadcasting Corp. (ABC) will be looking for sports programming to fill the hole when the United States Football League switches to the fall. With this in mind, the NHL&mdash;at least technically&mdash;has a shot at returning to the U.S. noncable network. But TV sources say ABC prefers the NBA.The Central Collegiate Hockey Assn, is negotiating with a cable outfit to have its championships March 7-8, at Joe Louis Arena televised&hellip;Devils&rsquo; assistant coach Lou Vairo predicted last summer that Greg Adams would lead the Jerseyites this season&mdash;and he has. But Adams originally had hoped to play for the Flames, except none of the Calgary birddogs ever scouted Adams at his alma mater, Northern Arizona. &ldquo;They say &lsquo;How many players come out of Northern Arizona,&rsquo;&rdquo; says Flames coach Bob Johnson, &ldquo;but I say it only takes one and Adams is it.&rdquo;&hellip;The Devils, who were shut out from New Jersey&rsquo;s superstation, WOR-TV (9), are hoping that a combination of political clout and grass roots lobbying will get them back on the very high frequency station&hellip;The New York hockey media lobbied hard to persuade Rangers&rsquo; GM Craig Patrick that Pierre Larouche should be returned to Madison Square Garden. Those close to Patrick insist that CP&rsquo;s intense dislike for Larouche kept Unlucky Pierre in the AHL. After watching Gioacchino Rossini&rsquo;s &ldquo;Barbet of Seville,&rdquo; by the Edmonton Opera, the Oilers&rsquo; Mike Krushelnyski offered this critique: &ldquo;The music was terrific, but the story&hellip;&rdquo; To that Edmonton Journal columnist Ray Turchansky adds: &ldquo;You have to give Mike credit. At least he didn&rsquo;t say he much preferred the version where Bugs Bunny gave Elmer Fudd a haircut.&rdquo;Asked what he misses most since he retired to become assistant coach of the Boston Bruins, Mike Milbury tells BLUELINES: &ldquo;The physical outlet. Sometimes I find it difficult to channel my frustrations.&rdquo; Milbury adds that he&rsquo;s still learning about player-managerial relations from the side of the high command. &ldquo;One day I skated over to a player to mention something,&rdquo; Milbury recalls, &ldquo;The guy really surprised me when he said, &lsquo;That&rsquo;s the first time you&rsquo;ve spoken to me in three days!&rsquo;&rsquo;&rsquo;&hellip;Ernie Higgins, the goalie mask designer from Boston is branching out. His latest creation is a custom-made super-protective jock-cup designed for Doug Keans&hellip;Esa Tikkanen, the controversial Finnish-born Oiler, is grumbling about his NHL future. &ldquo;If things don&rsquo;t work out,&rdquo; warns Tikkanen, &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll return to my home in Helsinki.&rdquo;&hellip;Wayne Gretzky continues to insist that marriage is not one of his higher priorities. Appearing on Larry King&rsquo;s TV show, Gretzky was also asked directly if he has ever taken drugs. The Great One replied that he never came close and credits the strong influence of his father. Bill LaForge continues to defend his brief, disastrous tenure as Canuck coach last season. &ldquo;I don&rsquo;t think the 20 games I coached was enough to be judged by,&rdquo; says LaForge. &ldquo;It was the first time in my life I had failed at anything but deep down there is still the feeling that I can do it.&rdquo;Whalers&rsquo; captain Ron Francis is turning into a one-man Madison Avenue-type promoter. He&rsquo;s working with the Hartford-based Elkinson and Sloves ad agency which did a survey and learned that Francis&rsquo; name had 70 percent recognition in the Hartford area&hellip;International ice scouts report that no matter how strong the Soviets are on defense or attack, they&rsquo;ll remain relatively weak in goal because of a failure to develop anyone remotely close to Vladislav Tretiak&hellip;Al Eagleson&rsquo;s contract as head of the player&rsquo;s union concludes next summer and there&rsquo;s no sign of a competitor to challenge his reign. Asked whether he&rsquo;d be interested in the NHL presidency, The Eagle tells BLUELINES: &ldquo;I turned down the job in 1972 and it hasn&rsquo;t improved since.&rsquo;&rsquo;&hellip;Saskatoon sportscaster Dane McKinnon recently told his listeners that Edmonton&rsquo;s NHL writers were guilty of the &ldquo;worst kind of cheerleading.&rsquo;&rsquo;&hellip;Flames&rsquo; broadcaster Peter Maher was victimized while dozing on a flight to Chicago. A couple of players removed one shoe and kept it hidden until Maher strolled through two terminals at O&rsquo;Hare International Airport with only one shoe on. According to the Flames&rsquo; Jim Peplinski, coach Bob Johnson&rsquo;s shoes were also a target. However, the mentor&rsquo;s shoes were not removed; they merely were covered with ketchup. &#9632;

BLUELINES

<div class="byline">BY DICK CHUBEY</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0014-011441/5776855-1-eng-US/f0014-012.jpg" title="f0014-01" width="570" height="158"></div><h2>EDMONTON OILERS</h2>EDMONTON&mdash;Fear of rotting in the minor leagues need not be an everlasting fear of Edmonton Oilers&rsquo; farmhands.Coach-general manager Glen Sather&rsquo;s policy of accommodating malcontents with the Nova Scotia Oilers continued Dec. 28 on the occasion of the third player movement within 10 days.Demoted Billy Carroll, who threatened retirement rather than continue to play in the American League, was dealt to the Detroit Red Wings in exchange for minor-league center Bruce Eakin.Red Wings&rsquo; general manager Jimmy Devellano is the man who originally drafted Carroll for the New York Islanders in 1979. Devellano was the Isles&rsquo; chief scout at the time.Carroll, who turns 27 on Jan. 19, played on three Stanley Cup winners with the Islanders until he was acquired by the Oilers in the 1984 waiver draft. He secured another championship ring with the Oilers last May.Experienced defensively, Carroll should help the Red Wings, who&rsquo;ve been known to surrender goals in vast quantities.&ldquo;There&rsquo;s no point in having a guy around who&rsquo;s disgruntled,&rdquo; explained Sather, who before Christmas dealt defenseman Larry Melnyk (to the New York Rangers) and center Marc Habs-cheid (Minnesota North Stars) after they had voiced displeasure at playing in Edmonton&rsquo;s minor-league system.&ldquo;I didn&rsquo;t want to see Billy retire,&rdquo; added Sather. &ldquo;This way he&rsquo;ll get a chance to play with another (NHL) team that isn&rsquo;t in our division.&rdquo;Carroll had contemplated full-time employment selling real estate in Toronto&mdash;a career he has dabbled in during recent off-seasons.The 5-foot-10, 190-pounder was driving with his family from Halifax to Toronto at the time of the trade.&ldquo;If I&rsquo;m traded to a team that has an interest in me for the NHL, fine,&rdquo; said Carroll before leaving Halifax. &ldquo;If not, I&rsquo;m not interested. I don&rsquo;t feel I should be playing in this league (AHL).&rdquo;Eakin will assume Carroll&rsquo;s place with Nova Scotia.&ldquo;We need some help in Halifax,&rdquo; said Sather of the struggling AHL outfit. &ldquo;Eakin&rsquo;s a little younger (23) and probably more skilled. He probably has a better chance to play here.&rdquo;Eakin, a Winnipeg-native who the Oilers atempted to sign as a free agent last summer, was a a first-team junior all-star with Saskatoon in 1982 and a second-team selection in the Central League two years later.He was Calgary&rsquo;s ninth pick in 1982 but only played in nine games with the Flames (two goals, one assist) over three seasons. This season he played four games with the Red Wings (one assist), but logged most of his time with Adirondack in the AHL.Carroll was Nova Scotia&rsquo;s second highest point-collector with seven goals and 18 assists in 26 games before he was recalled to Edmonton Dec. 10 on an emergency basis. The Oilers had been struck by a rash of injuries&mdash;Mike Krushelnyski (sprained knee), Craig MacTavish (charleyhorse), along with Mark Messier and Esa Tikkanen (each out with a broken foot)&mdash;while Glenn Anderson also drew an eight-game suspension. Yet Carroll played but three games (one assist) with the Oilers.The re-acquisition of ex-Oiler Mike Rogers (Dec. 19) and Gord Sherven (Dec. 20) in separate deals and the return of MacTavish led to Carroll&rsquo;s reassignment to Nova Scotia.Rogers played with the Oilers in his first pro season (1974-75) when they were still in the World Hockey Association. He accounted for 35 goals and 83 points as a freshman and was named the WHA&rsquo;s most gentlemanly player, but was dealt to the New England Whalers for Wayne Carleton in January, 1976.Carleton played 26 games with the Oilers before leaving because of a bad back, while Rogers went on to record three straight 100-point years in his first three NHL seasons. The deal was generally regarded as the worst the Oilers have ever made.Almost 10 years later, a delighted Rogers returned as the Oilers sent Melnyk and minor-leaguer Todd Strueby to the Rangers.The 31-year-old center drew a rousing ovation from the crowd at Northlands Coliseum when he scored on his first shift back.&ldquo;I couldn&rsquo;t ask for a better start,&rdquo; grinned Rogers of his breakaway goal against the Los Angeles Kings. &ldquo;1 used to be a scorer.&rdquo;Time will tell if he will be again?&ldquo;Exactly, the key is to try and play consistently,&rdquo; said Rogers. &ldquo;I just hope I play well enough that they&rsquo;ve got to make a decision (on keeping him here when Anderson and the injured hands return).&rdquo;Sherven, along with minor-leaguer Don Biggs, was re-acquired in a deal that sent Habscheid, junior Emanuel Viveiros and collegian Don Barber to Minnesota.Like Melnyk, who threatened to quit the Oilers following a demotion, Habscheid had been on Edmonton&rsquo;s suspended list. Once considered a top prospect, Habscheid was seeking his amateur status to play for a local college team.Sherven had been dealt to Minnesota last January in a deal that brought Mark Napier to the Oilers. Sherven, who also scored for the Oilers in his first game back, had an inkling something was up.&ldquo;I was told one night I was going to the minors, but then told to come to practice the following day,&rdquo; said Sherven. &ldquo;In any case, my bags were packed.&rdquo;IN THE CREASE&mdash;The Oilers were beaten soundly by the touring Soviet Red Army club 6-3 on Dec. 27&hellip;Dave Hunter&rsquo;s hearing for swinging his stick at L A&rsquo;s Phil Sykes will go Jan. 7 in Toronto, the day before the Oilers face the Maple Leafs. NHL executive vicepresident Brian O&rsquo;Neill will chair the hearing&hellip;Jeff Brubaker suffered an injured left ankle during the 5-3 win against Vancouver Dec. 29. &#9632;

f0014-01

Oilers Ship Out Dissidents Amidst A Flurry Of Trades

<div class="byline">Jay Greenberg</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0016-011220/5776886-1-eng-US/f0016-012.jpg" title="f0016-01" width="354" height="470"></div>THE SHAME OF it&mdash;sorry Oilers&mdash;was that Doug Crossman hit the crossbar with 10 seconds left and that a gimme rolled off Murray Craven&rsquo;s stick right at the buzzer. Not that the Philadelphia Flyers deserved Edmonton&rsquo;s 4-3 victory on New Year&rsquo;s Eve any more than did the Oilers. But the people watching it certainly would have appreciated five more minutes.Alas, the Oilers and Flyers only play three times each regular season. Two of them are now gone, with each team having won one, and the trick of waiting for the next treat on March 2 will be difficult.There is, of course, the promise of another best-of-seven in May. And while conceding things like Washington could get in the way of that, the best advice is that whatever the odds on another Philadelphia-Edmonton final, book it now. Even root for it. The thought of having a Stanley Cup at stake with the teams performing at the levels they did on New Year&rsquo;s Eve is delicious.&ldquo;This was a great hockey game,&rdquo; Oiler general managercoach Glen Sather said. His losing counterpart, Mike Keenan, while understandably less gushy, did not disagree.It was grand enough that the best two teams in the league. Cup finalists a year ago, went to the buzzer for a decision. And fascinating, too, that it was a 60-minute reflection of the two team&rsquo;s contrasting styles.The Flyers pounded and pounded away for 48 shots, 22 in the first period, enough to put away practically anybody but these guys. The Oilers, bending but not breaking, had Andy Moog&rsquo;s goaltending to keep Philadelphia from breaking open a 2-0 lead and Wayne Gretzky&rsquo;s three goals to bring them back.&ldquo;I&rsquo;d say it was a case of the greatest hockey player in the world rising to the occasion,&rdquo; Keenan said. The Oilers won this one largely because they have him and the Flyers don&rsquo;t.They do have a Tim Kerr and a Brian Propp and plenty of scoring to blow away garden-variety NHL teams. But at this level of competition, Gretzky will stand apart. After a slow start, he did it to the Flyers last May. And he&rsquo;ll do it again unless the Flyers get absolutely superb goaltending.Their impressive work ethic, interchangeable parts, team concept, one more year&rsquo;s experience and better health this time will assuredly give them a chance. But on this night Moog outplayed Bob Froese. Just one game? A clue towards May? We shall see.Froese made made several good saves in a wide-open first period and at least one down the stretch to keep the Flyers alive. But his puck-handling gaffe helped ignite the Oiler comeback and the fourth one, which turned out to be the winner, dropped off his glove.He hardly disgraced himself, but then again, he didn&rsquo;t stone the Oilers, either. And is there any reason to believe that is not what it&rsquo;s going to take to beat Edmonton four games out of seven?For their part, the Oilers are reasonably convinced of the inevitablity of the Flyers. When asked, they&rsquo;ll give it the old, &ldquo;you can&rsquo;t rule out Washington&rdquo; or &ldquo;we have to worry about getting to the finals ourselves&rdquo;, but they would be surprised and maybe a little relieved, too, if the Flyers weren&rsquo;t in their faces again come the finals.&ldquo;They were tough enough last year and now they have the experience of going through a finals once,&rdquo; Gretzky said. &ldquo;We didn&rsquo;t win the first time we got there, either. It makes a big difference.&rdquo;&ldquo;I&rsquo;d rather lose to the Russians 10 times than to Philadelphia once,&rdquo; Glen Sather said. Considering that the Oilers vs. RedArmy was the closest thing possible to a winner-take-all between the best two club teams in the world, Slats couldn&rsquo;t have paid the Flyers a higher tribute.So, the Oilers think the Flyers are going to be hell. But one senses that the coaching staff, at least, believes it retains one more edge on Philadelphia besides Gretzky. And that&rsquo;s with Moog and Grant Fuhr in goal.The day before the game, a guy walked around the Oiler dressing room asking if they were surprised that the Flyers, despite the death of Pelle Lindbergh, were still fight with Edmonton in the total points race. &ldquo;Not at all,&rdquo; Gretzky said. &ldquo;The way they play, forechecking so relentlessly and limiting your chances, great goaltending isn&rsquo;t an absolute necessity night after night. The goalie stops the one shot, which Froese does very well, and they clear it.&rdquo;While Gretzky did not mean to damn Froese with faint praise, assistant coach John Muckier came a little more directly to the point.&ldquo;The big games haven&rsquo;tbeen played yet,&rdquo; Muckier said. &ldquo;If there is a weakness, and I&rsquo;m not saying Froese is one, it hasn&rsquo;t shown up. I mean this game, at this point of the season, sure we put some importance on it, but it&rsquo;s just not the playoffs.&ldquo;Both these teams are going to be better come April. And it&rsquo;s going to come down to goaltending. Goaltending beats shooting, particularly in the finals. Go back over the last 10 years. (Bernie) Parent, (Ken) Dryden, then Billy Smith, who won four and stoned us the first time we got there. Last year, we broke the Flyer series open as it went along, but what was the turning point? Grant Fuhr stopping that (Ron Sutter) penalty shot (in the fourth game).&rdquo;It would be premature and probably unfair to suggest that the Flyers can&rsquo;t win it all with Froese. His record suggests that he is very capable, and who is to say that given the chance to run with the No. 1 job, he won&rsquo;t turn out to be one of the best.But the loss of Lindbergh has put the Flyers back almost to square one in one critical sense. The goalie who is going to have to do it for them was not the one that got the finals&rsquo; experience last year. &#9632;

f0016-01

Can The Philly Flyers Win It All With Froese?

<div class="byline">BY AL MORGANTI</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0016-02966/5776917-1-eng-US/f0016-022.jpg" title="f0016-02" width="576" height="168"></div><h2>PHILADELPHIA FLYERS</h2>PHILADELPHIA&mdash;On the way to zooming toward the best first-half finish in their history, the Philadelphia Flyers hit a speed bump in the form of the St. Louis Blues.Playing an intelligent and determined game, the Blues checked away the Flyers&rsquo; chances of winning 30 of their first 40 games, beating them in St. Louis 2-1.Beaten from start to finish, the game marked only the third time this season the Flyers had not held a lead at some point during a game. It was also their third 2-1 loss of the season, and their sixth one-goal loss of the season (seventh, if you add on an 8-6 loss to the Islanders which included an empty-net goal).The loss put a damper on the Flyers&rsquo; five-game road trip, which they finished at 3-2-0. But it&rsquo;s difficult to feel too badly for the Flyers, who checked into the half-way pit stop with a 29-11-0 record.The 58 points were good enough for a seemingly substantial six-point lead in the Patrick Division over the Washington Capitals. And in the overall point race, the Flyers finished their road trip four points behind the Edmonton Oilers (6258).The Oilers were the only other team to beat the Flyers (4-3) on their postChristmas journey, which included wins over Vancouver (6-1), Calgary (6-5) and Los Angeles (7-4).&ldquo;Obviously, we would have liked to have ended the trip with a win,&rdquo; said Flyers&rsquo; coach Mike Keenan, &ldquo;but you want to win every game you play.&ldquo;And overall, we&rsquo;re very pleased with our effort over the first half,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;If we can get another 58 points over the second half, it would be a heckuva season.&rdquo;If the Flyers had managed to win the game against the Blues, they would have been on a pace which, if continued, would have tied the NHL record for 60 wins in a season, set during the 1976-77 season by the Montreal Canadiens (60-812).As it is, the Flyers&rsquo; 29 wins put them on a pace to win 58 games, five more than last season when they set a club record with 53 victories. They also checked into the half-way mark with 55 power-play goals, a number which could boost them past the NHL record of 99 power-play goals in a season set by the Pittsburgh Penguins (1980-81).The power-play statistic got a boost with four power-play goals against the Kings. Those four included Tim Kerr&rsquo;s 22nd power-play goal of the season, breaking the club record of 21 co-held by Rick MacLeish. Kerr tied the mark last season.Kerr now has 40 more games in which to continue his assault on the NHL record of 28 power-play goals in a season, coheld by Mike Bossy and Phil Esposito.And when he breaks the record, you can bet he will lavish praise on rookie center Pelle Eklund, the little Swede who has quarterbacked the Flyers&rsquo; powerplay since mid-November.Playing primarily on the power play, Eklund had picked up seven goals and 25 assists for 32 points&mdash;28 of those points (five goals, 23 assists) coming on the power play. Even more important to Kerr, Eklund had assisted on exactly one half of big forward&rsquo;s power-play goals.In the victory over the Kings, Eklund added a season-high four assists&mdash;all on the power play. It was the second time this season the Flyers had scored four power-play goals in a game against the Kings, and their second 7-4 victory over L.A.The win over the Kings also featured a career-high five-point game from left winger Brian Propp, who knocked in a goal and four assists.Other highlights of the trip included Kerr&rsquo;s third hat trick of the season, which helped open the trip with the 6-1 win at Vancouver. The hat trick also marked Kerr&rsquo;s 11th multiple-goal game of the season.Overall, 12 of the 13 forwards used by Keenan scored at least one goal on the five-game journey.NOTES&mdash;The Flyers kicked off their second half with a key game against the Washington Capitals at the Spectrum. Although they held a six-point lead at the half-way point, the Caps held two games in hand, and the two clubs will meet six times over the second half&hellip;The Flyers reached just about all of their half-season goals, but fell just short of keeping their goals-against average under three per game. They finished the first half with a 3.07 GAA&hellip;After 40 games last season, the Flyers were 24-11-5 for 53 points, seven points behind this season&rsquo;s pace. The Flyers had a 13-8-0 record on the road&hellip;However, they were only a mediocre 5-3-0 against the supposedly-weak Norris Division teams&hellip;After missing 17 games due to a broken knuckle, Lindsay Carson returned to the lineup against Edmonton and contributed a goal against L.A. and an assist in St. Louis. &#9632;

f0016-02

Eklund And Kerr A Power-Packed Twosome

<div class="byline">BY GLENN COLE</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0017-011073/5776955-1-eng-US/f0017-012.jpg" title="f0017-01" width="580" height="157"></div><h2>MONTREAL CANADIENS</h2>MONTREAL&mdash;It was the game which received the most hype.It was the only game that was available to all on national TV.And the Central Red Army-Montreal Canadiens&rsquo; match-up on New Year&rsquo;s Eve was a mismatch.&ldquo;You can start making excuses for why we lost,&rdquo; said Larry Robinson, a veteran of 13 games against Soviet Union teams. &ldquo;That&rsquo;s the easiest thing. They were the better club than us tonight. That&rsquo;s the plain fact. It had nothing to do with us looking ahead or behind.&ldquo;They outplayed us. That&rsquo;s a simple fact.&rdquo;Had it not been for the work of Doug Soetaert in the first two periods, the Canadiens would have been blown away early. While the first period was more or less even, there was no doubt that the Soviet&rsquo;s top club team was superior as the last night of 1985 drew to a disappointing close for Montreal hockey fans.&ldquo;We panicked a lot,&rdquo; Robinson added. &ldquo;When they get rolling around and throwing that puck around, sometimes you can get mesmerized by it all. If you try and chase the puck and follow them all over the place, you just wear yourself out for nothing.&ldquo;We were running around like chickens with our heads cut off. That comes from inexperience.&rdquo;Few of the Montreal players looked good during the evening. Collectively, it was one of their poorest efforts under the coaching reign of Jean Perron.Mats Naslund and Kjell Dahlin, who have been enjoying fine seasons, were less than impressive, although Naslund did manage the lone goal for Montreal.&ldquo;They played well and after the first period, I don&rsquo;t know how well we played,&rdquo; noted left winger Ryan Walter. &ldquo;We let up a bit. I don&rsquo;t know why. We looked a bit tired and we shouldn&rsquo;t have been.&rdquo;The sluggishness carried over into the first day of 1986 as the Canadiens were beaten 3-2 by the plodding Toronto Maple Leafs. There was little flow to the game but the Leafs were the aggressors, chasing the puck and consistently beating the Montreal players in their own end.&ldquo;I don&rsquo;t think we wanted to win as badly as the Soviets did and I think the game against Toronto was a hangover of the same type of attitude,&rdquo; said Canadiens&rsquo; captain BobGainey. &ldquo;We just weren&rsquo;t able to come up with the right play or the right combination of players on the. ice. We played a mediocre game.&rdquo;Montreal was minus defenseman Rick Green, who will miss the next six to eight weeks with a broken right thumb suffered in the game against Central Red Army. Perron decided to go with five defensemen for the game in Toronto and there was little help given by the forwards in the defensive end.Two nights later in Winnipeg, Perron had Kent Carlson dressed as the sixth defenseman but he did not play as the Canadiens rolled to a 7-3 victory over the struggling Jets.The following night in Calgary, defenceman Petr Svoboda went down with a bruised right hand and was out of action for most of the second and third periods as the Canadiens handed the Flames their ninth consecutive loss.Montreal built up a 3-1 lead in the first period, only to have Calgary score three consecutive goals against rookie goaltender Patrick Roy who was pulled at 9:26 of the second period.In the Dec. 13,1985 issue of THE HOCKEY NEWS, we erroneously published the NHL Guide & Record Book ad for 1984-85. The book is completely out of stock and we regret any inconvenience this may have caused our readers who wrote in requesting copies of the book. Orders that were mailed to us were returned to the senders along with their checks.Soetaert came on in relief and gained credit for the 6-5 victory and had to make some key saves in the third period as the Flames put pressure on the four Montreal defensemen&mdash;Robinson, Craig Ludwig, Tom Kurvers and Mike Lalor.&ldquo;Usually when the goaltender comes in like that, they try to shoot the puck from anywhere,&rdquo; Soetaert said. &ldquo;The one they tested me on was a shot from just in over the blue line. The puck was rolling on end when he went to shoot it and a shot like that is one of the trickiest to stop.&rdquo;The Flames, who love to crowd the front of the net, found that Soetaert was more than ready for them, especially in the third period.&ldquo;They have a few big boys on that team and they try to muscle it into the crease and then bang and poke away at it.&ldquo;You have to be quick to kick it out when you are standing up or bat it to the side before they get it in front.&rdquo;Soetaert, whose play against the Red Army was criticized in some quarters, did exactly what he had to do against the Flames, otherwise the week could have ended exactly as it had started&mdash;with an embarrassing loss.IN PASSING&mdash;Defenseman Chris Chelios remained sidelined with a sprained knee suffered Dec. 19 in Quebec. The date of his return is uncertain. Mats Naslund stretched his pointscoring streak to 16 games with an assist in Calgary. During the streak. Naslund had 12 goals and 19 assists.<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0017-02826/5776948-1-eng-US/f0017-022.jpg" title="f0017-02" width="587" height="896"><figcaption class="caption-body">Rick Green broke his thumb in the Canadiens game against Central Red Army.</figcaption></div><h2>CORRECTION</h2>In the Dec. 13, 1985 issue of THE HOCKEY NEWS, we erroneously published the NHL Guide & Record Book ad for 1984-85. The book is completely out of stock and we regret any inconvenience this may have caused our readers who wrote in requesting copies of the book. Orders that were mailed to us were returned to the senders along with their checks. &#9632;

f0017-01

Canadiens No Match For Central Red Army

Here&rsquo;s what was happening 20 years ago this week in hockey:&bull; Buffalo&rsquo;s Knox brothers, Seymour III and Northrup, offered to expand the seating in the city&rsquo;s Memorial Auditorium from 9,850 to 16,080 as part of a $2.5-million rebuilding plan if the NHL would grant Buffalo a franchise for the 1967 expansion.&bull; Andy Hebenton played his 1,000th consecutive professional career game.Here&rsquo;s what was happening 15 years ago this week in hockey:&bull; The Detroit Red Wings suffered the worst rout in their history&mdash;a 13-0 bombing at the hands of the almost equally-mediocre Toronto Maple Leafs. The defeat surpassed the previous worst disaster in team history&mdash;an 11-2 licking administered by the New York Rangers in 1942.&bull; Georges Guilbault, a 27-year-old center with the New Haven Blades in the Eastern League, lost an eye as the result of an injury sustained in a game Dec. 27 against the Clinton Comets. Struck in the face by a puck, Guilbault&rsquo;s eye was permanently damaged and had to be removed. &#9632;

