1987 Canada Cup, Canada vs. USSR

[KariyaIsGod*]

Game 2 of that series is the greatest hockey game I've ever seen...

 

[Ludwig Fell Down]

Ludwig Fell Down.........

That's interesting to hear.........I didn't know it wasn't a sellout up there in Montreal......In Hamilton for Games 2 and 3 of the Finals you couldn't even get a ticket and Copps Coliseum was LOUD......very LOUD...most folks were saying that it was even louder than the old Chicago Stadium which use to be the loudest Rink in the NHL...........

Some of the better personal memories for me in 1987 was walking inside Jackson Square in Hamilton (Mall attached to the Copps Coliseum) and spotting alot of the Team Canada players like Mario Lemieux and Paul Coffey....even got to shake their hands in person...there was quite the circus around those 2 that day in the Mall.

Watching the games on tape, it looked like the Hamilton crowd was much more into the game. The crowd at the Forum was great, but it was strange to look up and see empty seats in the upper corners of the rink. It looked like a Bruins - Winnipeg game at the Garden.

When I was at Dorval airport the next morning, one of the Customs officers told me that Team USSR was in the next terminal. I went over, and there they were. I was in the process of convincing a player to trade his Canada Cup bag for my Addidas bag (I didn't speak Russian and he spoke no English, so it took a few minutes to barter), and they got called to their plane as we were starting to empty our bags out to switch. That was quite a loss, it was a cool bag with mostly Russian writing on it.

 

[Tb0ne]

Who were the best Russian players in the game? (yes I listened to who was on the top line, but I have no idea what sort of players they were or how talented they were).

 

[monkey_00*]

Watching the games on tape, it looked like the Hamilton crowd was much more into the game. The crowd at the Forum was great, but it was strange to look up and see empty seats in the upper corners of the rink. It looked like a Bruins - Winnipeg game at the Garden.

When I was at Dorval airport the next morning, one of the Customs officers told me that Team USSR was in the next terminal. I went over, and there they were. I was in the process of convincing a player to trade his Canada Cup bag for my Addidas bag (I didn't speak Russian and he spoke no English, so it took a few minutes to barter), and they got called to their plane as we were starting to empty our bags out to switch. That was quite a loss, it was a cool bag with mostly Russian writing on it.

Ludwig Fell Down.........

I think the fans in Montreal are so used to seeing the great hockey players and games that for them that Canada Cup Series wasn't as much a big deal for them like it was for the people of Hamilton who had just finished building their brand new 18,500-seat Arena; Copps Coliseum for the sole purpose of luring NHL team to the City....I was there right behind the Team Canada bench for games 2 and 3...best damn games or sporting event I've ever witnessed live...that's for sure.

 

[John Flyers Fan]

Who were the best Russian players in the game? (yes I listened to who was on the top line, but I have no idea what sort of players they were or how talented they were).

Fetisov .. just a dominant defenseman .. on a Ray Bourque type level

Sergei Makarov ... incredibly underrated .. IMO better than Jari Kurri and right there with Mike Bossy as the best RW of the 1980's

Vlad Krutov .. a goal scoring machine, short, powerful ... a different style but think Pavel Bure in his prime

Valeri Kamensky .. he was just a kid, but this was his breakout tournament

Alexei Kasatonov ... not flashy but a very very solid defenseman .. different stye, but think Larry Murphy

Alex Semak & Vyacheslav Bykov ... big time 2nd line players

 

[monkey_00*]

-------------------------------------------------------​

1987 Canada Cup:​

"I don't think you will ever see better hockey than what was played in that series."- Wayne Gretzky​

Round Robin Results​

Canada - CSSR 4-4
USA - Finland 4-1
USSR - Sweden 3-5
Canada - Finland 4-1
USSR - CSSR 4-0
USA - Sweden 5-2
USSR - Finland 7-4
Canada - USA 3-2
Sweden - CSSR 4-0
USSR - USA 5-1
CSSR - Finland 5-2
Sweden - Canada 3-5
USA - CSSR 1-3
Sweden - Finland 3-1
USSR - Canada 3-3​

Round Robin Standings
Country GP W L T GF GA PTS
------- -- - - - -- -- ---
Canada 5 3 0 2 19 13 8
USSR 5 3 1 1 22 13 7
Sweden 5 3 2 0 17 14 6
CSSR 5 2 2 1 12 15 5
USA 5 2 3 0 13 14 4
Finland 5 0 5 0 9 23 0​

Final Result ​

Sweden - USSR 2-4
Canada - CSSR 5-3
Canada - USSR 5-6
Canada - USSR 6-5
Canada - USSR 6-5​

======================================​

 

[monkey_00*]

1987 Canada Cup Roster

Wayne Gretzky-C
Mario Lemieux-RW/ C
Mark Messier-LW/ C
Dale Hawerchuk- C
Rick Tocchet- RW
Michel Goulet- LW
Brent Sutter- C
Mike Gartner- RW
Brian Propp- LW
Glenn Anderson- RW
Kevin Dineen- RW/ LW
Doug Gilmour- C
Claude Lemieux- LW

Ray Bourque- D
Larry Murphy- D
Paul Coffey- D
Normand Rochefort- D
Craig Hartsburg- D
James Patrick- D
Doug Crossman- D

Grant Fuhr- G
Ron Hextall- G
Kelly Hrudey- G ​

 

[russianrocket24]

Have you ever heard about the nice Gretzky story during the tournament? As far as I remember I read it in the Larionov book.
Gretzky invited some of the Russian players to a barbecue during the tournament. He had to ask Tikhonov because every decisison regarding the team was made by him. He said ok, but no alcohol for the players and he attended to the event as kind of guard.
Anyway, some of the players were able to dissapear from time to time out of Tikhonovs view and went to the basement of Gretzky's house where he had some cases of beer.
I think it's a nice small anecdote around the Canada Cup and show the class of Wayne Gretzky.
By the way, for the guys who want to know more about the Russian players in the tournament, please check out my page.
www.russianrocket.de

 

[Macman]

I just wanna say one thing : when I got the tape from the last game, I was so excited about it, everyone was saying it's one of the best hockey games ever played ... so I watched it ... and in the end I almost burned this damn video.

