During last Sunday’s NCAA hockey selection show, WCHA Commissioner Bill Robertson was tucking in to a well-deserved feast at his favorite steak house. He was celebrating his 60th birthday, surrounded by friends and family. At 6 pm Minneapolis time he beamed ESPN onto his mobile device. Somewhere between his appetizer and his ribeye, he got the best birthday present imaginable: three WCHA teams selected into the national tournament, a first for the WCHA since the 2013 realignment.
“I’m ecstatic, a great present” said the man known as Billy Rob. “A great way to cap off a very unusual year in athletics overall.”
The tireless efforts by Billy Rob and his WCHA staff had a direct impact on getting three teams—Minnesota State, Lake Superior and Bemidji—into the NCAA tournament. Through diligent testing and constant tinkering with league schedules, his eight WCHA teams averaged over 27 games played per team, seven more than Hockey East, who also had three teams selected.
New England hockey writer Jeff Cox was outraged that both the WCHA and Hockey East had three entries in the national tourney. “It was absolutely unconscionable that the WCHA gets the same amount of teams in the NCAA [tournament] as Hockey East,” Tweeted out Cox.
Robertson begs to differ. “Anybody who has not seen Lake State, Bemidji or Minnesota State are foolish to think they don’t belong in the tournament. They are legitimate.” Cox laments the fact that there was not enough interleague play to warrant the pair wise ranking system to select the teams. But the WCHA had a stellar out-of-conference record, including Bowling Green’s road sweep of tourney-bound Quinnipiac in December.
Actions speak louder than words, and the WCHA’s final entry, Bemidji, leads off the NCAA tournament. The Beavers will take on Big 10 power Wisconsin at 1 ET in Bridgeport, and the entire hockey world will see how the WCHA stacks up with college hockey’s iron. Bemidji’s strength of schedule, including six games versus 5th ranked Minnesota State, makes them a very tough out in single elimination play. Tom Serratore’s club also plays a style that translates well to playoff hockey: tight defense, long swaths of puck possession, and supreme penalty killing. They don’t have the firepower of the Badgers, but they may not need it. Senior goaltender Zach Driscoll could provide the winning edge
WCHA tournament champ Lake Superior has also shipped out east, where they will play the formidable Minutemen of UMass. This should be of great interest to pundit Cox and commissioner Robertson: a Hockey East-WCHA matchup. The 2019 NCAA finalists from Amherst should be careful not to overlook the Lakers who have been surging of late.
“If you look at Lake State’s record in the second half, it’s exceptional,” said Robertson, whose Lakers are 12-2 in their last 14 games. This intriguing Round of 16 matchup will probably be settled by an elite international goaltender, either the Finn Filip Lindberg of UMass or Latvian Mareks Mitens of Lake State. National oddsmakers may have been reading Cox; they have made UMass a prohibitive favorite in this game.
The WCHA’s flagship hockey program since realignment is Minnesota State, the winningest team in all of Division I since coach Hastings arrived eight years ago. Those wins have only come outside the NCAA tournament, however, where the Mavs remain historically winless. If there were ever a year for Minnesota State to reverse the trend, this would be it. They open the 2021 NCAA’s Saturday evening in Loveland Colorado, where Quinnipiac awaits. The Bobcats lost their automatic bid by losing the ECAC championship game to Saint Lawrence, but ultimately replaced their conquerors when the SLU was forced to withdraw from the NCAA’s due to Covid protocol.
MSU coach Mike Hastings has had his troops’ undivided attention for nearly a week of practice following the Mavs’ disappointing semifinal loss on home ice to Northern Michigan. They will resemble a wounded animal in this tourney, looking to avenge decades worth NCAA frustration dating back to 2003.
For the next day or two, optimism abounds in WCHA circles, as dreams of a Bemidji-Lake State regional final has Billy Rob dreaming of a Frozen Four appearance for at least one of his clubs.
“Anybody that plays a WCHA team in the NCAA tourney is going to have their hands full.”
Star-crossed hockey enigma Mark Pavelich died last week. He follows Bobby Suter as the second Miracle Man to have passed, and with it, yet another baby-boomer icon is gone. Unlike the gregarious Suter, Pavelich was understated, lurking in the shadows, skating into the light only when the puck was dropped.
To your average hockey fan, Pav’s offensive gifts were unappreciated until he after the Miracle on Ice, when he joined the New York Rangers. He spent five years playing at the World’s Most Famous Arena, averaging close to a point-a-game in five years with the Blueshirts, a 5’8” center in the rough and tumble NHL. The soft-spoken kid from Minnesota’s Iron Range couldn’t be ignored after his five-goal game for the Blue Shirts, one that splattered his name on the back cover of the Gotham tabloids.
Dixie Hockey Problems
@HockeyProbSouth
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Mark Pavelich once scored 5 goals in a game for the Rangers in a win over the Whalers. #RIP
But to Minnesota hockey lifers, Pav was “The Show,” long before he made it to the Miracle on Ice and the NHL. “He was the Gretzky of Minnesota minor hockey,” said John Burke, a Duluth native now coaching in Sun Valley, Idaho.
