What are you sentimental about that no one else would be?

Garlando

Registered User
May 5, 2014
685
237
Kingston, Ontario
Couple things stand out:
1.) I was born in the early 90’s it was about 96-97 when I really became a massive hockey fan. That time frame coincided with the prime Paul Kariya era with The Mighty Ducks and that dude quickly became my favourite player despite growing up in suburban Toronto in a Maple Leafs household. Kariya became Captain of the Mighty Ducks and he along with Teemu Selanne led the team to the playoffs including a thrilling 1st round 7 game series win before losing in 4 games to the Red Wings who went on to win the Stanley Cup. What followed was a contract dispute and then a concussion in 97-98. 98-99 was a disappointing first round exit for the Ducks and slowly but surely the team was torn apart including a Teemu Selanne trade to the Sharks, and eventually struggled until 2003 when out of seemingly nowhere...they made the famous Cinderella run to the Cup Finals. I remember being glued to TV watching that series, Giguere was unbelievable and the Ducks were winning. The moment I’m nostalgic about is the Kariya goal in game 6 at home where he scored the big 4th goal that sealed game 6 for the Ducks on that beautiful slapshot past Martin Brodeur after being concussed by prime Scott Stevens earlier in the game on a hit at the blueline. The emotional rollercoaster of watching your favourite player get blown up at the blue line in such an important game and thinking he’s gone for the game and potentially the series (could be even more long term too)…and then watching Kariya come back on bench and onto the ice and blow that slapshot past Brodeur…I was just over the moon elated and I remember actually having tears in my eyes. The will and determination just blew me away at the time, and I remember thinking that that was the definition of bouncing back and leading by example. Hindsight now says that Kariya probably shouldn’t have been out on the ice again, and that that hit likely changed Kariya’s life and career immensely, but damn what a moment!

2.) Playoff Rivalries: Red Wings and Avalanche in the late 90’s were so much fun to watch. And more personal for me was the Battle of Ontario in the early 2000’s between the Leafs and Senators. It may be nostalgia clouding my memory, but those series were hard fought, and super entertaining to watch as the players on both teams were well versed with each other and didn’t like each other. What makes it nostalgic for me is I had/have family that lived in Ottawa that were season ticket holders from the beginning of that franchise’s existence, and I always enjoyed the back and forth that we had during those series and seemingly throughout the entire year as we had/have a family cottage that we all congregate at in the summers some weekends. I’m sure there are plenty of other rivalries that others are nostalgic about and I encourage others to share their experiences with playoff rivalries! I feel like the parity in the NHL these days has robbed the league of playoff rivalries…I miss them!
 

Killion

Registered User
Feb 19, 2010
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... I’m sure there are plenty of other rivalries that others are nostalgic about and I encourage others to share their experiences with playoff rivalries! I feel like the parity in the NHL these days has robbed the league of playoff rivalries…I miss them!

Great memories, stories there Garlando... and ya, pretty hard not to be captivated by the Ducks & Kariyas' gutsy performances. Also always fun when you have family, relatives or friends living in your own home towns Playoff rivals as is the case with Toronto & Ottawa. ;)
 
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HomeAndHome

All aboard the Lane train! WooWoo
Mar 10, 2017
1,017
927
London, ON
One sentimental thing I can think of growing up as a hockey kid in the late 90's early 00's was a goalie book my parents had bought for my brother and I (I think it was "Hockey's Hottest Goalies by James Duplacey", which came out in 1999 after a quick search).

What made this book special was that it had addresses for the teams at the back so you could send letters to your player of choice. So of course my brother and I wrote letters to just about all of the goalies listed in the book, it didn't matter who because any goalie in the NHL was a legend to us, as Leafs games would be playing in the background while we wrote (if only we got the Habs on TV in Southern Ontario then).

When we received Thank You letters with bumper stickers, signatures, cards, etc. as responses it would be the only thing we talked about for months! I still have the package that I got from the Devils when I sent Marty Brodeur a letter stating he was my favourite goalie that wasn't playing for the Habs.

That book will always have a lot of sentimental value to us, not much can live up to writing letters to your heroes as a kid (even if the only person to see them is the receptionist lol).
 

