Nitzy's Hockey Den

Edouard 'Newsy' Lalonde in his mid-70s I've been sifting through Library and Archives Canada hockey photos on the Collections Canada website and found these awesome ones from the early 1960's. They are all from the early 1960's (the Hall opened in 1961). I find it pretty cool seeing some of hockey's greats in these photos. Even though they are 30 or 40 years removed from active playing, a good hockey fan can still recognize them. Two of the greatest defencemen of alltime, Eddie Shore at right, King Clancy 3rd from right. Art Ross, Lloyd Turner, Lester Patrick, W.A. Hewitt, Newsy Lalonde, 'Red' Dutton on Opening night, 1961 As a kid, I remember going to the old Hockey Hall of Fame at the Canadian National Exhibition grounds in Toronto. I went pretty much every year in the 1980's and judging by these photos, it looked pretty much the same as it did in the 60's. The Hall moved downtown in 1993, and the displays improved immeasureabl...

"He beat me every way you could think of tonight. Sittler gives you no warning. You can't anticipate when  he comes in like you can with a lot of other guys. He just wheels around and you've got only an instant to react," the words of Flyers goaltending legend Bernie Parent after being ventilated for five goals by the Maple Leaf great. It was 40 years ago to the day and Darryl Sittler had just equalled an NHL record for goals in a playoff game as Toronto tied Philadelphia at three games each in the Quarterfinal round. Parent continued, "He caught me shifting my weight and I was off balance." Apparently Bernie was off balance quite a bit on this night as Toronto won 8-5. Sittler commented, "I just got lucky again, like on February 7," the night of his famous ten point game. He shared the fact that he had put his stick under one of coach Red Kelly's lucky charm pyramids and felt that the spell worked. "The spell was marvellous"....

Let's open up another pack of 1980/81 Topps Hockey cards, shall we! A few weeks back I chronicled the opening of my first pack of this scratch-off silliness, here  and the best card I got was a Gretzky Assists Leader, not too shabby. Lets's see what we get here. Marcel Dionne All-Star Charlie Simmer All-Star Boom, right on top of the pack, two First Team All-Stars Dionne and Simmer. They're worth about two and one dollars each. Two-thirds of the Triple Crown Line (along with Dave Taylor), one of the greatest lines in hockey history. Definitely a good start to this pack. Ryan Walter Well, the good luck didn't last long. A second year card of the serviceable Ryan Walter. At the time of this card, he was the youngest captain in NHL history. He would go on to help the 1986 Canadiens win the Stanley Cup, card worth fifty cents. Mark Howe All-Star Oooh, another All-Star card, and Hall of Famer! This one of Gordie's kid is worth about 75 cents. In t...

Si Griffis, Newsy Lalonde, Allan Parr, Smokey Harris, Sibby Nicholls, Frank Patrick, Jack Ulrich, Tommy Phillips I recently discovered the online archives of the Library and Archives of the Government of Canada. Within, I found these terrific old hockey photos. The first one (above) is labelled simply Vancouver Hockey Team 1912-13 with a few familiar faces but no names listed. The Society for International Hockey Research database made identifying these guys fairly easy. The team is the Vancouver Millionaires and the photo itself it looks as if the team picture was taken in a sauna room. I'm not certain why an all wood room was chosen as location for this, but I like it. Vancouver Asahi  The next photo from the archives is this cool one of the Vancouver Asahi hockey club. The Asahi (Morning Sun) are better known as a baseball squad from Vancouver's Japanese community competing in the Terminal League from 1914 until 1941. It would seem the club also had a hockey team, ...

In the change room of my beer-hockey game the other night, as we put on our pungent gear,  the topic arose of the upcoming NHL playoffs. My defence partner Pat Kelly (of CBC's "This is That" radio program) shared that it will be tough for him to watch the playoffs this year with no Canadian based teams qualifying. Not at all, I told him. As a Maple Leafs fan, I have become accustomed to watching the post-season with no rooting interest. This season will be the tenth of the last eleven that Toronto has not made the cut to play extra hockey in April. Regardless of this, I look forward to the playoffs every season. Honestly though, the majority of fans of Canadian teams should be quite familiar with no playoff hockey along with us Leafs fans. Edmonton has missed the last ten post-seasons, Calgary has missed 6 of the last 7, Winnipeg 4 of the 5 seasons they've been back in Manitoba and even Ottawa has now missed 4 of last 8. Here's some easy ways to enjoy the playo...

1973/74 O-Pee-Chee Ring I've been wanting to post this for a while and finally got around to get pics of these beauties from my collection. I've picked these all up over the years at various collectible shows or off the internet. The first one is probably one of my faves, a Maple Leaf cardboard punch-out ring. These were inserted into O-Pee-Chee hockey card packs for the 1973/74 season and were meant to be worn proudly around the schoolyard by the lucky recipient. Thankfully mine is still intact although I am tempted to punch it out, slip it on my finger and wear it to work one day. 1972/73 O-Pee-Chee Logo The year before the ring inserts, O-Pee-Chee began the punch-out collectible fad with these logo cards. Each of teh 16 NHL and 12 WHA teams were depicted. 1973/74 Mac's Milk Cloth Sticker These are part of a 30 card set issued through the NHLPA at Mac's Milk stores in Canada. One would assume that these 3" cloth-textured stickers were meant to festo...

Time for another vintage hockey pack opening. This time it's a pack of 1982/83 O-Pee-Chee that I picked up for three or four bucks. I think I may have got five packs for $15 online a while back. The big ones in this set are the Grant Fuhr, Ron Francis and Dale Hawerchuk rookies worth about $30, $20 and $15 respectively. Let's see what I got. Boom! Doug Smail rookie card right out of the gate. 81/82 was his first full season and he produced 17 goals and 35 points. In 84/85 he topped out at 31 goals and 66 points and went on to play 691 NHL games. His career totals were 189 goals and 397 points. Card is worth a quarter. Ric Seiling and his Great Gazoo helmet were coming off a 22 goal campaign on their way to a 738 game career. Card, a quarter. Hedberg was coming off a season where he played a mere four games in 81/82. After tearing up the WHA with Winnipeg, he and Ulf Nilsson signed with the Rangers in 1978. This year he would pot 25 goals and 59 points and he'...