Another Sun Valley skater knew the Pavelich youth hockey legend firsthand. “I was on a very good bantam team with [future Olympian] Phil Verchota in Duluth,” said Tim Jeneson, who starred at Division II Saint Scholastica in the late 1970’s. “We went up to Eveleth and played Pavelich’s team, when he was an underage bantam. We lost 21-1, and we were a good team. Pav had nine goals.”
According to both Burke and Jeneson, that was business as usual for Pavelich.
Hi college numbers his final year at UMD are also breathtaking: over two points per game, 31 goals in 37 games. It was a no-brainer for Herb Brooks to slot Pavelich onto a line with fellow Iron Rangers John Harrington and Buzzy Schneider in Lake Placid, where they picked up the nick-name “cone-heads.”
In the NHL, Pav was one of the Rangers beloved “Smurfs,” a line of undersized clutch scorers. It was always more convenient to lump him within a group, because as an individual, Pav kept to himself.
His death has generated more stories than actual fact, Homeresque tales of the man’s outrageous scoring, his isolation, and his mental health challenges. Pav’s Duluth pals who moved on to Sun Valley shared stories both first and secondhand, like how he received a blow to the head so hellacious on the pre-Miracle tour that Herb Brooks thought Pav would never play again. Pav started the next night.
Another classic tale emerged from the pre-Olympic tour took place in November, 1979, just after the opening of firearm hunting season in Minnesota. Team USA was scheduled to play Pav’s old team Minnesota Duluth, a happy homecoming at the old DECC Center. Coincidentally, presidential candidate George H.W. Bush would be making the trip to glad hand the fresh-faced U.S. Olympians. The only problem was that Pav went AWOL, missing all the photo ops the day before. USA Hockey officials were justifiably distressed, though Herb Brooks was not shocked when Pav showed up at the rink an hour before game-time.
Pavelich had no problem entering the old Auditorium with a familiar wave to his pals in the Zamboni entrance, but he was immediately accosted by George Bush’s Secret Service detail. They were understandably freaked out from the sight of Pav in his blood stained jeans with a rifle slung over his shoulder. Just Pav being Pav.
He was always more comfortable deep in the Minnesota bush than in the company of fellow man. His best buddy in college was Mike Jacques, who transferred across town from UMD to play at St. Scholastica. The UMD guys always preferred partying at Scholastica; it was predominantly female, having recently transitioned from an all-girls school to co-educational. But Pav wasn’t really into chatting up the co-ed’s, he would stand around with Jacques and Jeneson, studying the label on his beer.
Minnesotans marvel at how Pavelich could make himself disappear in the off-season, portaging his canoe north from lake-to-lake, getting further and further away from any semblance of civilization. He was pure Minnesota: a guy who acquired his hockey creativity in the free space of outdoor ice; a hunter/fisherman who became one with nature during his lengthy forays into the land of 10,000 lakes.
His life was also an example of a square peg in a round hole: a Minnesota loner thrust into a starring NHL role on Broadway. He was intensely loyal to his Olympic Iron Range line mates, but balked at the high-profile Miracle on Ice reunions. He never felt comfortable embodying the team that pulled off the greatest victory of the 20th century.
One final insight courtesy of the Sun Valley puckers from Minnesota. Multiple sources were aware that Pav was preparing to live out his final chapter in northern Idaho. He had located a plot of land near Couer d’Alene, where he was going to build a refuge away from strangers and their prying eyes. Jeneson and Burke shared the anguish with so much of the Minnesota hockey community when they heard the news of Pavelich’s tragic passing. To this day, they remain in awe of the undersized Pavelich’s prodigious talent, one that dazzled on hockey’s grandest stages: the halcyon days of the WCHA, the Miracle on Ice, and at the World’s Most Famous Arena. R.I.P. Pav.
Sunday, January 10, 2021
Generation III: Charlie, Tim and Bill Rappleye
Unlike his old man or his younger brother, Bill Rappleye requested that he have his ashes spread in the woods, not the water. It only makes sense.
While his five dynamic daughters may be water creatures during the long summer days up at the family compound in Maine, Bill—like his two brothers and two preceding Willard Rappleyes—is a man of the woods, emphasis on the word "man."
The Mountainy Pond Club is a bit anachronistic when it comes to gender; testosterone is a vital asset when it comes to felling trees, splitting hardwood, and filling the gaping woodsheds. The electricity-free Rappleye camp, aptly named Sawbuck, runs on wood, and plenty of it. If you're not burning the precisely-measured stove pieces in the archaic wood burning stove, you'll be eating uncooked food.
That's been the norm since 1930, when Dean Rappleye of Columbia, the original Willard Rappleye, began stacking freshly hewn stove-length pieces into orderly rows.
His bulging woodshed became the pride of the lake—the subject of a Henry Sargent oil painting—for most of the 20th century.
