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Eastern Hockey League edit

Checklist edit

  • EAHL Statistics and history at hockeyleaguehistory.com.[1]
  • EHL Statistics and history at hockeyleaguehistory.com.[2]
  • Statistics and history at hockeydb.com[3]
  • History at theehl.com[4]

Unsorted edit

 
Atlantic City Boardwalk Trophy at the Hockey Hall of Fame
  • The Atlantic City Boardwalk Trophy, a prize handed from champion to champion of the old Eastern League, was found in a storage shed. Brian Elwell, a former player/coach for the old Syracuse Blazers, became a successful bar and grille owner after his retirement from hockey. As we talked about the proposed new AHL team for Syracuse, Elwell reminisced about his days in the Eastern Hockey League. "You know," he said to me, "somebody dropped this trophy off at my restaurant. It's been in my storage shed for a while. Seems like I remember seeing this once or twice in my playing days." I drove to Syracuse, hoping against hope that the pilgrimage wouldn't be just a 150-mile sightseeing journey. And when Elwell brought out a missile-shaped trophy with "THE BOARDWALK CHALLENGE TROPHY," carved into its side, the engravings drowning in a sea of tarnish and dirt, I knew this was something big. Our journey begins in the fall of 1930. Lincoln Dickey, manager of the Atlantic City Auditorium, imported some Montreal-based hockey players, set them up against the toughest amateur and professional teams on the East Coast, and the Atlantic City Sea Gulls were born. Led by coach Redvers McKenzie, the Gulls hosted everybody from the New York Rangers to college teams, and by 1932 they were one of the top amateur hockey squads. At that time, the resort owners and hotel managers of Atlantic City created a brass trophy decorated with eagles and winged angels, to be awarded to the 1932 AAU hockey tournament winner. In the final two-game, total-goal series, the Sea Gulls beat the Lake Placid Athletic Club, 11 goals to 5, and claimed the "Atlantic City Boardwalk Trophy" as their own. The Gulls would repeat as AAU champions in 1933, winning eight games against four teams on their way to the championship. The Gulls, along with the Hershey B'ars, Baltimore Orioles and Bronx Tigers, formed the Tri-State Hockey League in 1934. Because the TSHL was a non-AAU sanctioned circuit, the Gulls were barred from AAU tournament competition. Stung by this technicality, the Gulls placed the Boardwalk Trophy in storage and continued on with their hockey conquests. The Eastern Amateur Hockey League was formed in 1933 by Thomas Lockhart, a Madison Square Garden promoter with a keen sense of publicity. Lockhart had successfully turned Sunday afternoon hockey games at the Garden into a profitable attraction, and was looking for an established league for three of the MSG amateur squads - the St. Nicholas Hockey Club, the Crescent Athletic-Hamilton Club of Brooklyn, and the New York A.C. Enter the Tri-State Hockey League. Lockhart rode the rails all night to get to Philadelphia in time for the TSHL's organizational meeting. When he arrived, the organizers told him they were not planning any expansion. Lockhart told them he could give them three teams - the three amateur teams - and offered Madison Square Garden as their home ice! The TSHL, excited about road games in the Garden, tore up their schedule and added Lockhart's teams. The Eastern Amateur Hockey League was born, and Tom Lockhart left the meeting as the EAHL league president. Although the 1933-34 schedule divided 48 home games between Lockhart's three teams, Madison Square Garden had only 16 open dates available for Sunday afternoon hockey. So in the tradition of the Plainfield College football team, Lockhart made up phony games and reported their scores to the newspapers. Lest anyone suspect anything fishy, Lockhart inserted this clause in a 1933 program: "EXTRA GAMES WILL BE PLAYED AT THE ASSIGNED PRACTICE HOURS AT THE GARDEN AND WILL NOT BE OPEN TO THE PUBLIC." "I couldn't accommodate all of the extra games," he told author Stan Fischler in Those Were The Days, "so I had to cheat a little. I'd make up phony games; have the Crescents beating the New York A.C. 1-0 and put down somebody's name for scoring the goal and add an assist or two.[6]
  • If you look back in the Times you'll find a story about Lockhart's 'dark house' games. The seats were standing up and cheering. But it actually happened - 21 games never occurred and the league finished its full schedule of games played in the first year." The EAHL was an instant success, and fans purchased the inexpensive tickets in droves (good seats were available at Madison Square Garden for as little as 25 cents apiece). Soon other people wanted a piece of the golden goose, including Madison Square Garden's primary hockey tenant, the New York Rangers. "All the fuss over the Sunday afternoon amateur hockey ultimately seeped down to the Rangers' office," said Tom Lockhart, "and pretty soon I got a call from manager Lester Patrick. He thought we had a good thing going and felt he could help. "I said, 'Great, what can you do?' "'Well,' he offered, 'next season I could bring you some good hockey players in from Canada." Lester Patrick kept his word, bringing some Winnipeg-based players for the start of training camp. Patrick's acquisitions included Mac and Neil Colville, Alex Shibicky, Murray Patrick, Joe Cooper, and Bert Gardiner - all of whom would become future Rangers. The Winnipeg-fortified Crescents dominated the EAHL in the 1934-35 season, and Lockhart and Patrick changed the team's name to reflect the working agreement with the New York Rangers. "We spent half a day trying to name it," said Lockhart. "We had the Rangers and the [AHL's Philadelphia] Ramblers so we "roved" between them and called it the Rovers." By 1950, more than 100 EAHL players spent time in the NHL. 58 of those were ex-Rovers. Besides being a successful promoter, Lockhart had an uncanny knack for finding old abandoned hockey trophies. He recovered the Walker Cup, a hockey chalice named after and donated by New York City mayor James J. Walker in 1926, from a pawn shop. He also found the Hamilton B. Wills Trophy, a free-standing sculpture of a hockey player, and began a USA-Canada challenge series with that as the prize. When the Sea Gulls told him they still had the Boardwalk Trophy, Lockhart convinced the Gulls and the AAU to return the trophy to competition. Between 1938 and 1945, the EAHL had a three-round season. Teams first played for the Hershey Cup, a spherical award originally given to the Tri-State Hockey League by the candy company. Then came a tournament for the Boardwalk Trophy. After all that, the teams played another series for the Walker Cup. The team with the most cumulative points was declared the league champion. Sonja Henie was part of the EAHL. in the 1930's, Lockhart signed the Olympic figure skater to a performing contract, and between hockey periods she would perform ice ballets and pirouettes for the crowd. "She was very good at anything she did," remembered Madeline Lockhart, Tom's daughter and secretary of the EAHL. "What she wanted, she got, and she didn't care what anybody else said about it. She came in one time and had an argument with my father, he said, 'I don't care what you're doing, I have a hockey team to put out there, I can't be bothered if you want to practice!'" In another publicity stunt from the 1930's, Lockhart booked an ice-skating grizzly bear as intermission entertainment for a Rovers/Hershey B'ars Sunday afternoon game. The bear actually performed on roller skates, and the Madison Square Garden staff scrambled to locate ice skates for size 40 paws. Then the bear's owner wanted skates as well, despite the fact that he couldn't skate. After the first period of the Rovers/B'ars game, the bear took the ice, with the owner guiding it by the leash. Suddenly the bear took off, zipping around the ice like a Penske-customized Zamboni, dragging its helpless owner from blueline to blueline. Lockhart thought the bear's antics would cost him his job, but the fans were so enthralled by the skating bruin that the animal was booked into other Eastern League barns. The Boston Olympics joined the Eastern League in 1940, and in 12 years they won the Boardwalk Trophy five times. Walter Brown, manager of the Boston Garden, loved amateur hockey and promoted it often. Confident of the burgeoning Beantown hockey talent, Brown created an amateur team of Bostonian skaters and turned them loose on the hockey world. By 1933, the team had won the World Hockey Championships in Prague. Brown himself coached the 1936 Olympic hockey team, and the squad that competed in Garmisch-Partenkirchen was primarily stocked with his Boston "Olympics." By 1941, as the war loomed in Europe, the 'Pics found their talent pool diminishing, and worked out an agreement with the Boston Bruins so that the NHL club would fortify the 'Pics with their rising pre-NHL talent. The deal proved fruitful, as the 'Pics became one of the dominant teams in the 1940's. With the iron goaltending of Maurice Courteau and the scoring of Al Palazzari, Russ Kopak, Pentti Lund and Tommy Brennan, Boston won the Boardwalk Trophy and the Walker Cup year after year.[7]
  • In 1941, all the able-bodied Canadian skaters went to war. By 1942, the American skaters joined them on the battlefield. Only the Rovers, Olympics and the new Philadelphia Falcons had enough men to field competitive teams. Yet Lockhart got eight teams into the schedule, and each one completed its season. He brought four teams in through an interlocking series with the Metropolitan League, a Madison Square Garden club circuit. For the eighth team, he looked toward the armed forces. By coincidence or by design, the most talented American hockey players found themselves stationed at the Curtis Bay naval yard in Baltimore. Lockhart convinced Mel Harwood, a former EAHL player and official, that the Coast Guard could use this hockey talent as a way to boost homefront morale. Harwood stepped behind the bench as coach, and the Coast Guard Cutters were born. Their roster included former New York Ranger defenseman Art Coulter, Boston Bruin goaltender Frankie "Mr. Zero" Brimsek, and future AHL star left winger Eddie Olsen, who joined the military squad despite being underage. With Olsen at left wing, Joe Kucler at center and token Canadian Bob Gilray at right wing, the "Star Spangled Bangers" won games both in the EAHL and on a two-year exhibition tour. Stan Fischler once called them the greatest All-American squad ever, better than the 1960 or 1980 Olympic teams. But as World War II escalated, the military broke up the Cutters, relocating their skating seamen throughout the hot spots of the Pacific theatre. when the Cutters faced the Rovers at Madison Square Garden, an Armed Forces marching band serenaded the visitors with such ditties as "Indian Love Call" and "The Star Spangled Banner." And when the Cutters scored a goal (which was often), the band played "Semper Paratus," the Coast Guard theme. Although many players looked at the EAHL as a pipeline to the National or American Hockey Leagues, some skaters actually preferred staying in the amateur ranks. One of them was Ty Andersen, who spent 15 years in the EAHL for the Sea Gulls and the Olympics. Osborne Ty Andersen was a Norwegian-American from Swampscott, Massachusetts, where he learned hockey through the rough-and-tumble "shinny" games the kids played at the grade school. His raw talent earned him a place on the Boston Hockey Club (forerunner of the Olympics), and as a starting defenseman for the Sea Gulls in 1933, Andersen helped the Gulls repeat as Boardwalk Trophy champions. Andersen was cheered and respected in almost every arena. One of the most gentlemanly players in EAHL history, Andersen averaged only 11 PIMs per season, while scoring 15 points per year. And on March 9, 1941, while playing for the Olympics, he received a solid gold watch for his tenure on the ice on "Ty Andersen Day." Never mind the fact that Andersen was given the watch by the Rovers - the 'Pics were the visiting team that night. In 1949, only the Olympics and Rovers were capable of fielding teams, and Lockhart closed down the EAHL for a year. Boston and New York joined the Quebec Senior Hockey League, which had played an interlocking series with the EAHL for a few years. Unfortunately, the new teams were completely outmatched - Boston dropped out by midseason, and the Rovers finished dead last. For the first time since the Sea Gulls put it back in circulation, there was no tournament for the Boardwalk Trophy.[8]