THIS WEEK…20 Years Ago

1. Which two Winnipeg Jet players were teammates on Cornwall Royals&rsquo; Memorial Cupwinning squads in &lsquo;80 and &lsquo;81?2. What goaltender allowed Bobby Orr&rsquo;s first NHL goal?3. What goaltender allowed Bobby Orr&rsquo;s last NHL goal?4. Which current NHL GM recently refereed an American Wrestling Association world title bout?5. What former Pittsburgh Penguin goaltender is Winnipeg&rsquo;s chief scout?6. What goaltender won the Vezina Trophy in each of its first three seasons of existence?7. What U.S. high school produced Buffalo goaltender Tom Barrasso?8. Which L.A. Kings&rsquo; rearguard was born in Semaden, Sweden?9. Where did Mark Messier play his junior hockey?10. Which NHL 50-goal scorer from last season was a teammate of Messier&rsquo;s with Cincinnati of the WHA?<h2>ANSWERS TO THE QUIZ</h2>1. Dale Hawerchuk and Scott Arneil. 2. Gump Worsely. 3. Rogie Vachon. 4. John Ferguson. 5. Les Binkley. 6. George Hains-worth. 7. Acton-Boxboro. 8. Mark Hardy. 9. St. Albert Saints. 10. Mike Gartner. &#9632;

QUIZ

<div class="byline">BY TOM WHEATLEY</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0018-011116/5777034-1-eng-US/f0018-012.jpg" title="f0018-01" width="551" height="158"></div><h2>ST. LOUIS BLUES</h2>ST. LOUIS&mdash;Usually, it&rsquo;s the owner who gives a vote of confidence to a beleaguered coach or general manager.That procedure got turned around recently by the St. Louis Blues&rsquo; coach Jacques Demers and director of hockey operations Ron Caron.In rebutting some stubborn rumors, the Blues&rsquo; top hockey honchos said they are optimistic about the future of the club in St. Louis under owner Harry Omest.Rumors have followed the Blues all season. Ornest&rsquo;s now-resolved feud with the city over taxes, the club&rsquo;s modest home crowds and the new rink in hockey-hungry Hamilton have kept the speculative fires burning.So does the suspicion that Omest is in the NHL only for the money.Or as Toronto owner Harold Ballard put it recently, &ldquo;He&rsquo;ll try anything for a dollar.&rdquo;The latest whispers started after last month&rsquo;s governors&rsquo; meetings.Ornest allegedly was poised to mimic baseball opportunist Charley Finley. Ornest supposedly was ready to deal top players for cash and then move the Blues to Hamilton.The players rumored for sale, as they have been for the past year, were center Bernie Federko and winger Joe Mullen.Caron and Demers dismissed the whole scenario as preposterous gossip. Caron bristled at the notion that the business office dictates to him.&ldquo;There&rsquo;s no movement of that kind (to sell off talent),&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;None&hellip;I&rsquo;ve been told two years ago that if I need extra money to buy the right guy, come and discuss it.&ldquo;The rhythm (of the Blues&rsquo; hockey office) is the same. It&rsquo;s as smooth as it was. Nothing has changed in terms of operating that team.&ldquo;Everything has to be discussed with (with the business office), but that&rsquo;s the way it should be.&rdquo;Caron has&rsquo; insisted that economics played a minor part in his major decisions, such as last year&rsquo;s trade of Mike Liut and his $400,000 salary.Caron said his transactions are made to improve the Blues, or to battle the harsh protection problems the Blues faced in the last two waiver drafts.The best defense on his behalf is the Blues&rsquo; record. As the holidays ended, they were one of three winning clubs in the Campbell Conference, along with Edmonton and Calgary.The Blues, who sold a near record low of 5.900 season tickets, have drawn announced crowds averaging about 11,000 per game. That figure, though, includes free passes and no-shows.Demers believes the crowds will come after the holidays.As for rumors of the Blues leaving. Demers snapped: &ldquo;We&rsquo;re staying. I know when a franchise is moving and when it isn&rsquo;t.&rdquo;Demers is an authority on clubs that go &ldquo;poof!&rdquo; in the night. He had had three of them shot out from under him in the World Hockey Association.&ldquo;You can tell.&rdquo; said Demers. &ldquo;There was no more (expenditures). Everything was shut down. I could go home to my wife and say, &lsquo;We&rsquo;re leaving.&rsquo;&ldquo;So I&rsquo;m not looking through a bubble here. There&rsquo;s no question that this franchise is going to stay here. If I didn&rsquo;t think so. I&rsquo;d probably say, &lsquo;No comment&rsquo;. I wouldn&rsquo;t fight it as much as I do.&rdquo;Demers said Ornest has assured him that the Blues are staying put.In his two-and-a-half years years as owner. Omest has backed up his words with action, said Demers.Hey, he&rsquo;s just finishing new offices on the other side (of The Arena),&rdquo; said Demers. &ldquo;You&rsquo;re doing that if you&rsquo;re moving out? No way. And it&rsquo;s the little things.&ldquo;I asked them to put a new ceiling and new lights in my office, and the next day it was done. If they don&rsquo;t do it, you say, &lsquo;Oh-oh!&rsquo; But right away, the next day. it was done.&ldquo;I asked them to paint the dressing room, and the next day it was done. There&rsquo;s no question we&rsquo;re going to be here. It&rsquo;s being operated as a business, and I believe the franchise is healthy.&ldquo;It&rsquo;s an old arena and there are a lot of improvements that have to be made. But they&rsquo;re working on improving it.&rdquo;BLUENOTES&mdash;Coach Jacques Demers got instant action after complaining publicly about the boards at The Arena. &ldquo;You will be happy to know that the St. Louis Blues have ordered new boards and new glass,&rdquo; said Demers the morning that his comments were published in the St. Louis Post Dispatch. &ldquo;They&rsquo;re the same as Edmonton, which has the best boards in the league.&rdquo; Demers said he was told by Bobby Johnson, the building superintendent, that the boards had already been ordered. Demers did not elaborate on why the club ordered new boards without consulting him first, or at least informing him after the fact. When the new boards arrive, it will be impossible to install them until after the season. Demers said he was told. But repairs were made immediately on the many ill-fitting boards that prompted Demers&rsquo; concern. Last month at The Arena, Edmonton&rsquo;s Glenn Anderson narrowly escaped injury while skating near the penalty box. His stick became caught in a large gap between the sideboards, jerking his arm backwards&hellip;Winger Mark Hunter scored twice in an 8-4 home loss to Pittsburgh, giving him a career-high 22 goals in 34 games. He had 21 lab season in 72 games at Montreal&hellip;The New Year&rsquo;s Eve loss to Pittsburgh was the Blues&rsquo; worst of the season. Demers called a New Year&rsquo;s Day practice and met individually with each player. &ldquo;I don&rsquo;t like to be embarrassed,&rdquo; he said. &#9632;

f0018-01

Demers Insists ‘St. Lou’ Will Remain Blue

<div class="byline">BY RICK SADOWSKI</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0019-011036/5777072-1-eng-US/f0019-012.jpg" title="f0019-01" width="581" height="155"></div><h2>LOS ANGELES KINGS</h2>LOS ANGELES&mdash;Practice had been over for 10 minutes, yet a few Los Angeles Kings continued to go about their business on the Culver City ice surface, shooting pucks at imaginary goaltenders and skating a few extra laps.Practice had been over for 15 minutes and still the rink wasn&rsquo;t cleared. Two Kings remained: Assistant coach Mike Murphy and right winger Jim Fox.Up and down, and around they skated as the man who drives the Zamboni sat patiently outside the boards, waiting for this pair to exit so he could go about his business.Fox was huffing and puffing by this time, but Murphy, gliding slowly and effortlessly, wouldn&rsquo;t let up. &ldquo;A little more, a little more,&rdquo; Murphy barked, and Fox tried to pick up the pace.Finally, five minutes later, 20 minutes after the rest of the Kings had clumped upstairs to work on the weights, Murphy called it a day. Sweating profusely and almost gasping for air, Fox smiled, then trudged into the nearly vacant dressing room.&ldquo;It&rsquo;s like training camp all over again,&rdquo; Fox said, looking exhausted, &ldquo;excpet that I&rsquo;m two months behind everybody. I&rsquo;d rather play a game a day for two weeks&mdash;against the Russians&mdash;than skate one practice with Mike Murphy.&rdquo;But Fox doesn&rsquo;t have a choice, and he knows it. He hasn&rsquo;t played a game since Oct. 31, in Boston Garden, the night the pain in his lower back seeped all the way to the toes in his left foot.He had missed 24 games since and only now was beginning to skate his way back into shape. Fox had been skating for the past two weeks, but this workout, drills and all, was his first in two months.&ldquo;My back&rsquo;s fine,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;It&rsquo;s just taking me a long time to get my wind back. You have to push yourself.&rdquo;Fox said he should be able to play shortly into the New Year, when the Kings depart on a five-game trip.&ldquo;I might be even able to play before then, but I don&rsquo;t want to rush it,&rdquo; he said.Fox counts himself among the fortunate. When he pivoted in Boston and the pain&mdash;&rdquo;more numbness than pain,&rdquo; he said&mdash;shot down to his foot, he feared the worst: a herniated disc, likely spinal fusion and possibly the end of his career.But a battery of tests allayed those fears. The protective disc coating had been aggravated and re-aggravated by a year&rsquo;s load of skating, but the disc itself was aligned properly.The back bothered Fox during most of last season, including the Stanley Cup playoffs, though he posted the best numbers of his six-year career with 30 goals and 53 assists. But he had no idea what the problem was, just that getting out of bed in the morning was becoming a chore.After the Boston game, he saw a back specialist and received a series of injections that &ldquo;loosened it up&rdquo;. He waited a month before returning to the ice and became a soap-opera addict. &ldquo;I wasn&rsquo;t even supposed to leave the house,&rdquo; he said.When Fox returned to the practice rink Nov. 20, the pain did too. &ldquo;It was not good,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;I decided to wait another month.&rdquo;This time, at least, he didn&rsquo;t have to sit at home glued to his television set and &ldquo;Days of Our Lives&rdquo;. Therapeutic stretching exercises came first, followed by monotonous rides on the stationary bike and workouts on Nautilus machines to recapture lost strength.Then came his first rigorous workout. Hopefully. Fox said, &ldquo;It&rsquo;s over.&rdquo; Let his games begin.KINGS NOTES&mdash;The Kings played well despite a 5-2 loss to the Soviet Red Army team before their first sellout crowd of the year at the Forum. &ldquo;We showed a lot of things that had been lacking, particularly intensity and emotion,&rdquo; said Marcel Dionne, who scored both Kings goals. The best quote of the week leading up to the Soviets&rsquo; first visit to L.A. came from Tiger Williams, who said. &ldquo;I haven&rsquo;t decided yet whether to use my nuclear stick or my Star Wars model.&rdquo; Thankfully, he used neither&hellip;Goalie Rollie Melanson, sidelined since Nov. 19, with a pulled groin muscle suffered while he was with Minnesota, reported to New Haven of the American League. He faced 43 shots in his Dec. 27 debut, a 4-2 loss to Adirondack. The Kings, who acquired him Dec. 9, were encouraged by his performance. General manager Rogie Vachon said Melanson, if he felt well enough probably would be called up right after the New Year. The power play continued to struggle, but the Kings killed 44 of 47 penalties during an 11-game stretch to move from last in the NHL to 14th&hellip;Winger Joe Patterson, acquired from the Philadelphia organization Dec. 6. collected his first points (a goal and an assist) in a 5-4 win over Winnipeg Dec. 28&hellip;Anders Hakansson ended a 21-game goalless streak in that game with the winning goal that capped a rally from a 4-0 deficit.<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0019-02757/5777065-1-eng-US/f0019-022.jpg" title="f0019-02" width="582" height="796"><figcaption class="caption-body">After his best season, Jim Fox was forced to the sidelines with back problems.</figcaption></div> &#9632;

f0019-01

Fox’s Back, No More Soap Operas

<div class="byline">BY MIKE PERRICONE</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0019-03509/5777103-1-eng-US/f0019-032.jpg" title="f0019-03" width="577" height="142"></div><h2>CHICAGO BLACK HAWKS</h2>CHICAGO&mdash;Training camp, 1984. The Blackhawks are expecting big things from Wayne Presley after his 63-goal. 139-point season with Kitchener in the Ontario League.But Presley doesn&rsquo;t look like the right winger the Hawks drafted in the second round in 1983. They say they can&rsquo;t find any clues.More than a year later, Presley solved the mystery.&ldquo;I was overweight. I was out of shape, and I wasn&rsquo;t mature enough,&rdquo; said the 20-year-old redhead from Detroit. &ldquo;This year I was in a better state of mind. I told myself sooner or later, I&rsquo;d get my chance.&rdquo;Now Presley is showing the Hawks his stuff, his speed and his smarts. Just after being recalled Dec. 14 from Nova Scotia in the American League, Presley put together a six-game point streak.The timing was right. As Presley&rsquo;s streak began, the Hawks won four straight and seven of eight.His streak ended, but the Hawks reached.500 for the first time this season when they beat Pittsburgh Jan. 1 in Chicago, earning a share of first place in the Norris Division.Presley scored his first NHL goal Dec. 18 in Chicago Stadium against Winnipeg, skating out of the left-wing comer to beat veteran goaltender Dan Bouchard. And, of course, he grabbed the puck.&ldquo;I&rsquo;m going to send it home and have it put on a plaque,&rdquo; he said.He assisted on two goals in Steve Lud-zik&rsquo;s first career hat trick when the Hawks beat the Washington Capitals Dec. 28, ending a four-year winless streak at Capital Centre.The goals, however, have been a bit slow in coming.&ldquo;I&rsquo;ve been having some trouble scoring goals, so I&rsquo;ve been concentrating on my defense.&rdquo; Presley said. &ldquo;Larry Kish (Nova Scotia coach) has really helped me.&rdquo;Kish helped so much, in fact, that Presley quickly became one of the Hawks&rsquo; best backcheckers.&ldquo;He hasn&rsquo;t yet made the great play offensively,&rdquo; said Hawks&rsquo; general manager-coach Bob, Pulford. &ldquo;But he does a lot of smart things defensively. He always picks up the right man. Some of our Veteran guys don&rsquo;t always-do that&hellip;.It&rsquo;s no secret the Hawks have looking all year for a speedy right winger who can play defense and hopefully score some goals. Is it Presley?&ldquo;If we get everybody back from injuries and he continues to play, he could be that person we&rsquo;ve been looking for,&rdquo; said Pulford.If Presley continues to play, he will also get a new roommate&mdash;his wife, Susan, who visited him in Chicago over the Christmas holiday.&ldquo;She&rsquo;s back in Detroit right now,&rdquo; Presley said. &ldquo;If they tell me I&rsquo;m here, she&rsquo;ll come in to Chicago.&rdquo;Pulford remained noncommital.&ldquo;We haven&rsquo;t decided yet.&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;As of now, Presley is still here on emergency recall.&rdquo;In that case, it&rsquo;s no mystery to Presley what he has to do.&ldquo;I just want to keep trying hard,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;and hope they keep looking at me for a few more games. If they send me back. I&rsquo;ll just wait until it&rsquo;s my turn. &#9632;

f0019-03

Presley Showing Stuff For ’Hawks

<div class="byline">Al Strachan</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0020-02611/5777165-1-eng-US/f0020-022.jpg" title="f0020-02" width="401" height="448"></div>AT THE PRESS conference announcing his appointment as coach of the Detroit Red Wings, Brad Park said that he had every attribute he could possibly need for his new job &ldquo;except coaching experience.&rdquo;Suppose you wanted to be the anchor man for CBS News. Do you think that if you told them you had every attribute for the job &ldquo;except TV experience&rdquo;, they would hire you? Do you think that Standard Oil would let you run one of their multi-million-dollar oil-drilling operations if you said you knew about finding oil but had no experience?Of course not. They&rsquo;d say, &ldquo;Well, we&rsquo;re glad you&rsquo;re qualified in those other areas because it&rsquo;s not easy to find people who have that knowledge. But this is the big time. You&rsquo;ll have to start a bit closer to the bottom and work your way up.&rdquo;Such is not the case in the National Hockey League. In the NHL, you can make the jump from player to coach almost overnight. Sometimes, you can make the jump from player to general manager almost overnight. Ask the Minnesota North Stars about it.Usually, moves of this nature don&rsquo;t work out. Look at the top teams over the past few seasons and you&rsquo;ll find that the coaches are either professionals who never played in the NHL&mdash;Scott Bowman, Michel Bergeron. Mike Keenan. Bryan Murray etc.&mdash;or ex-players who spent some time as assistant coaches or minor-league coaches before taking over an NHL team, such as Al Arbour and Jacques Lemaire.There are exceptions to the rule&mdash;Edmonton&rsquo;s Glen Sather, for instance&mdash;but they&rsquo;re rare. Perhaps Park will be an exception as well. He was a knowledgeable player who served his time and studied the game and perhaps he&rsquo;ll be able to succeed in Detroit where Harry Neale failed.Either way, there is no criticism of Park implied here. He was offered the job and took it, just as almost anyone would. The criticism is reserved for the kind of NHL thinking which says on the one hand, &ldquo;This is the best hockey league in the world,&rdquo; and on the other hand, &ldquo;No, you don&rsquo;t need any coaching experience to come in and run a team.&rdquo;Perhaps, before they fired Harry Neale, they should have asked him about a lesson he learned from experience.Four years ago, when Neale was the general manager in Vancouver, his Canucks found themselves in the Stanley Cup finals. It was a bizarre set of circumstances because they finished in the bottom half of the standings and then beat only teams which had finished below them.But by the time the next season rolled around, the Canucks&rsquo; curious route to the finals was forgotten. The players remembered only that they had been one of the last two survivors in the Stanley Cup chase and they all wanted big raises.Neale handed them out. And he gave out long-term contracts too. The Vancouver players were satisified&mdash;so satisfied that they saw no further need to hustle and grind and fight. The Canucks have never even come close to the Stanley Cup finals since. In fact, last year, they missed the playoffs entirely.Because of that experience, Neale learned a lesson. He swore that he would never again hand out guaranteed, long-term contracts. Had he been Detroit general mana-. ger Jim Devellano last summer, he could have drawn upon that experience to tell all the high-priced free agents that team owner Mike llitich wanted to sign, &ldquo;Sure, we&rsquo;ll give you big money and we&rsquo;ll give you the big money year after year. But only if you produce. You&rsquo;ll get a series of one-year contracts. Play hard and you&rsquo;ll be rich.&rdquo;But instead of that, the Wings gave the free agents lucrative long-term contracts and as a result, created resentment among the established players. So they too had to be given big long-term contracts.And when the season started, all the players were quite satisfied. They were rich and comfortable. And if you&rsquo;re rich and comfortable, why bother taking the extra hit or skating the extra step? You don&rsquo;t need to prove anything to anybody. You&rsquo;re set for life.Most of those Detroit players should be ashamed of themselves. They had a chance to show the NHL establishment that substantial cash incentives produced.results. They could have provided an example that would have-resulted in increased salaries for every player in the NHL for years to come. Instead, they took their money and ran. They took care of themselves and everybody else can take a hike.But despite that, despite the fact that the Detroit players let down every player in the league, it could all have been prevented had there been someone in the front office with one important commodity&mdash;experience.However, the experience wasn&rsquo;t there and its absence did the Wings great damage.And now that the players have floated through nearly half the season and ignored the veteran coach, it is the coach who gets the axe. To compound the situation, the new coach has no experience.But perhaps there&rsquo;s a consolation for Park. Handling that team, he&rsquo;s going to get experience in a hurry. &#9632;