Let me explain myself : at the end of the 3rd period Lemieux takes the puck, skates into the zone, takes his time, and shoots. But the only problem is that on that same play, the defensement who was defending against Lemieux was hooked by Hawerchuk and for "some" reason the Canadian ref didn't call a penalty. And that's funny cause when it happened Hawerchuk wasn't skating as if expecting a call. Most obvious penalty ever ... but the crowd and the country wouldn't have liked if the Ruskies were given a PP instead.

But if we put aside this little "accident", they were the best 3 hockey games ever.

You need to watch the game again because as somebody mentioned before the hook on Bourque earlier in the game was even more blatant than Hawerchuk's and resulted directly in a Soviet goal. Bourque was alone in the Canadian end with the puck when he was hooked to the ice and the Soviets scored. The Canadian ref missed than one too, eh?

 

[c-carp]

I just saw it in a catalog where you could buy all three games. I am going to do that shortly.

 

[monkey_00*]

Have you ever heard about the nice Gretzky story during the tournament? As far as I remember I read it in the Larionov book.
Gretzky invited some of the Russian players to a barbecue during the tournament. He had to ask Tikhonov because every decisison regarding the team was made by him. He said ok, but no alcohol for the players and he attended to the event as kind of guard.
Anyway, some of the players were able to dissapear from time to time out of Tikhonovs view and went to the basement of Gretzky's house where he had some cases of beer.
I think it's a nice small anecdote around the Canada Cup and show the class of Wayne Gretzky.
By the way, for the guys who want to know more about the Russian players in the tournament, please check out my page.
www.russianrocket.de

Thanks for the story.........nice web site and great pics too.

 

[monkey_00*]

1987 Soviet Union​

Igor Larionov
Sergei Makarov
Vladimir Krutov
Alexei Kasatonov
Alexei Gusarov
Vitali Samoilov
Viacheslav Fetisov
Igor Stelnov
Igor Kravchuck
Vasili Pervukhin
Anatoli Fedotov
Andrei Khomotov
Vyacheslav Bykov
Valery Kamensky
Sergei Svetlov
Anatoli Semenov
Alexander Semak
Sergei Priakin
Yuri Khmylev
Sergei Nemchinov
Andrei Lomakin
Sergei Mylnikov
Yevgeny Belosheikin​

 

[RorschachWJK]

Well, I just ordered these two sets of DVDs from amazon.ca:
'Canada's Team of the Century: The Best of '72'
'Blade Wars: Best of 3 Finals 1987 Championship Round Canada/Russia'

I suppose there's nothing from the 1981 Cup? Would really like to get that one.

Edit: interesting prce difference for 'Canada's Team of the Century: The Best of '72':
Amazon.com lists it at 42.99 USD while amazon.ca at 25.58 CAD. That's a pretty big difference.

 

[monkey_00*]

Well, I just ordered these two sets of DVDs from amazon.ca:
'Canada's Team of the Century: The Best of '72'
'Blade Wars: Best of 3 Finals 1987 Championship Round Canada/Russia'

I suppose there's nothing from the 1981 Cup? Would really like to get that one.

Edit: interesting prce difference for 'Canada's Team of the Century: The Best of '72':
Amazon.com lists it at 42.99 USD while amazon.ca at 25.58 CAD. That's a pretty big difference.

One of the TV stations up here in Canada has been showing Classic Hockey Matches from the past and they showed some of those 1981 Canada Cup games.....Gilbert Perreault was probably the best player for Canada in that tournament but then he had a freak accident where he crashed against the boards with team mate Wayne Gretzky and he limped off the ice.....that was the last we saw of him in that Series and Canada missed him dearly since they went on to lose BIG TIME in the Finals........up to that point Canada's top line of Gretzky-Lafleur-Perreault were unstoppable.

 

[RorschachWJK]

One of the TV stations up here in Canada has been showing Classic Hockey Matches from the past and they showed some of those 1981 Canada Cup games.....Gilbert Perreault was probably the best player for Canada in that tournament but then he had a freak accident where he crashed against the boards with team mate Wayne Gretzky and he limped off the ice.....that was the last we saw of him in that Series and Canada missed him dearly since they went on to lose BIG TIME in the Finals........up to that point Canada's top line of Gretzky-Lafleur-Perreault were unstoppable.

Great that they show those old classics here. I don't think that I ever saw the 1981 games, as they probably were not shown by the Finnish tv. So this info is new for me, I didn't know about the accident.

 

[monkey_00*]

Great that they show those old classics here. I don't think that I ever saw the 1981 games, as they probably were not shown by the Finnish tv. So this info is new for me, I didn't know about the accident.

Yes........TSN has been showing the Classic Hockey games......next week either on Wednesday or Thursday they'll be showing the 1985 Adams division playoff series featuring Montreal Canadiens VS Quebec Nordiques.

 

[RorschachWJK]

Yes........TSN has been showing the Classic Hockey games......next week either on Wednesday or Thursday they'll be showing the 1985 Adams division playoff series featuring Montreal Canadiens VS Quebec Nordiques.

Interesting. However, if it's on Thursday I'll miss it due to volleyball practice.