  • March 24, 1952. Lorne Anderson, goaltender for the New York Rovers, was called up by the Rangers for the last game of the season against the Chicago Black Hawks. Anderson stepped into the net like a veteran, and took a 6-2 Ranger lead into the third period. Then Hawks forward Bill Mosienko scored three goals in a row - in only 21 seconds, the fastest hat trick in NHL history. Mosienko's achievement spurred the Black Hawks to a 7-6 victory, and Anderson was sent back to the Eastern League, never to play on NHL ice again. By 1953, the Eastern League was almost dead. Expansion to midwestern cities in 1949 proved financially disastrous, and established teams like the New York Rovers, Boston Olympics and Atlantic City Sea Gulls were losing tons of money. By 1953, the only teams left in the league were a Springfield Indians franchise run by former Bruin Eddie Shore, a talent-stripped Washington Lions squad run by the Boston Olympics' Walter Brown, and a team of ex-Rovers in Troy, New York (with the salacious nickname of Uncle Sam's Trojans). There was also a new team in Johnstown, Pennsylvania - the Jets. Originally created by former NHL-AHL standout Wally Kilrea, and featuring free agents and cast-offs from the EAHL's earlier Western expansion, the Jets won five Walker Cups, five Boardwalk Trophies, and one Amateur Hockey Association championship between 1951 and 1973. At that time, the Jets included Don Hall, a left winger with a sharp eye for the goal, right winger Dick Roberge, who would later become the Jets' coach, and well-traveled goaltender Ivan Walmsley, who blocked the puck every night. By 1954, Eastern League president Tom Lockhart searched for new franchises. Despite some ridiculous proposals by some organizing groups - one unnamed party actually thought they could operate a team on an entire budget of $2,500 - Lockhart gathered five teams for the 1954-55 season: Three full-time teams - the Washington Lions, Baltimore Clippers and New Haven Blades - and two part-time teams, the Worcester Warriors and the Clinton (N.Y.) Comets. While the Warriors were a dismal collection of college graduates from Harvard and Holy Cross, and lost games by double-digit margins, the Clinton Comets were an independent squad since 1928, winning three Amateur Hockey Association championships. The Comets actually played in two leagues simultaneously during the 1954-55 season, the EHL and the Eastern Ontario Senior League. Based on winning percentage, the Comets won the regular-season title, and the Washington Lions won the Boardwalk Trophy in the playoffs. True story - The EHL's southern expansion was caused by an Act of God. The 1955-56 season was halfway completed when on January 23, the Baltimore Clippers' arena burned to the ground. Clippers owner Charles Rock rescheduled his final five home dates for Charlotte, North Carolina, and the rechristened Charlotte Clippers {renamed Checkers in 1962) quickly won the hearts of a whole new breed of hockey fans. In an area where most people perceived ice as something one puts in a drink, a record 169,000 fans followed the Clippers when they won the Boardwalk Trophy in 1957. Travel in the Eastern League was an arduous endeavor. In the 1960's, with the league expanding ever southward (to Nashville, Knoxville, Greensboro, Jacksonville and St. Petersburg), buses were used. Teams traveled all day and night, ripping out seats in the back of the bus so players could sleep on mattresses. "We used to get on a bus in Clinton around 10:00 on a Sunday night," recalled Pat Kelly, who coached the Clinton Comets to three straight Walker Cups and four straight Boardwalk Trophies in the late 1960's, "and we'd drive for a day and a half to get to Jacksonville or St. Pete's to play. We'd go right through, no stop. They just changed drivers, two men would take turns driving. I sometimes drove the bus myself, just to help them out." This was indeed the era of the iron man - a player who could ride all night and still put his all in a game, trying to score goals around a league full of enforcers, policemen - in other words, goons. The Eastern League was the enforcer's breeding ground, and players moved from it to the NHL with bruised knuckles and black eyes.[9]
  • Imagine yourself as an Eastern League center on a road trip. Your first stop is New Haven, and Blake Ball is on defense for the Blades. Ball spent six years as a defensive end in the Canadian Football League before taking up hockey professionally - and accumulating 1,200 penalty minutes from 1965 to 1969. Now you're at the Long Island Arena, where John Brophy holds court. Brophy led the EHL in penalty minutes four times between 1960 and 1965 - each time with a different team. Now for a Southern swing to Knoxville and player/coach Don LaBelle. LaBelle was so tough, they once said, that during a playoff game it took three Nashville skaters to take him out of the game - and that was when LaBelle was in street clothes and behind the bench. Heading towards Salem, Virginia - and the Rebels' secret weapon, Dave "The Hammer" Schultz. Schultz, the muscle behind Philadelphia's Stanley Cup-winning Broad Street Bullies, spent 356 PIMs - almost six hours - in the EHL sin bin one season. Back through Clinton - and there's Indian Joe Nolan, a full-blood Ojibwa from Sault Ste. Marie who never met a forward he didn't like - to break in half. The first man to surpass 300 PIMs in an EHL season (he had 352 in 1955-56), Nolan later became a respected linesman. "Every team had a policeman," said Johnstown Jets player/coach Don Hall, "but most of the time those guys went after each other. But in the playoffs, you had to watch out for them, because they were trying to win the championship, too." In 1952, the New Haven Tomahawks and the Johnstown Jets faced each other in the final round of the playoffs. During one of the games, New Haven's Joe Desson drew a flagrant penalty, and referee Mickey Slowik motioned for him to take a seat in the penalty box. Without another word, Slowik turned his back on Desson, skated over to the off-ice officials and announced the penalty. Desson slowly moved toward the box, then changed direction, heading toward Slowik. Without warning, Desson cross-checked Slowik in the back, flipping the referee into the seats. Both benches emptied, and fists and sticks were flying. A policeman stepped onto the ice and arrested Desson, who spent the night in jail for starting a riot. The next day, Lockhart suspended Desson from the Eastern Hockey League - forever. "Some years after that, I remember two guys walking into the Garden and asking for my father," remembered Madeline Lockhart. "And they were the FBI! My father came in, they showed him their badges, they said we're the FBI. And it turned out that Joe Desson had applied for American citizenship, and that was on the paper that he was barred from hockey. And they wanted to know why! My father says, 'I have nothing against him being an American citizen. I'm just not going to let him go out there and kill anybody on the ice.' And he got the citizenship, and he sent my father the nicest letter afterward." Sometimes the fans could be really tough during a game. Pat Kelly recalled some of those tough barns. "The Commack Arena [on Long Island] was a tough one to play in. The worst part was that you used to come off down one end of the building, and your dressing room was all the way down the other end, and you had to walk between the stands, where all the concessions were, and there were many nights where the players would walk back to back just to protect themselves and get through the crowds so the fans wouldn't take punches at us. I remember one night we were in New Haven, and something happened, and all of a sudden the chairs come flying on the ice, and there was 14 hockey players in the middle of the ice, trying to dodge chairs. There were some days in the Clinton Arena that they used to come sailing out at the visiting team, and some nights you'd just pick them up and throw them back." And many arenas had media facilities that were archaic. Catherine "Cash" Garvey, who covered four EHL teams for six newspapers in the 1960's, had her own gripes about the buildings. "The press facilities (at the Utica Memorial Auditorium, the Comets' second home in the 1960's) were bad. There was one phone and everybody was using it. And when you got down to the office, there would probably be a line waiting to use the phone down there. And they had no stairs in the Clinton Arena, so I had to climb a ladder to get up into the press box. And naturally, when I got up there, I had to get down the same way." A rough league, indeed. The average team roster consisted of 14 players - three front lines, four defensemen and one goaltender. Those men played every game, never sitting out with a sprained wrist or a bum knee. "The only way you missed a game in the old Eastern League," said Kelly, "was if they had to cut your leg off and it took them one day to get you a new one, so you missed the game that night."[10]
  • Even though each team had a goon or two, they also had very skilled playmakers, centers and wingers who could take the puck, weave through a defenseman or two, then fake the goaltender out of position for a wrist shot. Syracuse center Ray Adduono scored 100 points five years in a row, a remarkable feat considering that the Blazers were doormats in their first three EHL seasons. Clinton's Borden Smith scored 400 goals in his career, staying with that team throughout the 1960's and 1970's. And Jack Martin was an especially adroit stickhandler who bounced through the southern half of the league. "While playing [for Knoxville] against the Dixie Flyers," said Roland Julian of the Knoxville News-Sentinel, "[Martin] was hit by Flo Pilot in Knoxville's defensive end, flipped over Pilot's back, landed on his feet and continued down the ice controlling the puck. Later, he was pinned against the end boards, passed the puck between his skates to [teammate] Les Calder, who banged in a goal directly in front of the goalie." True story - in 1963, Tom Lockhart convinced the Soviet Union to send their Olympic hockey team to America for some exhibition games, while a U.S. team (coached by Johnstown's Don Hall) toured the Soviet Union. The Soviets came over for five games against the EHL, and left with a 4-0-1 record against the Americans. They humbled Greensboro 12-3, and put similar hurts on Johnstown, Philadelphia and Charlotte. The EHL saved face only when the Knoxville Knights tied the Soviets, 4-4, in the final game of the exhibition tour. Meanwhile, the EHL All-Stars got creamed on their Eastern Bloc tour. "We didn't win a game until we got into Czechoslovakia," remarked Don Hall. "They sent their best teams against us. They didn't lay down for nobody." At the off-season meetings in 1972, Tom Lockhart announced he was stepping down from the EHL presidency, a post he had held for 40 years. Lockhart, who had run the league through good times and bad since its inception in 1933, felt it was time to retire. Norman MacLane was chosen has his successor. But under MacLane's tenure, the league quickly crumbled. The World Hockey Association came into existence in 1972. Suddenly EHL teams had WHA teams in their backyards, and the hockey dollar just couldn't stretch far enough. The New Jersey Devils had enough problems with an NHL team in nearby Philadelphia, but when the WHA put a franchise there, it forced the EHL team to close in 1973. Other teams saw their lineups ravaged by WHA and NHL raids, as the two major leagues battled with each other for ice talent. The Clinton Comets, who won four Boardwalk Trophies and three Walker Cups between 1967 and 1970, were raided, player by player, by the WHA, leaving behind a team dead last in the standings and drowning in red ink. By 1972, the league had expanded from Rhode Island to Florida, and the southern teams felt they had more games scheduled in the North than were necessary. The Jacksonville Rockets, at one time the league's southern-most city, folded after seven years of killer bus rides against northern teams. At the end of the 1972-73 season, the EHL's Southern Division seceded, forming their own Southern Hockey League. The EHL dropped its last puck in 1973, as the Syracuse Blazers won an astounding 63 of 76 games, claiming the Boardwalk Trophy easily and boring through the playoffs. Any teams left in the EHL competed as the North American Hockey League until 1977. But the EHL wasn't done yet. In 1977, the motion picture "Slapshot" premiered. Based on the Johnstown Jets' 1975 NAHL season, "Slapshot" was a good hockey movie for those who didn't know about the EHL/NAHL, and a riot for those who picked up on all the inside jokes and references. Many former EHL ice rinks were used in the filming, and some former EHL players had cameos and bit roles in the picture - for example, that's Indian Joe Nolan at the end of the picture, actually wearing war paint on ice for the first time as "Screamin' Buffalo." Yet the EHL's influence on hockey history goes far beyond a cult classic movie. Expansion into the southern markets made possible the success of the East Coast Hockey League. Five cities that started out with EHL franchises (Long Island, Philadelphia, Washington, Tampa Bay/St. Petersburg and New Jersey) currently are in the NHL. Buffalo coach John Muckler, Vancouver GM Pat Quinn, Toronto/Hampton Roads coach John Brophy, ECHL Commissioner Pat Kelly, and Central League Commissioner Ray Miron all came through the Eastern League, as well as Hall of Famers Frankie Brimsek, Art Coulter, Neil Colville, Bob Dill, Hub Nelson, John Mariucci, referee Bill Chadwick, Boston Olympics owner Walter Brown and EHL President Thomas Lockhart. And the Boardwalk Trophy, the chalice that disappared in 1973, finally coming to light in the storage shed of a former player's bar? It finally joined the Calder Cup - the Turner Cup - even the Stanley Cup - in the Hall of Fame on July 26, 1994. Home at last.[11]