f0020-02

Wings Opt For Inexperience In Choice Of Former Great

<div class="byline">BY STEVE DRYDEN</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0020-01910/5777134-1-eng-US/f0020-012.jpg" title="f0020-01" width="570" height="178"></div><h2>TORONTO MAPLE LEAFS</h2>TORONTO&mdash;The Toronto Maple Leafs spirited away one of Czechoslovakia&rsquo;s best-kept hockey secrets as the new year began.Miroslav Ihnacak, long considered a defector-in-waiting, fulfilled expectations over the Christmas holidays when he fled Czechoslovakia for Vienna, Austria.The 23-year-old right winger was met there by Leafs&rsquo; general manager Gerry McNamara, who guided Ihnacak and his fiancee, Eva Olach, through the remainder of the clandestine caper that reached its end Jan. 3 when the threesome landed in Toronto.The first order of business was an emotional reunion between Miroslav and Peter Ihnacak, the Leafs&rsquo; 28-year-old center who hadn&rsquo;t seen his brother since defecting nearly four years ago.The second matter was of a more public nature, as the wispy-haired Ihnacak was introduced to the Toronto media.Off skates since Dec. 23, however, he wasn&rsquo;t expected to make his Toronto-at-large debut until, at the earliest, Jan. 8 when the Edmonton Oilers visited the Leafs.The Leafs signaled their confidence in the newcomer&rsquo;s skills by dusting off sweater No. 27, worn most prominently by Frank Mahovlich and Darryl Sittler in the past, and giving it to Ihnacak.Naturally, he was blissfully unaware of the heritage represented by the sweater. But that&rsquo;s okay, the Leafs are counting on Ihnacak to create some memories of his own.The leading scorer in Czechoslovakia&rsquo;s elite league last year, Ihnacak was No. 2 this season before leaving behind a homeland which had already made a decision about his future.&ldquo;When I left,&rdquo; related Peter, &ldquo;they took away his passport and they wouldn&rsquo;t let him play on the national team. He could only play in Czechoslovakia and Russia.&rdquo;For that reason few hockey people have yet to have a good look at or have an opinion of the forward who is listed at 6 feet and 185 pounds.Even before his older brother&rsquo;s defection in 1982, Ihnacak was considered a high-risk player because three other family members were already living in the United States.In December of 1981 he was named to the national team that would represent Czechoslovakia at the World Junior Championships in Minnesota.But he only made it as far as the airport, where he was replaced by another player at the last moment.Less than three years ago, he married a Yugoslavian student and was told he would be allowed to leave the country to join her.Whether or not it was a marriage of convenience, he was not permitted to leave and the marriage has since been annulled.No details of Ihnacak&rsquo;s escape route were revealed by McNamara, who was in Vienna two days after Christmas and quickly signed Ihnacak to a multi-year contract.But it&rsquo;s believed the Leafs spent at least $150,000 to grease palms along the way.Only immigration red tape kept Ihnacak from joining the Leafs immediately. But they were eventually circumvented by the Canadian government&rsquo;s issuance of &ldquo;minister&rsquo;s permits&rdquo; to allow quick entry for Ihnacak and Olach.Ordinarily, wading through the appropriate paperwork to obtain landed immigrant status is a lengthy process.The Leafs, who placed Ihnacak on their payroll Dec. 28, received extraordinary goverment co-operation after stressing the dangers facing the young couple in Vienna, which is about 40 miles from the Czech border.There was some skepticism regarding the jeopardy surrounding Ihnacak and Olach. Many believed it was largely of the Leafs&rsquo; making in order to expedite proceedings.McNamara was of a different opinion.&ldquo;I was there. I was part of it. I know how dangerous it was,&rdquo; said the GM. &ldquo;If they (the Canadian government) hadn&rsquo;t done it, it wouldn&rsquo;t have been too humane.&ldquo;Wouldn&rsquo;t we have all felt great if they&rsquo;d been scooped off the street by the KGB and taken back to Czechoslovakia where he would have spent three years in jail.&rdquo;Hockey espionage does not entirely agree with McNamara, whose flight into Austria had to be re-routed so soon was it after the Dec. 27th terrorist attack on the Vienna airport.&ldquo;I felt (endangered) many times, looking over my shoulder&mdash;never knowing who was behind me in the hotel lobby mainly because I&rsquo;m known there in the hockey business.&ldquo;What happens if they scoop you off the street and take you back to the border. What would you do?&rdquo;This was not the first attempt by the Leafs, who have four other highly-rated Czechs on their reserve list, to get out Ihnacak.&ldquo;There had been other situations when we were close whether it be with Miroslav or not,&rdquo; said Gord Stellick, McNamara&rsquo;s assistant.Playing on a line with national teamers Igor Liba and Jan Vodila, Ihnacak was the top scorer both on VSZ Kosice and in the Czech elite league last year with 35 goals and 31 assists in 43 games. He also collected 68 penalty minutes.Midway through the 1985-86 season, Ihnacak trailed only Liba in league scoring.&ldquo;Supposedly he&rsquo;s (one of) the top players there but it&rsquo;s hard to gauge because he can&rsquo;t play on the national team,&rdquo; said Stellick.The coach of one of the national teams he couldn&rsquo;t play for wondered why Ihnacak would defect.&ldquo;Ido not understand why he did it. He had very good conditions at home,&rdquo; said Jiri Justre. coach of the Czechoslovakian national junior team which was participating in the World Junior Championships in Hamilton at the time of Ihnacak&rsquo;s arrival.The Leafs acquired the rights to Ihnacak in the ninth round of the entry draft three years ago&mdash;six rounds after they took Peter.&ldquo;We didn&rsquo;t know that much about him so we took a flyer on him,&rdquo; recalled Stellick. &ldquo;He is comparable and maybe better than a (Peter) Klima.&rdquo;Klima, the Czechoslovakian who defected to West Germany and later the United States during the summer, has been at or near the top of the the Detroit Red Wings&rsquo; scoring list all of his rookie season.The second Ihnacak&rsquo;s arrival will bring to four the number of Czechoslovakians in the Leafs&rsquo; lineup. Mirko Frycer, Marian Stastny and Peter Ihnacak are the others.The Leafs have been league leaders in the employment of Czechs (Frycer) and Slovaks (the other three). In the past, goalie Jiri Crha and defenseman Slava Duris suited up for Toronto.NOTES&mdash;Miroslav Ihnacak witnessed Leaf losses to Los Angeles (6-4) and Detroit (6-5) in his first exposure to the team. The setbacks against the basement brigade were not appreciated by coach Dan Maloney&hellip;The Leafs had a scare at a post-Christmas practice when assistant coach Claire Alexander suddenly collapsed while in conversation with goalie Don Edwards. Briefly unconscious, he was taken from the ice on a stretcher but left the Gardens for the hospital under his own power. Tests failed to uncover the reason he blacked out&hellip;Goalie Tim Bernhardt made his first appearance since Nov. 27 a winning one on Jan. 1 when he beat Montreal 3-2. &#9632;

f0020-01

Czechmate! The Leafs Get Another Ihnacak

<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0022-02556/5777227-1-eng-US/f0022-022.jpg" title="f0022-02" width="532" height="734"></div>Quebec Nordiques goaltender Clint Malarchuk compiled a 3-0-0 record and 1.68 goals-against average to earn THN-NHL Player of the Week honors for the period ending Jan. 5.In 16 starts this season, Malarchuk had an 8-7-1 record. &#9632;

f0022-02

Player Of The Week

<div class="byline">BY JOHN GILBERT</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0022-01796/5777196-1-eng-US/f0022-012.jpg" title="f0022-01" width="562" height="174"></div><h2>MINNESOTA NORTH STARS</h2>BLOOMINGTON&mdash;Lome Henning, with his balding head, subdued manner and less than pudgy body, wouldn&rsquo;t have made a very good Santa Claus.But he is the man responsible for exorcising the Minnesota North Stars&rsquo; ghosts of inconsistencies past.The holiday season was the unlikely time for the success of Henning&rsquo;s plans to show through. With only a few exceptions, December had been a woeful month for the Stars during most of their 18 seasons.This year, however, December will be remembered as the upward turning point if the Stars achieve success. The Stars roared into the new year with a 7-4-1 ledger in December, and when they beat Vancouver 3-2 on Jan. 2, it gave the Stars a five-game winning streak, something that hadn&rsquo;t been approached for two years.In fact, before losing in Chicago Jan. 5, the Stars were on a 7-2-1 stretch.Henning&rsquo;s style, from day one of training camp, has been to do things his way. He got the players he wanted, played the players he wanted to in a variety of methods and chipped away at some prominent egos.Each move by Henning was aimed at the long haul in an organization that has scatter-gunned for the short-term fix in the past. It was an enormous undertaking for a rookie coach, and while Henning is the first to say he&rsquo;s reluctant to stamp &ldquo;success&rdquo; on the current product, the signs were good.At Boston, the Stars scored on their first two shots, then went into the tank and lost 5-2 on Dec. 21. It seemed like the same old North Stars. One night later, however, they snapped back for a nearperfect 8-3 romp in New Jersey.Scott Bjugstad, who scored three goals and an assist, said &ldquo;We were pretty mad about the Boston game. We played (against New Jersey) the way we should play every game&mdash;as if it was the last game before getting eliminated from the playoffs.&rdquo;The Stars had won big and faltered before, but this time, it was the start of something. The Stars survived a wild game to win 6-5 in Winnipeg. Then they played a jewel to beat the Rangers 3-1 before closing December with a 6-3 victory over Calgary and 3-2 win over Vancouver on Jan. 2.In the Ranger victory, nobody stood out as the team&rsquo;s star, but almost everybody emerged as a contender. It might have been their best game from the standpoint of every player contributing solidly at both ends of the rink.The Neal Broten-Bjugstad-Dino Ciccarelli line continued to sizzle and pile up goals. Bjugstad had 14 goals and six assists in the 12 games of December, and after a goal in each of the first two games of January, he had 16 of his 23 goals since moving to Broten&rsquo;s left wing.But other forwards flourished, too.Keith Acton, who earlier would get down on himself when he was scored upon, played better overall with what seemed to be an improved positive attitude.Dennis Maruk, told a month ago he no longer figured in the club&rsquo;s plans, has played with youthful vigor and veteran effectiveness. Dirk Graham continued to find rewards in the way of points for his ceaseless work ethic.Steve Payne came back from disc surgery and played with the kind of intensity he used to say couldn&rsquo;t be achieved consistently. Kent Nilsson displayed some fire and hard work. Willi Plett delivered an impact nearly every shift. Brian Bellows has improved his consistency.Defensively, Curt Giles has played with computer like efficiency, as he has throughout his career. Usually among the NHL&rsquo;s most overlooked and underrated players, Giles stood out more this season, partly because of inadequacies by his teammates on the blue line.Craig Hartsburg, coming back slowly from knee problems, continued to regain his prime touch, even if he&rsquo;s lost a step. Dave Langevin, who may have lost two steps, has been an effective leader.The pairing of Gordie Roberts and Bob Rouse has faltered through the first half of the season, but, again. Henning&rsquo;s patience paid off. Roberts may have been trying to overdo his role as helpmate to his inexperienced partner, but in midDecember Roberts&rsquo; confidence seemed to return, and so did his effectiveness.The bold move to go with rookie Jon Casey alternating with Don Beaupre in goal paid off richly. Casey stood 5-3 against NHL teams, and played very well in a fast-paced 4-3 overtime loss to the USSR&rsquo;s Central Red Army.The Stars&rsquo; five-game win streak moved them to within one point of Norris Division co-leaders Chicago and St.Louis, but the streak was snapped in Chicago. The Black Hawks scored four third-period goals to win 6-2.The Stars played hard for a 2-2 tie through two periods, then faded. But there was a difference after that game. The players knew they had faltered&mdash;and they were upset about it.No longer was there acceptance of such failure. Henning won&rsquo;t accept that attitude. And if he has finally convinced his players to not accept failure, it could indeed be a Happy New Year. &#9632;

f0022-01

Minnesota Appears To Have Turned Corner

<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0023-01717/5777258-1-eng-US/f0023-012.jpg" title="f0023-01" width="614" height="1122"><figcaption class="caption-body">PERRY BEREZAN</figcaption></div>Calgary Flames&rsquo; rookie Perry Berezan played nine games in the National Hockey League last season, and scored his first goal against the Toronto Maple Leafs in the first period of his first game on March 20, 1985.And although he hasn&rsquo;t set the scoring record books afire this season, the Flames should be well-pleased with Berezan&rsquo;s solid performance at right wing.&ldquo;He&rsquo;s one of our best penaltykillers,&rdquo; says Mike Burke, a spokesman for the Flames. &ldquo;He is very knowledgeable about the game. He&rsquo;s one of those few players who can anticipate the flow of play.&rdquo;Berezan has played much of the first half of the season with linemates Jim Peplinski and Joel Otto, and while not dazzling with his scoring ability, he is a very good playmaker, running close to a point-a-game clip.&ldquo;He&rsquo;s very consistent,&rdquo; says Burke. &ldquo;He&rsquo;s quite hot right now.&rdquo;Berezan played Tier II hockey in St. Albert, Alta., and later for the University of North Dakota Fighting Sioux, where he scored 51 goals and 110 points in 86 games over two seasons. He was Calgary&rsquo;s third choice (56th overall) in the 1983 entry draft.The 21-year-old Berezan has size (6-foot-2, 192 pounds) and is a speedy skater.&ldquo;But he does need some work on his shooting,&rdquo; adds Burke. &#9632;

f0023-01

QUAKER STATE ROOKIE PROFILES

<div class="byline">BY RANDY SMITH</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0024-01779/5777296-1-eng-US/f0024-012.jpg" title="f0024-01" width="576" height="156"></div><h2>HARTFORD WHALERS</h2>HARTFORD&mdash;Paul Lawless should have a nickname, like &ldquo;Downtown&rdquo; or &ldquo;World B &ldquo;, but the truth is, he doesn&rsquo;t need one.His surname&mdash;Lawless&mdash;perfectly describes his approach to the game of hockey, a game that only yesterday couldn&rsquo;t find a spot for him.&ldquo;I was this close to being a washout,&rdquo; says the Hartford Whalers&rsquo; 21-year-old left winger. &ldquo;And if it had turned out that way, I would have had no one to blame but myself.&rdquo;Lawless was the Whalers&rsquo; No. 1 draft pick, 14th overall, in 1982. He played 47 games in Hartford his rookie season, and showed enough flash and dash to be counted on as a regular the next season. But Lawless showed up at training camp out of shape, and the downward slide began.&ldquo;Paul Lawless used to be a bad actor,&rdquo; he admits.Sent back to junior hockey in Windsor, Lawless was voted the league&rsquo;s fastest skater, but his lack of discipline, both on and off the ice, sent his stock plummeting.Last year he failed to stick with Binghamton, the Whalers&rsquo; American League affiliate, and was sent to Salt Lake City of the&mdash;gulp&mdash;International League.&ldquo;Let&rsquo;s just say it took me awhile to get back to Hartford,&rdquo; he says.At Salt Lake, Lawless came under the guidance of coach Tom Webster, a former star for the World Hockey Association Whalers, and responded with his best pro season. His 49 goals and 97 points in 72 games at Salt Lake persuaded a few eyes that had closed to open again, but no more so than by winning the team&rsquo;s &ldquo;Mr. Hustle&rdquo; award.Still, the train that runs from the NHL to the IHL is almost always one-way. Few make the return trip, but Lawless, to his everlasting credit, did.&ldquo;I learned the hard way,&rdquo; says Lawless, who had 12 goals and 23 points in his first 28 games with the Whalers this year. &ldquo;Anybody who still says I&rsquo;m a bad actor doesn&rsquo;t know me. I respect the game of hockey now.&rdquo;The Whalers didn&rsquo;t know quite what to do with Lawless in October. His outstanding speed and new dedication were clearly in evidence in camp, but when the season opened, Lawless remained on the sidelines as the brass went with Jorgen Pettersson, a more experienced hand.For the first seven games, Lawless sat, watched and wondered.&ldquo;All I really wanted was a chance,&rdquo; he says. &ldquo;I thought I had earned one, but you never know. The one thing I did know is that I didn&rsquo;t want to go back.&rdquo;It took Lawless seven starts to net his first goal, his first as a Whaler since April, 1983. Ironically, both came at Le Colisee in Quebec City.After that. Lawless literally took off.Paired with center Dean Evason and right winger Stewart Gavin on the LEG line, Lawless scored in six straight games, with four goals and five assists. His streak, the longest on the Whalers this season, ended against Montreal when he curiously saw little ice time. In the next game, he registered his first career hat trick in a thrilling, come-from-behind victory at Buffalo.&ldquo;They used to say that I was a lazy hockey player, but now I&rsquo;m trying as hard as I can, both offensively and defensively,&rdquo; Lawless says. &ldquo;I just go out there and work. I try as hard as I can every second I&rsquo;m on the ice.&rdquo;Lawless&rsquo; rise from the ashes has earned him many supporters among his teammates.&ldquo;Lawly really works hard and skates hard,&rdquo; linemate Gavin says. &ldquo;Our line talks a little bit about how we&rsquo;re going to play a certain team, but mostly, we just say let&rsquo;s go out and go for it. That&rsquo;s the way to deal with Lawly. The best thing to do is to tell him just to go for it. He&rsquo;s got the potential to score 40 goals in this league.&rdquo;And he&rsquo;s still got all that speed.&ldquo;He skates faster than all but the top two or three per cent in the league,&rdquo; defenseman Joel Quenneville says.On the ice, he is still, ah, Lawless, but don&rsquo;t be misled, he makes things happen.&ldquo;I&rsquo;m just going to go out there and keep on digging,&rdquo; he says.There should be more stories in the NHL like Lawless, a fourth-year pro who took the long way home. Patience has always been a virtue, but with the advent of the 18-year-old draft, it has become more than that. In the rare and uplifting case of Paul Lawless, it was a necessity.&ldquo;I never quit on myself,&rdquo; Lawless says. &ldquo;I always thought that I could play in the NHL.&rdquo;Others&mdash;beep, beep&mdash;have begun to notice.<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0024-02540/5777289-1-eng-US/f0024-022.jpg" title="f0024-02" width="580" height="942"><figcaption class="caption-body">Speedy Paul Lawless admits he narrowly averted ruining his OVA hockey career.</figcaption></div> &#9632;

f0024-01

Hartford’s Outlaw Fighting The Good Fight

<div class="byline">Rod Beaton</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0024-03349/5777327-1-eng-US/f0024-032.jpg" title="f0024-03" width="437" height="443"></div>HOCKEY IN HAMILTON? Heaven help us!No sooner has the NHL been able to beat back the efforts of a bunch of sadists to locate a franchise in Saskatoon than this Hamilton business starts.Evidently there is no rest for the weary. These humble Hamiltonians seem to think a new arena entitles them to a new team&mdash;an NHL team.Are they crazy? We are, for listening.Give Hamilton credit. It brought Copps Coliseum in under budget, an extraordinary achievement during an era in which the average construction worker toils about as hard as the average Detroit Red Wing.The fans aren&rsquo;t bad either. They turned out in fine numbers during the World Junior Championships, flexing turnstile muscle to impress NHL bigshots.Of course the fans suffer from the same illness common to all English-speaking Canadians. They make less noise in the whole building than just one section of the Montreal Forum, the Colisee, the Spectrum or most U.S. buildings. I suspect they figure they are too sophisticated to do something as uncool as cheering.Maybe they figured they had to be as bland as the building. Copps is your basic no-frills production, it is not a brand-name product. It won&rsquo;t beat out the Saddledome or Meadowlands for the center spread in Architectural Digest.The NHL is trying&mdash;despite the best efforts of Pal Hal Ballard&mdash;to be a major league. Is Hamilton a majorleague city?It has the requisite population, but stick it in the Toronto-Buffalo corridor and we suddenly have a three-team glut in an area that is not exactly Paradise Found.Will we rename the NHL the National Snowbelt League? I mean it&rsquo;s bad enough to have three teams crammed into the New York-New Jersey area, the land of hot and cold running dioxin. But despite the ill-mannered fans, a trip to that turf offers a few rewards.What cultural advantages does Hamilton offer?I went into a Hamilton bar to see Edmonton play Red Army on the big screen. I was well-dressed as hockey writers go, and in the esteemed company of the U.S. junior coaching staff.So what happens? Some bouncer from Godfather Casting bends over and squeezes my toes. He wanted to make certain I didn&rsquo;t have steel-tipped boots for an unfair advantage in brawls.That&rsquo;s class. That&rsquo;s style. And that&rsquo;s supposed to be one of Hamilton&rsquo;s nicer spots.Of course Hamilton has Don Cherry&rsquo;s place. A good bistro. Hockey fans gather there. But it&rsquo;s dangerous. You might have to listen to Old Grapes himself. I thought the only people who took him seriously were Stan Fischler and Al Strachan. Besides Blue, I guess the Hamiltonians do, too. What does that tell you?And Hamilton has become the home of a strange junior coach&mdash;Bill LaForge. Now, LaForge is a great name for a steel town, but his ideas of turning intelligent players into junkyard dogs just aren&rsquo;t 20th century. Hamilton loves him. What does that tell you?Sure, Hamilton has turned out pros&mdash;players and coaches. Heck, half the coaches of the North Stars over the years have come from Hamilton. What does that tell you?Hamilton can say it is a seat of higher learning. There&rsquo;s a school there named McMaster. But hockey&rsquo;s most famous McMaster is Sam, late of the Soo, now with the Caps. It&rsquo;s not that school. What does that tell you?People in Hamilton are friendly. No doubt they are thrilled to see someone from the civilized world. And can they ever dress. Some of them made the Russians look like the essence of sartorial splendor. What does that tell you?(Ed. Note: Mr. Beaton, by the way, is the only hockey writer on the beat who wears construction boots&mdash;granted, without steel toes&mdash;to complement a blazer, tie and slacks. What does that tell you?)Certainly Hamilton has a major-league newspaper, although the sports columnist insisted on calling the Soviet coach &ldquo;Vlad Baby&rdquo;.And I thought his name was Vladimir Vasiliev. Silly me.I have to admire Hamilton&rsquo;s restaurants. Truly they&rsquo;re major-league. Hamiltonians know the real meaning of haute-cuisine. They make a mean grilled cheese.All seriousness aside, the best thing about Hamilton is its proximity to Toronto and Buffalo. You can go to Toronto for a show, a meal, and a delightfully sophisticated city. And you can go to Buffalo for chicken wings and major-league hockey.But let&rsquo;s not see major-league hockey in Hamilton. It&rsquo;s bad enough we have to visit Winnipeg. &#9632;

f0024-03

Hamilton Gets ‘The Boot’ From Sharp-Dressed Man

<div class="byline">BY ERIC DUHATSCHEK</div><h2>CALGARY FLAMES</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0025-01689/5777358-1-eng-US/f0025-012.jpg" title="f0025-01" width="578" height="156"></div><h2>CALGARY FLAMES</h2>CALGARY&mdash;Hanging from the ceiling in the visitor&rsquo;s dressing room was Marty McSorley&rsquo;s Edmonton Oiler sweater, ripped to shreds by Doug Risebrough&rsquo;s skate blades.Nothing summed up the disintegration of the Calgary Flames better than that graphic illustration of their frustrations.The sweater-shredding took place in the second period of a 4-3 loss to the Oilers on Jan. 3, the Flames&rsquo; eighth conecutive defeat.Only once before in the franchise&rsquo;s history, from Dec. 2 to Dec. 17, 1974, were the Flames able to duplicate that sorry feat. Clearly, the pressure of losing was getting to them.It did not let up as the Flames lost twice more to run the streak to 10 with setbacks against Montreal and Edmonton (once more). Those defeats dropped Calgary&rsquo;s record to 17-18-3.As is usually the case, the slump began innocently enough. Riding a 13-3-3 streak that temporarily had moved them into a tie with the Washington Capitals for third overall in the league standings, the Flames proceeded to lose close one-goal games to the Vancouver Canucks, Pittsburgh Penguins and Hartford Whalers.Bad luck, they said.Next they ran into a couple of hot goaltenders, Rick Wamsley and Bob Sauve, to drop games four and five to St. Louis and Chicago, respectively.More bad luck, they said.Following Christmas, they lost 5-4 to the Philadelphia Flyers on a shot that caromed in off two skates.Unbelievable bad luck, they said.They were full value for loss number seven to the Minnesota North Stars, everyone agreed. Then they dropped number eight to the Oilers as goaltender Grant Fuhr blocked 48 of 51 shots directed his way.Suddenly, the team that was 17-8-3 and challenging the Oilers was 17-16-3 and wondering if they were ever going to snap out of it.&ldquo;We can talk about 51 shots and we can talk about everything else, but the bottom line is we lost the game,&rdquo; said Calgary coach Bob Johnson, following the Oiler loss. &ldquo;We had the opportunities to execute the big plays so many times and just didn&rsquo;t.&rdquo;That may indeed be the major shortcoming. Half a dozen Flames picked December as their month to stop scoring. On a team where the offense must be equally shared by all 12 forwards, that development turned out to be catastrophic.Johnson, ever the optimist, said he did not think the term &ldquo;slump&rdquo; accurately described what the Flames were going through;&ldquo;In all honesty, I don&rsquo;t think it&rsquo;s a slump,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;We lost an edge. When you lose an edge, you may get a little frustrated. Maybe you don&rsquo;t play as well defensively. It&rsquo;s amazing when you win, how good you feel, how well you practise. Lose a few and you don&rsquo;t practise as well. You don&rsquo;t practise as well and you don&rsquo;t play as well. It&rsquo;s as simple as that.&rdquo;Johnson says the challenge now is for the players not to get down on themselves. That may be easier said then done.Lanny McDonald, asked if the team was aware that the losing streak had hit record proportions, replied: &ldquo;Damn right we&rsquo;re aware of it. Thank God we had a good start and we got the jump on the other teams in our division. But that won&rsquo;t last forever. We&rsquo;ve got to turn it around.&rdquo;General manager Cliff Fletcher, who has been with the team from the first day, said he could not recall the circumstances of the last eight-game losing streak. Understandably, he wasn&rsquo;t satisfied with the results the Flames had been getting lately.&ldquo;I knew we were in trouble on the road trip when the players were talking about how well they played even though they lost,&rdquo; said Fletcher. &ldquo;That&rsquo;s usually the first sign of trouble.&ldquo;Watching the Calgary Flames play right now is like watching a pick-up game on a pond. The effort&rsquo;s been there, but our defense better get back to the basics.&rdquo;Fletcher admitted he had recieved &ldquo;a couple of interesting calls,&rdquo; from other general managers around the league, including one &ldquo;that&rsquo;s a follow-up to something we talked about last summer. But I&rsquo;m not going to do anything today that I wouldn&rsquo;t have done Dec. 15 when we were nine games over 500. I know what I&rsquo;d like to do and if it becomes available, we&rsquo;ll do it.&rdquo; &#9632;