The legacy of those cords of oak, birch and beach may not have been haunting to the Dean's three grandchildren, but they were daunting. As society sped up, days off the grid chopping wood became a luxury, and the once proud woodshed hit hard times. Siblings Bill, Charlie and Tim spend more time raising families in the woods than they did replenishing their stockade. In recent years, supply has barely kept pace with annual demand.
The recently departed W.C. Rap III and his bro's were groomed to appreciate the gratification of a fully processed tree: combing it for fireplace logs, starter brush and vital stove pieces. Both Willard Cole Senior and Junior taught the three lads to safely master the heavy tools of the woods: the two-man saw; the maul axe, the wedge and the sledge. But after becoming grownups, the ratio of workdays to play days while up north on vacation listed towards the latter.
With the tragic passing of both Bill and Charles within barely two years of each other, there was genuine cause for concern. Bill's daughters are competent campers, but they don't swing an axe. Entering 2021, Camp Sawbuck needed an influx of eager woodsmen to keep the fires burning.
Enter Mike and Matt. They are a father-and-son team that has just entered the Rappleye clan. In Bill's final grand act (in a life that contained plenty), he gave away his oldest daughter Georgia to Michael Boyer.
Proud Papa with his "Pentagon"
Michael was fortunate enough to have shadowed Willard Rappleye III through a fortnight of woodsy chores this past summer at Sawbuck. He first lesson was how to start the fires, and the next was how to keep them burning with a full wood box. Check and check. These were lessons pulsing with unspoken urgency; it would prove to be Bill's final summer in Maine.
It turns out that Michael had a hidden agenda: he has an ten-year-old son from a previous marriage, a spirited lad who coincidentally summers in Maine with him mom. Mike wants to partake in the patriarchal tradition of Mountainy Pond, where fathers teach their sons how to safely split up a tree, to master the art of the sawbuck.
Next wave: Mike 'n Matt
The new men in the Rappleye camp join 32-year-old Dexter, the 6'4" son of the late Charlie Rap, a rail splitter just like his old man. And don't forget the "Three T's," Tim and his two sons Tom and Ted. Together, they split enough hard wood last summer to keep pies baking for all of the 2021 season.
Ted and Tom with fruits of their labors
The primary passion of the recently departed Bill Rappleye was his beloved camp, ground zero for his daughters and extended family. This recent addition of Mike and Matt should help fuel Sawbuck for the next generation.
Traverse City's head-in-the-sand ostrich strategy—having unmasked referees enforce mask compliance of players—split its seams last week, the inevitable outcome in dealing with the relentless virus. It was the classic combination of factors that has felled empires large and small: external pressure and internal decay.
Externally, both New Hampshire and Massachusetts tabled all hockey for a month, sending shock waves throughout our National Governing Body (NGB), putting Michigan's affiliate (MAHA) on high alert.
Internally, the fissures began innocently. A pee-wee sporting a long blonde ponytail made a polite request midway through a Sunday afternoon contest: "Would you please put on your mask?" Neither me nor my officiating partner complied. We continued the untenable position of our district—half-heartedly policing players to mask up while not wearing our own. MAHA assignor Mutt has been caught between the proverbial rock and hard place: to enforce the mask mandates with a tribe of officials who are opposed to masking up for a variety of reasons (physical and philosophical). Mutt claims that a lawyer in his hockey circle has looked at the paperwork coming from the state and has found a reasonable loophole exempting refs from masking up, so the charade played on for several weeks: "Do what I say, not what I do."
The walls started closing in our district Tuesday. I participated in a 50-person virtual seminar to secure my annual certification. It originated from Grand Rapids, the second most populated hockey district in the state. The officials in Grand Rapids are in close touch with the state's referee in chief, and there was not z whiff of ambiguity in the role of the officials when it comes to Covid compliance: We must be fully masked. And we must be the unswerving in the implementation of harsh penalties. One pre-game meeting to serve as a warning, and then Game Misconducts handed out at every faceoff to all maskless faces.
The news from downstate had not reached out tribe in T.C. My peers were still adamant that they would not be masking, nor would they use the electronic whistles. I came into the officials locker room and saw the red E-Whistles dangling from a hook, largely unused. My partner Terry was loudly spewing how it wasn't healthy to be breathing one's own carbon dioxide, and that hospitals were making false Covid claims to reap illegal benefits. He has not completed a single item on the certification punch list, waiting to see how the mask mandate would all work out.
Having heard the rumblings from downstate, I was determined to soldier through a game with my new mask and the E-Whistle. I enjoyed the fact that both the mask and the whistle were bright red with black trim, a color-coordinated statement of compliance. I barely survived the night on ice.
After just two minutes of warmups I was legally blind due to the fogging and condensation inside my visor. All my exhales were traveling north, up past my cheek bones and into the inside of my visor. I dashed off the ice, seconds before puck drop, to grab a cloth wipe to help salvage a semblance of vision. It barely helped.