Bibliography edit

  • Miller, Chuck. From Atlantic City to Toronto: The Boardwalk Trophy and the Eastern Hockey League. Part 1: The Sea Gulls, the Rovers, the Olympics and the Cutters. Vol. 3 (2 ed.). Fort Wayne, Indiana: Hockey Ink!. pp. 1–3.
  • Miller, Chuck. From Atlantic City to Toronto: The Boardwalk Trophy and the Eastern Hockey League. Part 2: The Jets, the Comets, Southern Expansion and Well-Worn Knuckles. Vol. 3 (2 ed.). Fort Wayne, Indiana: Hockey Ink!. pp. 4–6.

References edit

  1. ^ http://www.hockeyleaguehistory.com/Eastern_Amateur_Hockey_League1933.htm. {{cite web}}: Missing or empty |title= (help)
  2. ^ http://www.hockeyleaguehistory.com/Eastern_Hockey_League_1954.htm. {{cite web}}: Missing or empty |title= (help)
  3. ^ http://www.hockeydb.com/ihdb/stats/leagues/ehl1934.html. {{cite web}}: Missing or empty |title= (help)
  4. ^ http://www.theehl.com/. {{cite web}}: Missing or empty |title= (help)
  5. ^ "Eastern U.S. Puck Loops Quits A.A.U." The Winnipeg Tribune. Winnipeg, Manitoba. August 31, 1937. p. 36.
  6. ^ Miller, Chuck. Part 1, page 1
  7. ^ Miller, Chuck. Part 1, page 2
  8. ^ Miller, Chuck. Part 1, page 3
  9. ^ Miller, Chuck. Part 2, page 4
  10. ^ Miller, Chuck. Part 2, page 5
  11. ^ Miller, Chuck. Part 2, page 6

Atlantic City Seagulls edit

Checklist edit

Unsorted edit

 
Atlantic City Boardwalk Trophy at the Hockey Hall of Fame
 
Boardwalk Hall in Atlantic City
  • The Atlantic City Boardwalk Trophy, a prize handed from champion to champion of the old Eastern League, was found in a storage shed. Brian Elwell, a former player/coach for the old Syracuse Blazers, became a successful bar and grille owner after his retirement from hockey. As we talked about the proposed new AHL team for Syracuse, Elwell reminisced about his days in the Eastern Hockey League. "You know," he said to me, "somebody dropped this trophy off at my restaurant. It's been in my storage shed for a while. Seems like I remember seeing this once or twice in my playing days." I drove to Syracuse, hoping against hope that the pilgrimage wouldn't be just a 150-mile sightseeing journey. And when Elwell brought out a missile-shaped trophy with "THE BOARDWALK CHALLENGE TROPHY," carved into its side, the engravings drowning in a sea of tarnish and dirt, I knew this was something big. Our journey begins in the fall of 1930. Lincoln Dickey, manager of the Atlantic City Auditorium, imported some Montreal-based hockey players, set them up against the toughest amateur and professional teams on the East Coast, and the Atlantic City Sea Gulls were born. Led by coach Redvers McKenzie, the Gulls hosted everybody from the New York Rangers to college teams, and by 1932 they were one of the top amateur hockey squads. At that time, the resort owners and hotel managers of Atlantic City created a brass trophy decorated with eagles and winged angels, to be awarded to the 1932 AAU hockey tournament winner. In the final two-game, total-goal series, the Sea Gulls beat the Lake Placid Athletic Club, 11 goals to 5, and claimed the "Atlantic City Boardwalk Trophy" as their own. The Gulls would repeat as AAU champions in 1933, winning eight games against four teams on their way to the championship. The Gulls, along with the Hershey B'ars, Baltimore Orioles and Bronx Tigers, formed the Tri-State Hockey League in 1934. Because the TSHL was a non-AAU sanctioned circuit, the Gulls were barred from AAU tournament competition. Stung by this technicality, the Gulls placed the Boardwalk Trophy in storage and continued on with their hockey conquests. The Eastern Amateur Hockey League was formed in 1933 by Thomas Lockhart, a Madison Square Garden promoter with a keen sense of publicity. Lockhart had successfully turned Sunday afternoon hockey games at the Garden into a profitable attraction, and was looking for an established league for three of the MSG amateur squads - the St. Nicholas Hockey Club, the Crescent Athletic-Hamilton Club of Brooklyn, and the New York A.C. Enter the Tri-State Hockey League. Lockhart rode the rails all night to get to Philadelphia in time for the TSHL's organizational meeting. When he arrived, the organizers told him they were not planning any expansion. Lockhart told them he could give them three teams - the three amateur teams - and offered Madison Square Garden as their home ice! The TSHL, excited about road games in the Garden, tore up their schedule and added Lockhart's teams. The Eastern Amateur Hockey League was born, and Tom Lockhart left the meeting as the EAHL league president. Although the 1933-34 schedule divided 48 home games between Lockhart's three teams, Madison Square Garden had only 16 open dates available for Sunday afternoon hockey. So in the tradition of the Plainfield College football team, Lockhart made up phony games and reported their scores to the newspapers. Lest anyone suspect anything fishy, Lockhart inserted this clause in a 1933 program: "EXTRA GAMES WILL BE PLAYED AT THE ASSIGNED PRACTICE HOURS AT THE GARDEN AND WILL NOT BE OPEN TO THE PUBLIC." "I couldn't accommodate all of the extra games," he told author Stan Fischler in Those Were The Days, "so I had to cheat a little. I'd make up phony games; have the Crescents beating the New York A.C. 1-0 and put down somebody's name for scoring the goal and add an assist or two.[1]
  • If you look back in the Times you'll find a story about Lockhart's 'dark house' games. The seats were standing up and cheering. But it actually happened - 21 games never occurred and the league finished its full schedule of games played in the first year." The EAHL was an instant success, and fans purchased the inexpensive tickets in droves (good seats were available at Madison Square Garden for as little as 25 cents apiece). Soon other people wanted a piece of the golden goose, including Madison Square Garden's primary hockey tenant, the New York Rangers. "All the fuss over the Sunday afternoon amateur hockey ultimately seeped down to the Rangers' office," said Tom Lockhart, "and pretty soon I got a call from manager Lester Patrick. He thought we had a good thing going and felt he could help. "I said, 'Great, what can you do?' "'Well,' he offered, 'next season I could bring you some good hockey players in from Canada." Lester Patrick kept his word, bringing some Winnipeg-based players for the start of training camp. Patrick's acquisitions included Mac and Neil Colville, Alex Shibicky, Murray Patrick, Joe Cooper, and Bert Gardiner - all of whom would become future Rangers. The Winnipeg-fortified Crescents dominated the EAHL in the 1934-35 season, and Lockhart and Patrick changed the team's name to reflect the working agreement with the New York Rangers. "We spent half a day trying to name it," said Lockhart. "We had the Rangers and the [AHL's Philadelphia] Ramblers so we "roved" between them and called it the Rovers." By 1950, more than 100 EAHL players spent time in the NHL. 58 of those were ex-Rovers. Besides being a successful promoter, Lockhart had an uncanny knack for finding old abandoned hockey trophies. He recovered the Walker Cup, a hockey chalice named after and donated by New York City mayor James J. Walker in 1926, from a pawn shop. He also found the Hamilton B. Wills Trophy, a free-standing sculpture of a hockey player, and began a USA-Canada challenge series with that as the prize. When the Sea Gulls told him they still had the Boardwalk Trophy, Lockhart convinced the Gulls and the AAU to return the trophy to competition. Between 1938 and 1945, the EAHL had a three-round season. Teams first played for the Hershey Cup, a spherical award originally given to the Tri-State Hockey League by the candy company. Then came a tournament for the Boardwalk Trophy. After all that, the teams played another series for the Walker Cup. The team with the most cumulative points was declared the league champion. Sonja Henie was part of the EAHL. in the 1930's, Lockhart signed the Olympic figure skater to a performing contract, and between hockey periods she would perform ice ballets and pirouettes for the crowd. "She was very good at anything she did," remembered Madeline Lockhart, Tom's daughter and secretary of the EAHL. "What she wanted, she got, and she didn't care what anybody else said about it. She came in one time and had an argument with my father, he said, 'I don't care what you're doing, I have a hockey team to put out there, I can't be bothered if you want to practice!'" In another publicity stunt from the 1930's, Lockhart booked an ice-skating grizzly bear as intermission entertainment for a Rovers/Hershey B'ars Sunday afternoon game. The bear actually performed on roller skates, and the Madison Square Garden staff scrambled to locate ice skates for size 40 paws. Then the bear's owner wanted skates as well, despite the fact that he couldn't skate. After the first period of the Rovers/B'ars game, the bear took the ice, with the owner guiding it by the leash. Suddenly the bear took off, zipping around the ice like a Penske-customized Zamboni, dragging its helpless owner from blueline to blueline. Lockhart thought the bear's antics would cost him his job, but the fans were so enthralled by the skating bruin that the animal was booked into other Eastern League barns. The Boston Olympics joined the Eastern League in 1940, and in 12 years they won the Boardwalk Trophy five times. Walter Brown, manager of the Boston Garden, loved amateur hockey and promoted it often. Confident of the burgeoning Beantown hockey talent, Brown created an amateur team of Bostonian skaters and turned them loose on the hockey world. By 1933, the team had won the World Hockey Championships in Prague. Brown himself coached the 1936 Olympic hockey team, and the squad that competed in Garmisch-Partenkirchen was primarily stocked with his Boston "Olympics." By 1941, as the war loomed in Europe, the 'Pics found their talent pool diminishing, and worked out an agreement with the Boston Bruins so that the NHL club would fortify the 'Pics with their rising pre-NHL talent. The deal proved fruitful, as the 'Pics became one of the dominant teams in the 1940's. With the iron goaltending of Maurice Courteau and the scoring of Al Palazzari, Russ Kopak, Pentti Lund and Tommy Brennan, Boston won the Boardwalk Trophy and the Walker Cup year after year.[2]
  • In 1941, all the able-bodied Canadian skaters went to war. By 1942, the American skaters joined them on the battlefield. Only the Rovers, Olympics and the new Philadelphia Falcons had enough men to field competitive teams. Yet Lockhart got eight teams into the schedule, and each one completed its season. He brought four teams in through an interlocking series with the Metropolitan League, a Madison Square Garden club circuit. For the eighth team, he looked toward the armed forces. By coincidence or by design, the most talented American hockey players found themselves stationed at the Curtis Bay naval yard in Baltimore. Lockhart convinced Mel Harwood, a former EAHL player and official, that the Coast Guard could use this hockey talent as a way to boost homefront morale. Harwood stepped behind the bench as coach, and the Coast Guard Cutters were born. Their roster included former New York Ranger defenseman Art Coulter, Boston Bruin goaltender Frankie "Mr. Zero" Brimsek, and future AHL star left winger Eddie Olsen, who joined the military squad despite being underage. With Olsen at left wing, Joe Kucler at center and token Canadian Bob Gilray at right wing, the "Star Spangled Bangers" won games both in the EAHL and on a two-year exhibition tour. Stan Fischler once called them the greatest All-American squad ever, better than the 1960 or 1980 Olympic teams. But as World War II escalated, the military broke up the Cutters, relocating their skating seamen throughout the hot spots of the Pacific theatre. when the Cutters faced the Rovers at Madison Square Garden, an Armed Forces marching band serenaded the visitors with such ditties as "Indian Love Call" and "The Star Spangled Banner." And when the Cutters scored a goal (which was often), the band played "Semper Paratus," the Coast Guard theme. Although many players looked at the EAHL as a pipeline to the National or American Hockey Leagues, some skaters actually preferred staying in the amateur ranks. One of them was Ty Andersen, who spent 15 years in the EAHL for the Sea Gulls and the Olympics. Osborne Ty Andersen was a Norwegian-American from Swampscott, Massachusetts, where he learned hockey through the rough-and-tumble "shinny" games the kids played at the grade school. His raw talent earned him a place on the Boston Hockey Club (forerunner of the Olympics), and as a starting defenseman for the Sea Gulls in 1933, Andersen helped the Gulls repeat as Boardwalk Trophy champions. Andersen was cheered and respected in almost every arena. One of the most gentlemanly players in EAHL history, Andersen averaged only 11 PIMs per season, while scoring 15 points per year. And on March 9, 1941, while playing for the Olympics, he received a solid gold watch for his tenure on the ice on "Ty Andersen Day." Never mind the fact that Andersen was given the watch by the Rovers - the 'Pics were the visiting team that night. In 1949, only the Olympics and Rovers were capable of fielding teams, and Lockhart closed down the EAHL for a year. Boston and New York joined the Quebec Senior Hockey League, which had played an interlocking series with the EAHL for a few years. Unfortunately, the new teams were completely outmatched - Boston dropped out by midseason, and the Rovers finished dead last. For the first time since the Sea Gulls put it back in circulation, there was no tournament for the Boardwalk Trophy.[3]
  • By 1953, the Eastern League was almost dead. Expansion to midwestern cities in 1949 proved financially disastrous, and established teams like the New York Rovers, Boston Olympics and Atlantic City Sea Gulls were losing tons of money. By 1953, the only teams left in the league were a Springfield Indians franchise run by former Bruin Eddie Shore, a talent-stripped Washington Lions squad run by the Boston Olympics' Walter Brown, and a team of ex-Rovers in Troy, New York (with the salacious nickname of Uncle Sam's Trojans). There was also a new team in Johnstown, Pennsylvania - the Jets. Originally created by former NHL-AHL standout Wally Kilrea, and featuring free agents and cast-offs from the EAHL's earlier Western expansion, the Jets won five Walker Cups, five Boardwalk Trophies, and one Amateur Hockey Association championship between 1951 and 1973. At that time, the Jets included Don Hall, a left winger with a sharp eye for the goal, right winger Dick Roberge, who would later become the Jets' coach, and well-traveled goaltender Ivan Walmsley, who blocked the puck every night.[4]

Uncited edit

Bibliography edit

  • Miller, Chuck. From Atlantic City to Toronto: The Boardwalk Trophy and the Eastern Hockey League. Part 1: The Sea Gulls, the Rovers, the Olympics and the Cutters. Vol. 3 (2 ed.). Fort Wayne, Indiana: Hockey Ink!. pp. 1–3.
  • Miller, Chuck. From Atlantic City to Toronto: The Boardwalk Trophy and the Eastern Hockey League. Part 2: The Jets, the Comets, Southern Expansion and Well-Worn Knuckles. Vol. 3 (2 ed.). Fort Wayne, Indiana: Hockey Ink!. pp. 4–6.