f0025-01

Flames Burn Black Mark Into Record Book

<div class="byline">BY RICH CHERE</div><h2>NEW JERSEY DEVILS</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0026-01733/5777396-1-eng-US/f0026-012.jpg" title="f0026-01" width="576" height="157"></div>EAST RUTHERFORD&mdash;They are a team struggling for stability.The last move general manager Max McNab and coach Doug Carpenter wanted to make was a shakeup of the New Jersey Devils&rsquo; defensive corps to start the new year.But after allowing 15 goals in back-to-back games against the Montreal Canadiens and 30 goals over four games, McNab and Carpenter had no choice.On Jan. 2 the Devils recalled Ken Daneyko and Randy Velischek from Maine in an attempt to add some spark to New Jersey&rsquo;s defense. They also brought up goalie Sam St. Laurent to fill in for Alain Chevrier while the rookie&rsquo;s severe ankle sprain healed.To make room for the two young defensemen, Uli Hiemer and Bruce Driver were sent to the American League Mariners.&ldquo;We&rsquo;re not pointing fingers at any two people.&rdquo; insisted Carpenter, &ldquo;and you don&rsquo;t make moves just for the sake of making them. We&rsquo;ve gotten ourselves into a slide. As a result the changes were made and not hastily.&rdquo;The changes added some beef in front of the net, as well as shake up the team. Time will tell if that is the answer.&ldquo;We&rsquo;re playing scared. We don&rsquo;t trust the other guy. We don&rsquo;t know what the other guy will do,&rdquo; said veteran defenseman Bob Lorimer after the Devils&rsquo; losing streak reached a season-high five straight, giving them eight losses in nine games. &ldquo;It looks like six guys doing their own thing out there.&ldquo;Everybody is trying to help everyone else out and not worrying about their own guy. It&rsquo;s the natural thing to do but you&rsquo;ve got to trust the other guy to do his job or that&rsquo;s how things snowball.&rdquo;Things had snowballed.Until a few weeks ago Lorimer and Dave Lewis were performing with precision, but both seemed a step slower and out of position too often. Rookie Craig Wolanin, impressive in stretches, was struggling with eight giveaways in 13 games that had led to opposing goals. Dave Pichette couldn&rsquo;t get the handle and the benched Phil Russell couldn&rsquo;t get back into the lineup.&ldquo;We just gave up 15 goals in two games. Obviously we&rsquo;re not playing well,&rdquo; said Pichette. &ldquo;You can&rsquo;t blame or point to one guy. It&rsquo;s the whole team. It&rsquo;s one of those things you can&rsquo;t explain. A few guys make mistakes and it seems like everybody&rsquo;s making mistakes. It&rsquo;s tough for us right now. We&rsquo;re trying to work our way out of a hole.&ldquo;It is scary. We don&rsquo;t want to go 10 or 12 games like this. We want to get out of it as soon as possible. We can&rsquo;t afford to lose 10 or 12 games in a row. We want to stay close to the Rangers and Penguins. We&rsquo;re digging ourselves a hole.&rdquo;Could Daneyko and Velischek help?&ldquo;I played physical down at Maine and Doug said that&rsquo;s what he heard,&rdquo; said Daneyko. &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve got to play a physical defensive style&mdash;stay at home, keep the puck out of the net and knock people out from in front. I hope I can help.&rdquo;&ldquo;I&rsquo;m a little happy and surprised,&rdquo; added Velischek. &ldquo;I just hope to get into the lineup.&rdquo;They didn&rsquo;t call him to New Jersey to watch.HOT STUFF&mdash;Mel Bridgman, spurred by Hector Marini&rsquo;s career-ending eye injury and recent close calls for Craig Wolanin and Montreal&rsquo;s Ryan Walter, began wearing a face shield Dec. 21. Wolanin began wearing a shield in practice&hellip;Alain Chevrier sprained his ankle making two breakaway stops on Guy Carbonneau of Montreal&hellip;Rich Preston required 16 stitches to close a laceration on the right side of his rib cage Dec 21&hellip;At Maine, Ken Daneyko was 3-2-5 in 20 games with 75 penalty minutes while Randy Velischek was 0-4 in 20 games.<h2>The Snowbirds</h2><div class="figure-block image-bleed"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0026-02502/5777389-1-eng-US/f0026-022.jpg" title="f0026-02" width="1214" height="1399"></div><h2>JOFA Entries</h2>If you would like to nominate a player for THN-JOFA Minor Showcase Player of the Week, please send a photo, along with a note outlining pertinent information&mdash;name, age, birthplace, current hometown, position, height, weight, team and league name, coach&rsquo;s name, favorite hockey team and player, statistics plus school grade and school name&mdash;to JOFA SHOWCASE, THE HOCKEY NEWS, 85 Scarsdale Rd., Suite 100, Don Mills, Ont. M3B 2R2.At the end of the season, all entries will be eligible for THN-JOFA Minor Player of the Year, which includes a trip to Toronto for THN awards banquet, a plaque plus a complete line of JOFA hockey equipment. &#9632;

f0026-01

New Jersey Coming Undone At Blue Line

Sutters and Hunters beware, the Turgeon Connection is on the way. And we&rsquo;re not talking about Sylvain, the Hartford Whaler ace, and his younger brother, Quebec League star Pierre.No, this Turgeon Connection consists of nine-year-old Doug, eight-year-old Dominic and six-year-old Matthew, who all play on the St. Peter&rsquo;s Mites Team in the Lewiston-Auburn Youth Hockey League in Lewiston, Maine.All three of them were born and raised in Lewiston and are now coached by Roger Theriault and Frank Corrao.Doug, a fourth-grade student at St. Peter&rsquo;s Catholic School, is a 4-foot-3,60-pound center and his favorite player is&mdash;who else?&mdash;Sylvain Turgeon of the Whalers.Dominic, a third-grade student, is a 4-foot-4,62-pound defenseman whose favorite player is Boston Bruin Ray Bourque.<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0026-03405/5777427-1-eng-US/f0026-032.jpg" title="f0026-03" width="562" height="844"><figcaption class="caption-body">Left to right, Doug, Matthew and Dominic Turgeon.</figcaption></div>And little Matthew, a first grader at the same school as his brothers and a 3-foot-10, 45-pound right winger, says Bruin sniper Rick Middleton is his favorite player. &#9632;

f0026-03

PLAYER OF WEEK

<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0026-04293/5777458-1-eng-US/f0026-042.jpg" title="f0026-04" width="716" height="1040"><figcaption class="caption-body">Whalers&rsquo; sparkplug Kevin Dineen saw the sights of the hockey world while he was learning his profession.</figcaption></div>If he ever writes it, Kevin Dineen&rsquo;s autobiography about his minor hockey days will probably have a borrowed title. How about Homer&rsquo;s Odyssey? Or John Bunyan&rsquo;s A Pilgrim&rsquo;s Progress? Maybe Jules Verne&rsquo;s Around the World in 80 Days?Dineen&rsquo;s pre-professional hockey career carried him from the west-coast city of Seattle to the Rocky Mountain highs of Denver to the flat, hockey wasteland of Houston during the 1970s to the promised land of Toronto, and back to the lofty plateau of Denver.&ldquo;It&rsquo;s kind of tough to learn how to play hockey in Houston, Texas,&rdquo; says Dineen, 22. &ldquo;But I was fortunate enough to have a dad who was a professional coach. I got a lot of opportunities to sneak down with the team and go out and skate after them. So that was a real plus.&rdquo;Dineen&rsquo;s father. Bill, coached the World Hockey Association&rsquo;s Houston Aeros from 1972-73 to 1977-78, and then the Hartford Whalers during the 1978-79 season. Twice he led the Aeros to Avco Cup championships.&ldquo;Every summer my dad was working at the Okanagan Hockey School in Penticton, B.C.,&rdquo; says Dineen. &ldquo;We&rsquo;d go out there every summer and it was like a vacation, we&rsquo;d get a cottage. We&rsquo;d go to the hockey school every summer for five weeks.&ldquo;So it was kind of weird. It&rsquo;s not your normal &lsquo;Go play for the Toronto Marlies or whatever on up.&rsquo;&rdquo;Despite his near-migratory early hockey days, Dineen doesn&rsquo;t think that moving around hindered his development.&ldquo;I don&rsquo;t think so,&rdquo; he says. &ldquo;I think it worked out well. Maybe if I had stayed one more year in Houston, I don&rsquo;t think I would have done a lot with my hockey, because when you play down there, the level of competition isn&rsquo;t good enough.&ldquo;But we moved to Connecticut in my second year of bantam. And I played a year of high school hockey there, and that was kind of a step up in the level of hockey with bigger guys.&ldquo;In my second year of midget, it was kind of like walking into hockey heaven. We moved to Toronto, and I played for St. Mike&rsquo;s (Jr. B) for a year. I loved it there. I had a great coach in Rick Cornacchia. He was a real fundamentalist.&rdquo;With four brothers, two of whom are playing professional hockey, Kevin had plenty of practice.&ldquo;Always there was competition. Skating, pick-up games. I think you can tell brothers, like the Hunters or the Sutters. They&rsquo;re competitors. I don&rsquo;t think that&rsquo;s a coincidence. I think it&rsquo;s growing up in that kind of an atmosphere of competition that does it. But by the time you reach minor midget, you&rsquo;re rooting for each other, so I think it turns out well.&rdquo;After he left St. Mike&rsquo;s. Dineen headed back to Denver, where he played for the University of Denver. He scored 26 goals and 49 points in 62 games over two years and then played under coach Dave King for one year on the Canadian Olympic team, before turning pro with the Hartford Whalers.&ldquo;So I&rsquo;ve been around the circle quite a bit,&rdquo; &#9632;

f0026-04

A Traveling Man’s Hockey Player

<div class="byline">BY TONY GALLAGHER</div><h2>VANCOUVER CANUCKS</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0028-01711/5777527-1-eng-US/f0028-012.jpg" title="f0028-01" width="581" height="149"></div>VANCOUVER&mdash;A cursory look at the point total of the Vancouver Canucks indicates the National Hockey League team hasn&rsquo;t made much progress this season.But points are not everything. While they had not made great strides in terms of points, they had managed to improve in two vital areas.First, their Smythe Division record reflected a dramatic turnaround. While they had lost nine of 10 points to the Edmonton Oilers, the Canucks had winning records against their other three divisional opponents.&ldquo;We definitely felt we had to improve in our divisional games,&rdquo; said coach Tom Watt. &ldquo;I wasn&rsquo;t here last year, but it doesn&rsquo;t take a rocket scientist to figure out we needed to improve.&rdquo;The Canucks had won their three games with Los Angeles, two of three with Winnipeg and prevailed in their only meeting with Calgary.To play.500 against Calgary this season would be a tremendous boon. Last year they did not beat the Flames, losing seven and tying one and the year before that they were 2-5-1.Further, they were still looking for their first win at the Calgary Saddle-dome, something they had not even accomplished during pre-season visits.While the season series against Smythe Division teams were really just getting started, one of the reasons for the early success was a product of the second major area of improvement in the Canucks this season.They have become a team that no longer gets sand kicked in its face.Last year the Canucks had only two willing combatants. Cam Neely did nearly all the duking, with Garth Butcher also getting involved frequently. The main problem was that neither of these two is in the super heavyweight category, and the opposing super heavyweights knew it.But with Craig Coxe and Glen Cochrane both getting more ice time this season, that shortcoming appears to be rectified. Both are good at throwing the mitts and both are abrasive, with the bonus being that both are beginning to play some excellent hockey.Cochrane was finally recovering from knee problems which kept him out of the lineup when he joined the Canucks from the Philadelphia Flyers at the trading deadline last year. He will never be mistaken for Ray Bourque, but he was skating as well as he ever had, and he was moving the puck quickly.&ldquo;I was amazed at the things this team used to take last year,&rdquo; said Cochrane, who had to watch from the press box. &ldquo;But when you look at last year&rsquo;s roster, there really wasn&rsquo;t anything they could do about it. I think that is pretty much in the past now. We know for sure that at least four guys are going to show up.&rdquo;Coxe, who hates the goon label and is working like the devil to improve his skills to shake it, has had some titanic battles, with the results almost always decisive, either for or against him.In a recent homestand, Coxe was jumped by Dave Brown of the Philadelphia Flyers and pummelled to the point where he took a total of 14 stitches above and below the eye. He was sore and wasn&rsquo;t supposed to play the next game against Edmonton, but when Brent Peterson got the flu, he was inserted into the lineup at the last moment.<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0028-02498/5777520-1-eng-US/f0028-022.jpg" title="f0028-02" width="585" height="761"><figcaption class="caption-body">The Canucks&rsquo; Garth Butcher has had some help in the trenches this season.</figcaption></div>As misfortune would have it, he became embroiled in another distasteful affair, and despite Cochrane&rsquo;s desperate attempts to fight Don Jackson in his stead, Coxe went at it. While his face was again cut for three stitches, he drove Jackson right off his feet with some blows of his own in one of the more courageous demonstrations in Canuck history.&ldquo;It&rsquo;s a lot different this year,&rdquo; said Neely, who carried the whole load last season. &ldquo;Now there is lots of help and it&rsquo;s rubbing off on the other guys as well. Look at the way Hawk (Doug Halward) jumped in when (the Kings&rsquo; Bernie) Nicholls stuck Thommy (Gradin).&rdquo;The fact that rugged teams like Los Angeles and Calgary could no longer declare open season on the Canucks was a big reason for the early turnaround in their divisional record. &#9632;

f0028-01

Canuck Smythe Record Improved

<div class="byline">Terry Jones</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0028-03353/5777558-1-eng-US/f0028-032.jpg" title="f0028-03" width="303" height="420"></div>THE FELLOW THE FANS have fingered to be the starting goaltender for one team, Pelle Lindbergh, is dead.The chap the customers have chosen to play goal for the other team, Grant Fuhr, can&rsquo;t claim to be the best goaltender on his own team, much less the league.When the first-round voting was released, Calgary Flames&rsquo; Paul Reinhart had 11,200 votes and had played one game. Los Angeles Kings&rsquo; Mark Hardy had 4,430 votes and hadn&rsquo;t played at all.One month to go before the Feb. 4th All-Star game in Hartford and you can make a case that the top goaltender in the Wales conference is either John Vanbiesbrouck of the New York Rangers or Bob Froese of the Philadelphia Flyers, and neither is on the ballot.So how is it working so far?Hockey finally gave the fans the vote for the midseason All-Star game and what have they gone and done with it?More than one columnist has come out and raged that the fans have made it a farce.But excuse me if I come out and rave that the fans have made it fun.The only screaming I hear about the fans&rsquo; voting is from the disenfranchised inhabitants of the press box.&ldquo;I think it&rsquo;s already proved to be a great way to get the fans involved,&rdquo; said Wales&rsquo; Conference coach Mike Keenan of the Philadelphia Flyers. &ldquo;I&rsquo;m sure it has created a lot more interest with the fans and even with the players themselves.&rdquo;Wayne Gretzky likes it.&ldquo;I don&rsquo;t think there&rsquo;s any question the fans are more involved. They&rsquo;re filling in thousands of ballots and they&rsquo;re following their figures which have been released, reflecting their votes.&ldquo;There is no perfect way to choose the mid-season All-Star team. But I like this way best because it creates more interest in the game.&ldquo;Anybody who considers complaining about it ought to consider the fact that without the fans, there is no hockey.&ldquo;Sure, now and then, there are going to be some situations, but I look at the votes so far, and to me, they&rsquo;re pretty accurate.&rdquo;The fans select the starting six. The remainder of the teams are selected by the all-star coaches.Pelle Lindbergh&rsquo;s 94,666 votes led the goaltenders at the end of December. The voting is obviously a final tribute to him by most of the newly-franchised fans. In the real voting for the position, Tom Barrasso of Buffalo and Mario Gosselin of Quebec were only a handful of votes apart in second spot.Ray Bourque of Boston led defensemen despite what many media men suggest has been a sub-par season. Rod Langway of Washington was 13,000 votes back with the second defensive spot. Mark Howe of Philadelphia was, in the eyes of many of press-boxers who used to have the vote, allowed to sing the &ldquo;somebody done somebody wrong&rdquo; song.Brian Propp of Philadelphia at right wing, Tim Kerr of the Flyers at left wing and Mario Lemieux of Pittsburgh at center wasn&rsquo;t creating controversy although Bobby Carpenter of Washington sitting behind Lemieux was way out of whack.In the Campbell Conference, the fans had John Ogrod-nick of Detroit as the early leader at left wing ahead of Glenn Anderson of Edmonton, who was coming off a sub-par season. The fans deserved credit for correctly identifying Anderson&rsquo;s hot hand in the first half and had him 15,000 votes ahead of Ogrodnick by New Year&rsquo;s Day.Gretzky at center, Jari Kurri at right wing plus overall vote leader Paul Coffey and Chicago&rsquo;s Doug Wilson on defense haven&rsquo;t caused controversy either.Where the fans have flubbed is in goal, where Andy Moog has been brilliant for the Oilers and stablemate Grant Fuhr, when he hasn&rsquo;t been injured, inconsistent.But Moog isn&rsquo;t fuming.&ldquo;I think the fans should have a chance to vote for the most popular players,&rdquo; Moog said. &ldquo;And I think the coach should have the votes for the most talented players.&rdquo;As long as the coaches are in the position to right all wrongs, then Moog figures this is the way it should be.&ldquo;When it comes to goalies, where this year there is by far the most controversy, I think it comes down mostly to television and where you finished last year,&rdquo; said Moog. &ldquo;Grant and myself were in the finals and were on TV a lot last year. People saw us. While there are obviously other reasons involved with Pelle, the early voting for him, was partially based, I suspect, on the fact he was in the finals last year.&rdquo;For several years I was one of the voters. But I waved the white flag a long time ago on this subject. For years I&rsquo;ve thought it was time for hockey to go the same route as baseball and basketball and give the vote to the fans.Sure there are going to be some stupid situations. All sports have had them. One of the most memorable was baseball fans picking Reggie Jackson when he was having such a shabby season. He was having trouble justifying his position on his own team let alone the all-star team.I guess how you feel on this subject depends on how you view the All-Star game itself.I see it strictly as a showcase game&mdash;a who&rsquo;s who of hockey, live and in person. To me the All-Star game is always great during the player introductions and absolutely awful after that.The fans wanted Reggie Jackson in the baseball AllStar game regardless. So what&rsquo;s wrong with the midseason All-Star game being a popularity contest? What&rsquo;s the All-Star game if it isn&rsquo;t a place to parade all the players with the profiles? As long as the All-Star coaches have room to take care of the obvious injustices, which they do, why not have the fans voting like they are now? The fans make it more fun. &#9632;

f0028-03

The NHL All-Star Contest Belongs In Hands Of Fans

<div class="byline">BY CHUCK MOODY</div>Louisville HockeyLouisville Hockey<h2>PITTSBURGH PENGUINS</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0029-01615/5777589-1-eng-US/f0029-012.jpg" title="f0029-01" width="575" height="163"></div>PITTSBURGH&mdash;Rookie Norm Schmidt has overcome two serious knee injuries to become one of the Pittsburgh is best two-way defensemen.Schmidt, 22, was Pittsburgh&rsquo;s third ice in the 1981 National Hockey league entry draft from Oshawa of the Ontario League. He scored 21 goals and 49 assists for the Generals during his final junior season.&ldquo;I was known primarily as an offensive defenseman coming out of junior,&rdquo; said Schmidt. &ldquo;The past year and a half, I&rsquo;ve been trying to play more defensively and just worry about my positioning and not wandering up the ice so much.&rdquo;Schmidt split his first pro season between Pittsburgh and Baltimore of the American League. He scored six goals and 12 assists in 34 games with the Penguins.His goal-scoring touch deserted him last sesaon in Baltimore, however, where he had 22 assists but was goalless in 33 games. Schmidt was going to be recalled by the Penguins the day after he suffered tom ligaments in his right knee on Dec. 28, an injury that required surgery and sidelined him for the remainder of the season.&ldquo;I worked very hard during the summer so I could have a good chance of making the team,&rdquo; said Schmidt. &ldquo;Unfortunately, my other knee went out the same type of way the first week of training camp.&ldquo;I was concerned about how I was going to be able to skate. I did a lot of work with Doug McKenney, our strength coach. I had a lot of extra work on the ice with (assistant coach) Jimmy Roberts and (coach) Bob Berry just to get myself back in playing shape.&ldquo;My skating is just coming around now. I still feel like I&rsquo;m a stride behind. I&rsquo;m wearing a couple of braces on my knees that are kind of hard to get used to. I&rsquo;ve been able to overcome a little bit of adversity so I&rsquo;m happy about that.&rdquo;Schmidt, who possesses one of the Penguins&rsquo; most powerful slapshots, scored seven goals and 10 assists in his first 26 games, including two two-goal games, and was plus-seven.&ldquo;I got the chance to play, and I think I&rsquo;m contributing,&rdquo; said Schmidt, whose second knee injury also required surgery. &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve been working hard every game, and that&rsquo;s really paid off for me. I&rsquo;m not playing as well as I could. There&rsquo;s still a lot of things that I&rsquo;ve got to brush up. Within the next month or so it should come back.&rdquo;Penguin management thought Schmidt was playing well enough to tell him to move out of the hotel he had been staying in and find a permanent place to live.&ldquo;Each year I&rsquo;ve been up, I&rsquo;ve been living in the hotel for a couple of months,&rdquo; said Schmidt. &ldquo;I think it shows some confidence on their part.&ldquo;I hope I&rsquo;m here to stay. If I continue playing the way I can, if I get a little more confidence, I&rsquo;ll stay. Gradually I think that&rsquo;ll come.&rdquo;Following two knee operations within nine months, Schmidt also has had to cope with an off-center vertebrae near the base of his spine. Schmidt said he first felt the condition at the end of November.&ldquo;It&rsquo;s probably because of some fighting I was doing,&rdquo; Schmidt said. &ldquo;You could say it&rsquo;s there 24 hours a day, unless I&rsquo;m sleeping. It&rsquo;s more or less a lightning-type sensation down the right side of my leg.&ldquo;I can feel it, but I just have to be strong mentally. Just try to block that out and not worry about it. So far, they&rsquo;ve found nothing they can treat it with.&rdquo;The prospect of being operated on a third time does not thrill Schmidt.&ldquo;I would probably have to say that&rsquo;s still up in the air,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;But now is not the time for surgery. I&rsquo;m sick and tired of it, to tell you the truth.&ldquo;I just want to have a strong mind, try to block most of the pain out. I am just going to have to live with it.&rdquo;PENGUIN TRACKS&mdash;Two straight sellouts raised home attendance for the first half of the season to 218,773, an average of 10,939. Attendance last season for 20 games was 206,934, an average of 10,347. The consecutive sellouts against Boston and the Islanders were the first since November, 1981&hellip;Mario Lemieux scored his first NHL career hat trick with a four-goal game Dec. 31 in St. Louis&hellip;Mike Bullard also scored a hat trick in the same game. &#9632;