NyQuil

Big F$&*in Q
Jan 5, 2005
95,348
59,259
Ottawa, ON
I was born in the late 70s. Here's a grab bag of anecdotes and random thoughts.

1. I can remember trying to hide my yawns behind a sofa pillow on the basement couch as I watched my Dad yell expletives at Steve Penney and his beloved Canadiens in the mid 80s. That pillow is fixed in my memory - wool knit, red and white stripes. I figured that if I was sneaky and hid my yawns, I wouldn't have to go to bed. Rick Middleton was a nemesis.

2. My older brother and I collected hockey cards. We had a Messier rookie card with a mustache drawn on his face. Ray Bourque's rookie card was missing the corner. We would throw all of our cards into a plastic bag and then pull them out one at a time and make line-ups.

For some reason, I developed an irrational hatred of Pat Price. For no discernible purpose or rationale. I must have ripped up a half-dozen Pat Price cards. 726 GP - a pretty solid career. My brother would tease me by putting Pat Price cards under my pillow, in my lunch box.

By the time we were older, we kept them in much better shape, but it was too late for some of those early valuable ones. I can still taste the horrible pink stick gum.

3. When I was a toddler, the Colorado Rockies were my favourite team because I had a button with the logo on it. But soon after, I was one of the many Oilers bandwagoners among kids in Canada. I ate Pro Stars cereal. We got his signature at a mall in Chicoutimi (funny to imagine now!). My brother had those Gretzky sneakers with the 99s on them.

After Gretzky was traded, my brother and I angrily switched teams. And by that I mean, my brother switched to the Calgary Flames (!), and I felt the need to do the same because I didn't want to be lame. I flirted with the Bruins for a few months because of Ray Bourque, but for no real reason, I settled on the New York Rangers. Brian Leetch was my guy.

In Ottawa, there were very few Rangers fans, my friends called me the "Lone Ranger", and my Dad would grab whatever Rangers memorabilia he could when he saw it. There wasn't much. I'd be excited when NYR would be on HNIC (because it wasn't all that often), but mainly I'd follow them through the Ottawa Citizen boxscores, always looking forward to the weekly roster page with all of the scoring statistics for all the teams.

My isolation ended rather suddenly when Mark Messier was traded to the team. I stayed a New York Ranger fan until the 2000s - in university my roommate made me take down my "Made in America" Brian Leetch poster during the 1998 Olympics. "It's coming down, or I'm ripping it down".

4. My first live NHL game was against the Vancouver Canucks, at the old Ottawa Civic Centre (capacity 10,500). The Senators lost 4-1 but Bure scored two and Dixon Ward (future superstar!) scored one.

Ottawa Senators at Vancouver Canucks Box Score — November 6, 1992 | Hockey-Reference.com

5. Inevitably the home town wins you over.

My father the Habs fan, my brother the Flames fan, my wife and her family who were all Leaf fans, all of us are Sens fans now.

I lived through the four losing series against the Leafs (still a Rangers fan mind you) living in a house with 5 Leaf fans from Toronto, Parry Sound, Hamilton, etc. I felt the need to defend the Senators as a proud Ottawa native but inevitably they lost every time.

They would wake me up in the middle of the night and ask me if I knew who had won the series, that kind of crap. The fact that I was a Rangers fan was irrelevant. I was the closest Ottawa-based target.

Eventually though, I watched a lot more Senators hockey than Rangers hockey, and the Rangers were picking up players I absolutely hated, like Lindros and Barnaby. Basically I knew more about the Senators. Mrs_NyQuil, a Leaf fan, also switched to the Senators around that time.

We bought playoff tickets all through the playoffs in 2003 (Game 7 ECF: f***ing Jeff Friesen!) then opted for ticket packages and have watched almost every home playoff game since.

It's a lot easier to follow an out-of-town team now, even just 10-15 years later.

6. I've seen a lot of goals, wins, exciting plays, but my favourite in-game experience is probably the time my brother and I decided to heckle Dennis Wideman.