References edit

  1. ^ Miller, Chuck. Part 1, page 1
  2. ^ Miller, Chuck. Part 1, page 2
  3. ^ Miller, Chuck. Part 1, page 3
  4. ^ Miller, Chuck. Part 2, page 4

Atlantic City Boardwalk Trophy edit

Checklist edit

  • introduce wikilinks to Atlantic City Boardwalk Trophy
  • expand introduction
  • copyvio/spell check
  • citations in numerical order
  • check for duplicate wikilinks
  • add categories?

Infobox and introduction edit

Atlantic City Boardwalk Trophy
 
Trophy on display at the Hockey Hall of Fame
Awarded forChampionship trophy of the Eastern Hockey League
First awarded1932
Last awarded1973

The Atlantic City Boardwalk Trophy was the championship trophy of the Eastern Hockey League playoffs.

Unsorted edit

  • The Atlantic City Boardwalk Trophy, a prize handed from champion to champion of the old Eastern League, was found in a storage shed. Brian Elwell, a former player/coach for the old Syracuse Blazers, became a successful bar and grille owner after his retirement from hockey. Elwell said, "You know, somebody dropped this trophy off at my restaurant. It's been in my storage shed for a while. Seems like I remember seeing this once or twice in my playing days." I drove to Syracuse, hoping against hope that the pilgrimage wouldn't be just a 150-mile sightseeing journey. And when Elwell brought out a missile-shaped trophy with "THE BOARDWALK CHALLENGE TROPHY," carved into its side, the engravings drowning in a sea of tarnish and dirt, I knew this was something big. Our journey begins in the fall of 1930. Lincoln Dickey, manager of the Atlantic City Auditorium, imported some Montreal-based hockey players, set them up against the toughest amateur and professional teams on the East Coast, and the Atlantic City Seagulls were born. the Gulls hosted everybody from the New York Rangers to college teams, and by 1932 they were one of the top amateur hockey squads. the resort owners and hotel managers of Atlantic City created a brass trophy decorated with eagles and winged angels, to be awarded to the 1932 AAU hockey tournament winner. In the final two-game, total-goal series, the Sea Gulls beat the Lake Placid Athletic Club, 11 goals to 5, and claimed the "Atlantic City Boardwalk Trophy" as their own. The Gulls would repeat as AAU champions in 1933, winning eight games against four teams on their way to the championship. The Gulls, along with the Hershey B'ars, Baltimore Orioles and Bronx Tigers, formed the Tri-State Hockey League in 1934. Because the TSHL was a non-AAU sanctioned circuit, the Gulls were barred from AAU tournament competition. Stung by this technicality, the Gulls placed the Boardwalk Trophy in storage and continued on with their hockey conquests. The Eastern Amateur Hockey League was formed in 1933 by Tommy Lockhart, and looking for an established league for three of the MSG amateur squads. Enter the Tri-State Hockey League. The TSHL added Lockhart's teams. The Eastern Amateur Hockey League was born, and Tom Lockhart left the meeting as the EAHL league president.[1]