f0029-01

Schmidt Proving He Belongs In The NHL

<div class="byline">BY RANDY SCHULTZ</div><h2>BUFFALO SABRES</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0029-02417/5777620-1-eng-US/f0029-022.jpg" title="f0029-02" width="590" height="160"></div>BUFFALO&mdash;With the Buffalo Sabres struggling through the first half of their season, their offense sputtering and a defense that had almost half of the regulars sidelined with injuries, an injury to team captain Gil Perreault couldn&rsquo;t have come at a better time.Or so it seemed as the Sabres put together a four-game unbeaten streak during Perreault&rsquo;s absence due to a bruised foot suffered Dec. 21 in Montreal.Why the sudden turnaround? What the team doing differently without Perreault?&lsquo;&lsquo;Sometimes I think we found ourselves looking in awe of Gil when he would be out on the ice,&rdquo; said Lindy Ruff, who was filling in as team captain during Perreault&rsquo;s absence before being sidelined himself Dec. 29 with a knee injury.&ldquo;We take a look at him out on the ice and see that he&rsquo;s having a good game and sometimes say that he&rsquo;ll carry us tonight. Or maybe we&rsquo;ll look and see he&rsquo;s doing well and say that maybe he&rsquo;ll pull it out us tonight.&ldquo;But I think after he got hurt the guys took a look at themselves and said that we all have to pull together and play as a team.&ldquo;Now guys like (John) Tucker, (Paul) Cyr, (Sean) McKenna, (Gilles) Hamel, (Phil) Housley and (Dave) Andreychuk have worked extremely hard since Gil&rsquo;s been gone and are trying to pick up the slack.&ldquo;And the goals are beginning to come for them, which is something all of them have been having troubles with on and of throughout the season.Before the injury, Ruff was having the best season of his seven-year career, scoring 14 goals in 29 games. On Dec. 15 in Quebec City, he became the second player in Sabres&rsquo; history to score four goals in one game. (Former Sabres&rsquo; star Richard Martin was the other.)&ldquo;All I&rsquo;ve been really trying to do is strive for consistent play night after night,&rdquo; said Ruff. &ldquo;I guess I&rsquo;ve been trying to score the big goal, the ones that will lift the team.&ldquo;And, although the goals have been coming for me this year, I still consider hitting and digging in the comers the biggest part of my game. That&rsquo;s where the power part of my game comes from.&rsquo;&rsquo;Power was one thing Memorial Auditorium didn&rsquo;t have much of in the contest against the Islanders.With the Sabres trailing 3-1 midway through the second period of the game, a transformer in the Aud was knocked out commission, dimming the lights in the building.Following a 40-minute delay and with the score clock and public address system not in working order, the game continued. The Sabres had a power surge of their own, taking the play to the Islanders the rest of the way.With Mike Foligno scoring his seventh career hat trick and Tucker scoring the game winner, the Sabres came from behind to defeat the Islanders 4-3.Sabres&rsquo; coach Jim Schoenfeld was very pleased with the victory, the team&rsquo;s third consecutive.&ldquo;I think the team has been playing very well of late,&rdquo; said Schoenfeld. &ldquo;We&rsquo;ve just been taking advantage of the scoring opportunities.&rdquo;Schoenfeld, like Ruff, noted the improved play of others during Perreault&rsquo;s absence.&ldquo;When he was in the lineup just before his injury opposing teams would check the heck out of his line. At the time, if his line was shut down that sort of shut down the rest of our offense.&ldquo;Now, with two lines providing our scoring attack, when Gil comes back maybe the other teams won&rsquo;t be checking his line so much.&rdquo;SABRE POINTS&mdash;Defenseman Dave Fenyves, who suffered a concussion in a game against the New York Rangers (Dec. 26) was expected back soon&hellip;Gil Perreault&rsquo;s foot injury was being evaluated on a day-to-day basis-&hellip;Bill Hajt was to miss another week with a pulled groin&hellip;Ric Seiling was out on a day-to-day basis with a pulled groin&hellip;Lindy Ruff was to be out at least a week with his twisted knee&hellip;Mikael Andersson played for Team Sweden at the World Junior Championships in Hamilton. He was expected to rejoin the Sabres on Jan. 5&hellip;Goaltender Jacques Cloutier posted his first NHL win since Jan. 26, 1984 against the Islanders-&hellip;Norm Lacombe and Adam Creighton were both recalled from Rochester on Dec. 26 for the game against the Rangers. Lacombe responded by scoring two goals. &#9632;

f0029-02

Sluggish Sabres Sizzling Without Leader Perreault

<div class="byline">BY MIKE KANE</div>Louisville HockeyLouisville HockeyFREDERICTON&mdash;In his own quiet way, Al MacAdam is helping the Vancouver Canucks deal with one problem while he takes care of another more personal one.It&rsquo;s a marriage of convenience, really, but one that is producing positive results for both parties.MacAdam, the soft-spoken man with the long National Hockey League career, is making the sometimes-difficult transition from fulltime professional player to another line of work. He&rsquo;s doing it this season, the final one of his contract, as a player/assistant coach/on-site coordinator with the Fredericton Express.He&rsquo;s wearing a lot of hats, breaking new ground and enjoying the experience.&ldquo;It evolved when I went to (the Canucks&rsquo;) training camp to make the team, and with a new coach and general manager they decided on going with a younger lineup,&rdquo; MacAdam said.&rdquo; They wanted me to come to Fredericton to do some playing. I decided I probably wouldn&rsquo;t choose to go that way.&ldquo;What they decided last year was to have some input into the team (in Fredericton). Because Quebec owns the team and manages it and coaches it. Vancouver, being so far away, had nobody really on top of the team. They had nobody watching a lot of their games. They felt a little bit on the outside because of that. So they decided to send me to Fredericton as a player-assistant coach. I practise with the team and I&rsquo;ve played five games, but only when the numbers get down to 19 do I play.&ldquo;I feel that my role with the team is to be more one on one with the players. Not only the Vancouver players, but because I&rsquo;m with the team, all the players. I feel that it has so far worked out pretty well.&rdquo;MacAdam, 33, is ending his playing days in a suitably unusual manner, close to his home of Prince Edward Island. It&rsquo;s fitting in a way because it completes a distinguished 13-year pro career&mdash;the last 11 of which were spent in the NHL&mdash;near to where it began in 1972.The Philadelphia Flyers started the story that year when they drafted MacAdam, then a University of Prince Edward Island student. Canadian college players are just beginning to draw the attention of NHL talents hunters. Fourteen years ago, hardly anyone was paying attention.The Flyers were, of course, and their astute decision to draft the lean right winger produced a player who scored 240 goals and 591 points in 864 games with the Flyers, California Golden Seals, Cleveland Barons, Minnesota North Stars and Canucks.&ldquo;I was prepared to play, but when the decision was made it didn&rsquo;t take any more than a day or two to adjust to it,&rdquo; MacAdam said. &ldquo;There wasn&rsquo;t a week of depression or anything like that. I felt I was comfortable with myself and confident with myself that once hockey was over that I&rsquo;d try something else when the decision was made.&ldquo;The timing of the year was such, October, that if I wanted to get into coaching, it wasn&rsquo;t a very opportune time to look for something. So this worked out really well.&rdquo;MacAdam takes part in the practice sessions, travels with the team, helps Express coach Andre Savard with analysis between periods of games and serves as Vancouver&rsquo;s representative to its younger players.The future beyond the end of this season is uncertain, though. If another coaching position doesn&rsquo;t develop, MacAdam figures he&rsquo;ll return to college next fall, probably at the University of New Brunswick&rsquo;s campus at Fredericton.In the meantime, he&rsquo;s looking after Vancouver&rsquo;s kids in Fredericton.&ldquo;I have a good rapport with the players. I feel that when I talk they listen. Because of that, I feel they&rsquo;re improving,&rdquo; he said.AROUND THE DIVISON&mdash;Maine, which had played 35 games this season without having a player recalled by New Jersey, lost three in one day when the Devils called up goalie Sam St. Laurent and defensemen Randy Velischek and Ken Daneyko. The Devils sent defensemen Uli Hiemer and Bruce Driver to Maine&hellip;Andy Brickley returned to the Maine lineup after missing a month with tendinitis in his shoulder&hellip;An eightgame winless streak (0-7-1) put the Nova Scotia Oilers in the Northern Division cellar. Defenseman Kent Paynter, a Chicago Black Hawks&rsquo; prospect, returned to the Oilers&rsquo; lineup after missing most of the season with injuries. The Oilers also picked up center Bruce Eakin in a trade that sent Billy Carroll to l^h troit&hellip;Adirondack defeated Frederick on New Year&rsquo;s Eve to move into first place overall in the league with 44 points. The Wings, 20-10-4, improved to 10 games over.500 for the first time in their history and evened their career won-lost record at 229-229. It&rsquo;s the first time they&rsquo;ve been at.500 since Nov. 30, 1979, two months into their first season&hellip;Forward Mark Kumpel and defenseman Gord Donnelly were assigned to Fredericton by Quebec&hellip;Moncton, riding the crest of a 4-1-2 surge, picked goalie Mike Vernon, forward Gi&rdquo; Cavallini and defenseman Neil Sheehy from Calgary&hellip;Montreal recalled Kent Carlson from Sherbrooke. &#9632;

Marriage Of Convenience Suits MacAdam

<div class="byline">BY DICK BAKER</div>ROCHESTER&mdash;Should old acquaintance be forgot and never brought to-mind, the Rochester Amerks will have a hard time staying atop the Southern Division.Before the New Year could ring itself in, the Amerks&rsquo; dressing room was emptying out faster than Times Square after the ball comes down. Numerous injuries to the parent Buffalo Sabres sent a quintet of Amerks shuffling off to Buffalo.Looked like the Amerks would need them back.As Rochester dropped its fifth straight game, Don Lever, Richie Dunn, Adam Creighton, Norm Lacombe and Richard Hajdu were still with the National Hockey League squad. Add injuries to AHL superstar Paul Gardner, crafty Claude Verret and monster-shot Mai Davis and it&rsquo;s easy to see why the South race had heated up.Rochester public relations director John Gurtler quantified the effect of the missing bodies.&ldquo;When we lost Sunday to Binghamton, we were down to 15 active skaters,&rdquo; said Gurtler. &ldquo;We were minus 51 per cent of our goal scoring for the year and 61 per cent of our power-play scoring.&rdquo;Like the good, all bad things must come to an end, so the Amerks were looking forward to the return of Davis, who had missed a month with a thumb injury. Davis was scheduled to return to the lineup in time for the Jan. 3 contest against St. Catharines. Coach John Van Boxmeer was also hoping that the Saints&rsquo; game would mark the return of Gardner (groin injury) and Verret (hip pointer.)Additionally, goaltender Jacques Cloutier was up in Buffalo, replaced in Rochester by prospect Darren Puppa. But Puppa had lost three straight games while rotating with Mike Craig. Through it all, the Amerks managed to cling to a one-point lead over the Hershey Bears. Only an unusual and costly pair of home losses to red-hot Springfield and Sherbrooke prevented the Bears from bouncing to the top spot.Meanwhile, Springfield soared to 1813-3 (only four points out of first) with strong performances home and away. Following a 3-2 home loss to Binghamton Dec. 21, the Indians breezed past Fredericton 6-1 the next night. Then they earned a 4-4 tie at New Haven before knocking off Adirondack 6-4, Dec. 26 at Glens Falls.Once again the Indians beat the Express at home 3-1 before easily upending the Bears in Hershey, 6-1. One of the keys to the Indians&rsquo; attack was center Hare Habscheid. Habscheid had been sitting at home before being traded by the Edmonton Oilers to Minnesota in exchange for center Don Biggs, Springfield&rsquo;s leading scorer at the time, and the speedy Gord Sherven. Habscheid put away fears that the deal would be damamging to the Indians by scoring four goals and four assists in his first four games.The Binghamton Whalers, earlier buried at the bottom of the standings, galloped up the Southern staircase with a 10-game unbeaten string. The Whalers moved into fourth place and hit the.500 mark before their string was broken with a 6-4 loss to Moncton on New Year&rsquo;s Eve.Paul Fenton, who had the overtime goal that defeated Springfield Dec. 21, had another game winner and a five-point night when the Whalers downed the Amerks 7-3 in Rochester. Fenton was scoring at two goals for every three games with 22 in just 33 games this season.The Whalers accomplished the 10-game unbeaten string even though six of the game were played on the road.DOWN SOUTH&mdash;Hershey Bears were missing Tim Tookey, who was suffering from a bad back as the result of a minor car mishap in which his vehicle was hit from behind. Tookey has had back troubles in the past. Rochester added a policeman in right winger Andy Ristau. Ristau (6-foot-5, 230-pounder) was playing with Carolina of the ACHL, where he had 10 goals and 15 assists in only 13 games. Amazingly, he had 160 penalty minutes during that short stretch&hellip;The Baltimore Skipjacks were sticking with Brian Ford in goal. Ford gave the Jacks a lift with a New Year&rsquo;s Eve 6-0 shutout over Sherbrooke. Ford started seven of nine games. Jeff Cooper played the other two, including a 6-2 loss to Binghamton in which he was pulled in favor of Ford. TomRoulston was named as the &lsquo;Jacks player of the month with 6-9-17 in 13 games&hellip;Mitch Lamoureux played his 200th career game as a Skipjack&hellip;St. Catharines was staying in the playoff fight with the help of some fine goaltending from Allan Bester. Bester lowered his average from 5.40 goals per game to 4.20 during a solid stretch in which he started 12 straight games, a team record. &#9632;

Sabres Cut Swath Out Of The Amerks’ Player Bank

<div class="byline">BY BILL PICKETT</div>Louisville HockeyLouisville HockeyINDIANAPOLIS&mdash;Ron Ullyot is as mad as hell and he&rsquo;s not going to take it anymore.In fact, Ullyot said he&rsquo;d rather play sWthanded than stand for mediocre performances by his Indianapolis Checkers.The Indy coach was voicing his resolution for 1986, perhaps, when he said: &ldquo;If you don&rsquo;t want to play, you&rsquo;re not going to stay.&rdquo;His determination to turn things around for the Checkers was brought about by the team&rsquo;s nosedive as 1985 drew to a close. The Checkers lost three straight games, including an embarrassing 7-2 setback in Fort Wayne on New year&rsquo;s Eve.That led to Ullyot cutting loose three players.&ldquo;I released right winger Yvan Joly and Doug Moffatt after the Fort Wayne game,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;In my estimation, they just hadn&rsquo;t been putting out enough.&rdquo;That transaction came a few days after he had put rookie winger Richard Adolfi on waivers. Ullyot had figured Adolfi would go to Kitchener and play overage in the Ontario League, but Saginaw claimed him, according to 1HL commissioner Bud Poile. Ullyot&rsquo;s waiting for the situation to be resolved.In the meantime, the Checkers finished 1985 a game over the.500 mark at 16-15-1. They had 35 points&mdash;more than three other teams in the IHL&mdash;but they were last in the West Division.One of the things that bothered Ullyot most, though, was the deterioration of his defense. &ldquo;We&rsquo;re supposed to be the best defensive team in the league,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;but we&rsquo;ve given up 17 goals in our last three games.&rdquo;He said that he was in the market for forwards to replace wingers Adolfi and Joly and center Moffatt, but added, &ldquo;We&rsquo;ve got a couple of other players who have been told if they don&rsquo;t start performing, they&rsquo;ll be gone, too. I won&rsquo;t hesitate to let any of these defensemen go if they don&rsquo;t want to play.&rdquo;After winning five of their first six games of the season. Indianapolis had but one other lengthy (4-0-1) unbeaten streak. They have lost three in a row on three occasions.Through Dec. 30, the Checkers had only two players with 10 or more goals. Charlie Skjodt led the squad with 13 and 33 points and fellow center Gerry Minor had 11 goals and 24 points.Meanwhile, the defending Turner Cup champions, Peoria Rivermen, pleased coach Pat Kelly by claiming four of six points during the holiday stretch. He especially singled out Brian Shaw, who scored seven points in three games&mdash;including a five-goal performance.&ldquo;That&rsquo;s a once-in-a-year or even once-in-a-career game,&rdquo; Kelly said. &ldquo;But we&rsquo;re starting to move. Tony Curtale has taken charge on defense and Mike Posavad is playing the type of hockey he played in last year&rsquo;s playoffs. Doug Evans played well at center while Glen Sharpley was hurt.&rdquo;The Rivermen, who languished in the West Division cellar much of the early season, have moved ahead of Indianapolis and were four points out of second place as the New Year came in.IHL NOTES&mdash;Saginaw&rsquo;s Jeff Pyle was IHL player of the week for the period ending Dec. 30. He had four goals and three assists as the Generals won two of three games to take a firm grip on second place in the East Division&hellip;Goaltender Corrado Micalef was recalled from Kalamazoo by Detroit and reassigned to Adirondack&hellip;Goalie Mark Holden was assigned to Fort Wayne by Winnipeg on a five-game tryout&hellip;Chicago returned Brian Noonan to Saginaw&hellip;Randy Pierce returned from the injured reserve list at Salt Lake City while Glen Sharpley of Peoria was placed on it. &#9632;

Ullyot Wields Axe Over His Players’ Heads

<div class="byline">BY PAT LYON</div>ASHEVILLE, N.C.&mdash;The future of the Atlantic Coast League appears more secure with the announcement that a sixth team will be joining the circuit for the 1986-87 season.Commissioner Ray Miron was here on Dec. 12 to help welcome the newest expansion franchise.An Asheville-based company. Recreational Ice Of North Carolina Inc. (RINC), will operate the expansion club. The owners have already purchased land and have plans to construct a 3,200-seat arena.Construction could begin as early as March; according to Miron, and the facility, to be named the Asheville Ice Garden, will feature numerous skating activities in addition to professional hockey.&ldquo;We think they will be a good addition to the league,&rdquo; said Miron. &ldquo;We&rsquo;re much better off with six teams and of course we&rsquo;d like to get another team up north. There are some possibilities, but there is nothing definite at this time.&rdquo;Asheville will be North Carolina&rsquo;s second team in the ACHL, joining the Carolina Thunderbirds of Winston-Salem. The Virginia Lancers of Vinton, Va., are also located in the South, while Erie, Mohawk Valley (Utica, N.Y.) and the New York Slapshots of Staten Island comprise the league&rsquo;s other teams.RINC president Marvin Eckerich said that his group is eagerly looking forward to involvement in the ACHL. &ldquo;We&rsquo;re excited about it. There are five solid franchises as well as an attractive operating plan,&rdquo; Eckerich said.Miron is very pleased with the league operation this season although, as always, there have been some problems.&ldquo;The league is in much better shape and we have more balance this year which makes things more interesting,&rdquo; said the league boss. The one sad part is that New York hasn&rsquo;t been able to play in their own building.&rdquo;Because the Phil Esposito Sports and Entertainment Center on Staten Island is far behind schedule, the Slapshots had not played a home game for almost a two-month stretch.The Slapshots found a temporary home in Newark, N.J., at the Ironbound Sports Center and finally made their first &ldquo;home&rsquo;&rsquo; appearance on Dec. 30. Mohawk Valley ruined the Slapshots&rsquo; home debut by nipping New York 4-3.After playing just 12 games the first two months, the Slapshots will be plenty busy the rest of the season. Coach Dave Schultz&rsquo;s club will face a rugged schedule that includes 18 games in January and 19 games in February.AROUND THE LEAGUE&mdash;After the Erie Golden Blades failed to sign veteran goaltender Carey Walker, the Virginia Lancers quickly inked him to a deal and dropped Mark Chiamp. The Lancers also added rookie John Hill, whom they picked up from Carolina. John Tortorella had been the hottest Lancer and player-coach Frank Perkins was still trying to recover from a broken hand&hellip;The Golden Blades dropped their fifth overtime game in a 5-4 setback to Mohawk Valley on Dec. 28. The Blades had lost eight games by one goal and four of those overtime losses were inflicted by the Comets. Several of the Blades are riding scoring streaks including Paul Mancini (10 games) and Jim Cowell and Todd Bjorkstrand (eight games each). Bjorkstrand earned player-of-the-week honors for scoring 11 points in four games. After dropping a 9-5 decision to Carolina, player-coach Ron Hansis read the riot act and the Blades responded by yielding just two goals in their next two games, both of them wins. Things were going badly for coach Bill Horton&rsquo;s Comets as they struggled during a six-game losing streak. They finally remembered how to win and tripped the Blades 5-4 in overtime on Dec. 28. Dave Litz, cut by the Blades, got some revenge on his former club by scoring the overtime winner. Jay Ness of the Comets was tied with Hill for most game-winning goals with three. &#9632;

Asheville Becomes 6th Franchise

<div class="byline">BY TOM BURKE</div>BOSTON&mdash;The Hockey East season is half over so it&rsquo;s time for mid-term report cards.Let&rsquo;s start from the bottom:New Hampshire didn&rsquo;t rank as an early contender, but they&rsquo;re doing much worse than anyone anticipated. Only sophomore Steve Leach has looked consistently good. The talent simply isn&rsquo;t there. Oddly, UNH is a close fourth (22.1 per cent) in power-play conversions, thanks largely to Leach.But they&rsquo;re last in penalty killing (27.9 per cent) and they&rsquo;ve scored 3.3 goals per game while yielding 5.8. With Maine&rsquo;s improvement becoming evident, and Lowell overdue, UNH will have a hard time not clinching the league cellar by mid-February.Maine&rsquo;s loss of Shawn Anderson to the Canadian Nationa Team program is really going to hurt. Otherwise, things are looking up. Transfer Mike Golden became eligible at second semester&rsquo;s start, and the return of Todd Jenkins from an ankle injury will help bolster the attack too. Maine will probably end the season in sixth place.Lowell is roughly a year ahead of Maine in terms of experience, and they ought to be higher in the standings than they are.The Chiefs are keeping most of their games close, but their specialty teams&rsquo; mediocrity is killing them. They&rsquo;re 16.7 per cent on power plays and give up power-play goal? 25.9 per cent of the time. Only Jon Morris has cracked the league&rsquo;s top 20 in scoring. Unless Lowell puts together a streak soon, a repeat of last season&rsquo;s fifth-place finish is the best they&rsquo;ll do.Providence finally has Chris Terreri back in goal but showed it could win without him. A big story at Schneider Arena is the emergence of sophomore forward Gordie Cruickshank on offense and the work of Jim Hughes and Perry Florio on defense.Cruickshank has 21 goals in 19 games. He also leads the team in power-play goals with six. Hughes is PC&rsquo;s fourthleading scorer with 19 points. He and fellow freshman Florio have added mobility to Providence&rsquo;s backline.Boston University still hasn&rsquo;t played up to its capability. But the Terriers lead the league in both power plays (25.4 per cent) and penalty-killing (15.1 percent). BU has a nice mix of veteran and younger players.Sophomore Clark Donatelli has become one of the league&rsquo;s best forwards, as expected. In goal, Bob Deraney has a league-leading 3.35 goals-against average but it looks like Terry Taillefer has won his old job back from Deraney anyway.The obvious reasons for Northeast-em&rsquo;s excellent first half are the combacks of senior forwards Jay Heinbuck and Stew Emerson along with the spectacular goaltending of Bruce Racine.Also obvious is the continued leadership of Rod Isbister and former hothead Paul Fitzsimmons, who has cleaned up his &ldquo;enforcer&rdquo; shtick on defense. Other factors are the blossoming of winger Dave O&rsquo;Brien and defenseman Claude Lodin, both sophomores.Boston College remains the best in the league, but the Eagles are a long way from peaking. The power play (21.7 per cent) misses right point man Dominic Campedelli. No sooner did the Eagles get back superb sophomore Ken Hodge from academic purgatory than they lost freshman center Craig Janney to a broken collarbone suffered at the World Junior Championships. &#9632;