We had seats right behind the bench, but noted pests like Shawn Thornton were used to being accosted by the crowd. After he unsuccessfully tried to engage Wade Redden in a fight, a kid next to us yelled out, "You gonna come after me next, Shawn Thornton?" He turned and flashed the kid a wink, which instantly raised my opinion of the guy about 100 notches.

So, they COULD hear us. But who to go after? Probably some guy that's never been heckled before. So we started going after Wideman, constantly. "You should be playing better Wideman." "My scouting report says that you suck." Really dumb stuff.

But he was getting on edge. Finally, he earned a penalty, and Ottawa scored on the ensuing powerplay. Wideman came back to the bench and we had the whole section going "WIDEMAN...WIDEMAN..." He slammed the door and proceeded to destroy his stick, slamming it against the top of the boards again and again and again until it shattered into pieces, and then kicked the stool at the end of the bench, sending it flying.

"Don't take it out on the STOOL OF SHAME Dennis! It's not the stool's fault!"

The Boston Globe noted that he had an uncharacteristically bad game and was a -3.
 
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NyQuil

Big F$&*in Q
Jan 5, 2005
95,348
59,259
Ottawa, ON
One last funny thing that happened to us was that my brother (age 11 or 12?) recognized Alan Eagleson as we were flying on a plane. He's a hockey fanatic.

He got his autograph in his NHL Official Guide and Record Book. Still has it today.

As we were waiting for our luggage, my Dad asked him what it took to make it as a hockey player.

Alan said, "If you want to make money in this business, don't be a player, be a lawyer."

Hilarious in hindsight.
 

DJ Man

Registered User
Mar 23, 2009
771
219
Central Florida
A nice start to cleaning up the ice would be to eliminate the red center line. It no longer has any function re offsides, and I'm sure that the can call icings readily enough without it.
 
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Boxscore

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Collecting these...

johnbouffard-1982-hockey-digest-51982.jpg
 

SealsFan

Registered User
May 3, 2009
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What made this book special was that it had addresses for the teams at the back so you could send letters to your player of choice. So of course my brother and I wrote letters to just about all of the goalies listed in the book,

When we received Thank You letters with bumper stickers, signatures, cards, etc. as responses it would be the only thing we talked about for months! .

Similarly, I couldn't wait to buy the new edition of the World Almanac and Book of Facts every January because it had the stats of all the major US sports in the back, and more importantly, it had the mailing addresses of all the pro teams, and I sent postcards to every NHL team asking for whatever free souvenir stuff they cared to send (stickers, pocket schedules, ticket brochures, photos, etc.)

Related but a tad embarrassing -- I was a journalism major in college in the late 70's but I had already had newspaper and magazine articles published (that paid). I wanted to collect the press guides from all the NHL teams but I was concerned they might not send me one if I wasn't affiliated with a newspaper, so I sent out letters saying I was covering the Islanders for the tiny weekly community paper in my hometown on Long Island. Like who's gonna check, right? Turns out the publicity guy from the St.Louis Blues who got the postcard knew the editor of my hometown paper! So I get a call from the editor one day asking why I was saying that I worked for the paper. I was stammering but he wasn't mad, said I should have just asked him and he would have got a press guide for me. Whew...:blush:
 

SealsFan

Registered User
May 3, 2009
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The disappointment was in getting the same stickers twice. And there were always those 1 or 2 players on page 12 or whatever that nobody seemed to ever have (obviously the book's way of fleecing kids to buy more).

I've mentioned this before, but Sheldon Kannegeiser of the Penguins was the bane of my, and my friends', existence because all four of us were collecting 1971-72 Topps hockey cards until we all had a complete set... except for ol' Sheldon. None of us could get him. Didn't know any kids at school that had him. But we kept throwing down our dimes hoping the next pack would reveal the elusive Penguin.... those bastards!
51UqV6qRIPL._SY445_.jpg


Ya think he's laughing at us kids???
 

MarkusKetterer

Shoulda got one game in
I remember collecting the Panini stickers as a kid. I used to try and collect team "sets" (say for instance the 94-95 Sharks I would try to get a card of every player that played that year if it existed) and would use them as placeholders until I could get an actual card. Man, those Upper Deck sets were fantastic for that.
 