trim unrelated information, here onwards

  • If you look back in the Times you'll find a story about Lockhart's 'dark house' games. The seats were standing up and cheering. But it actually happened - 21 games never occurred and the league finished its full schedule of games played in the first year." The EAHL was an instant success, and fans purchased the inexpensive tickets in droves (good seats were available at Madison Square Garden for as little as 25 cents apiece). Soon other people wanted a piece of the golden goose, including Madison Square Garden's primary hockey tenant, the New York Rangers. "All the fuss over the Sunday afternoon amateur hockey ultimately seeped down to the Rangers' office," said Tom Lockhart, "and pretty soon I got a call from manager Lester Patrick. He thought we had a good thing going and felt he could help. "I said, 'Great, what can you do?' "'Well,' he offered, 'next season I could bring you some good hockey players in from Canada." Lester Patrick kept his word, bringing some Winnipeg-based players for the start of training camp. Patrick's acquisitions included Mac and Neil Colville, Alex Shibicky, Murray Patrick, Joe Cooper, and Bert Gardiner - all of whom would become future Rangers. The Winnipeg-fortified Crescents dominated the EAHL in the 1934-35 season, and Lockhart and Patrick changed the team's name to reflect the working agreement with the New York Rangers. "We spent half a day trying to name it," said Lockhart. "We had the Rangers and the [AHL's Philadelphia] Ramblers so we "roved" between them and called it the Rovers." By 1950, more than 100 EAHL players spent time in the NHL. 58 of those were ex-Rovers. Besides being a successful promoter, Lockhart had an uncanny knack for finding old abandoned hockey trophies. He recovered the Walker Cup, a hockey chalice named after and donated by New York City mayor James J. Walker in 1926, from a pawn shop. He also found the Hamilton B. Wills Trophy, a free-standing sculpture of a hockey player, and began a USA-Canada challenge series with that as the prize. When the Sea Gulls told him they still had the Boardwalk Trophy, Lockhart convinced the Gulls and the AAU to return the trophy to competition. Between 1938 and 1945, the EAHL had a three-round season. Teams first played for the Hershey Cup, a spherical award originally given to the Tri-State Hockey League by the candy company. Then came a tournament for the Boardwalk Trophy. After all that, the teams played another series for the Walker Cup. The team with the most cumulative points was declared the league champion. Sonja Henie was part of the EAHL. in the 1930's, Lockhart signed the Olympic figure skater to a performing contract, and between hockey periods she would perform ice ballets and pirouettes for the crowd. "She was very good at anything she did," remembered Madeline Lockhart, Tom's daughter and secretary of the EAHL. "What she wanted, she got, and she didn't care what anybody else said about it. She came in one time and had an argument with my father, he said, 'I don't care what you're doing, I have a hockey team to put out there, I can't be bothered if you want to practice!'" In another publicity stunt from the 1930's, Lockhart booked an ice-skating grizzly bear as intermission entertainment for a Rovers/Hershey B'ars Sunday afternoon game. The bear actually performed on roller skates, and the Madison Square Garden staff scrambled to locate ice skates for size 40 paws. Then the bear's owner wanted skates as well, despite the fact that he couldn't skate. After the first period of the Rovers/B'ars game, the bear took the ice, with the owner guiding it by the leash. Suddenly the bear took off, zipping around the ice like a Penske-customized Zamboni, dragging its helpless owner from blueline to blueline. Lockhart thought the bear's antics would cost him his job, but the fans were so enthralled by the skating bruin that the animal was booked into other Eastern League barns. The Boston Olympics joined the Eastern League in 1940, and in 12 years they won the Boardwalk Trophy five times. Walter Brown, manager of the Boston Garden, loved amateur hockey and promoted it often. Confident of the burgeoning Beantown hockey talent, Brown created an amateur team of Bostonian skaters and turned them loose on the hockey world. By 1933, the team had won the World Hockey Championships in Prague. Brown himself coached the 1936 Olympic hockey team, and the squad that competed in Garmisch-Partenkirchen was primarily stocked with his Boston "Olympics." By 1941, as the war loomed in Europe, the 'Pics found their talent pool diminishing, and worked out an agreement with the Boston Bruins so that the NHL club would fortify the 'Pics with their rising pre-NHL talent. The deal proved fruitful, as the 'Pics became one of the dominant teams in the 1940's. With the iron goaltending of Maurice Courteau and the scoring of Al Palazzari, Russ Kopak, Pentti Lund and Tommy Brennan, Boston won the Boardwalk Trophy and the Walker Cup year after year.[2]
  • In 1941, all the able-bodied Canadian skaters went to war. By 1942, the American skaters joined them on the battlefield. Only the Rovers, Olympics and the new Philadelphia Falcons had enough men to field competitive teams. Yet Lockhart got eight teams into the schedule, and each one completed its season. He brought four teams in through an interlocking series with the Metropolitan League, a Madison Square Garden club circuit. For the eighth team, he looked toward the armed forces. By coincidence or by design, the most talented American hockey players found themselves stationed at the Curtis Bay naval yard in Baltimore. Lockhart convinced Mel Harwood, a former EAHL player and official, that the Coast Guard could use this hockey talent as a way to boost homefront morale. Harwood stepped behind the bench as coach, and the Coast Guard Cutters were born. Their roster included former New York Ranger defenseman Art Coulter, Boston Bruin goaltender Frankie "Mr. Zero" Brimsek, and future AHL star left winger Eddie Olsen, who joined the military squad despite being underage. With Olsen at left wing, Joe Kucler at center and token Canadian Bob Gilray at right wing, the "Star Spangled Bangers" won games both in the EAHL and on a two-year exhibition tour. Stan Fischler once called them the greatest All-American squad ever, better than the 1960 or 1980 Olympic teams. But as World War II escalated, the military broke up the Cutters, relocating their skating seamen throughout the hot spots of the Pacific theatre. when the Cutters faced the Rovers at Madison Square Garden, an Armed Forces marching band serenaded the visitors with such ditties as "Indian Love Call" and "The Star Spangled Banner." And when the Cutters scored a goal (which was often), the band played "Semper Paratus," the Coast Guard theme. Although many players looked at the EAHL as a pipeline to the National or American Hockey Leagues, some skaters actually preferred staying in the amateur ranks. One of them was Ty Andersen, who spent 15 years in the EAHL for the Sea Gulls and the Olympics. Osborne Ty Andersen was a Norwegian-American from Swampscott, Massachusetts, where he learned hockey through the rough-and-tumble "shinny" games the kids played at the grade school. His raw talent earned him a place on the Boston Hockey Club (forerunner of the Olympics), and as a starting defenseman for the Sea Gulls in 1933, Andersen helped the Gulls repeat as Boardwalk Trophy champions. Andersen was cheered and respected in almost every arena. One of the most gentlemanly players in EAHL history, Andersen averaged only 11 PIMs per season, while scoring 15 points per year. And on March 9, 1941, while playing for the Olympics, he received a solid gold watch for his tenure on the ice on "Ty Andersen Day." Never mind the fact that Andersen was given the watch by the Rovers - the 'Pics were the visiting team that night. In 1949, only the Olympics and Rovers were capable of fielding teams, and Lockhart closed down the EAHL for a year. Boston and New York joined the Quebec Senior Hockey League, which had played an interlocking series with the EAHL for a few years. Unfortunately, the new teams were completely outmatched - Boston dropped out by midseason, and the Rovers finished dead last. For the first time since the Sea Gulls put it back in circulation, there was no tournament for the Boardwalk Trophy.[3]
  • March 24, 1952. Lorne Anderson, goaltender for the New York Rovers, was called up by the Rangers for the last game of the season against the Chicago Black Hawks. Anderson stepped into the net like a veteran, and took a 6-2 Ranger lead into the third period. Then Hawks forward Bill Mosienko scored three goals in a row - in only 21 seconds, the fastest hat trick in NHL history. Mosienko's achievement spurred the Black Hawks to a 7-6 victory, and Anderson was sent back to the Eastern League, never to play on NHL ice again. By 1953, the Eastern League was almost dead. Expansion to midwestern cities in 1949 proved financially disastrous, and established teams like the New York Rovers, Boston Olympics and Atlantic City Sea Gulls were losing tons of money. By 1953, the only teams left in the league were a Springfield Indians franchise run by former Bruin Eddie Shore, a talent-stripped Washington Lions squad run by the Boston Olympics' Walter Brown, and a team of ex-Rovers in Troy, New York (with the salacious nickname of Uncle Sam's Trojans). There was also a new team in Johnstown, Pennsylvania - the Jets. Originally created by former NHL-AHL standout Wally Kilrea, and featuring free agents and cast-offs from the EAHL's earlier Western expansion, the Jets won five Walker Cups, five Boardwalk Trophies, and one Amateur Hockey Association championship between 1951 and 1973. At that time, the Jets included Don Hall, a left winger with a sharp eye for the goal, right winger Dick Roberge, who would later become the Jets' coach, and well-traveled goaltender Ivan Walmsley, who blocked the puck every night. By 1954, Eastern League president Tom Lockhart searched for new franchises. Despite some ridiculous proposals by some organizing groups - one unnamed party actually thought they could operate a team on an entire budget of $2,500 - Lockhart gathered five teams for the 1954-55 season: Three full-time teams - the Washington Lions, Baltimore Clippers and New Haven Blades - and two part-time teams, the Worcester Warriors and the Clinton (N.Y.) Comets. While the Warriors were a dismal collection of college graduates from Harvard and Holy Cross, and lost games by double-digit margins, the Clinton Comets were an independent squad since 1928, winning three Amateur Hockey Association championships. The Comets actually played in two leagues simultaneously during the 1954-55 season, the EHL and the Eastern Ontario Senior League. Based on winning percentage, the Comets won the regular-season title, and the Washington Lions won the Boardwalk Trophy in the playoffs. True story - The EHL's southern expansion was caused by an Act of God. The 1955-56 season was halfway completed when on January 23, the Baltimore Clippers' arena burned to the ground. Clippers owner Charles Rock rescheduled his final five home dates for Charlotte, North Carolina, and the rechristened Charlotte Clippers {renamed Checkers in 1962) quickly won the hearts of a whole new breed of hockey fans. In an area where most people perceived ice as something one puts in a drink, a record 169,000 fans followed the Clippers when they won the Boardwalk Trophy in 1957. Travel in the Eastern League was an arduous endeavor. In the 1960's, with the league expanding ever southward (to Nashville, Knoxville, Greensboro, Jacksonville and St. Petersburg), buses were used. Teams traveled all day and night, ripping out seats in the back of the bus so players could sleep on mattresses. "We used to get on a bus in Clinton around 10:00 on a Sunday night," recalled Pat Kelly, who coached the Clinton Comets to three straight Walker Cups and four straight Boardwalk Trophies in the late 1960's, "and we'd drive for a day and a half to get to Jacksonville or St. Pete's to play. We'd go right through, no stop. They just changed drivers, two men would take turns driving. I sometimes drove the bus myself, just to help them out." This was indeed the era of the iron man - a player who could ride all night and still put his all in a game, trying to score goals around a league full of enforcers, policemen - in other words, goons. The Eastern League was the enforcer's breeding ground, and players moved from it to the NHL with bruised knuckles and black eyes.[4]
  • Imagine yourself as an Eastern League center on a road trip. Your first stop is New Haven, and Blake Ball is on defense for the Blades. Ball spent six years as a defensive end in the Canadian Football League before taking up hockey professionally - and accumulating 1,200 penalty minutes from 1965 to 1969. Now you're at the Long Island Arena, where John Brophy holds court. Brophy led the EHL in penalty minutes four times between 1960 and 1965 - each time with a different team. Now for a Southern swing to Knoxville and player/coach Don LaBelle. LaBelle was so tough, they once said, that during a playoff game it took three Nashville skaters to take him out of the game - and that was when LaBelle was in street clothes and behind the bench. Heading towards Salem, Virginia - and the Rebels' secret weapon, Dave "The Hammer" Schultz. Schultz, the muscle behind Philadelphia's Stanley Cup-winning Broad Street Bullies, spent 356 PIMs - almost six hours - in the EHL sin bin one season. Back through Clinton - and there's Indian Joe Nolan, a full-blood Ojibwa from Sault Ste. Marie who never met a forward he didn't like - to break in half. The first man to surpass 300 PIMs in an EHL season (he had 352 in 1955-56), Nolan later became a respected linesman. "Every team had a policeman," said Johnstown Jets player/coach Don Hall, "but most of the time those guys went after each other. But in the playoffs, you had to watch out for them, because they were trying to win the championship, too." In 1952, the New Haven Tomahawks and the Johnstown Jets faced each other in the final round of the playoffs. During one of the games, New Haven's Joe Desson drew a flagrant penalty, and referee Mickey Slowik motioned for him to take a seat in the penalty box. Without another word, Slowik turned his back on Desson, skated over to the off-ice officials and announced the penalty. Desson slowly moved toward the box, then changed direction, heading toward Slowik. Without warning, Desson cross-checked Slowik in the back, flipping the referee into the seats. Both benches emptied, and fists and sticks were flying. A policeman stepped onto the ice and arrested Desson, who spent the night in jail for starting a riot. The next day, Lockhart suspended Desson from the Eastern Hockey League - forever. "Some years after that, I remember two guys walking into the Garden and asking for my father," remembered Madeline Lockhart. "And they were the FBI! My father came in, they showed him their badges, they said we're the FBI. And it turned out that Joe Desson had applied for American citizenship, and that was on the paper that he was barred from hockey. And they wanted to know why! My father says, 'I have nothing against him being an American citizen. I'm just not going to let him go out there and kill anybody on the ice.' And he got the citizenship, and he sent my father the nicest letter afterward." Sometimes the fans could be really tough during a game. Pat Kelly recalled some of those tough barns. "The Commack Arena [on Long Island] was a tough one to play in. The worst part was that you used to come off down one end of the building, and your dressing room was all the way down the other end, and you had to walk between the stands, where all the concessions were, and there were many nights where the players would walk back to back just to protect themselves and get through the crowds so the fans wouldn't take punches at us. I remember one night we were in New Haven, and something happened, and all of a sudden the chairs come flying on the ice, and there was 14 hockey players in the middle of the ice, trying to dodge chairs. There were some days in the Clinton Arena that they used to come sailing out at the visiting team, and some nights you'd just pick them up and throw them back." And many arenas had media facilities that were archaic. Catherine "Cash" Garvey, who covered four EHL teams for six newspapers in the 1960's, had her own gripes about the buildings. "The press facilities (at the Utica Memorial Auditorium, the Comets' second home in the 1960's) were bad. There was one phone and everybody was using it. And when you got down to the office, there would probably be a line waiting to use the phone down there. And they had no stairs in the Clinton Arena, so I had to climb a ladder to get up into the press box. And naturally, when I got up there, I had to get down the same way." A rough league, indeed. The average team roster consisted of 14 players - three front lines, four defensemen and one goaltender. Those men played every game, never sitting out with a sprained wrist or a bum knee. "The only way you missed a game in the old Eastern League," said Kelly, "was if they had to cut your leg off and it took them one day to get you a new one, so you missed the game that night."[5]
  • Even though each team had a goon or two, they also had very skilled playmakers, centers and wingers who could take the puck, weave through a defenseman or two, then fake the goaltender out of position for a wrist shot. Syracuse center Ray Adduono scored 100 points five years in a row, a remarkable feat considering that the Blazers were doormats in their first three EHL seasons. Clinton's Borden Smith scored 400 goals in his career, staying with that team throughout the 1960's and 1970's. And Jack Martin was an especially adroit stickhandler who bounced through the southern half of the league. "While playing [for Knoxville] against the Dixie Flyers," said Roland Julian of the Knoxville News-Sentinel, "[Martin] was hit by Flo Pilot in Knoxville's defensive end, flipped over Pilot's back, landed on his feet and continued down the ice controlling the puck. Later, he was pinned against the end boards, passed the puck between his skates to [teammate] Les Calder, who banged in a goal directly in front of the goalie." True story - in 1963, Tom Lockhart convinced the Soviet Union to send their Olympic hockey team to America for some exhibition games, while a U.S. team (coached by Johnstown's Don Hall) toured the Soviet Union. The Soviets came over for five games against the EHL, and left with a 4-0-1 record against the Americans. They humbled Greensboro 12-3, and put similar hurts on Johnstown, Philadelphia and Charlotte. The EHL saved face only when the Knoxville Knights tied the Soviets, 4-4, in the final game of the exhibition tour. Meanwhile, the EHL All-Stars got creamed on their Eastern Bloc tour. "We didn't win a game until we got into Czechoslovakia," remarked Don Hall. "They sent their best teams against us. They didn't lay down for nobody." At the off-season meetings in 1972, Tom Lockhart announced he was stepping down from the EHL presidency, a post he had held for 40 years. Lockhart, who had run the league through good times and bad since its inception in 1933, felt it was time to retire. Norman MacLane was chosen has his successor. But under MacLane's tenure, the league quickly crumbled. The World Hockey Association came into existence in 1972. Suddenly EHL teams had WHA teams in their backyards, and the hockey dollar just couldn't stretch far enough. The New Jersey Devils had enough problems with an NHL team in nearby Philadelphia, but when the WHA put a franchise there, it forced the EHL team to close in 1973. Other teams saw their lineups ravaged by WHA and NHL raids, as the two major leagues battled with each other for ice talent. The Clinton Comets, who won four Boardwalk Trophies and three Walker Cups between 1967 and 1970, were raided, player by player, by the WHA, leaving behind a team dead last in the standings and drowning in red ink. By 1972, the league had expanded from Rhode Island to Florida, and the southern teams felt they had more games scheduled in the North than were necessary. The Jacksonville Rockets, at one time the league's southern-most city, folded after seven years of killer bus rides against northern teams. At the end of the 1972-73 season, the EHL's Southern Division seceded, forming their own Southern Hockey League. The EHL dropped its last puck in 1973, as the Syracuse Blazers won an astounding 63 of 76 games, claiming the Boardwalk Trophy easily and boring through the playoffs. Any teams left in the EHL competed as the North American Hockey League until 1977. But the EHL wasn't done yet. In 1977, the motion picture "Slapshot" premiered. Based on the Johnstown Jets' 1975 NAHL season, "Slapshot" was a good hockey movie for those who didn't know about the EHL/NAHL, and a riot for those who picked up on all the inside jokes and references. Many former EHL ice rinks were used in the filming, and some former EHL players had cameos and bit roles in the picture - for example, that's Indian Joe Nolan at the end of the picture, actually wearing war paint on ice for the first time as "Screamin' Buffalo." Yet the EHL's influence on hockey history goes far beyond a cult classic movie. Expansion into the southern markets made possible the success of the East Coast Hockey League. Five cities that started out with EHL franchises (Long Island, Philadelphia, Washington, Tampa Bay/St. Petersburg and New Jersey) currently are in the NHL. Buffalo coach John Muckler, Vancouver GM Pat Quinn, Toronto/Hampton Roads coach John Brophy, ECHL Commissioner Pat Kelly, and Central League Commissioner Ray Miron all came through the Eastern League, as well as Hall of Famers Frankie Brimsek, Art Coulter, Neil Colville, Bob Dill, Hub Nelson, John Mariucci, referee Bill Chadwick, Boston Olympics owner Walter Brown and EHL President Thomas Lockhart. And the Boardwalk Trophy, the chalice that disappared in 1973, finally coming to light in the storage shed of a former player's bar? It finally joined the Calder Cup - the Turner Cup - even the Stanley Cup - in the Hall of Fame on July 26, 1994. Home at last.[6]

Uncited edit

  • Import from Silverware (pages 40–41) by Andrew Podnieks

https://blog.timesunion.com/chuckmiller/finding-the-atlantic-city-boardwalk-trophy/45/ Finding the Atlantic City Boardwalk Trophy - Chuck Miller

https://www.baltimoresun.com/news/bs-xpm-1994-07-24-1994205137-story.html Piece of city's past finds spot in Hockey Hall of Fame - Baltimore Sun

https://www.greensboro.com/trophy-is-found-memories-intact-boardwalk-trophy/article_1483e360-0d4b-587a-ae62-20343a69ee35.html TROPHY IS FOUND; MEMORIES INTACT BOARDWALK TROPHY

https://books.google.ca/books?id=8SqmtL7DHYoC&pg=PA52&lpg=PA52&dq=Atlantic+city+boardwalk+trophy&source=bl&ots=Za_6jM6gAr&sig=ACfU3U3kBH5Tsi6QzOhFiIl3th9F1qppmA&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwi_yMHy1vffAhXI1lkKHRR9Br04ChDoATAAegQIABAB#v=onepage&q=Atlantic%20city%20boardwalk%20trophy&f=false Hockey in Syracuse - Jim Mancuso - Google Books

https://books.google.ca/books?id=eQALBnDckHUC&pg=PA30&lpg=PA30&dq=Atlantic+city+boardwalk+trophy&source=bl&ots=uo3IDNPDvS&sig=ACfU3U2cq2Xv8k0d-Xfzz6Lx7c_1P-qUNQ&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjq9r-w1vffAhUmw1kKHbLVBUgQ6AEwEXoECAAQAQ#v=onepage&q=Atlantic%20city%20boardwalk%20trophy&f=false Hockey in Charlotte - Jim Mancuso - Google Books

Bibliography edit

  • Miller, Chuck. From Atlantic City to Toronto: The Boardwalk Trophy and the Eastern Hockey League. Part 1: The Sea Gulls, the Rovers, the Olympics and the Cutters. Vol. 3 (2 ed.). Fort Wayne, Indiana: Hockey Ink!.
  • Miller, Chuck. From Atlantic City to Toronto: The Boardwalk Trophy and the Eastern Hockey League. Part 2: The Jets, the Comets, Southern Expansion and Well-Worn Knuckles. Vol. 3 (2 ed.). Fort Wayne, Indiana: Hockey Ink!.
  • Podnieks, Andrew (2005). Silverware. Bolton, Ontario: Fenn Publishing. ISBN 1-55168-296-6.