In the lengthy of the U-19 women's game, I found myself swiping my visor during play, tilting my helmet back at absurd angles, and guessing at several of my calls. The E-Whistle had no gusto, and if not for the Terry's typical solid performance, it could have been a debacle. He seemed amused in the post-game locker room, firmer than ever in his position of defiance.
The following day, the winds of authority from downstate had arrived in T.C. Mutt fired off a blast email mirroring the seminar I had been subject to earlier in the week. Everyone masks, no tolerance, no exceptions. Doctor's notes to be ignored, game misconducts to be meted out, no second chances. Boom, boom, boom. That arrived in our inboxes Saturday evening, my next game was noon Sunday. I located my old gaiter, lost after the last laundry. Right after my Sunday coffee I put on the gaiter, strapped on my helmet, and hopped on the stationary bike. It took barely a minute to ramp up my cardio levels, including some heavy breathing. The gaiter did not force as much air into my shield; I figured I would survive.
My teenage partner, having not been through the sequence of events leading up to the Sunday game, had no idea that he was part of a watershed moment. I informed him that the pre-game meetings were of utmost importance, they would be the official warnings prior to potential Game Misconducts for mask violations. And five minutes into the AA squirt contest, 10-year old winger Magnus showed up at the faceoff circle sans mask. He became a martyr to the cause of saving hockey in Michigan.
The coach, an official in his own right when he's not wearing his coaching hat, grilled me pretty thoroughly during the intermission, pleading the case for his play getting a second chance, that kids unmask to get water on the bench. I told him under no circumstances would he be allowed to return to play. The coach was understandably pissed, but there were no repeat offenders. A Game Misconduct is a helluva deterrent. Sadly, Magnus will miss his next game as well, standard procedure for the G.M. But in the grand scheme of things, his penalty, regardless of whether or not justice was served, accomplished a lot. The gauntlet has been thrown. We will see how players, and official, respond to the imminent challenges of sports in a pandemic.
The "Room" for refs in Traverse City is ample: thirty feet long with showers, TV, a fridge, and dual entrances depending on which rink you are heading towards, east or west. On Saturday it had a new feature, in addition to all the skate laces, old rule books and skate laces, there were four red electronic whistles hanging from the towel hooks.
If we officials were to comply with the mandate to keep our faces covered while working the games—and that was the info being passed down to us in no uncertain terms—then these hand-held whistles were the new world order. I gave mine a try and pressed the button—it seemed fairly loud, though a traditional whistle creates quite a screech in our cement bunker. There were three settings on the red whistle, which was the most powerful. It was clearly a whistle, but not piercing. The gadgets were not entirely convincing.
I was partnered up again with Max for another doubleheader—bantams and pee-wees, both AA level. I notified all the coaches during warmup, none had experienced a game officiated with handheld whistles. The devices were clearly a decibel or two fainter than the real thing. This would be interesting.
I had purchased a "gaiter" this week, comparable to a balaclava, a very thin covering that fisherman use to protect against mosquitos. I could actually blow my original whistle through the material, while still keeping my face covered. I considered trying to combine the old and new, but decided to succumb to the
Over the next couple of hours Max and I sounded our Fox-40 E-whistles a few dozen times, mostly without incident. He and I both inadvertently squeezed our triggers to the confusion of everyone on the ice. I had to stop play with an apology and conduct a faceoff, when Max sounded his after losing an edge and squeezing his hand involuntarily, I shouted to "Play on!" and that's what they did.
When Max signaled off-sides, I provided accompaniment with my gadget, a little support from my side of the rink. It was a little faint from 100 feet away.
At game's end there were no complaints, but I do think the play was slightly compromised. There are times when a shrill whistle is needed to defuse scrums around the net. This airless facsimile is a lot easier to ignore than the urgent blast from a zebra in your face.
In the post game locker we checked in with our two striped counterparts from the East rink. Although they wore masks, neither used the E-whistles. From what I could tell, Max and I were the outliers. The only other official I knew of who had used the E-Whistle was the USA Hockey District assignor Mutt. He and I had texted throughout the week, and I told him about the being able to blow through the gaiter, and he had asked about the brand. Nothing official had come down the line other than to use the E-whistles.
The players complied much more thoroughly this week; I estimated 75% of the players had mouths covered, maybe half over their noses. Family members in the stands were in full compliance, by and large. Change has come, and not a moment too soon.
Sunday morning I nearly spit out my coffee when I saw this bold headline in the local paper.
Nearly three dozen Covid cases reported from a summer tourney at the rinks. There was anecdotal evidence of unmasked players crowded onto benches hacking and spitting, but there was a valid consideration that these cases were shared away from the rink, socializing together over drinks and dinner, a common spreading scenario.
The rink protocol had clearly improved since that July tourney, but Sunday's blaring headline has placed rink management on high alert. For as long as hockey is permitted up here in Michigan District 7, those funny little fish-shaped whistles will become the new normal.
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SEPT 12.