Hodge Returns To BU, Janney Sidelined

<div class="byline">BY TOM BOGGIE</div>CAMBRIDGE&mdash;Scott Fusco has. bounced back.Showing no ill effects from a serious back injury that slowed him down during the latter stages of the 1984-85 Eastern College Athletic Conference season, Fusco, a senior wing at Harvard, is again taking a serious run at the Hobey Baker Award.As the league schedule resumed, fol-, lowing the Christmas break, Harvard led the ECAC with a 7-1 record while Fusco was busy rewriting the Harvard record books.Fusco, who was averaging 2.54 points per game at the break, became the leading goal scorer in Harvard history with his 93rd career tally and then hit the magic 200-point mark, also a Crimson record, on a road trip to Wisconsin. A couple of more assists and Fusco will hold every offensive record at Harvard.&ldquo;When I got to Harvard, I took a look at the records and felt that if I played like I thought I could, I had a shot at them,&rdquo; said the Burlington, Mass., native. &ldquo;I just kind of went along and didn&rsquo;t really think about records again until last year. They really just happened. The points got up there.&rdquo;Fusco is a scoring machine, blessed with outstanding speed, an explosive shot and a thickly-muscled, 5-foot-11, 190-pound frame that can take a hit. After scoring 16 goals and 20 assists during his freshman season, he led the Crimson in goals (33) and points (55) as a sophomore and improved those numbers to 34 goals and 47 assists last season.An 11 th-round pick by the Hartford Whalers in the 1982 draft, Fusco was a member of the 1984 U.S. Olympic team and is still contemplating playing for the Americans in the 1988 Winter Games in Calgary.He doesn&rsquo;t even have to be playing college hockey this season. He sat down and talked with the Whalers about turning pro at the end of his junior year, but his bad back became the deciding factor when it came time to choose between the pros and his final year of college.&ldquo;There were a couple of reasons (for not turning pro),&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;I wanted to finish school and get that phase behind me before I went on to another phase. Also, I had a pretty serious back injury and I didn&rsquo;t want to go into my first camp coming off a major injury. I wanted to rehabilitate my back and I didn&rsquo;t feel my worth would go down any.&rdquo;Fusco spent the entire summer in a brace from his waist to armpits to rehabilitate the injury, which was diagnosed as either a severe strain or a tear of the major ligament that runs in front of the spine.&ldquo;I was in the brace for four months,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;About the middle of August, I started working on my flexibility and doing strength work on my back muscles.&rdquo;Although Fusco is still the primary weapon in Harvard&rsquo;s arsenal, he has a lot of help this season. Last year, his line, which consisted of Tim Smith and Lane MacDonald, did the majority of Harvard&rsquo;s scoring. This year, with talented sophomore Allan Bourbeau back in the fold, the scoring is more balanced and that has made Harvard even better.&ldquo;It&rsquo;s definitely helped a lot,&rdquo; said Fusco. &ldquo;What has been happening is that opponents play tough defensively against my line and that opens things up for the second line (of Bourbeau, Tim Barakett and freshman Ed Krayer) and they&rsquo;ve been playing well. As the year progresses, teams will realize how good that line is and hopefully, things will reverse themselves and things will open up for my line again.&rdquo;Once the 1985-86 season ends, Fusco will have another decision to make. A member of the U.S. Select Team, he will have to decide whether to turn pro or retain his amateur status in order to play in the 1988 Olympics.&ldquo;I&rsquo;m not sure what I&rsquo;m going to do yet,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;The Whalers hold my rights and I&rsquo;ll have to sit down and talk it over with them. I&rsquo;m looking at Europe because if I go to Europe, I can keep my amateur status.&ldquo;I&rsquo;m not sure where I stand in their (the Whalers&rsquo;) eyes. I&rsquo;m not sure high I am on their list.&rdquo;Fusco also hopes the Whalers treat him an an individual, not a Fusco. His brother, Mark, a former Hobey Baker Award winner at Harvard who went on to play defense for the Whalers, retired from hockey this year rather then be sent to the minors and Scott hopes that decision won&rsquo;t have any effect on his dealings with the Whalers.&ldquo;I really want to play pro hockey, but I realize what I&rsquo;m up against,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;I hope they treat me for myself. I&rsquo;m a different person and it&rsquo;s a totally different case altogether.&rdquo; &#9632;

Harvard’s Fusco A Record Breaker

<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0032-01688/5777816-1-eng-US/f0032-012.jpg" title="f0032-01" width="402" height="560"><figcaption class="caption-body">TOM DRAPER Vermont</figcaption></div><h2>ECAC</h2>Junior goaltender Tom Draper of Montreal grabbed the spotlight as the Vermont Catamounts swept Dartmouth 6-1 and Harvard 3-2. Draper made a total of 55 saves in the two games to lead Vermont into first place in the ECAC Conference.<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0032-02493/5777809-1-eng-US/f0032-022.jpg" title="f0032-02" width="398" height="560"><figcaption class="caption-body">TERRY TAILLEFER Boston Univ</figcaption></div><h2>HOCKEY EAST</h2>The Boston University Terriers needed a strong goaltending performance from junior Terry Taillefer to gain a split of their two-game series with the Denver Pioneers. Taillefer made 57 saves as BU won 3-1 after losing 5-4.<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0032-03338/5777802-1-eng-US/f0032-032.jpg" title="f0032-03" width="394" height="560"><figcaption class="caption-body">GARY KRUZICH Bowling Green</figcaption></div><h2>CCHA</h2>The Bowling Green Falcons regained first place in the CCHA Conference race by sweeping Lake Superior 4-3 and 6-2 behind the sparkling netminding of Gary Kruzich, who made 62 saves in the two games. Kruzich had a 14-2 record after the two wins.<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0032-04220/5777795-1-eng-US/f0032-042.jpg" title="f0032-04" width="396" height="558"><figcaption class="caption-body">TONY GRANATO Wisconsin</figcaption></div><h2>WCHA</h2>Junior forward Tony Granato of Wisconsin came up with five scoring points, including the game-winning goals in both games as the Badgers toppled Providence by identical 4-3 scores. The NY Rangers&rsquo; draft pick raised his year&rsquo;s total to 20 goals. &#9632;

f0032-01

Bauers College Performer Of The Week

<div class="byline">BY BILL CRAWFORD</div>KALAMAZOO&mdash;The dictionary defines the word &ldquo;enigmatic&rdquo; as &ldquo;anything that is inexplicable&hellip;a riddle. difficult to understand or explain&hellip;&rdquo;In that case, the best word with which to describe the Western Michigan University hockey team is, yup, you guessed it, enigmatic.The Broncos are a good team. On paper, they have few weaknesses. They have balanced scoring and good defense. The goaltending has been surprisingly good, seeing as how All-America netminder Glenn Healy graduated last spring, leaving the job to an untested sophomore and a freshman.And the Broncos were in fourth place in the Central Collegiate Hockey Association, with games in hand on certain teams just ahead of them in the standings.Western started the season with a bang, knocking off powerful Wisconsin twice at Madison, and then coming home to whip perennial Central Collegiate Hockey Association pacesetter, Michigan State.Since then, though, the Broncos have dropped some games they probably shouldn&rsquo;t have and, for a few weeks just after the MSU series, they looked like anything but a CCHA contender. Lake Superior swept them on their own ice and they split a couple of series with league lightweights.&ldquo;We&rsquo;re still just a lunch pail hockft club,&rdquo; said assistant coach Bill Newton. &ldquo;If we don&rsquo;t come to play hard, and work for 60 minutes, we can lose to anybody. If we bring the right ethics, we can beat anybody. We&rsquo;re a good team, we just don&rsquo;t always play like it.&rdquo;Coach Bill Wilkinson has turned around the WMU hockey fortunes since taking over four seasons ago.He was named CCHA Coach of the Year in 1983-84 after the Broncos ma^ the playoffs for the first time in severe seasons and actually reached the finals at Joe Louis Arena before bowing out.Last season, Western finished 22-162, tying for the most victories in a season by a Bronco team, and played in the playoffs on home ice for the first time ever.Dan Dorion is the Broncos&rsquo; ace, leading them in scoring through the first 22 games (though he played in just 20), with 50 points, including 20 goals. Dorion is a solid Hobey Baker candidate as college hockey&rsquo;s MVP.Stu Bumie is the goal-scoring leader, with 25. a whopping 15 on the power play, where Western excels.Wilkinson has built his top two lines around these two prolific scorers, putting Dorion on the right side, with heady Troy Thrun at center and rugged Jeff CrossMian on the left wing. Thrun is no slouch Offensively, either, with 15 goals and 36 points, while Crossman led the team in the penalty minutes with 66.Bumie works on a line centered by freshman standout Ron Hoover, who had eight goals and 24 points through his first 22 games, and big Rob Bryden on the other wing. Bryden adds muscle and gives Bumie and Hoover somebody to work the comers.Henry Fung, a junior, broke out of the scoring doldrums with four goals and berth on the All-Tournament team at Syracuse over the Christmas break. Added offense from Fung would be most welcome in the second half.Western lured in transfer Lee Brodeur from North Dakota recently and he should add on a lot on a forward unit in the coming weeks.Defensively, the Broncos are led by Wayne Gagne, who is one of college hockey&rsquo;s most offense-oriented defensemen, with nine goals and 33 assists through his first 22 games. He is within one point of his own record for points by a WMU defenseman and within two of his own assists mark.Gagne is paired with veteran blueliner Chris MacDonald, a defensive specialist, while Ron Pesetti teams with Jim Culhane and Dave Lobdell with fellow sophomore Scott Howe. Freshman John McCormick is seeing more and more ice time, too.Dorion has led the Broncos since his freshman season, when he came in out of the U.S. Junior League at Austin, Minn. Last year he piled up 67 points, including a disappointing 21 goals.Obviously, he&rsquo;ll do better this campaign. Dorion is a New Jersey Devil draft pick who has played on various U.S. select teams over his four years at WMU. He&rsquo;s a very strong pro prospect, with great hockey sense and good wheels. He goes to the net well and possesses that &ldquo;scoring touch.&rdquo; &#9632;

Broncos Bucking For Consistency

<div class="byline">BY VIRG FOSS</div>GRAND FORKS&mdash;James Patrick, who earned All-America honors his sophomore season at the University of North Dakota, is generally considered to be the finest defenseman Sioux hockey coach Gino Gasparini has had.But you know what, Gasparini says senior Scott Sandelin may be as good, if not a better overall defenseman, than Patrick, who now plays for the New York Rangers.&ldquo;I&rsquo;d have to rate Sandelin with the best, if not the best,&rdquo; Gasparini said.That&rsquo;s high praise indeed for a guy who has never so much as earned a berth on the Western Collegiate Hockey Association all-star team.&ldquo;I think he&rsquo;s a blend of the offensive Meilis of a James Patrick and the defensive ability of a Craig Ludwig,&rdquo; Gasparini said. &ldquo;Maybe that&rsquo;s why I feel he&rsquo;s a bona fide All-America candidate and a good candidate for the Hobey Baker Award.&rdquo;The Hobey Baker Award goes to the top collegiate player in the United States.&ldquo;If he&rsquo;s not a finalist for that, it&rsquo;s an injustice,&rdquo; Gasparini said. &ldquo;You have to go a long way to find a better defenseman in all of college hockey. His improvement from his freshman season to now is phenomenal.&rdquo;Heady stuff, to be sure, but Sandelin handles it in stride.&ldquo;Those would be nice things, but the success of the team comes first for me,&rdquo; the native of Hibbing, Minn., said. &ldquo;I played in the NCAA tournament my freshman year and once you get a taste of that, you want to go back. So going back to the NCAA tourney comes first for me, before any individual goal.&rdquo;Sandelin, whose National Hockey League rights are owned by the Montreal Canadiens, said he had an offer to sign with Montreal after last season.&ldquo;I talked it over with the coaches here and they told me they didn&rsquo;t think I was ready,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;I thought about that and I knew I wasn&rsquo;t ready, either. And I knew I didn&rsquo;t have the kind of season last year that I wanted.&rdquo;He is this year. Every week, Gasparini raves about Sandelin.&ldquo;I think so highly of him that when he graduates, I&rsquo;m confident that he&rsquo;ll have to play himself out of the NHL. Others have to prove that they can play at that level.&rdquo;Sandelin is a rarity in that he&rsquo;ll most likely be one of the few outstanding Sioux players to leave college with a diploma in hand. Sandelin, a marketing major, carried a 2.95 cumulative grade point average, based on a 4.0 scale. His interest in education is another reason why he declined the offer to sign with Montreal last year, said Sandelin. &ldquo;Plus, I&rsquo;m just 21,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;So I&rsquo;m a young senior.&rdquo;In the past, Sandelin has been his harshest critic. He&rsquo;s mellowed in that regard, and that&rsquo;s smoothed out his play.&ldquo;I was probably harder on myself than anyone,&rdquo; said Sandelin, one of UND&rsquo;s tri-captains. &ldquo;I&rsquo;d get down on myself when I made a mistake. But Gino kept telling me not to worry about the first mistake. It&rsquo;s what you do after that that counts. When I got down on myself, I&rsquo;d press harder to do more and I&rsquo;d end up doing less.&rdquo;Now, it&rsquo;s all come into place for him. &ldquo;When he first came to UND, he already had good size and strength,&rdquo; Gasparini said. &ldquo;Now he&rsquo;s developed the agility and quickness and he&rsquo;s developed the mental toughness so critical for surviving as a professional athlete. He&rsquo;s a tremendous leader for us. He has the good hockey skills, but more importantly, he&rsquo;s a great young man and an outstanding student.&rdquo;Now that Sandelin&rsquo;s development is near completion, UND is blessed with one of its finest defensemen ever.WCHA NOTES&mdash;North Dakota, which earlier lost freshman winger Grant Paranica for the season following back surgery, has now lost sophomore winger Todd Norman for the year after he underwent major knee surgery. &#9632;

Canadiens’ Draft Choice Earns High Praise

<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0033-01612/5777909-1-eng-US/f0033-012.jpg" title="f0033-01" width="398" height="554"><figcaption class="caption-body">DARREN LOWE Toronto</figcaption></div><h2>OUAA</h2>Former Canadian Olympic team member Darren Lowe was the big gun for the Toronto Blues as they won the Key Bank Classic Tournament at Lake Placid, N.Y. against a select U.S. college field. Lowe was selected tourney MVP after picking up four points in the titlewinning game.<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0033-02432/5777902-1-eng-US/f0033-022.jpg" title="f0033-02" width="380" height="556"><figcaption class="caption-body">MIKE COFLIN UBC</figcaption></div><h2>CWAA</h2>Center Mike Coflin helped the UBC Thunderbirds gain a third-place finish in their own invitational hockey tournament. He was named to the first all-star team and had four points as the host Thunderbirds edged Manitoba Bisons 7-6. UBC lost to tournament winner Cornell 5-2 despite Coflin&rsquo;s heroics.<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0033-03313/5777895-1-eng-US/f0033-032.jpg" title="f0033-03" width="402" height="554"><figcaption class="caption-body">MARK READE McGill</figcaption></div><h2>QUAA</h2>Center Mark Reade of McGill went on a scoring spree in the Micron Invitational Tournament as he scored six goals in a 10-7 win against Northern Arizona. Reade was on a scoring spree, picking up 18 goals and six assists in his last 10 games for the Red-men. He had 10 points in the Micron tourney. &#9632;

f0033-01

Bauer’s University Performer OF THE WEEK

<h2>CCHA</h2>(STANDINGS ON FRI. JAN. 10)<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-01696/5778045-1-eng-US/f0034-012.jpg" title="f0034-01" width="539" height="296"></div><h3>GAMES COMPLETED</h3>SAT. DEC. 14FERRIS STATE 3 AT BOWLING GREEN 7LAKE SUPERIOR 6 AT ILL-CHICAGO 4MICHIGAN 5 AT MIAMI 4OHIO STATE 5 AT MICH. STATE 6FRI. DEC. 27CONCORDIA 4 AT LAKE SUPERIOR 7PRINCETON 2 AT ILL-CHICAGO 5SAT. DEC. 28CONCORDIA 4 AT LAKE SUPERIOR 5PRINCETON 3 AT ILL-CHICAGO 3MON. DEC. 30CZECH NATIONALS 9 AT MICHIGAN 1FRI. JAN. 3BOWLING GREEN 4 AT L. SUPERIOR 3FERRIS STATE 3 AT MICHIGAN 10ILL-CHICAGO 5 AT OHIO STATE 7MIAMI 10 AT MICH-DEARBORN 4SAT. JAN. 4BOWLING GREEN 6 AT L. SUPERIOR 2FERRIS STATE 6 AT MICHIGAN 2W. MICHIGAN 2 AT MICH. STATE 4MIAMI 8 AT MICH-DEARBORN 2ILL-CHICAGO 6 AT OHIO STATE 5SUN. JAN. 5MICH. STATE 8 AT W. MICHIGAN 5<h3>LEADING SCORERS</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-02524/5778038-1-eng-US/f0034-022.jpg" title="f0034-02" width="534" height="324"></div><h2>WCHA</h2>(STANDINGS ON FRI. JAN. 10)<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-03408/5778031-1-eng-US/f0034-032.jpg" title="f0034-03" width="536" height="266"></div><h3>GAMES COMPLETED</h3>SUN. DEC. 22HARVARD 4 AT WISCONSIN 5FRI. DEC. 27COLORADO COLL 4 AT MAINE 5BOSTON COLLEGE 3 AT NO. DAKOTA 2SAT. DEC. 28COLORADO COLL 2 AT MAINE 5BOSTON COLLEGE 3 AT NO. DAKOTA 4N. MICHIGAN 3 AT PROVIDENCE 4SUN. DEC. 29N. MICHIGAN 5 AT PROVIDENCE 1WISCONSIN 4 AT BOSTON UNIV. 7MINNESOTA 5 AT NEW HAMPSHIRE 1MIN-DULUTH 5 AT LOWELL 3MON. DEC. 30COLORADO COLL 5 AT YALE 6MINNESOTA 10 AT NEW HAMPSHIRE 2WISCONSIN 6 AT BOSTON UNIV. 3MIN-DULUTH 5 AT LOWELL 3FRI. JAN. 3COLORADO COLL 3 AT N. HAMPSHIRE 5BOSTON UNIV. 4 AT DENVER 5LOWELL 1 AT N. MICHIGAN 3MICH. TECH 2 AT MIN-DULUTH 7MAINE 3 AT MINNESOTA 8NO. DAKOTA 5 AT NORTHEASTERN 7PROVIDENCE 3 AT WISCONSIN 4SAT. JAN. 4COLORADO COLL 4 AT N. HAMPSHIRE 2BOSTON UNIV. 3 AT DENVER 1LOWELL 4 AT N. MICHIGAN 8MICH. TECH 4 AT MIN-DULUTH 5MAINE 2 AT MINNESOTA 16NO. DAKOTA 4 AT NORTHEASTERN 4PROVIDENCE 3 AT WISCONSIN 4<h3>LEADING SCORERS</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-04305/5778024-1-eng-US/f0034-042.jpg" title="f0034-04" width="536" height="352"></div><h2>HOCKEY EAST</h2>(STANDINGS ON TUE. JAN. 7)<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-05240/5778017-1-eng-US/f0034-052.jpg" title="f0034-05" width="534" height="236"></div><h3>GAMES COMPLETED</h3>TUE. DEC. 10 PROVIDENCE 2AT BOSTON UNIV. 4WED. DEC. 11BOSTON COLL. 8 AT N. HAMPSHIRE 4DENVER 5 AT MAINE 2MERRIMACK 9 AT LOWELL 4THU. DEC. 12DENVER 4 AT MAINE 3FRI. DEC. 13PROVIDENCE 4 AT N&rsquo;EASTERN 5FRI. DEC. 27COLORADO COLL 4 AT MAINE 5BOSTON COLLEGE 3 AT NO. DAKOTA 2SAT. DEC. 28COLORADO COLL 2 AT MAINE 5BOSTON COLLEGE 3 AT NO. DAKOTA 4N. MICHIGAN 3 AT PROVIDENCE 4SUN. DEC. 29MINNESOTA 5 AT N. HAMPSHIRE 1WISCONSIN 4 AT BOSTON UNIV. 7MIN-DULUTH 5 AT LOWELL 3N. MICHIGAN 5 AT PROVIDENCE 1MON. DEC. 30MINNESOTA 10 AT N. HAMPSHIRE 2WISCONSIN 6 AT BOSTON UNIV. 3MIN-DULUTH 5 AT LOWELL 3COLORADO COLLEGE 5 AT YALE 6FRI. JAN. 3COLORADO COLL 3 AT N. HAMPSHIRE 5NO. DAKOTA 5 AT NORTHEASTERN 7BOSTON UNIV. 4 AT DENVER 5LOWELL 1AT N. MICHIGAN 3 MAINE 3 AT MINNESOTA 8PROVIDENCE 3 AT WISCONSIN 4SAT. JAN. 4COLORADO COLL 4 AT N. HAMPSHIRE 2NO. DAKOTA 4 AT NORTHEASTERN 4BOSTON UNIV. 3 AT DENVER 1MAINE 2 AT MINNESOTA 16PROVIDENCE 3 AT WISCONSIN 4LOWELL 4 AT N. MICHIGAN 8<h3>LEADING SCORERS</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-06207/5778010-1-eng-US/f0034-062.jpg" title="f0034-06" width="542" height="362"></div><h2>ECAC</h2>(STANDINGS ON TUE. JAN. 7)<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-07191/5778003-1-eng-US/f0034-072.jpg" title="f0034-07" width="536" height="386"></div><h3>GAMES COMPLETED</h3>MON. DEC. 16PRINCETON 2 AT ALA-ANCHORAGE 3TUE. DEC. 17PRINCETON 2 AT ALA-ANCHORAGE 1SAT. DEC. 21HARVARD 4 AT WISCONSIN 5SUN. DEC. 22HARVARD 4 AT WISCONSIN 5FRI. DEC. 27PRINCETON 2 AT ILL-CHICAGO 5SAT. DEC. 28PRINCETON 3 AT ILL-CHICAGO 3MON. DEC. 30COLORADO COLLEGE 5 AT YALE 6FRI. JAN. 3ARMY 4 AT CLARKSON 7HARVARD 4 AT RPI 2PRINCETON 3 AT ST. LAWRENCE 5DARTMOUTH 1 AT VERMONT 6SAT. JAN. 4PRINCETON 2 AT CLARKSON 6DARTMOUTH 1 AT RPI 10ARMY 4 AT ST. LAWRENCE 6HARVARD 2 AT VERMONT 3<h3>LEADING SCORERS</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-08180/5777996-1-eng-US/f0034-082.jpg" title="f0034-08" width="538" height="236"></div><h2>CWUAA</h2>(STANDINGS ON MON. JAN. 6)<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-09166/5777989-1-eng-US/f0034-092.jpg" title="f0034-09" width="536" height="263"></div><h3>GAMES COMPLETED</h3>SWISS TOURFRI. DEC. 20ALBERTA 7 AT ZURICH 9SAT. DEC. 21ALBERTA 6 AT AMBRI 3SUN. DEC. 22ALBERTA 9 AT FRIBOURG-GOTTERON 6(CWAA schedule resumes Fri. Jan. 10)SUN. JAN. 7LETHBRIDGE 3 AT CALGARY 7NON&mdash;CONFERENCESASKATCHEWAN 9, REGINA 4CALGARY 9, SEIBU JAPAN 1<h2>OUAA</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-10161/5777982-1-eng-US/f0034-102.jpg" title="f0034-10" width="531" height="412"></div><h3>LEADING SCORERS</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-11151/5777975-1-eng-US/f0034-112.jpg" title="f0034-11" width="533" height="323"></div><h2>AUAA</h2><h3>MACADAM DIVISION</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-12147/5777968-1-eng-US/f0034-122.jpg" title="f0034-12" width="545" height="176"></div><h3>KELLY DIVISION</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-13134/5777961-1-eng-US/f0034-132.jpg" title="f0034-13" width="535" height="144"></div><h3>LEADING SCORERS</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-14128/5777954-1-eng-US/f0034-142.jpg" title="f0034-14" width="535" height="233"></div><h2>QUAA</h2>(STANDINGS ON FRI. DEC. 27)<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-15122/5777947-1-eng-US/f0034-152.jpg" title="f0034-15" width="539" height="173"></div><h3>LEADING SCORERS</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0034-16120/5777940-1-eng-US/f0034-162.jpg" title="f0034-16" width="540" height="326"></div> &#9632;