SovietWings

Registered User
Feb 1, 2017
212
155
Pardubice
I kinda miss those times before it became easy to check the game results online in few seconds.
As a European fan: You know, there gonna be important game of your team during night. In the morning, you wake up, listen the radio hoping they say it but they don't (IF they said some results it was only Pittsburgh and Buffalo because of Jagr and Hasek). Then you pick newspapers at the metro station only to read "Match ended after editorial deadline" because of Western Conference. If you were lucky, some of your friends at high school would know the result... but usually they followed other team and didn't give a damn about Detroit (or maybe just hating them because they were "too strong" "buying all the good players" etc.). So your came back home in the late afternoon, still not knowing the results... Sometimes I checked the teletext, sometimes I had to wait for evening sports news (the remote on our tv didn't work properly and handle the teletext by the buttons on the tv is only for strong characters)... today, you just open the smartphone and know the results immediately... kinda boring.:D
 

tarheelhockey

Offside Review Specialist
Feb 12, 2010
84,982
137,355
Bojangles Parking Lot
As several people have mentioned, the way you got your information had a formative impact in the pre-internet era.

s-l225.jpg


Books like these, along with THN's annual yearbook and the NHL Guide and Record Book, were like gold mines of information. It was hockeydb.com, NHL.com, and Legends of Hockey all wrapped into one publication. I would just sit there and read stat lines, marveling at players' junior league numbers and the obscure names of their hometowns. That was my introduction to Canadian geography and the structure of the junior league system, and come playoff time it was the way I'd internalize the backgrounds of key players. I remember being blown away by Mark Messier's suspension and injury history, and wondering how in the world Dave Manson could have been suspended for biting.

Of course the internet and cable TV has made learning all of this information much efficient, but the relationship with a physical object has disappeared, and there's something about flipping through a Bible-sized tome and stumbling across something that blows your mind about a player you thought you knew well.
 

Killion

Registered User
Feb 19, 2010
36,763
3,211
Not so much The Hockey News in my day as we didnt have a shop or store near us that sold newspapers & magazines when I was a kid in suburbia. Not even a local convenience store, milk & bread delivered to your home... but we did get the Toronto Star & their coverage of hockey really quite excellent back in the day. Every Saturday they also had an insert called Canadian Magazine... though wasnt really a "magazine" per se', on newsprint, 11" x 17" or maybe a bit bigger, full color photo's & often lengthy stories on NHL hockey players from around the League.

Stars like Stan Mikita, Bobby Hull etc along with guys like Reggie Fleming etc. These articles complete with interviews were much more of the "human interest" variety, dealing with their lives not only on but off the ice, trials & tribulations, successes & failures, fairly extensive biographically. Growing up, journeys through amateur, Junior, Minor Pro, NHL, family, marriage, kids... "issues" theyve had or were having & so on.... I see theres a bit of a collectibles market for them on ebay, Craigslist etc, mainly those issues that feature hockey coverage. Very well done, written, something you'd look forward to receiving with your weekend paper. Saturday tradition. Believe it was produced right into the 80's, Canada Cup issues & so on.
 
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BlueBull

Habby Man
Oct 11, 2017
1,696
1,434
Vancouver Island
I'm really sentimental for Ryan Kesler.
After from the sedins and luongo, I really thought he was the best player on the canucks. Guys like Alexander Edler and Alexandre Burrows were some others I liked (Didn't even know about Christian Ehrhoff), but my personal favourite player was Ryan Kesler. I know others who probably liked him back then (Looking back to 2011, he won the Selke), but I have really been following Kesler even after he was traded to Anaheim. I still think he is a good player. Heading back to 2011, I was not rooting just for the sedins and luongo, but for Kesler as well.
Ryan Kesler is a good defensive forward with good leadership as well. He is one of my favourite players in the NHL and possibly one of my favourites ever.
 