Nothing Else Matters
Searching the icy depths for a crucial artifact; a crowded ref room brimming with Covid protest; and Mettallica sings the anthem that has us all reveling in blissful ignorance.
Arriving at the twin rinks Saturday, I noticed the parking lots were brimming. Turns out this was a showcase tourney, with clubs from Covid-restricted hotspots down state and in Ohio coming up to play here in Traverse City, a Phase-5 region that permits competition. Just as I reached the side entrance, a blast of natural sound informed me of the mask choice of the local refs: A real whistle shrilled, sans mask. Four zebras were at work in the two rinks, none covered above the neck.
Most fans were covered, coaches yes, players partially. Later I saw teams performing dryland with the exuberance that comes from a new season that had been in jeopardy; sadly, only a third were covered above the nose. Another real world experiment: blissful ignorance vs the Corona virus.
I shuffled through the ref's locker room, one of the premier such rooms in the region, and saw it had a half dozen sets of gear bags spread about five-feet apart, no humans visible, the virus level unknown. I walked out to the west rink to track my striped peers at work. Competitive AA bantam play: kids sprinting around, coaches exhorting troops, smart jerseys from Cleveland sporting the old Barons colors and logos. Less than a week after Labor Day hockey appeared to be in full swing. The new season had begun while the NHL still had weeks to play in the old season. A time/space continuum. I wasn't sure about the sustainability of this blind optimism; it's one thing to keep hockey self-contained within this region that had a very small Carona caseload, but it's another to invite the regions not allowed to compete because of their own Covid issues into our bubble. But once the puck drops, it's full on hockey, and nothing else matters (thanks for that kicker Jim Hetfield).
A minute into watching my guys, including the region's dispatcher Mutt, working a tidy game the second day of a new season, a forward got run the through the boards in the far corner. I look to Mutt for the call, but his young partner immediately shot up his arm. At the whistle I watch his hands for what's known at the "TV call," letting the whole building (and a potential TV audience) know the type of infraction, and the kid let the perp have full justice. The young zebra performed a bit of a yoga pose, putting his non-whistle hand between his shoulder blades to signal a hit from behind.
Kind of a ballsy call. Instead of a roughing, where the guilty party simply serves two minutes and the game rolls on, this was an obligatory 2 and a TEN, one of the four minors that includes a ten minute misconduct. The young but extremely competent ref took the time to oversee the off-ice official make two entrees onto the scoresheet, then he had to explain to a snarly coach that he had to pluck another skater from his bench to serve the original two minutes as the primary perp sat for the misconduct. It was textbook work by the young zebra on opening weekend, something worthy of the USA Hockey instructional video at the annual seminar.
I hustled to the scorers table, and during a time-out motioned the kid over to the puck-sized communications circle cut out in the plexi. I complimented him on his stellar work. Then I went back to the room to lace up.
I found my favorite ref, a fellow NY and Boston guy nick named "Vig," possesser of a thick New Yawk accent he acquired during his previous life on Long Island. Vig rarely blares below the six-decibel mark. "I ain't wearing no (flippin) mask!" he bellowed. I love Vig, but our politics come from different stratospheres, even though we are both Boomers from back East. "I'm trusting my own immune system. I told them (USA Hockey regional powers) that if I have to wear a mask, I'm done."
Turns out another like-minded ref, Tom, shares his belief in no masks (and the second amendment for that matter), and that they would both gladly retire before donning a mask to work a game. From what I could tell, they were the driving forces that got our region's Poobah's to back off the obligatory masks and electronic whistles. I rationalized that Vig's L-O-U-D protests would simplify my job, but I also sensed that it wasn't great news over the long run. You can't outshout this virus.
I playfully parried with Vig about asymptomatic carriers, and how masks were proven effective, and even asked what he would do when 'They" came for his guns (Vig's plan was to do some high-powered sniping from atop the town water tower). I headed out of this potential Covid reservoir to get on the ice and re-acquaint with my edges. I'm in pretty good biking shape, but as stated before, hadn't touched my blades in half a year.
Thanks in no small part to my excellent partner Max, we had a game free from controversy. Halfway through I noticed the name "Drake" on the back of an undersized wing-man, and stole a glance at the Traverse City bench. There was Dallas, the 16-year NHL vet, the soft-spoken legend of the local rinks. In a one-goal game, I saw one of his players get his legs taken out from two-zones away as the trail official. There were too many bodies between me and the infraction to jack up my arm; I heard three sets of adult chirps from the Drake bench. Oh well, no one throws a perfecto on opening day, except maybe the Kid who worked the preceding game against the radioactive Cleveland Barons.
At the conclusion of the high-intensity affair (was it January already?) I dutifully hoisted the nets from the pegs and waited on the Zamboni before tilting the cages against the boards. I returned to the uncomfortably crowded room and saw my partner Max fiddling with the adhesive on his official USA Hockey crest. The one you have to dive through many hoops to acquire: seminars; open and closed book tests; NGB Safe Sport training; background checks and countless training videos. Attaining one of those cloth shields in the mail from Colorado Springs always contained some satisfaction fir the effort invested. Watching Max I instinctively pawed at my chest, and felt... nothing.