f0034-01

Bauer College Scoreboard

GREAT LAKES INVITATIONALJoe Louis Arena, Detroit, MlMich. State 2, Mich. Tech 1RPI 8, Michigan 3ConsolationMichigan 6, Mich. Tech 4ChampionshipMich. State 8, RPI 3(Mich. State wins tournament)SYRACUSE INVITATIONALWar Memorial Aud. Syracuse, NYRIT 4, W. Michigan 3Colgate 8, Notre Dame 7ConsolationW. Michigan 11, Notre Dame 2ChampionshipRIT 3, Colgate 0(RIT wins tournament)KEY BANK CLASSICOlympic Arena, Lake Placid, NYBowling Green 5, St. Lawrence 2Toronto 6, Clarkson 3ConsolationClarkson 4, St. Lawrence 3ChampionshipToronto 5, Bowling Green 4(Toronto wins tournament)YORK TOURNAMENTYork Ice Palace, Toronto, ONWestern Ontario 9, Ohio State 7York 9, Acadia 1ConsolationOhio State 5, Acadia 3ChampionshipYork 4, Western Ontario 2(York wins tournament)AULD LANG SYNE CLASSICThompson Arena, Hanover, NHVermont 3, Maine 1Dartmouth 6, Bowdoin 5ConsolationMaine 6, Bowdoin 4ChampionshipVermont 5, Dartmouth 4(Vermont wins tournament)BRITISH COLUMBIA TOUR.Thunderbird Rink, Vancouver, BCYale 8, Manitoba 5UBC 9, Japan 7Toronto 6, Yale 5Cornell 5, UBC 2Cornell 4, Japan 2Manitoba 7, Toronto 25th place vs 6th placeToronto 14, Japan 4ConsolationUBC 7, Manitoba 6ChampionshipCornell 7, Yale 3(Cornell wins tournament)WESTERN HOLIDAY CLASSICThompson Arena, London, ONYork 4, Laurier 2Western 7, Alberta 5ConsolationLaurier 6, Alberta 3ChampionshipYork 3, Western 1(York wins tournament)MICRON INVITATIONALOttawa 6, Union College 4Moncton 7, McGill 5Concordia 9, No. Arizona 4Ottawa 6, Moncton 3McGill 10, No. Arizona 7Concordia 5, Union College 4Mon. Jan. 6ChampionshipOttawa vs ConcordiaBEANPOT TOURNAMENTBoston Garden, Boston, MAMon. Feb. 3Harvard vs Boston CollegeNortheastern vs Boston UniversityMon. Feb. 10Consolation & championship games &#9632;

COLLEGE TOURNAMENTS

<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0035-01662/5778162-1-eng-US/f0035-012.jpg" title="f0035-01" width="564" height="568"><figcaption class="caption-body">NICK KYPREOS North Bay</figcaption></div><h2>ONTARIO LEAGUE</h2>The North Bay Centennials have their sights set on climbing higher in the tough Emms Division race and the man who could lead them there is Nick Kypreos.The 19-year-old left winger was the team scoring leader with 29 goals in 34 games. Kypreos was selected the OHL Player of the Week after he collected eight points, including a four-goal performance in North Bay&rsquo;s 12-2 romp over Windsor.Kypreos, who is the property of the Philadelphia Flyers, raised his point total to 50 with the surge.<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0035-02511/5778155-1-eng-US/f0035-022.jpg" title="f0035-02" width="562" height="566"><figcaption class="caption-body">TIM IANNONE Regina</figcaption></div><h2>WESTERN LEAGUE</h2>Tim lannone is a 19-year-old who hasn&rsquo;t been drafted by the NHL, but that could change this season.The 5-foot-10, 174-pound Regina center was named the WHL Player of the Week for collecting 10 scoring points, eight of them goals, in three games. lannone had one four-goal night and turned his 5th hat trick of the season in another outing.lannone ranked 7th in the WHL&rsquo;s individual scoring race with 66 points after 34 games. He had counted 38 goals, surpassing his 1984-85 total of 30.<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0035-03412/5778148-1-eng-US/f0035-032.jpg" title="f0035-03" width="564" height="562"><figcaption class="caption-body">STEVE PEPIN Drummondville</figcaption></div><h2>QUEBEC LEAGUE</h2>The Chicago Black Hawks drafted Steve Pepin in 1983 because of his ability to put the puck in the net.And Pepin still has that magic scoring touch even though the Hawks haven&rsquo;t called upon him as yet. The 20-year-old center, who was picked as the QMJHL Player of the Week, had 37 goals and 45 assists after Drummondville had played 43 games. Pepin was one of the main reasons the Voltigeurs were tops in the Quebec League&rsquo;s Dilio Division.He scored 56 goals last season and 54 the year previous. &#9632;

f0035-01

MICRON JUNIOR PLAYERS OF THE WEEK

<div class="byline">BY RICK MAYOH</div>QUEBEC CITY&mdash;The Quebec League&rsquo;s new education program has passed its first session.The original plan called for all of the league&rsquo;s players enrolled in junior colleges, or CEGEPs as they are known, to register with the St-Jean-sur-Richelieu campus in a QMJHL center just south of Montreal.Teachers were to travel to each league city and conduct classes to accommodate league schedules.St. Jean registered 132 QMJHL players for the diploma program, a prerequisite for attending university in Quebec. But it was decided to use the faculties of the CEGEPs in each city.The program is designed to help players earn a two-year diploma in three years.&ldquo;In the past, about half of the players would quit in the first term because of the pressure of taking four different courses and playing hockey,&rdquo; said Jean-Pierre Legault, the Hull Olympiques&rsquo; education advisor. &ldquo;For the first time, only one player left the CEGEP program in the first term and he had passed.&rdquo;The league contributed $80,000 to the $650,000 program and the provincial government is paying the remainder. Another 36 athletes in a number of sports including skiing, swimming and gymnastics also are participating.The normal schedule has students taking 45-hour courses over 15 weeks and attending classes every day.The new program has small classes of players taking one course at a time. Each course is compressed into a five-week period and requires only three days a week. Special tutoring is also available.The Olympiques started the season with 16 of 21 players in schools ranging from high school to university. Nine players are involved in the new program at Hull&rsquo;s CEGEP de I&rsquo;Outaouais. They took French, philosophy and history in five-week blocks in the first term, attending classes from 9 a.m. to noon, Tuesday through Thursday.&ldquo;CEGEP won&rsquo;t give them the diploma, they have to work,&rdquo; said Legault, who feels more players will complete their requirements with the new format.&ldquo;They found it tough for the first course, especially young newcomers like Jean-Marc Routhier and Benoit Brunet. There&rsquo;s homework every day and the tests are close together. It&rsquo;s different for the teachers, too.&ldquo;A major improvement is getting feedback during the course, not after the class is over,&rdquo; Legault said.Part of the program&rsquo;s intent is to attract more players to the league and keep Quebec players from leaving the province.&ldquo;It&rsquo;s three hours a day and if you miss a day, it&rsquo;s tough,&rdquo; said Hull goaltender Bobby Desjardins. Desjardins, 18, came to the Olympiques in a trade after helping the Shawinigan Cataractes reach the Memorial Cup final as a rookie last season.&ldquo;I think the players really like it,&rdquo; said Desjardins. &ldquo;We have eight to 10 in a class and it helps to spend more time with the teachers. You can ask more questions without being embarrassed.&rdquo;Desjardins is a good student who also is taking courses in the regular program so he can finish in two and a half years.&ldquo;I think it should continue,&rdquo; he said.&ldquo;The guys involved only in the new program think it&rsquo;s great.&rdquo;&ldquo;The program was a bit difficult to start,&rdquo; said Georges Lariviere, who coaches the Granby Bisons while teaching in the University of Montreal&rsquo;s Physical Education department.&ldquo;Teachers in St-Jean didn&rsquo;t endorse it at the beginning, and that forced the CEGEP to work closer with the other colleges. But the program has settled down.&ldquo;The players on my team really appreciate the flexibility and small classes and it is easier for them to concentrate on one subject at a time.&ldquo;Many question the feasibility of implementing the program but the most difficult part is finished,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;We had Claude Dumas at Washington&rsquo;s camp and he missed the first course but he didn&rsquo;t have to miss the whole session.&rdquo;All trades involving players in the program had to be cleared with a supervisor, Josee Ferland of the St-Jean CEGEP.&ldquo;It is very important to have her coordinating the program,&rdquo; Lariviere said. &ldquo;She was very tough to negotiate with sometimes but it was her duty. I think they have done a very good job, considering the problems.&rdquo; &#9632;

School Program Gains Acceptance

<div class="byline">BY BEN KUZMA</div>Louisville HockeyLouisville HockeyKAMLOOPS&mdash;The Western League penned a best-seller in 1985 with the rags-to-riches story of the Prince Albert Raiders&rsquo; rise to Memorial Cup status. Unfortunately, the year will be better remembered for a mystery novel.Although coaching changes are commonplace in any league, the WHL rose to a new height of musical mentors in 1985 with countless firings and hirings.Nobody was spared as the axe came down with frightening regularity. And it just wasn&rsquo;t the new kids on the coaching block who felt the cutting edge. Veteran WHL coaches Marc Boileau, John Chapman, Paddie Ginnell and Jack Sangster also fell by the wayside.Before the season began Barry Trapp replaced Graham James in Moose Jaw, Al Patterson left New Westminster to join Victoria, Bill Moores replaced departed Bob Strumm in Regina, Earl Jessi-man took over for Patterson in New Westminster and Ernie Gare replaced Marc Pezzin in Spokane.The real fun began when the 1985-86 regular season commenced. It went something like this:&bull; Paddie Ginnell replaced Jessiman in New Westminster.&bull; Pezzin was rehired in Spokane and Gare became his assistant.&bull; Don Barry replaced Marc Boileau in Seattle.&bull; Sandy Hucul was dismissed in Calgary, and succeeded by assistant coach Ken Southwick on a temporary basis.&bull; Jessiman replaced John Chapman in Lethbridge. &bull; Barry was dismissed by Seattle and replaced by general managerSheldon Ferguson.&bull; Ernie (Punch) McLean replaced Ginnell in New Westminster.&bull; Gord Lane replaced Jack Sangster in Brandon.Thirteen coaching changes. While some switches were expected due to sour showings in the win-loss column, frequency of firings was the WHL story of the year.&ldquo;Thirteen changes? I can&rsquo;t even remember when there were 13 teams in the league,&rdquo; said McLean. &ldquo;I&rsquo;ll tell you why there have been so many changes. You can be the greatest coach in the world, but if you don&rsquo;t have talent you&rsquo;ll win some games, but you won&rsquo;t win consistently.&ldquo;The biggest thing is the coach is the first to go. What has happened in major junior hockey is that now everybody has a general manager and coach. We didn&rsquo;t have that before. You had to be the general manager, coach and promotions manager. Now the general manager finds the player and he might not be the same character that the coach wants.&ldquo;There is trouble today with general managers and coaches not getting along. One of the best going is Farwell (general manager Russ), and Sauter (coach Doug) in Medicine Hat. They get along and know what each other wants. Another is in Prince Albert, where Terry Simpson is both general manager and coach. He calls his own shots.&rdquo;McLean, the latest to ride the WHL merry-go-round in New Westminster, should know what he&rsquo;s talking about. The 53-year-old coach twice guided the old New Westminster Bruins to Memorial Cup champioships in 1977-78.Moose Jaw Warriors&rsquo; coach Barry Trapp said it wasn&rsquo;t so much the quantity but the quality of the coaches replaced that makes the behind-the-bench shuffling so hard to stomach.&ldquo;People let go are very capable of coaching,&rdquo; said Trapp. &ldquo;There are no guarantees in this job, but there was maybe more going on behind the scenes than what we know.&ldquo;It makes you wonder as a coach. I was more shocked than surprised. Coaches are always the scapegoats in these situations. A better way of shaking up a team may be to get rid of a top player rather than a coach.&rdquo;Another concern as 1985 faded away was the fate of Regina Pats. The cornerstone WHL franchise, struggling at the gate, was put up for sale after an ongoing dispute with the city&rsquo;s exhibition board over a parking tariff.A group in Swift Current, Sask., which has been trying for years to secure a WHL franchise, made an offer but the consensus is the league won&rsquo;t approve it.&ldquo;Regina without the Pats is like the Catholic Church without the Pope,&rdquo; said Trapp.While there was pessimism in 1985, there is optimism in the New Year.Prince Albert is geared for another crack at the Memorial Cup, and the Portland Winter Hawks will have their say, too, after earning the host berth for the 1986 national playdown.The Winter Hawks had the best overall record of WHL teams eligible to hold the three-league playdown after 30 games. The Hawks and Medicine Hat were in a neck-and-neck race to the wire and it boiled down to Portland&rsquo;s 6-1 home-ice win Dec. 11 over Medicine Hat.WHL WEEK&mdash;Spokane dealt forward Landis Chaulk and defenseman Ian Herbers and Mike Weigleitner to Lethbridge for defenseman Mike Berger. &#9632;

Clubs Playing Game Of ‘Musical Mentors’

<h2>WORLD JUNIOR Thu. Dec. 26</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0037-01544/5778336-1-eng-US/f0037-012.jpg" title="f0037-01" width="546" height="698"></div><h2>Fri. Dec. 27</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0037-02399/5778329-1-eng-US/f0037-022.jpg" title="f0037-02" width="550" height="1477"></div><h2>Sun. Dec. 29</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0037-03309/5778322-1-eng-US/f0037-032.jpg" title="f0037-03" width="542" height="580"></div><h2>Mon. Dec. 30</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0037-04254/5778315-1-eng-US/f0037-042.jpg" title="f0037-04" width="548" height="690"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0037-05223/5778308-1-eng-US/f0037-052.jpg" title="f0037-05" width="552" height="730"></div><h2>Wed. Jan 1</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0037-06194/5778301-1-eng-US/f0037-062.jpg" title="f0037-06" width="550" height="1188"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0037-07171/5778294-1-eng-US/f0037-072.jpg" title="f0037-07" width="542" height="90"></div><h2>Thu. Jan. 2</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0037-08142/5778287-1-eng-US/f0037-082.jpg" title="f0037-08" width="544" height="489"></div><h2>Sat. Jan. 4</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0037-09123/5778280-1-eng-US/f0037-092.jpg" title="f0037-09" width="542" height="638"></div><h2>Sat. Dec. 28</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0037-10113/5778273-1-eng-US/f0037-102.jpg" title="f0037-10" width="548" height="612"></div><h2>Sun. Dec. 29</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0037-1194/5778266-1-eng-US/f0037-112.jpg" title="f0037-11" width="550" height="526"></div><h2>Mon. Dec. 30</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0037-1284/5778259-1-eng-US/f0037-122.jpg" title="f0037-12" width="550" height="668"></div><h2>Fri. Dec. 27</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0037-1377/5778252-1-eng-US/f0037-132.jpg" title="f0037-13" width="548" height="608"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0037-1470/5778245-1-eng-US/f0037-142.jpg" title="f0037-14" width="542" height="122"></div><h2>Sun. Dec. 29</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0037-1563/5778238-1-eng-US/f0037-152.jpg" title="f0037-15" width="550" height="1130"></div><h2>Tue. Dec. 31</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0037-1656/5778231-1-eng-US/f0037-162.jpg" title="f0037-16" width="548" height="578"></div><h2>Thu. Jan. 2</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0043-0869/5778224-1-eng-US/f0043-082.jpg" title="f0043-08" width="548" height="604"></div><h2>Sat. Jan. 4</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0043-0963/5778217-1-eng-US/f0043-092.jpg" title="f0043-09" width="550" height="1241"></div> &#9632;