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WildGopher

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Jun 13, 2012
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Orange absent from the NHL palette (though still much in use at the minor-pro levels for many years) since the demise of the Hamilton Tigers until the Flyers came along

Not to nitpick, but in the interest of (admittedly obscure) historical accuracy, the NHL's 1930-31 Philadelphia Quakers took orange as their color when they moved from Pittsburgh. Pittsburgh's NHL Pirates colors had been yellow, I believe, a reference back to that city's great amateur Yellow Jackets teams, from whom the Pirates evolved. I'm curious if anyone knows if the Flyers' choice to go with orange was a conscious reference back to the Quakers' colors or not.
 

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Not to nitpick, but in the interest of (admittedly obscure) historical accuracy, the NHL's 1930-31 Philadelphia Quakers took orange as their color when they moved from Pittsburgh. Pittsburgh's NHL Pirates colors had been yellow, I believe, a reference back to that city's great amateur Yellow Jackets teams, from whom the Pirates evolved. I'm curious if anyone knows if the Flyers' choice to go with orange was a conscious reference back to the Quakers' colors or not.

Here is the story of the Flyers selecting the color orange...

"The team’s founders wanted a warm color for marketing reasons, but the obvious choice of red was already being used by the Red Wings and Canadiens, so one of the owners, Bill Putnam, pushed for orange for personal reasons. He [Bill Putnam] didn’t want to go with the more passive thing, a blue or a green, so he chose an orange. Putnam had also been a quarterback at the University of Texas, so the inspiration for the Philadelphia Flyers choosing the colors of orange, black, and white—or at least orange and white, they added the black later on—the inspiration for that was the Texas Longhorns, if you can believe that." —Jay Greenberg

Full article here...

Ironically, Bill Putnam was hired by the Atlanta Flames in 1971 to help get their franchise off the ground as well.
 
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Killion

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Feb 19, 2010
36,763
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Here is the story of the Flyers selecting the color orange...

"The team’s founders wanted a warm color for marketing reasons, but the obvious choice of red was already being used by the Red Wings and Canadiens, so one of the owners, Bill Putnam, pushed for orange for personal reasons. He [Bill Putnam] didn’t want to go with the more passive thing, a blue or a green, so he chose an orange. Putnam had also been a quarterback at the University of Texas, so the inspiration for the Philadelphia Flyers choosing the colors of orange, black, and white—or at least orange and white, they added the black later on—the inspiration for that was the Texas Longhorns, if you can believe that." —Jay Greenberg

Full article here...

Ironically, Bill Putnam was hired by the Atlanta Flames in 1971 to help get their franchise off the ground as well.

Interesting.... also... orange was a thing in the late 60's & 70's, shag carpeting, cars, wall papers & wall colors, fashions... movie A Clockwork Orange inspiring its usage as well... actually adopted by a Cult... followers of Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh... otherwise called Orange People as thats what they'd dress up in..... Hell of a thing.... tried to take over a town in Oregon called Antelope where they had like a commune... real nasty... went around poisoning peoples food in restaurants & so on..... a guy I grew up with, excellent hockey player well on his way to at least Junior & all-round athlete got sucked into that, from an extremely wealthy family..... ran away from home, showed up a couple years later all wide-eyed wearing an orange sweatshirt, beads, little cameo of the Rajneesh around his neck.... later on de-programming, whole 9 yards.... went on to be a stockbroker in the family business, worth millions so ya... orange... quite the color. o_O
 
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Killion

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Feb 19, 2010
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Not to nitpick, but in the interest of (admittedly obscure) historical accuracy, the NHL's 1930-31 Philadelphia Quakers took orange as their color when they moved from Pittsburgh. Pittsburgh's NHL Pirates colors had been yellow, I believe, a reference back to that city's great amateur Yellow Jackets teams, from whom the Pirates evolved. I'm curious if anyone knows if the Flyers' choice to go with orange was a conscious reference back to the Quakers' colors or not.