This was not good. It had happened once before when the two-way carpet tape used to adhere the crest to the striped jersey had come unglued over time. I made a mental note that such a thing would never happen again, yet it had. The Covid protocol had given us an extra half-hour between games, and I began the urgent work of retracing steps before the trail ran ice-cold.
No one had turned in a crest, there was nothing to see on either bench or the scorers' table, locker room zip, zilch, nada. I tracked down Zamboni driver Sam, who hadn't noticed anything unusual on the ice. Deductive reasoning told me that it had to have been scooped up by the Zam. I asked Sam the Zam (no Pharaohs for you oldy music aficionados) to keep on eye out for traces of color in the frosty bath of the Zamboni dump. He agreed to help, but I wasn't terrible confident.
Meanwhile, Max was setting me up with his two-year old crest, applying a new layer of double-sided tape to a 2018-19 crest when Sam popped his head in the door.
"Is this it?"
And there was my sacred crest, one which cannot be replaced. It had been through the full Zam cycle: gobbled up, spun with snow, and pounded down into the icy depths of a very large ice bath. Turns out it was Tony who spotted it, and rescued my peace of my mind in the form of a five-inch piece of colorful cloth.
So I was able to work the pee-wee end of my double header with enough peace of mind to get through it relatively undistracted. It was actually a hybrid pee-wee AA vs bantam A game, and it was kind of fun. I busted a bantam for bodychecking (a new rule to accommodate the pee-wees) and we had a mild discussion on the way to the box. He eventually admitted that the victim was his little brother. Which is just SO hockey, the ultimate clan sport.
So, all told, a great day; maybe. I left the ref room, one of my favorite respites in all of the Grand Traverse region, with a glow of camaraderie. I gave Vig an elbow nudge, thanked Max for help with the crest debacle, checked in on Jake's community college drone work, asked Buck about his U.S. Army reinstatement, and repeated my compliment to the young stud who executed the checking from behind to perfection. As if we were picking up exactly where we left off. But we weren't.
Exiting the complex through the east rink, I intersected another wave of geeked up hockey teens from downstate going through their dryland paces. They were laughing and bouncing and largely unmasked. This, my hockey friends, is not sustainable. I love the fact that the guys managing the T.C. rink are finally beginning to dig out from all the Covid-related red ink from a dormant summer, but I did not see a happy ending in this porous "bubble."
By Sunday morning, MAHA had sent down the latest edict in a blast email:
"So within the last 12 hours MAHA has decided for a 2nd time that officials WILL be required to wear face coverings. For those of you working tomorrow get the E whistles that are there. I have ordered 6 of the fox40 E whistles for us. 2 of them will be available to use at Kalkaska for next weekend only."
I now wonder if I'll ever work with my guy "Vig" again.
March 12. The last time I skated, exactly six months ago. With less than 24 hours notice, my USA Hockey regional assignor dropped two games on me—Bantam AA and Pee Wee AAA. This should be a trip. I started the morning with a coffee and a quick brush up with 'Ol Reliable,' the red Basic Officials Manual that is the first line of defense for every sanctioned ref.
In addition to managing the unfamiliar ice, my partner and I are expected to be masked at all times, and solve the riddle of electronic faux whistles for the first time. I've never seen one, but I'm guessing a button is to be pushed on a handheld gadget. Oh, yeah, this should be a wild ride. I'm trying not to conjure up the worst possible scenario: trying to converse with outraged coaches through my mask, defending a whistle that never sounded, surrounded by angry players. This has the makings of an on-ice maelstrom.
BREAKING NEWS: The USAH supervisor just weighed in by email, found a loophole on Page 4 of the latest mandate, giving us the option of wearing a mask during live play. Hmm... might make this maiden voyage a little smoother, though my wife and step-daughter might not like the idea of taking any unnecessary risks. Then again, the masks are one-way protection, not for the wearer. My family tested negative this week, so I'm confident I won't be endangering the kids. I'm leaning towards return to status quo during the live action, but will be prepared to go either way. Two pre-Covid whistles are tucked in my bag.
We live our lives to meet challenges. This is one of those opportunities. Carpe Diem.
Bedlam. Bobby Orr had just scored the acrobatic goal ending the Bruins 29-year championship drought and Boston Garden was shaking to its foundations. South Boston teen Kenny Callow was against the glass, giving his brother Keith a boost up, just as he was getting smacked down by a Garden security guard. Although Kenny never made it, Keith scooted over, joining a dozen other Southie kids frolicking in the midst of Bruins delirium: clapping backs, cutting in on hugs, and looting. Priceless mementos, mostly sticks and gloves shed by the celebrating players, ended up in the clutches of these adolescent raiders.
"I've got three gloves from that game," said Franny Flaherty, still living on South Boston, "Hodge, Bucyk and Sanderson. They're down in my basement." He jabbed his thumb over his shoulder, pointing toward a closed door.