f0037-01

WORLD JUNIOR, INTERNATIONAL SUMMARIES

<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0040-02207/5778559-1-eng-US/f0040-022.jpg" title="f0040-02" width="539" height="158"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0040-01312/5778566-1-eng-US/f0040-012.jpg" title="f0040-01" width="187" height="179"></div><h2>NHL</h2>---TEAM STANDINGS---(PCT) PERCENTAGE OF ACTUAL POINTS VERSUS POSSIBLE POINTSCLARENCE CAMPBELL CONFERENCE<h3>NORRIS DIVISION</h3><h3>SMYTHE DIVISION</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0040-03148/5778552-1-eng-US/f0040-032.jpg" title="f0040-03" width="528" height="161"></div><h2>PRINCE OF WALES CONFERENCE ADAMS DIVISION</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0040-04115/5778545-1-eng-US/f0040-042.jpg" title="f0040-04" width="524" height="159"></div><h3>PATRICK DIVISION</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0040-0596/5778538-1-eng-US/f0040-052.jpg" title="f0040-05" width="527" height="190"></div><h2>POINTS RACE</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0040-0683/5778531-1-eng-US/f0040-062.jpg" title="f0040-06" width="508" height="575"></div><h2>RESULTS ENDING JAN. 5,1986</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0040-0775/5778524-1-eng-US/f0040-072.jpg" title="f0040-07" width="545" height="1308"></div><h2>ACHL</h2>(STANDINGS ON TUE. JAN. 7)<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0040-0868/5778517-1-eng-US/f0040-082.jpg" title="f0040-08" width="530" height="208"></div><h3>GAMES COMPLETED</h3>SUN. DEC. 29VIRGINIA 2 AT CAROLINA 7MON. DEC. 30MOHAWK VALLEY 4 AT NEW YORK 3TUE. DEC. 31CAROLINA 6 AT VIRGINIA 3THU. JAN. 2VIRGINIA 6 AT NEW YORK 7FRI. JAN. 3ERIE 2 AT CAROLINA 5VIRGINIA 9 AT MOHAWK VALLEY 5SAT. JAN. 4CAROLINA 6 AT ERIE 3VIRGINIA 5 AT NEW YORK 7SUN. JAN. 5CAROLINA 9 AT MOHAWK VALLEY 0NEW YORK 5 AT VIRGINIA 3<h2>AHL</h2>(STANDINGS ON MON. JAN. 6)<h3>SOUTHERN DIVISION</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0040-0960/5778510-1-eng-US/f0040-092.jpg" title="f0040-09" width="530" height="234"></div><h3>NORTHERN DIVISION</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0040-1060/5778503-1-eng-US/f0040-102.jpg" title="f0040-10" width="527" height="207"></div><h3>GAMES COMPLETED</h3>FRI. DEC. 27MAINE 3 AT BALTIMORE 2ROCHESTER 1 AT BINGHAMTON 3ADIRONDACK 4 AT NEW HAVEN 2SHERBROOKE 9 AT NOVA SCOTIA 2FREDERICTON 1 AT SPRINGFIELD 3SAT. DEC. 28NEW HAVEN 5 AT ADIRONDACK 6BALTIMORE 2 AT BINGHAMTON 6SPRINGFIELD 6 AT HERSHEY 1FREDERICTON 5 AT MAINE 2SHERBROOKE 1 AT MONCTON 3SUN. DEC. 29HERSHEY 5 AT BALTIMORE 3NEW HAVEN 4 AT MONCTON 6SHERBROOKE 5 AT NOVA SCOTIA 5BINGHAMTON 7 AT ROCHESTER 5MON. DEC. 30FREDERICTON 2 AT MAINE 3TUE. DEC. 31FREDERICTON 4 AT ADIRONDACK 7SHERBROOKE 0 AT BALTIMORE 6MONCTON 5 AT BINGHAMTON 4NEW HAVEN 6 AT NOVA SCOTIA 4WED. JAN. 1SHERBROOKE 6 AT HERSHEY 4THU. JAN. 2NEW HAVEN 4 AT FREDERICTON 1SPRINGFIELD 3 AT MAINE 4BINGHAMTON 1 AT ST. CATHARINES 5FRI. JAN. 3MONCTON 4 AT BALTIMORE 2ST. CATHARINES 4 AT ROCHESTER 5MAINE 4 AT SHERBROOKE 2HERSHEY 5 AT SPRINGFIELD 4SAT. JAN. 4ROCHESTER 3 AT ADIRONDACK 4NEW HAVEN 3 AT FREDERICTON 4MONCTON 5 AT HERSHEY 3SHERBROOKE 3 AT MAINE 2BINGHAMTON 2 AT SPRINGFIELD 0SUN. JAN. 5HERSHEY 4 AT BALTIMORE 5NEW HAVEN 5 AT NOVA SCOTIA 6MONCTON 2 AT ROCHESTER 1SPRINGFIELD 4 AT ST. CATHARINES 5<h2>IHL</h2>(STANDINGS ON TUE. JAN. 7)<h3>EAST DIVISION</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0040-1158/5778496-1-eng-US/f0040-112.jpg" title="f0040-11" width="529" height="175"></div><h3>WEST DIVISION</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0040-1254/5778489-1-eng-US/f0040-122.jpg" title="f0040-12" width="528" height="263"></div><h3>GAMES COMPLETED</h3>FRI. DEC. 27MUSKEGON 3 AT SAGINAW 4INDIANAPOLIS 0 AT KALAMAZOO 5FORT WAYNE 8 AT TOLEDO 7MILWAUKEE 4 AT PEORIA 2FLINT 4 AT SALT LAKE 5SAT. DEC. 28MILWAUKEE 4 AT MUSKEGON 3TOLEDO 2 AT SAGINAW 8INDIANAPOLIS 4 AT PEORIA 5SUN. DEC. 29KALAMAZOO 2 AT FORT WAYNE 3PEORIA 8 AT TOLEDO 7SALT LAKE 5 AT MILWAUKEE 4SAGINAW 4 AT FLINT 6MON. DEC. 30FLINT 4 AT MUSKEGON 8TUE. DEC. 31INDIANAPOLIS 2 AT FORT WAYNE 7TOLEDO 3 AT KALAMAZOO 4SALT LAKE 5 AT FLINT 4FRI. JAN. 3FORT WAYNE 1 AT SAGINAW 2PEORIA 6 AT TOLEDO 3MUSKEGON 5 AT MILWAUKEE 3SALT LAKE 7 AT INDIANAPOLIS 3KALAMAZOO 7 AT FLINT 3SAT. JAN. 4SALT LAKE 5 AT FORT WAYNE 7FLINT 6 AT SAGINAW 5MUSKEGON 3 AT PEORIA 2SUN. JAN. 5INDIANAPOLIS 5 AT TOLEDO 7SAGINAW 6 AT MILWAUKEE 3MUSKEGON 5 AT PEORIA 4SALT LAKE 5 AT FLINT 4<h3>LEADING SCORERS</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0040-1351/5778482-1-eng-US/f0040-132.jpg" title="f0040-13" width="525" height="150"></div><h2>WHL</h2>(STANDINGS ON TUE. JAN. 7)<h3>EAST DIVISION</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0040-1444/5778475-1-eng-US/f0040-142.jpg" title="f0040-14" width="528" height="264"></div><h3>WEST DIVISION</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0040-1544/5778468-1-eng-US/f0040-152.jpg" title="f0040-15" width="525" height="207"></div><h3>GAMES COMPLETED</h3>FRI. DEC. 27MOOSE JAW 4 AT SASKATOON 5SAT. DEC. 28CALGARY 3 AT BRANDON 4LETHBRIDGE 1 AT MEDICINE HAT 4REGINA 5 AT MOOSE JAW 3SEATTLE 5 T VICTORIA 7SUN. DEC. 29CALGARY 2 AT BRANDON 9SPOKANE 4 AT KAMLOOPS 5MEDICINE HAT 6 AT LETHBRIDGE 5PRINCE ALBERT 4 AT SASKATOON 2VICTORIA 0 AT SEATTLE 6MON. DEC. 30SASKATOON 8 AT PRINCE ALBERT 5TUE. DEC. 31SEATTLE 8 AT PORTLAND 10NEW WESTMINSTER 8 AT VICTORIA 7WED. JAN. 1NEW ESTMINSTER 6 AT KAMLOOPS 2REGINA 10 AT LETHBRIDGE 5CALGARY 4 AT MEDICINE HAT 6SASKATOON 8 AT MOOSE JAW 6THU. JAN. 2PRINCE ALBERT 9 AT BRANDON 5SPOKANE 4 AT PORTLAND 5.FRI. JAN. 3REGINA 4 AT CALGARY 6KAMLOOPS 6 AT SEATTLE 5SAT. JAN. 4MOOSE JAW 5 AT MEDICINE HAT 9SEATTLE 3 AT NEW WESTMINSTER 6KAMLOOPS 5 AT PORTLAND 8BRANDON 7 AT PRINCE ALBERT 4LETHBRIDGE 6 AT SASKATOON 7VICTORIA 3 AT SPOKANE 7SUN. JAN. 5MEDICINE HAT 3 AT MOOSE JAW 5PORTLAND 4 AT NEW WESTMINSTER 6LETHBRIDGE AT REGINA (ppd) BRANDON 3AT SASKATOON 7 VICTORIA 3AT SEATTLE 7 KAMLOOPS 6 AT SPOKANE 9<h2>OHL</h2>(STANDINGS ON TUE. JAN. 7)<h3>EMMS DIVISION</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0040-1642/5778461-1-eng-US/f0040-162.jpg" title="f0040-16" width="532" height="260"></div><h3>LEYDEN DIVISION</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0040-1738/5778454-1-eng-US/f0040-172.jpg" title="f0040-17" width="527" height="231"></div><h3>GAMES COMPLETED</h3>SUN. DEC. 29LONDON 2 AT NORTH BAY 6CORNWALL 6 AT OTTAWA 3WED. JAN. 1OTTAWA 3 AT BELLEVILLE 2THU. JAN. 2KINGSTON 8 AT CORNWALL 4KITCHENER 8 AT GUELPH 1WINDSOR 2 AT NORTH BAY 12TORONTO 6 AT PETERBOROUGH 6FRI. JAN. 3OSHAWA 8 AT KINGSTON 5GUELPH 2 AT KITCHENER 5HAMILTON 3 AT LONDON 5BELLEVILLE 6 AT OTTAWA 8WINDSOR 4 AT SUDBURY 6PETERBOROUGH 3 AT S.S. MARIE 2SAT. JAN. 4OSHAWA 3 AT BELLEVILLE 4NORTH BAY 5 AT KITCHENER 6OTTAWA 6 AT TORONTO 11SUN. JAN. 5LONDON 2 AT HAMILTON 6GUELPH 4 AT NORTH BAY 7OTTAWA 3 AT OSHAWA 5PETERBOROUGH 1 AT SUDBURY 2WINDSOR 2 AT S.S. MARIE 2KINGSTON 5 AT TORONTO 4<h2>QMJHL</h2>(STANDINGS ON MON. JAN. 6)<h3>ROBERT LEBEL DIVISION</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0040-1834/5778447-1-eng-US/f0040-182.jpg" title="f0040-18" width="536" height="178"></div><h3>FRANK DILIO DIVISION</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0040-1931/5778440-1-eng-US/f0040-192.jpg" title="f0040-19" width="538" height="208"></div><h3>GAMES COMPLETED</h3>FRI. JAN. 3VERDUN 3 AT CHICOUTIMI 8HULL 4 AT DRUMMONDVILLE 8T-RIVIERES 6 AT LONGUEUIL 3GRANBY 5 AT SHAWINIGAN 12LAVAL 7 AT ST. JEAN. 3SUN. JAN. 5CHICOUTIMI 3 AT HULL 7ST. JEAN 8 AT SHAWINIGAN 7LONGUEUIL 2 AT T-RIVIERES 8GRANBY 2 AT VERDUN 7<h2>OSHL</h2>(STANDINGS ON SAT. JAN. 4)<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0040-2030/5778433-1-eng-US/f0040-202.jpg" title="f0040-20" width="534" height="218"></div><h3>GAMES COMPLETED</h3>FLAMBORO 6, GEORGETOWN 5COLLINGWOOD 7, PETROLIA 4FLAMBORO 10, GEORGETOWN 5DUNDAS 7, COLLINGWOOD 5FLAMBORO 4, PETROLIA 2GEORGETOWN 9, COLLINGWOOD 4PETROLIA 4, DUNDAS 3<h2>USHL</h2>(STANDINGS ON TUE. JAN. 7)<div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0040-2129/5778426-1-eng-US/f0040-212.jpg" title="f0040-21" width="532" height="326"></div><h3>GAMES COMPLETED</h3>SAT. DEC. 28NORTH IOWA 3 AT DUBUQUE 5MADISON 9 AT WATERLOO 6ROCHESTER 10 AT DES MOINES 3SUN. DEC. 29MADISON 4 AT ST. PAUL 6DUBUQUE 6 AT ROCHESTER 5TUE. DEC. 31ROCHESTER 1 AT SIOUX CITY 7WATERLOO 9 AT NORTH IOWA 8THU. JAN. 2ST. PAUL 5 AT THUNDER BAY 3FRI. JAN. 3MADISON 7 AT DES MOINES 6DUBUQUE 5 AT NORTH IOWA 2ST. PAUL 5 AT THUNDER BAY 1SAT. JAN. 4MADISON 4 AT SIOUX CITY 5DUBUQUE 6 AT DES MOINES 4NORTH IOWA 5 AT WATERLOO 2SUN. JAN. 5MADISON 3 AT WATERLOO 6<h2>WORLD JUNIORS (FINAL STANDINGS)</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0040-2229/5778419-1-eng-US/f0040-222.jpg" title="f0040-22" width="533" height="267"></div><h3>GAMES COMPLETED</h3>THU. DEC. 26CANADA 12, SWITZERLAND 1SOVIET UNION 7, U.SA 3CZECHOSLOVAKIA 9, W. GERMANY 3SWEDEN 2, FINLAND 0FRI. DEC. 27CANAD 18, W. GERMANY 2SOVIET UNION 6, SWEDEN 1FINLAND 9, SWITZERLAND 2U.S.A. 5, CZECHOSLOVAKIA2SUN. DEC. 29CANADA 5, U.S.A. 2FINLAND 7, W. GERMANY 2SOVIET UNION 7, SWITZERLAND 3SWEDEN 3, CZECHOSLOVAKIA 2MON. DEC. 30CANADA 9, SWEDEN 2 ASOVIET UNION 10, W. GERMANY 0FINLAND 7, U.S.A. 5CZECHOSLOVAKIA 7, SWITZERLAND 2WED. JAN. 1CANADA 6, FINLAND 5SOVIET UNION 4, CZECHOSLOVAKIA 2U.SA. 4, W. GERMANY 1SWEDEN 7, SWITZERLAND 1THU. JAN. 2SOVIET UNION 4, CANADA 1CZECHOSLOVAKIA 2, FINLAND 0U.SA. 11, SWITZERLAND 3SWEDEN 10, W. GERMANY 0SAT. JAN. 4CZECHOSLOVAKIA 5, CANADA 3U.S.A. 5, SWEDEN 1SOVIET UNION 4, FINLAND 1SWITZERLAND 7, W. GERMANY 1(End of tournament)<h3>FINAL SCORING LEADERS</h3><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0040-2327/5778412-1-eng-US/f0040-232.jpg" title="f0040-23" width="527" height="265"></div><h2>ALL-STAR TEAMS</h2><h3>FIRST TEAM</h3>GOAL&mdash;EVGENY BELOSHEIKIN, SOVDEF&mdash;MIKHAIL TATARINOV, SOVDEF&mdash;SYLVAIN COTE, CANCTR&mdash;MICHAL PIVONKA, CZERW&mdash;IGOR VIAZMYKIN, SOVLW&mdash;SHAYNE CORSON, CAN<h3>SECOND TEAM</h3>GOAL&mdash;JAROSLAV LANDSMAN, CZE 4DEF&mdash;FREDRIK OLAUSSON, SWE WDEF&mdash;SCOTT PALUCH, U.S.A.CTR&mdash;ALEXANDER SEMAK, SOVRW&mdash;JIM SANDLAK, CANLW&mdash;VALERY KAMENSKY, SOV<h3>BEST FORWARD</h3>JIM SANDLAK, CAN<h3>BEST DEFENSEMAN</h3>MIKHAIL TATARINOV, SOV<h3>BEST GOALTENDER</h3>EVGENY BELOSHEIKIN, SOV<h2>SPENGLER CUP (FINAL STANDINGS)</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0040-2426/5778405-1-eng-US/f0040-242.jpg" title="f0040-24" width="527" height="184"></div><h3>GAMES COMPLETED</h3>THU. DEC. 26CANADA 2, CZECHOSLOVAKIA 2SWITZERLAND 4, W. GERMANY 3FRI. DEC. 27SOVIET UNION 6, SWITZERLAND 2CZECHOSLOVAKIA 5, W. GERMANY 5SAT. DEC. 28CANADA 7, W. GERMANY 2SOVIET UNION 3, CZECHOSLOVAKIA 1SUN. DEC. 29CANADA 5, SWITZERLAND 2SOVIET UNION 10, W. GERMANY 2MON. DEC. 30SOVIET UNION 6, CANADA 0SWITZERLAND 4, CZECHOSLOVAKIA 2 fl<h2>SOVIET TOUR</h2><h3>GAMES COMPLETED</h3>THU. DEC. 26CENTRAL ARMY 5, LOS ANGELES 2FRI. DEC. 27CENTRAL ARMY 6, EDMONTON 3SUN. DEC. 29QUEBEC 5, CENTRAL ARMY 1CALGARY 4, MOSCOW DYNAMO 3TUE. DEC. 31CENTRAL ARMY 6, MONTREAL 1THU. JAN. 2CENTRAL ARMY 4, ST. LOUIS 2SAT. JAN. 4CENTRAL ARMY 4, MINNESOTA 3PITTSBURGH 3, MOSCOW DYNAMO 3<h3>GAMES TO COME</h3>MON. JAN. 6MOSCOW DYNAMO AT BOSTONWED. JAN. 8MOSCOW DYNAMO AT BUFFALO &#9632;

f0040-02

CHRYSLER

<h2>Fri. Dec. 27</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0041-01261/5778751-1-eng-US/f0041-012.jpg" title="f0041-01" width="546" height="1389"></div><h2>Sat. Dec. 28</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0041-02169/5778744-1-eng-US/f0041-022.jpg" title="f0041-02" width="544" height="1875"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0041-03125/5778737-1-eng-US/f0041-032.jpg" title="f0041-03" width="542" height="156"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0041-04102/5778730-1-eng-US/f0041-042.jpg" title="f0041-04" width="544" height="173"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0041-0589/5778723-1-eng-US/f0041-052.jpg" title="f0041-05" width="554" height="177"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0041-0682/5778716-1-eng-US/f0041-062.jpg" title="f0041-06" width="536" height="119"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0042-01272/5778709-1-eng-US/f0042-012.jpg" title="f0042-01" width="568" height="3589"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0042-02199/5778702-1-eng-US/f0042-022.jpg" title="f0042-02" width="542" height="446"></div><h2>Sun. Dec. 29</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0042-03152/5778695-1-eng-US/f0042-032.jpg" title="f0042-03" width="562" height="3149"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0042-04118/5778688-1-eng-US/f0042-042.jpg" title="f0042-04" width="546" height="566"></div><h2>Mon. Dec. 30</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0042-0599/5778681-1-eng-US/f0042-052.jpg" title="f0042-05" width="548" height="641"></div><h2>Tue. Dec. 31</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0042-0689/5778674-1-eng-US/f0042-062.jpg" title="f0042-06" width="545" height="2360"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0042-0781/5778667-1-eng-US/f0042-072.jpg" title="f0042-07" width="550" height="2517"></div><h2>Wed. Jan. 1</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0042-0874/5778660-1-eng-US/f0042-082.jpg" title="f0042-08" width="560" height="1076"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0042-0969/5778653-1-eng-US/f0042-092.jpg" title="f0042-09" width="542" height="788"></div><h2>Thu. Jan 2</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0042-1062/5778646-1-eng-US/f0042-102.jpg" title="f0042-10" width="550" height="2823"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0043-01280/5778639-1-eng-US/f0043-012.jpg" title="f0043-01" width="544" height="1739"></div><h2>Fri. Jan. 3</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0043-02209/5778632-1-eng-US/f0043-022.jpg" title="f0043-02" width="554" height="1215"></div><h2>Sat. Jan. 4</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0043-03177/5778625-1-eng-US/f0043-032.jpg" title="f0043-03" width="548" height="550"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0043-04126/5778618-1-eng-US/f0043-042.jpg" title="f0043-04" width="586" height="3579"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0043-05112/5778611-1-eng-US/f0043-052.jpg" title="f0043-05" width="562" height="1479"></div><h2>Sun. Jan. 5</h2><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0043-0690/5778604-1-eng-US/f0043-062.jpg" title="f0043-06" width="568" height="2073"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/f0043-0780/5778597-1-eng-US/f0043-072.jpg" title="f0043-07" width="576" height="2509"></div> &#9632;

f0041-01

NHL Summaries

BOSTON&mdash;Charlie Simmer, LW, returns from injury list only to suffer an eye injury and return to inactive status for indefinite period. INJURED&mdash;Nevin Markwart, RW, hip-pointer, Frank Simonetti, D, shoulder surgery, Louis Sleigher, RW, reinjured groin. Markwart out on day-to-day basis, Simonetti one more month, Sleigher indefinitely.BUFFALO&mdash;Richard Hajdu, LW, recalled from Rochester of AHL Ric Seiling, RW, Paul Cyr, RW, and Bill Hajt, D, back from injury list. INJURED&mdash;Gilbert Perreault, C, bruised groin, Lindy Ruff, LW, bruised knee, Dave Fenyves, D, concussion. Bob Halkidis, D, dislocated shoulder, Chris Langevin, LW, knee injury. Perreault out on day-to-day basis, Ruff and Fenyves 10 more days, Halkidis and Langevin indefinitely.CALGARY&mdash;Mike Vernon, G, Neil Sheehy, D, and Gino Cavallini, LW, assigned to Moncton of AHL Marcd Amour, G, back from injury list. Ed Beers, LW, out on day-to-day basis with Charley horse.CHICAGO&mdash;Jeff Larmer, RW, returned to Nova Scotia of AHL. Victor Posa, LW, recalled from Toronto of OHL. Steve Ludzik, LW, returns from injury list. INJURED&mdash;Tom Lysiak, C, bruised foot, Darryl Sutter, LW, shoulder separation. Curt Fraser, LW, sprained shoulder. Lysiak out on day-to-day basis, Sutter two more weeks, Fraser three.DETROIT&mdash;Bruce Eakin, C, recalled from Adirondack of AHL and trded to Edmonton for Billy Carroll, C. Joe Kocur, RW, Tim Friday, D, Kelly Kisio, C, all back from injury list. INJURED&mdash;Claude Loiselle, C, knee injury, Harold Snepsts, D, knee injury, Gerard Gallant, LW, broken jaw. Loiselle and Snepsts out on day-to-day basis. Gallant sidelined for 3 more weeks.EDMONTON&mdash;Craig MacTavish, C, back from injury list. INJURED&mdash;Jeff Brubaker, LW, sprained ankle, Mike Krushelnyski, LW, sprained knee, Mark Messier, C, bruised foot, Esa Tikkanen, LW, broken foot. All out two more weeks except Tikkanen, who is sidelined for 3 more weeks.LOS ANGELES&mdash;Roland Melanson, G, back from injury list and recalled from New Haven of AHL. Daren Eliot. G, sent to New Haven. Lyle Phair, LW, returned to New Haven. Jim Fox, RW, back from injury list. INJURED&mdash;Garry Galley, D, knee injury, Glenn Currie, C, back injury from training camp. Both out indefinitely.MONTREAL&mdash;Kent Carlson, D, recalled from Sherbrooke of AHL. Craig Ludwig, D, Ryan Walter, LW, Stephane Richer, C, all back from injury list. INJURED&mdash;Rick Green, D, broken thumb, Chris Chelios, D, sprained knee, Sergio Momes-so, LW, knee surgery, Steve Penney, G, bruised shoulder. Penney out on day-to-day basis. Green 6-8 weeks, Chelios and Momesso indefinitely.NEW JERSEY&mdash;Uli Hiemer, D, and Bruce Driver, D, assigned to Maine of AHL. Sam St. Laurent, G, Ken Daneyko, D, and Randy Velis-chek, D, recalled from Maine. Perry Anderson, LW, back from injury list. INJURED&mdash;Alain Chevrier, G, sprained ankle, Rich Preston, RW, face lacerations. Both out on day-to-day basis.NY ISLANDERS&mdash;Brent Sutter, C, out on day-to-day basis with bruised shoulder. Ari Haanpaa, LW, sidelined indefinitely with shoulder injury. Mikko Makela, RW, out on day-to-day basis with Charley horse. Bob Nystrom, RW, out on day-to-day basis with bruised right ankle.NY RANGERS&mdash;Mike Allison, LW, and Tony Feltrin, D, assigned to New Haven of AHL. Feltrin suffered eye injury on his return and underwent surgery. INJURED&mdash;Mark Pavelich, C, fractured finger, Jan Erixon, LW, bruised leg, George McPhee, LW, hip-pointer, Barry Beck, D, muscle bruise and spasms. Erixon out on day-to-day basis, Pavelich 3 weeks, McPhee and Beck indefinitely.PITTSBURGH&mdash;Chris Dahlquist, D, recalled from Baltimore of AHL Terry Ruskowski, LW, out with sprained thumb. Rod Buskus, sidelined with bruised ribs. Both out on day-to-day basis. Randy Hillier, D, out indefinitely with tom knee ligaments.QUEBEC&mdash;Mark Kumpel, RW, and Gord Donnelly, D, assigned to Fredericton of AHL. John Anderson, RW, Dave Shaw, D, and Normand Rochefort, D, back from injury list. Richard Sevigny, G, sidelined indefinitely with broken hand.WINNIPEG&mdash;Peter Taglianetti, D, recalled from Sherbrooke of AHL. Bobby Dollas, D, assigned to Sherbrooke as replacement. &#9632;

TRANSACTIONS

<div class="byline">BY REYN DAVIS</div><div class="figure-block image-block"><img src="/var/site_2854/storage/images/media2/images/c0004-01227/5778806-1-eng-US/c0004-012.jpg" title="C0004-01" width="581" height="149"></div><h2>WINNIPEG JETS</h2>WINNIPEG&mdash;If the thought of quitting has crossed the mind of Barry Long&mdash;and it has on more than one occasion&mdash;the team&rsquo;s on-ice leader dreads a change of coaches as the cure for all the problems that ail the Winnipeg Jets.&ldquo;It&rsquo;s a cruel thing to blame the coach for this,&rdquo; said Randy Carlyle, the Jets&rsquo; best defenseman and a veteran of eight seasons in the National Hockey League.&ldquo;A coach can do only so much. He can&rsquo;t do it for you. It&rsquo;s wrong of him to have an axe hovering over his head.&rdquo;General manager John Ferguson has tried to offer his coaches some comfort by telling them he is not contemplating any changes.Claiming he has not lost faith in them, Ferguson said: &ldquo;There are times when we look confused and disorganized and those are times when I&rsquo;ve sat down with the coaches and talked about the problems.&ldquo;I tell the coaches, naturally, to be concerned about the team&rsquo;s problems, but, no, I am not planning to fire this coaching staff.&rdquo;Ferguson said that the loss of Carlyle for 10 games following the celebrated trade of Dave Babych &ldquo;put us behind the eight-ball.&rdquo;Nagged by a thigh injury, Carlyle has since returned to the lineup. But the Jets continue to lose.A four-game losing sreak included back-to-back losses in Los Angeles, allowing the last-place Kings to pull within four points of them.&ldquo;Firing the coach has never been the remedy,&rdquo; said Carlyle. &ldquo;Maybe it works for a couple of games, but it&rsquo;s never the long-term answer.&rdquo;Some people believe Long is too laid-back behind the bench.&ldquo;He doesn&rsquo;t get flustered,&rdquo; said Carlyle. &ldquo;He is cool, calm and collected. If he is going to get hot at us, he does so in practice.&ldquo;The coaching staff is not the problem. I feel I can speak for the team. We have full confidence in them.&rdquo;Carlyle believes the Jets were guilty of having over-achieved a year ago when they finished the season in fourth place overall with a 43-27-10 record.&ldquo;But this is the way the game is played,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;Some years are better than others.&ldquo;What is puzzling, though, is that we are basically the same team, yet we are not accomplishing the same things.&rdquo;The Jets&rsquo; schedule has been a pain in the neck. They travelled on 14 of the first 15 weeks of the schedule and they played their 40th game before Jan. 1, after 16 games in December.&ldquo;What&rsquo;s the rush?&rdquo; asked Carlyle. &ldquo;In years past, we never played our 40th game until the second week of January. Our schedule is just horrendous.&rdquo;The Jets&rsquo; dependence on Carlyle is a major weakness the Kings, among others, have exploited.He had been burned badly by the Kings, who believe the more involved he is, the faster he breaks down.&ldquo;Carlyle puts a burden on himself to try to make an extra special play to catch up, once he&rsquo;s been taken advantage of,&rdquo; said Pat Quinn, the Kings&rsquo; coach.Twice, he handed passes to the Kings in his own zone, costing the Jets key goals. In another instance he completely missed Dave Taylor on a rush and the right winger scored.Carlyle commands a great amount of ice time, more than ever before following the trade of Babych.He is used in a regular rotation with three others&mdash;Mario Marois, Dave Ellett and Tim Watters. Jim Kyte and Wade Campbell or Peter Taglianetti are used two or three times a period, often beside Carlyle.The Jets would seem to be in great need of a fifth starting defenseman. And Ferguson says he is looking.BENCH BITS&mdash;The boo birds have been on Brian Hayward&rsquo;s back lately. &ldquo;They are the same people who booed Babs (Dave Babych) all the time,&rdquo; said Hayward. &ldquo;I&rsquo;ve inherited them&rdquo;&hellip;The Jets sent Bobby Dollas down to Sherbrooke and called up Peter Taglianetti, who had his nose broken in a fight with Los Angeles&rsquo; Joe Paterson on his first shift&hellip;Frederick Olausson, a 6-foot-4 defenseman from Sweden, is ready for the NHL right now, according to Ferb son. However, he still must serve a six month military hitch. &#9632;

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