References edit

  1. ^ Miller, Chuck. Part 1, page 1
  2. ^ Miller, Chuck. Part 1, page 2
  3. ^ Miller, Chuck. Part 1, page 3
  4. ^ Miller, Chuck. Part 2, page 4
  5. ^ Miller, Chuck. Part 2, page 5
  6. ^ Miller, Chuck. Part 2, page 6
  7. ^ {{cite web}}: Empty citation (help)
  8. ^ {{cite web}}: Empty citation (help)
  9. ^ {{cite web}}: Empty citation (help)
  10. ^ {{cite book}}: Empty citation (help)
  11. ^ {{cite book}}: Empty citation (help)

Hamilton B. Wills Trophy edit

  • A post-season series between the USAHA and CAHA was arranged, but no games were played due to various reasons.[1]
  • April 17, 1934.[3]
  • Hamilton B. Wills obituary.[4]
  • Lockhart had an uncanny knack for finding old abandoned hockey trophies. He recovered the Walker Cup, a hockey chalice named after and donated by New York City mayor James J. Walker in 1926, from a pawn shop. He also found the Hamilton B. Wills Trophy, a free-standing sculpture of a hockey player, and began a USA-Canada challenge series with that as the prize.[5]

Bibliography edit

  • Miller, Chuck. From Atlantic City to Toronto: The Boardwalk Trophy and the Eastern Hockey League. Part 1: The Sea Gulls, the Rovers, the Olympics and the Cutters. Vol. 3 (2 ed.). Fort Wayne, Indiana: Hockey Ink!. pp. 1–3.

References edit

  1. ^ Godin, Roger A. (2005). Before the Stars: Early Major League Hockey and the St. Paul Athletic Club Team. Minnesota Historical Society Press. p. 74. ISBN 0-87351-476-9.
  2. ^ "Moncton Can Have Trophy". Winnipeg Tribune. Winnipeg, Manitoba. April 14, 1934. p. 22.
  3. ^ "Search Opens Here For Wills Cup". Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. April 17, 1934. p. 15.
  4. ^ "Hamilton Wills, Native of City, Dies in Canada". The Indianapolis Star. Indianapolis, Indiana. November 15, 1934. p. 14.
  5. ^ Miller, Chuck. Part 1, page 2

Baltimore Skipjacks edit

Source 1 edit

  • expand/audit from updated source
  • Baltimore is not exactly a hockey hotbed. In 1993, the American Hockey League's Baltimore Skipjacks moved to Portland, Maine, and the city responded by seemingly shrugging its shoulders. You could drive from Ocean City to Hagerstown in winter and barely see a frozen puddle, much less a frozen pond suitable for skating. The average Baltimorean might identify a Zamboni with Italian cuisine, not a machine that resurfaces the ice between periods of a hockey game. Yet, Bob Teck and Alan Gertner, majority owners of the Bandits, Baltimore's latest entry into the AHL, have invested millions of dollars and thousands of hours into making hockey a success here. "This is definitely the right time for hockey in Baltimore," Teck said. "Hockey has become a more mainstream sport; over 30 high schools are playing hockey in this area, and, in every neighborhood, there are kids playing street hockey." There is also a lot to learn from the past. The Baltimore Bandits will market extensively and promote the sport. The Skipjacks did little in those areas to boost the team. Bob Leffler, whose ad agency handled the Skipjacks, now works for the Bandits. He said the new ownership is consumed with making hockey work. "Gertec is putting together a massive marketing campaign," Leffler said. "They are dedicated to spending $1 million to advertising. The last time we had that kind of financial support was with the Blast [of the Major Indoor Soccer League] in the mid-'80s. They were drawing 11,000 fans a game then." The Portland Pirates drew more than 7,000 fans a game and won the Calder Cup, the AHL's championship, in their first year after moving from Baltimore.[1]

Source 2 edit

sort and trim
  • The Baltimore Skipjacks were a Washington Capitals minor league affiliate from 1988-93 after stints being affiliated with the Minnesota North Stars, Boston Bruins and the Pittsburgh Penguins. As Washington Capitals fans celebrated Thursday night, you couldn’t help but wonder if the roots of the Stanley Cup victory might have been planted in Baltimore. Coach Barry Trotz, who is in the last year of a four-year contract, started his head-coaching career in the professional ranks with the Skipjacks in 1992. At 30 years old, he was the youngest coach in the American Hockey League when he led the Skipjacks for their final season in the city (1992-93). He won the 1994 Calder Cup with the team rechristened the Portland Pirates. Though Trotz was just a fleeting name by the Chesapeake Bay then, the Skipjacks, who ended their life as a Capitals affiliate, were beloved symbols of the city, the gritty underdogs who could down winning teams every once in a while. The Skipjacks followed several incarnations of the Baltimore Clippers, and joined the AHL in 1982. They were affiliated with the Pittsburgh Penguins and Boston Bruins before becoming attached to the Caps. Throughout their 10-year tenure in Baltimore, the Skipjacks pulled together only four winning seasons and often struggled to pull a crowd at the Civic Center, which they shared with the Major Indoor Soccer League’s Baltimore Blast, who did often pack the house. “Our best franchises are where we are the big fish in the pond,” AHL president Jack A. Butterfield told the Washington Post in 1983. The Skipjacks moved up the coast to Portland, Maine, in 1993 after a losing season — Trotz’s first full season — that forced owner Tom Ebright to reconcile his $2.5 million lost in the investment. They were later replaced by the Baltimore Bandits, who survived only two seasons before moving to Cincinnati. Still, in that time the Skipjacks adopted its city’s blue-collar persona that has longtime fans keeping its spirit alive today — even in its former coaches. During the 2011 preseason exhibition dubbed the “Baltimore Hockey Classic” that pit the Capitals against the Nashville Predators at Royal Farms Arena, Trotz, who had been coaching the Predators since their 1998 inception, reminisced on his time in Baltimore. “Coaching in Baltimore was great," he said. "When I started, Camden Yards had just come about. It was a neat time in Baltimore with the way the Inner Harbor grew. I'm really looking forward to getting back there … to see some good friends and the city, how it's grown."[2]

Source 3 edit

See reasons for leaving Baltimore
  • PORTLAND, MAINE -- "It was like the Beatles -- girls were just screaming." On Sunday evening, after the all-they-do-is-win Portland Pirates had won another hockey game, the players hung around to sign autographs in a planned promotion. The fans ringed the lobby of Cumberland County Civic Center, desperate for a glimpse -- and, if it were possible, a piece -- of the young men who own the hearts of this small New England city. Kevin "Killer" Kaminski, who leaves his heart, soul and a good amount of blood on the ice after every game, gets the fans going more than any other Pirate, hence the Beatles analogy from Tom Caron, the club's director of communications. The Pirates, the Washington Capitals' top farm team, play in the American Hockey League. Until two years ago, they were the Baltimore Skipjacks. All they have done since relocating is capture the Calder Cup, which goes to the AHL champion, and then begin this season undefeated in their first 17 games (14-0-3), an all-time North American professional hockey record. Nope, there's no lockout here. More like locked in. "Barry Trotz, the coach, can hardly go out anymore. {Player} Mike Boback says he can't go to restaurants because people are always asking for autographs while he's trying to eat," says Tom Ebright, the team's effervescent co-owner, who was wearing a Pirates sweater when he greeted a visitor to the locker room. The Pirates may be a minor league club, but they are big-time in Portland, a city of 65,000 (about 230,000 reside in the greater area). "Kids play ice hockey here," says the 50-year-old Ebright, who owns the club with his wife, Joyce. The community, which lost the AHL's Maine Mariners three seasons ago, has embraced the Pirates as it never did the Mariners, who left for Providence after 15 years. In the Mariners' last year, 1991-92, more than 60 players suited up as the parent Boston Bruins shuttled players back and forth. Now, even though the Capitals could do likewise, Ebright has tried to slightly alter the concept of his minor league team. The primary goal remains to be a developmental club for the Capitals, but with young prospects he has mixed veterans who have little chance of reaching (or returning to) the National Hockey League. Says Caron, a native of Maine: "It struck a chord -- players signed to play in Portland." (Brian "the Colonel" Curran -- who has played for teams in 11 cities the past 10 years, including NHL stops with Washington, Boston, Buffalo, Toronto, and the New York Islanders -- is 31 years old and nearing the end of his career. He likes Portland so much he is building a house here.) Then, to attract people other than ardent hockey fans, Ebright -- whose other business is an investment managment firm -- turned to various promotions, and there's at least one for virtually all of the 40 home games. "As a Mainer," says Caron (who doubles as the club's radio play-by-play voice), "when I heard about some of the promotions, I wondered whether the conservative people of New England would take to it. They love it as much as hockey." The Pirates do have such promotions as Toys for Tots Night and Special Olympics Night, but the ones Caron was leery of likely included Toilet Seat Racing Night, Macaroni and Cheese Night, Dog Racing Night, Human Bowling Night and Mascot Massacre Night (don't ask). And during each intermission, Godfrey Wood -- the team's president, of all people -- is on the ice sling-shotting T-shirts high into the crowd, while a between-period host-on-skates screams into a wireless microphone to further incite the frenzied throng. The team video -- "No One Left to Beat" -- and a poster -- The Bruise Brothers -- are huge sellers. A local BMW dealer heard Kaminski always wanted a BMW, so he lets "Killer" drive one any time he wants. And occasionally, Caron says, Portland's finest may turn the other cheek when a Pirate speeds by. "I haven't really been in a town that has taken to a team the way Portland has," says Trotz, a hockey lifer who was on the coaching staff during the Skipjacks' last three years in Baltimore. (Ebright and Trotz stressed that there were avid hockey fans in Baltimore, but both say "there just weren't enough of them." Ebright says he and his wife lost $2.5 million the last six years in Baltimore. He chose Portland over Syracuse, N.Y., because of its "established fan base for hockey.") Over the weekend -- when the Pirates broke the best-start record of the 1984-85 Edmonton Oilers, who opened 12-0-3 en route to their second successive Stanley Cup -- the attendance at the 6,746-seat arena was 7,255 on Saturday and 7,045 on Sunday. Aside from 24 VIP seats that cost $15 each, tickets cost $8 to $12. Children under 12 and senior citizens can get in for $5 -- and that's any seat, not just those in nose-bleed territory. And on Sunday, kids wearing their youth hockey sweaters got in for $3. The Pirates' next game, here on Thursday night, is on ESPN2. On Saturday, they were on Home Team Sports. Capitals fans who were watching have reasons to be pleased. They saw rookie goaltender Jim Carey tie the AHL record by going unbeaten in his first 15 games, a mark he broke the next night. They saw 21-year-old center Jeff Nelson, the league's fourth-leading scorer last season and its best so far this season, score the winning goal. They saw Kaminski, a center who, even though's he's 5 feet 9 and 170 pounds, relishes his encounters with bruisers maybe half a foot taller and 50 pounds heavier than he. Kaminski, in fact, had made the Capitals' roster this season, but was sent down so he could keep playing during the lockout. Center Stefan Ustorf and defensemen Ken Klee (in the same locked-out situation as Kaminski) and Sergei Gonchar also could be Capitals of the future. This club is loaded. There have been four AHL player-of-the-week awards so far this season and the Pirates have won all of them: Carey the past two and before him Nelson and Boback. Still, cautions Capitals General Manager David Poile, "there's a difference between the National League and the American League: talent level, speed of the game. Sometimes great junior hockey players can't play professionally. There is a big, big difference." Poile, however, was quick to point out that a number of Capitals -- among them goalie Olaf Kolzig and defenseman John Slaney -- have spent time in Portland. But, for now, the Pirates' players are in Portland, where they are revered. Upon winning the title last season, 20,000 people stood in the rain for a ticker tape parade down, where else, Main Street. Ebright wasn't sure what amazed him more, that a soaking-wet Kaminski signed autographs for two hours or that soaking-wet fans waited that long to get one. One thing he is sure about: That scene tells him Portland was the right choice over Syracuse. After all, he says, "these people wanted hockey back so bad."[3]