Shuttle the YouTube clip to the1:44 mark you will see a white shirted teenager with two Bruins gloves. He puts them on to consolidate his spoils. At the 2:10 mark, a lad in a yellow shirt caresses a pilfered stick, greeting his buddy in an auburn windbreaker (back to the camera) who's claimed his own. They are all from Southie. The Garden was their turf. How they claimed it, and how they managed to get into every contest they chose, is a Dickensian backstory to hockey's greatest moment.
Flaherty's cousin Larry Norton lived around the corner on Telegraph Street. A charming and dapper middle aged gentleman, Norton was the lynchpin of this neighborhood gang of sports maniacs who claimed Boston Garden as their turf. Their method of entry was as simple as it was ingenious. "I would put on my Sunday School clothes," said Norton, who was 13 at the time and known for his baby face. "I'd find a well-dressed family and slide in front of the dad. When the usher asked for my ticket, I'd just point behind me."
In the ensuing moment of confusion, Norton would bolt into the masses, and head for a designated location. "Door 14 off the East Lobby," said Norton, or another favorite spot called the "Cheese Doors." He would push them open, and let his pals in. Those doors led to five or six different areas of the Garden, so the staff couldn't cover all the options. "There would be 25 of us," said Norton. "The ushers would only get three or four of us. Those that got caught usually tried again and got in. We had eight or nine sure ins, and one would always work."
At the 3:01 mark of the video, a Southie kid comes up to Orr as he embraces an ecstatic old man atop the glass, the youth nearly separating Orr from his gloves. The legend rebuffs the attempt, and at 3:14 Orr hands his gloves to his roommate and team trainer, John "Frosty" Forristall. Orr was one of the few who escaped the swarm.
Prior to that season, the Garden belonged to kids from the North End and Charlestown. "We controlled Fenway, and Charlestown ran the Garden," said Flaherty, nearly two generations later. "There were a lot of turf battles. You were taking your life into your own hands, you [Southie kids] couldn't go over there. But we started to outnumber them, like locusts, the sheer numbers. Finally in 1969 I could go over there on my own."
Future firefighter Sean Ingram was also on the ice. He is in other unedited clips of the post-game madness, long red hair flowing as he danced across center ice.
By pure happenstance, Ingram was on a job in 2010, and began reminiscing about Orr's goal with John Gilligan, a pipe-fitter from Reading. Like so many others in Boston, Gilligan fell in love with the Bruins, and as soon as they swept the Blackhawks in the semifinals, he bolted to the Garden to spend the night waiting for tickets. There is a picture of him in the Record American, patiently queued up in the pre-dawn hours.
That morning he paid face-value for a pair of ducats worth their weight in gold. Gilligan's next stop was a Xerox copy shop, the first step in forging a reasonable facsimile of a workable ticket.
On May 10, Gilligan scalped his legit tickets for a sensational markup, and then used his forged version to slip in to the packed Garden, At game's end, he too, made it onto the ice, but he waited for the bedlam to subside. As the ice was being cleared he saw the cages and nets, cleared off inside the Zamboni entrance. With the building off its high alert, Ingram strolled over to cage and cut the netting, slipping it inside his jacket. The historic twine resides in his Reading den, next to the framed picture from The Record.
The Southie gang's lock on Garden access provided high-end entertainment beyond hockey. "We went to prize fights, Celtics, college hockey, AHL, concerts," said Flaherty. "We'd see big name bands on the board and we'd be there. It wasn't like we knew their music. Wednesday night, we're going to The Stones."
Garden security started wising up, and the Southie kids had to make adjustments. "For big games, we'd get there two hours early, before regular fans were allowed in," said Flaherty. "Sometimes the owners of the Bruins, Westy Adams senior and junior, would be down at ice level before the game, grab a security guard and point us out in the Heavens [the old Garden's Upper Balcony]. Their feeling was No one gets in for free. We'd have to climb up the ventilation shafts and hide in the ceiling until they let the fans in. We'd pop back down and go wash up in the bathrooms. It looked like we'd been playing in coal."
The good times rolled on for the Southie hockey maniacs into the 1970's. After games at the Garden they would come home and play street hockey for another two hours. When the Bruins made it to the 1972 Finals against the Rangers, they got set for what they thought would be another rollicking Cup party, the Bruins leading three games to one, ready to clinch the championship on home ice once again.
"We were too cool to take the "T" any more," said Norton. "So instead of sharing a cab, I saw a car with the keys in it." The boys were now riding in style to the Garden, albeit in a hot car. With the Cup in the house, the Rangers upset the Bruins, forcing a Game Six in New York. This provided yet another opportunity.
"I still had the car," said Norton, "Let's go to New York!" Larry found lots of well-dressed New Yorkers to ply his craft, and Southie's answer to the Bowery Boys found themselves in a much glitzier Garden party. The end result, however, was much the same, with Johnny Bucyk and Lord Stanley taking a victory lap.
