Game Report: Dec.15, 1935 New York Americans v Chicago

Perusing the vintage hockey program listings on ebay (as I do on a fairly regular basis) I came across this 75 year old beauty. The description said it was from a game on December 15, 1935 and not much else. I wanted to dig deeper and find out what happened at Madison Square Garden that night.

It turns out that this game was the exact 10th anniversary of the Americans first home game at the Garden. They celebrated by shutting out the Chicago Black Hawks 3-0 in front of future Hall of Fame goaltender Roy "Shrimp" Worters. The Associated Press described the affair, "The Americans opened with a startling display of speed and agressiveness that threw the Hawks back on their heels." Indeed they came out fast and took the lead on an un-assisted mark by Sweeney Schriner. They led 2-0 at the end of one on a goal from Joe Jerwa with helpers from Nels Stewart and Harry Oliver.

"The second period was slow and scoreless, but the teams came back raging in the third, which was featured by a furious slugging match between Bill Brydge of the Amerks and Marty Burke of the Hawks." Oliver tallied halfway through the third with help from Stewart to close out the scoring.

The victory put New York one point out of first in the tight NHL's International Division, behind Toronto and one up on the Montreal Maroons. Their 5-6-2 record however would have placed them a distant fourth in the leagues' other division, the American. The Amerks would go 11-19-5 the rest of the season to finish 16-25-7 and 15 points behind the Maroons. They upset Chicago (which had 11 more regular season points) in the quarter-finals by 7-5 in the total goals round.
The Maple Leafs then dispatched New York two games to one in the Semis.

Sweeney Schriner ended up leading the NHL in points with 45, five more than Chicago's Paul Thompson and Marty Barry of Detroit. Schriner was also voted First Team All-Star left winger. 1935-36 was only the second time in eleven seasons that the Americans had made the post season and would remain the deepest they would ever get in the playoffs. The franchise would fold after six more seasons without getting any closer to the Stanley Cup than they did in this season of 1935/36.

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