Ya, your absolutely correct. I'd forgotten about the Quakers. So some precedent in Philly... I'd always associated orange more with Baltimore & MLB's Orioles before the Flyers came along..... some interesting, nicely done minor pro hockey team's uniforms also used orange over the years... indeed when the 1st Expansion came along in Toronto a number of amateur organizations received permission from the newly minted teams to adopt their colors & use their logo's beginning with the formerly Don Mills Civitans who's AAA team became the Flyers (alumni including Larry Murphy, Rick Tocchet, Peter Zezel, Kirk McLean etc - team I also played for but no, didnt go to the pro's) with their AA team adopting the North Stars logo & colors. Same with Ted Reeve Minor Hockey Association becoming the Penguins; Leaside the Kings & so on.
 

Iapyi

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Apr 19, 2017
5,072
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Canadian Prairies
In the 70's I used to write letters and mail them to the Maple Leafs, they would mail back some really nice photos which were about 3.5" X 6" or so which the players had autographed. They didn't even charge anything for them.
 

a79krgm

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Jul 15, 2006
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White Bear Lake
www.northstarshockey.com
I was six years of age when I added this Topps Bruce Gamble card to my collection. (can still smell that cheap gum). When I got older I was disappointed the learn that he wasn't the best goalie that ever played. Some years later I was very saddened to hear that he died of a heart attack at age 44 after an old-timers game. I understand that he actually had an attack during his career in 1972 after recording a win against the Seals. RIP Bruce.

brucegamble.jpg
 

Killion

Registered User
Feb 19, 2010
36,763
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I was six years of age when I added this Topps Bruce Gamble card to my collection. (can still smell that cheap gum). When I got older I was disappointed the learn that he wasn't the best goalie that ever played. Some years later I was very saddened to hear that he died of a heart attack at age 44 after an old-timers game. I understand that he actually had an attack during his career in 1972 after recording a win against the Seals. RIP Bruce.

brucegamble.jpg

.... :laugh: no, "not the best who ever played" but he was damn good, underrated. In tough with the Leafs who had considerable goaltending depth with Bower & Sawchuk, Al Smith & Marv Edwards, Parent & Plante etc. He did have several excellent seasons as the Starter in the late 60's that get overlooked, forgotten, hence "underrated" however the wheels had pretty much fallen off the Leafs wagon by that time... and Gamble was often times beyond spectacular & had to be as the Leafs were goin nowhere post 66/67 & that last Cup. He'd earned a bit of enmity from Punch Imlach upon arrival in Toronto, showing up with Mutton Chop Sideburns... facial hair of anykind an absolute no no for Drill Sarge Punch Imlach...

Interestingly, it was Imlach who rescued Gamble from Retirement, Bruce quitting hockey in 1965 having had it up to here with the notorious Eddie Shore, owner & Manager of the AHL Springfield Indians... But ya, Bruce Gamble was an excellent Goalie and by my eye having watched him very closely, he was one one of the best in the League late 60's, though he could have bad games & when he did, one of the worst. So a bit of inconsistency at times... When Jacques Plante was acquired, there was a fan who used to go to the Gardens with a homemade sign that read "DONT GAMBLE, PLAY PLANTE".... something that was kind of sad really as Gamble had played exceptionally well, beyond the call really behind a team that was slipping into obscurity fast. But some nights, more than a few games between 67/68 & 1970 or so, absolutely, Bruce Gamble was the best Goalie in the League.
 

sabremike

Friend To All Giraffes
Aug 30, 2010
22,544
33,790
Brewster, NY
Fighting to get WTIC on my bedroom radio so I could listen to the great Chuck Kaiton call the games of my beloved Whalers. I lived in NY so after SportsChannel lost the league TV contract I couldn't see many Whalers games and radio was my link to the team. I still remember getting it to finally come in in one night just in time to hear us beat the hated Bruins on a Geoff Sanderson OT game winner. The only thing in this world that I miss as much as my Whalers is my late father.
 
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Hot Water Bottle

Registered User
Aug 26, 2010
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I am sentimental for those corny but effective Molson or Labatt's commercials that would be shown approximately 600 times per game (in Ontario).
 
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crobro

Registered User
Aug 8, 2008
3,873
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Just a little over 20 years ago listening to half your teams games on the Radio.

The pre game, intermissions and post games were the only up to date go to place for live hockey updates,scores etc.

This was the norm till about 1999-2000
 
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