At the final buzzer, old film clips show renegade fans sprinting onto the ice, reminiscent of Mother's Day two years prior. But this Cup celebration was not nearly as accommodating to the gate crashers.
At the 22:35 mark you see an excited fan in a blue windbreaker sprinting towards Gerry Cheevers and the Boston net, gleefully ready to join the black and gold conga line. That is, until he runs into the elbow of Johnny "Pie" McKenzie, and gets flattened to the ice for his trouble.
In the remaining footage, the renegades are now out of the picture, apparently deflated by McKenzie's last check of the season.
The Bruins didn't win another Cup until 2011, and by that time the Norton, Flaherty, Ingram and Callow were all watching from their couches as middle aged men. But like their heroes in black and gold, this Southie gang had a hell of a run.
Every hockey fan is aware of the Hobey Baker Award, bequeathed annually to the NCAA’s premier player since 1981. Although three decades older than its more heralded cousin, the Hobey Baker Trophy is a forgotten gem in the pantheon of college hockey hardware. Awarded annually to the Princeton freshman who best exhibits the characteristics of its namesake, the Hobey Baker Trophy has been around since 1950. Its list of recipients reads like a Who’s Who of the sport, from Canadian hockey royalty—Syl Apps (P ’70), to a Stanley Cup Champion in George Parros (P ’03), to current elite NHL Prospect Max Veronneau (P ’19). The Hobey Baker Trophy has been a harbinger for hockey greatness.
You kind of look back and see who’s won it, to be a part of those guys, and held in the same light, is pretty important,” said Parros. “These are all things that mean something to players when they’re trying to figure out what their hockey careers are going to look like. It was a huge deal for me personally.”
The 2020 recipient is Pito Walton (P ’23), a Lawrenceville School product who was introduced to college hockey at Baker Memorial Rink as a toddler. Walton is a useful starting point to play the Hobey Baker version of “Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon,” an exercise that takes us all the way back to the Baker era.
Walton’s father Jim was a senior men’s league goalie for the Essex Hunt Club, who often stared down Princeton Hockey Club’s ageless sniper John Cook (P ’63), the 1960 Hobey Trophy winner. Cook and Austin Sullivan (P ’63) actually shared the 1960 award, back in the era when freshmen ineligible to play varsity hockey, had their own team. The Tiger frosh were a juggernaut in 1959-60.
“We were a great team, we only lost one game,” said Cook. “We played the varsity that year, and to their chagrin, tied them 5-5.”
Cook’s older brother Peter (P ’60) was on that humbled Princeton varsity squad, as was captain and scoring star John McBride (P ’60), the 1957 Baker Trophy recipient. McBride will never forget the aura of Hobey when he arrived at Princeton in 1956, a skinny teenager from Chicago.
“We’d heard of Hobey Baker, for sure,” said McBride, “and went and played in Baker Rink. You walk in the rink and there’s a huge portrait of him. If you didn’t know about him before you came, you certainly did when you went out for your first tryout.”
McBride went on to set several Princeton scoring records (Baker’s teams did not keep official statistics in his era), including an astounding 54-point season in 1959-60, a Tiger record that held up for 58 years. John Cook racked up 67 career goals, another piece of Princeton bedrock that wasn't shattered until 2019.
McBride’s father Paul (P ’22) never played hockey, but made annual pilgrimages from his Chicago home to Baker Rink to watch his son take a star’s turn for the Tigers. Back when Paul McBride began his freshman year at Princeton, Tiger sports hero Hobey Baker was racking up aerial victories in World War I France. Shortly after his first exam period in December of 1918, McBride and the entire campus was rocked by news that still confounds the Tiger sports community today: the legendary Hobey Baker had perished in a freak plane crash, the proverbial last man to die in World War I.
During his senior year, Paul McBride learned that Princeton would honor their hockey deity by building their own facility on campus, the Hobey Baker Memorial Rink. McBride missed its grand opening in January of 1923, having graduated seven months prior. Paul McBride’s first visit to Baker Rink wasn’t until 1957, the year his son John won the Hobey Baker Trophy.
Baker-to-McBride-to-McBride-to-Cook-to-Walton-to-Walton, six degrees of separation within a century of Tiger hockey.
It’s impossible for Princeton player not to know the legend of Baker, and cannot help but be inspired by the superstar’s long shadow. John Cook frequently thought of Hobey as he commuted from his Kingston home to Baker Rink, passing the Baker family farm on Castle Howard Court en route. John’s father Peter (P ’37), yet another Tiger scoring star from the Cook hockey clan, painted the quintessential Baker portrait with a grant from Hobey’s 1914 classmates.
And now 20-year-old Pito Walton, who watched his first college game as a five-year-old at Baker Rink, is the 81st Princeton freshman to have his name forever associated with the legend in orange and black. He plays all his home games in front of season ticket holder John Cook. Cook is impressed with the lad, and thoroughly enjoyed the club’s playoff sweep over Dartmouth this spring.