Source 4 edit

  • When Michael Caggiano owned the Baltimore Bandits minor league hockey team in the mid-1990s, he received a letter from a woman who went to a game with her husband and two children. She loved it, the letter said, but she’d never go back. That’s because her purse was stolen, her car was broken into and her 4- and 6-year-old kids were hassled by homeless people on the street. Caggiano no longer has the letter, but it’s a fitting symbol of how the sport left Baltimore after decades of successful minor league teams because various issues ranging from the arena to money. “I believe that there are lots of people who would have an interest in going to a Baltimore hockey game,” Caggiano said. “The issue was not whether or not there was fan interest. We would get fans into the building, but there were some structural issues that prevented us from hitting our stride.” As the Washington Capitals visit Charm City for Tuesday’s Baltimore Hockey Classic preseason game against the Nashville Predators, much has changed — but still it appears unlikely that minor league hockey will return anytime soon. Baltimore housed hockey dating to 1932 and the Orioles (Tri State Hockey League). Since then, the Blades (of the Eastern Hockey League and pro World Hockey Association), Clippers (EHL, Northeastern Hockey League, Southern Hockey League), Skipjacks (Atlantic Coast Hockey League, American Hockey League) and Bandits (AHL) came and went. “Baltimore has a rich tradition of hockey — we had the Skipjacks and the Bandits,” Baltimore city council president Bernard C. “Jack” Young said. Baltimore’s 1st Mariner Arena, which is the site of Tuesday night’s game, opened in 1962 with a hockey game. The Skipjacks were the longest-tenured AHL team in the city, playing there from 1982 to 1993 before leaving for Portland, Maine. For the next 12 years, the Portland Pirates were the Caps’ top minor league affiliate. In 1995, the Bandits — an affiliate of the Mighty Ducks of Anaheim — were founded to fill the void. Buzz was pretty good, and Caggiano (who bought the team in 1996) was optimistic that the team could draw fans, even if they were going to watch unfamiliar players such as Bobby Marshall, Pavel Trnka and Sean Pronger, the lesser-known brother of Philadelphia Flyers defenseman Chris. But the “structural issues” that Caggiano referenced were hard to change. Above all else, 1st Mariner Arena also was the home of the Baltimore Spirit (now the Blast) indoor soccer team and could not make many Saturday nights from October to May available for the Bandits. Caggiano pointed out that one Saturday night is probably worth four weeknights when it comes to drawing fans and making money. “It’s like waterfront property — everybody wants Fridays and Saturdays,” 1st Mariner Arena general manager Frank Remesch said. Trying to target families and hockey aficionados — many of whom resided in the Baltimore suburbs — Caggiano and the Bandits struggled with the placement of the arena, which was “less than desirable,” Remesch conceded, back in the mid-1990s before a substantial expansion of the Inner Harbor area. With no local TV or radio deal, the Bandits relied on corporate sponsorship and ticket sales and fell deep in debt. Caggiano, who now serves as chief operating officer at an accounting firm in the District, said all he wanted to do was break even. “I ran out of money,” he said. “After putting so much money into it and not seeing the good end to it, I just realized it was a zero sum game at this point.” The “political winds” just didn’t blow in the right direction for the Bandits, Caggiano said, as attempts to build a suburban arena were dismissed. Young blamed Caggiano and other owners, saying “it’s their fault” minor league hockey never succeeded in Baltimore. “You should ask the owner of the minor league teams now because 95 percent of the seats [sold for the Baltimore Hockey Classic],” Young said. “There must be some fan base in Baltimore.” And while Verizon Center revitalized the District’s Chinatown neighborhood because of a strong Caps brand and the NHL, Caggiano believed 1st Mariner Arena wouldn’t be the place to grow minor league hockey. “I think that’s why it hasn’t worked in the past — you were trying to put a minor league product with a suburban following in an urban setting,” he said. “It’s like trying to take a hummer and drive an IndyCar race.” Caggiano, who acquired significant debt when buying the team, eventually gave up the dream of making it work, and the Bandits became the Cincinnati Mighty Ducks. According to reports, he and the team lost $2 million in two seasons. No one has attempted a serious foray into a full-time hockey team in Baltimore since. And it might take a long shot for that to happen anytime soon. Aging 1st Mariner Arena, which has a capacity of 11,111, has drawn rave reviews for concerts — Billboard last year named it the top arena of its size (10,001-15,000) in the U.S. — but a hockey team wouldn’t fit into the schedule, for the same reason the Bandits went west. “It would probably be highly unlikely,” Remesch said. “We were voted No. 1 because of the amount of money we made — concerts and other events. A minor league hockey team with 40 dates, I don’t have weekends to give them. Without weekends, a minor league team won’t make it.” The past seven years have been the most financially successful in 1st Mariner Arena’s history, Remesch noted, because of such acts as Bruce Springsteen, Cirque du Soleil and Hannah Montana. Those sellouts are evidence that the area around the arena has improved, officials insisted, but Remesch admitted that if a hockey team made the arena home, he would love to add a scoreboard, update the locker rooms and fix up some “bells and whistles” around the place. Caggiano’s experiment with the Bandits didn’t work out, but the former owner of minor league baseball’s Potomac Cannons (now the Potomac Nationals) doesn’t think Baltimore is a minor league hockey wasteland. It might take a new facility or renovations, but there’s some hope it could work — even in a city with two major professional teams in the Orioles and Ravens. “I believe Baltimore today is a different city,” Caggiano said. “With the right amount of money to create a fan base, I believe Baltimore could support a minor league hockey team.” Philadelphia showed that minor league hockey could thrive in a major league town, thanks to a local connection, family atmosphere and cheap tickets to watch the Flyers of the future. Given that this game is a chance to expand and capitalize on large group of fans in Baltimore, Caggiano, Remesch and Young agreed that a team with a Caps connection could succeed. One intriguing scenario would be if Caps owner Ted Leonsis wanted to bring a team to Baltimore — if only because he can pour tens of millions of dollars into a new arena or renovations and help build the kind of tradition started by the Clippers, Skipjacks and Bandits. But the Caps’ strong affiliation with the Hershey Bears was the reason Leonsis gave when saying he’s not considering trying to restart minor league hockey in Baltimore. “We are ecstatic about our relationship with Hershey. I really can’t imagine a better affiliation between a parent club and an affiliate,” he said in an email to The Washington Times. “So from that perspective, I don’t see us altering our relationship. And I haven’t entertained the idea of purchasing a franchise in another league, such as the ECHL.” In a hypothetical sense, Remesch said “I would listen — in a New York minute I would listen to anything that man has to say, because he’s been successful.” Issues regarding the Blast and concerts and Saturday nights wouldn’t be hindrances if a team could get 6,000 to 7,000 fans a game for 40 dates a year. “I would do that in a heartbeat,” Remesch said. There are no immediate plans to attempt minor league hockey again in Baltimore, and Young said that would be an issue for the mayor’s office. But one man around the Caps with a connection to hockey in Baltimore doesn’t have a theory for why a team hasn’t been able to stick there. “I think it’s a great city, I really do,” said Caps coach Bruce Boudreau, who played for the Skipjacks in 1985. “I think hockey should be in the city.” For now, that’s a one-night deal, and the hope for longer than that is more of a dream than a reality.[4]

Source 5 edit

  • The Baltimore Skipjacks, holders of the record for the longest winning streak in professional hockey, have attained another mark:consecutive losses. The American Hockey League franchise Sunday lost its 18th straight game, falling to the Adirondack Red Wings 6-2 at the Baltimore Arena. The Skipjacks have yet to win this season. 'I guess the only thing I've done right all season was to appoint myself both manager and coach,' Gene Ubriaco said. 'Otherwise, the manager might have shipped out the coach along with this week's released players.' The defeat broke the record for consecutive losses by a professional hockey team, previously held by the NHL's Washington Capitals, who lost 17 straight in the 1974-75 season. Last week, the Skipjacks broke the AHL losing record of 15 in a row. 'I'll guarantee we'll win one of our next 72 games,' right wing Doug Shedden said. The string of losses comes just three seasons after the Skipjacks set pro hockey's record for consecutive victories with 16 straight in February and March of the 1984-85 season. The Pittsburgh Penguins did not continue their exclusive affiliation with the Skipjacks this season, forcing the AHL team to rely on players from several NHL franchises. 'We have some people who try to do too much and others who just seem to disappear,' Ubriaco said. 'We've gone as far as we can with some of these people, and some guys are going to lose their jobs here.' The Skipjacks' next game is Wednesday against the Springfield Indians at the Baltimore Arena. 'We can't do anymore,' Ubriaco said. 'We constantly are dealing for player help. I'm convinced we are improving, even if the results are the same.'[5]

Source 6 edit

  • There are no smoking, glittering spacecraft or mammoth rubber pucks descending on the Civic Center ice when the Baltimore Skipjacks hockey team is in town, unlike the high-tech ceremony that has welcomed sellout crowds to Baltimore Blast indoor soccer games.

Skipjacks hockey is a working-class sport in a working-class town, the team's fans note with almost belligerent pride. Where tweed brushes with Shetland wool at Blast games, polyester clings to sweaty, sleeveless undershirts when the Skipjacks take the ice.

"Indoor soccer is a man-made, synthetic sport," says Jeff Amdur, 32, a high school foreign languages instructor. After each Skipjack goal, Amdur charges to the rink, a red revolving light perched on top of his firefighters' hat while the scoreboard flashes "JEFF-JEFF-JEFF."

"There's no way indoor soccer is half the game this is," he says, panting after performing his ritual. "This is grass-roots hockey."

But while Blast fans often fill the 11,400-seat arena, the first-year American Hockey League franchise averaged 2,660 fans a game--second lowest in the 13-team AHL--through its first 17 home games (11-4-2).

The sparse crowds here leave fans to ponder the strange attraction of a soccer game they liken to indoor pinball and display little tolerance for other attractions. "I go to see the Capitals and it's like a morgue. I could never afford to be a Capitals fan, anyway. Season tickets here cost what it takes to park at the Capital Centre," Amdur says, scanning the near-empty arena. "I wish I knew the answer."

The Skipjacks (22-22-5, fourth place in the AHL Southern Division through games of Saturday) are a resurrection of the Baltimore Clippers, who succeeded and failed here under different names for most of 40 years. In 1976, after 14 semisuccessful years in the AHL, the Clippers succumbed to sagging attendance and lack of affiliate support.

Following a string of lowly minor league teams, Baltimore was without professional hockey between 1977 and 1979, 10 years after the Clippers could pack the Civic Center for contests with the arch-rival Hershey Bears or for the AHL playoffs, which they often reached, but never won.

In 1979, 22 Baltimore businessmen and professionals raised $100,000 and formed the Baltimore Hockey Advocates, determined to fight the odds against a minor league sport. Despite their efforts, the Clippers crumbled into a heap of debt and disappointment after one season.

Kicking in at least another $100,000, the Advocates then helped establish the Atlantic Coast Hockey League, which was set up "primarily to pay the financial obligations" of the previous league, says Advocates President John M. Haas. The team's name was changed to Skipjacks, because the owner of the Clippers trademark wanted $10,000 before selling his rights.

Little difference, though; after 1 1/2 seasons, two ACHL teams had folded and in January 1982, another quit, forcing the league to cancel 15 games and disband after a hastily called playoff series.

The Advocates had been lobbying energetically for an AHL team, but encouraging words from NHL executives proved hollow when affiliation was at hand. The Pittsburgh Penguins, whose last-place Erie, Pa., franchise stumbled through last season, finally took the gamble last summer, giving the Advocates a three-year commitment to support an AHL franchise in Baltimore and returning top-caliber minor league play to the city.

"There's going to be hockey in Baltimore for a long time to come," says Baz Bastien, general manager of the Penguins, which pays the salaries of 15 Skipjacks players. The Boston Bruins own four contracts, while the Advocates have signed two players on their own, according to Haas.

"They're only two (now, 14) points out of first place and people like to see a winner. We have a good product on the ice," Bastien said a couple of weeks ago. He echoed team officials in predicting that attendance will pick up.

Aside from having an AHL-leading number of player callups to the NHL this season, the Skipjacks were dealt the least advantageous 80-game schedule in the AHL, Haas said.

"It's a terrible situation," he said, noting the team has three Saturday night home games, while AHL granddaddy and Capitals affiliate Hershey has 23. "It's disappointing, to say the least."

Scheduling problems are just a symptom of a larger problem facing the Skipjacks, said AHL President Jack A. Butterfield. "It is extremely difficult for a minor league sport to succeed in a major league city. Our best franchises are where we are the big fish in the pond," Butterfield said.

Whoever the scapegoats, there is no disagreement that the quality of hockey on the Civic Center ice is the best it has been since the early 1970s.

"These guys are a phone call away from the National Hockey League," says Haas. "The kids are hungry; they want to advance."

Many of players are far from hungry. Salaries range from $17,000 in Advocates contracts to more than $100,000 a year for one player whose NHL contract does not call for a cut in pay when he's in the minors, Haas says.

While life in the AHL isn't as classy as in the NHL, players say they are satisfied--though they also want to see bigger turnouts.

"After two weeks in Boston, I got used to playing in front of 15,000," said forward Dave Barr, 22. "I like the big crowds."

The many callups from the Penguins and Bruins this year have hurt the team, says Coach Lou Angotti, a former Chicago Black Hawk. "It's a team sport. If you have one or two players on the front line and you lose them, it takes away from the team overall."[6]

Source 7 edit

  • BALTIMORE CLIPPERS (1979-1981)

Eastern Hockey League (1979-1981)

Tombstone Born: September 12, 1979 – EHL expansion franchise Re-Branded: September 1981 (Baltimore Skipjacks)

First Game: October 24, 1979 (L 4-1 @ Erie Blades) Last Game: April 11, 1981 (L 5-1 @ Erie Blades)

Mitchell Cup Championships: None

Arena Baltimore Civic Center (11,000) Opened: 1962

Branding Team Colors: Green, White & Yellow

Ownership Owners: Baltimore Hockey Advocates (James Watson, et. al) & Minnesota North Stars

Background Baltimore Clippers ProgramThe Baltimore Clippers name was a proud one in minor league hockey, used by several clubs operating in various different leagues from 1944 until 1977. The longest tenured and most successful of these teams were the Clippers of the American Hockey League (1962-1975). But the Clips fell on hard times in the mid-1970’s, shifting leagues and folding several times amidst the market upheaval caused by the NHL-WHA competition and the overall hard times for the minor league hockey business in the 1970’s.

This 1979 incarnation – dubbed “The New Baltimore Clippers” on the program above right – was the final attempt to restore the Clippers name. The Eastern Hockey League franchise was owned jointly by the Minnesota North Stars of the NHL and a group of 19 local investors and hockey boosters known as Baltimore Hockey Advocates. The club served as a farm club for the North Stars and took their green, white & yellow color scheme from the parent club.

On The Ice The 1979-80 Clippers team advanced to the Eastern Hockey League championship series, where they fell to the defending champion Erie Blades four games to one in the Mitchell Cup finals.

The Clippers’ top scorer during the 1979-80 season was Warren Young (53 goals, 53 assists). Young later went on to have a 40-goal season with the Pittsburgh Penguins in the NHL in 1984-85. Clippers Head Coach and General Manager Gene Ubriaco went on to coach the Penguins in the late 1980’s.

During the 1980-81 season, the Erie Blades once again cut down the Clippers in the playoffs, this time knocking out Baltimore in the semi-final round.

Clips to Skips The Eastern Hockey League folded in July 1981. Baltimore Hockey Advocates decided to keep the club going in the new Atlantic Coast Hockey League, but dropped the historic Clippers name in favor of a new identity: the Baltimore Skipjacks.[7]

Source 8 edit

  • BALTIMORE SKIPJACKS

Atlantic Coast Hockey League (1981-1982) American Hockey League (1982-1993)

Tombstone Born: September 1981 – The Baltimore Clippers re-brand as the Skipjacks Move Announced: March 26, 1993 (Portland Pirates)

First Game: October 24, 1981 (W 6-4 @ Salem Raiders) Final Game: April 30th, 1993 (L 5-3 @ Binghamton Rangers)

Calder Cup Championships: None

Arena Baltimore Civic Center (11,025)1 Opened: 1962

Branding Team Colors:

1982-83: Black, Gold & White2 1992-93: Red, White & Blue3 Ownership & Affiliation Owners:

1981-1987: Baltimore Hockey Advocates (John Haas, Robert Pinkner, Barton Mitchell, et al.) 1987-1993: Tom Ebright and Baltimore Hockey Advocates NHL Affiliates:

1982-1983: Boston Bruins 1982-1987: Pittsburgh Penguins 1988-1993: Washington Capitals


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Background The Baltimore Skipjacks were a minor league hockey club that served as a farm team to the Boston Bruins (1982-1983), Pittsburgh Penguins (1982-1987) and Washington Capitals (1988-1993). Prior to the Skipjacks, Baltimore had a long and checkered history with pro hockey. Going back to the World War II era, all of Baltimore’s previous minor league clubs were named the “Clippers”.

Coach Gene Ubriaco on the cover of a 1984 Baltimore Skipjacks program

Penguins Era The Skipjacks’ finest seasons came during the mid-1980’s when they served as a Penguins’ farm club and were coached by Gene Ubriaco. In 1983-84, the Skipjacks had the best regular season record in the American Hockey League (46-24-10). The 1983-84 squad kept their core talent together for much of the season, thanks in part to Pittsburgh’s conscious effort to tank the NHL season and win the right to select Mario Lemieux in the 1984 NHL draft. At one point, the 1983-84 Skipjacks set an AHL record by winning 16 games in a row, but they were bounced in the Calder Cup semis by the Rochester Americans.

The following season, Ubriaco’s charges went further, advancing to the 1985 Calder Cup finals. The Skipjacks’ captain that season was Steve Carlson, a minor league warhorse who played one of the Hanson Brothers in Slap Shot. The 1984-85 team also included notorious tough guys Marty McSorley and Bennett Wolf. Rookie goaltender Jon Casey, on loan from the Minnesota North Stars, was outstanding with a 30-11-4 mark and a 2.63 GAA. But in the Calder Cup finals, Baltimore ran into the Sherbooke Canadiens and a young Montreal goaltending prospect named Patrick Roy. Sherbrooke beat the Skipjacks 4 games to 2 behind Roy’s heroics in net.

1985 Baltimore Skipjacks Program

Financial Troubles & Move To Portland During their 12-year run in Baltimore the Skipjacks played second fiddle to the Baltimore Blast indoor soccer team, the ‘Jacks winter co-tenant at the Civic Center. The Blast, whose original 1980-1992 run coincided closely with the Skipjacks’ lifespan, consistently outdrew the hockey team on a magnitude of about 3:1.

That meant that the Skipjacks consistently lost six figures a year. After the 1986-87 season the Pittsburgh Penguins, who funded most of the club’s expenses, ran out of patience. They shifted their top farm club relationship to Muskegon of the IHL. A businessman named Tom Ebright saved the team. He bought the club for $250,000 and operated the ‘Jacks as an independent club (without NHL affiliation) for the 1987-88 season.

Starting in 1988, the Skipjacks became the top farm club for the nearby Washington Capitals of the NHL. With the switch, the Skipjacks dropped their black & yellow palate of the Penguins era in favor of a red, white & blue color scheme. The Capitals era wasn’t particularly fruitful for Baltimore hockey fans. However, the ‘Jacks did help to produce two future NHL goaltending stars for Washington in Byron Dafoe and Olaf Kolzig.

Owner Tom Ebright lost an estimated $2.5 million on the Skipjacks over six years from 1987 to 1993. In March of 1993 he threw in the towel and signed a deal to move the Skipjacks to Portland, Maine. The Skipjacks became the Portland Pirates for the 1993-94 AHL season.[8]

Source 9 edit

  • The Baltimore Skipjacks were a minor league hockey club that served as a farm team to the Boston Bruins (1982-1983), Pittsburgh Penguins (1982-1987) and Washington Capitals (1988-1993). Prior to the Skipjacks, Baltimore had a long and checkered history with pro hockey. Going back to the World War II era, all of Baltimore’s various minor league clubs were named the “Clippers”.

The Skipjacks’ finest seasons came during the mid-1980’s when they served as a Penguins’ farm club and were coached by Gene Ubriaco. In 1983-84, the Skipjacks had the best regular season record in the American Hockey League (46-24-10). The 1983-84 squad kept their core talent together for much of the season, thanks in part to Pittsburgh’s conscious effort to tank the NHL season and win the right to select Mario Lemieux in the 1984 NHL draft. At one point, the 1983-84 Skipjacks set an AHL record by winning 16 games in a row, but they were bounced in the Calder Cup semis by the Rochester Americans.

The following season, Ubriaco’s charges went further, advancing to the 1985 Calder Cup finals. The Skipjacks’ captain that season was Steve Carlson, a minor league warhorse who played one of the Hanson Brothers in Slap Shot. The 1984-85 team also included notorious tough guys Marty McSorley and Bennett Wolf. Rookie goaltender Jon Casey, on loan from the Minnesota North Stars, was outstanding with a 30-11-4 mark and a 2.63 GAA. But in the Calder Cup finals, Baltimore ran into the Sherbooke Canadiens and a young Montreal goaltending prospect named Patrick Roy. Sherbrooke beat the Skipjacks 4 games to 2 behind Roy’s heroics in net.

During their 12-year run in Baltimore the Skipjacks played second fiddle to the Baltimore Blast indoor soccer team, the ‘Jacks winter co-tenant at the Civic Center. The Blast, whose original 1980-1992 run coincided closely with the Skipjacks’ lifespan, consistently outdrew the hockey team on a magnitude of about 3:1.

That meant that the Skipjacks consistently lost six figures a year. After the 1986-87 season the Pittsburgh Penguins, who funded most of the club’s expenses, lost patience and shifted their top farm club relationship to Muskegon of the IHL. Businessman Tom Ebright saved the team, buying the club for $250,000 and operating as an independent (without NHL affiliation) for the 1987-88 season.

Starting in 1988, the Skipjacks became the top farm club for the nearby Washington Capitals of the NHL. With the switch, the Skipjacks dropped their black & yellow palate of the Penguins era in favor of a red, white & blue color scheme. The Capitals era wasn’t particularly fruitful for Baltimore hockey fans, but the ‘Jacks did help to produce two future NHL goaltending stars for Washington in Byron Dafoe and Olaf Kolzig.

Owner Tom Ebright lost an estimated $2.5 million on the Skipjacks over six years from 1987 to 1993. In March of 1993 he threw in the towel and signed a deal to move the Skipjacks to Portland, Maine. The Skipjacks became the Portland Pirates for the 1993-94 AHL season and continue to play under that identity today.

1981-82: The Skipjacks began their existence in the ill-fated Atlantic Coast Hockey League (ACHL). With a history that featured teams folding after as few as six games and a franchise buyout by future pro wrestling icon Vince McMahon, the ACHL finished the season with only four team. Baltimore had a largely forgettable third place finish with a 22-23-3 mark. Goalie Jim Stewart earned 1st team all-star honors but his future NHL career was fitting for an ACHL alumni. He played in just one game for the Boston Bruins in 1979 and gave up 3 goals in the first 4 minutes and 5 goals in the 1st period and never played again.

​

1982-83: Long time NHL veteran Lou Angotti was named head coach of the Skipjacks, Baltimore’s new AHL entry that was actually a merge with the Erie Blades. Future Hall of Famer and franchise all-time scoring leader Mitch Lamoureaux (57 goals, 50 assists, 107 points) was named rookie of the year and Greg Tebbett (56 assists) was named defenseman of the year. Left wing Mike Gilles set single-season franchise records with 81 assists and 113 points while Lamoureaux’s 57 goals also set a single-season franchise record. The Skipjacks finished the season with a 35-36-9 record and missed the playoffs in their one and only season as a Boston Bruins affiliate.

​

1983-84: The Skipjacks became a Pittsburgh Penguins affiliate in their second AHL season and benefitted greatly from a roster stocked with top prospects that where being kept in the minors so the Penguins could secure the top draft pick and take future superstar Mario Lemiuex. Gene Ubriaco took over as head coach and earned AHL Coach of the Year honors as Baltimore captured their only Southern Division championship with a 46-24-10 mark and a team record 384 goals scored. But Baltimore’s success was more the result of much improved goaltending as Roberto Romano, Vincent Tremblay and Jim Ralph each had a goals against average of under 4.00. Romano had a 23-6-1 record between the pipes and lowered his GAA from 4.05 to 3.62. In the opening round of the playoffs, the Skipjacks swept the Springfield Indians four straight before getting eliminated four games to two by the Rochester Americans in the semifinals.

​

1984-85: In a league known for offense, Skipjacks goalie Jon Casey turned in a franchise record performance with four shutouts and a 2.63 GAA and was named the AHL Goalie of the Year. Right winger Tom Roulston led Baltimore in scoring with 31 goals and 70 points. A sixteen game win streak enabled the Skipjacks to finish second in the Southern Division with a 45-27-8 record. Baltimore was red-hot in the playoffs as they downed Rochester four games to one in the opening round and swept regular season champion Binghamton to reach the Calder Cup finals. Playoff MVP Brian Skrudland and a future NHL Hall of Fame goalie named Patrick Roy led the Sherbrooke Canadiens to a six game series with over the Skipjacks to take the AHL title.

​

1985-86: Instead of carrying momentum from the previous season’s playoff run, the wheels fell off for the Skipjacks as they finished dead last in the Southern Division with a 28-44-8 record and a league low 64 points. Tom Roulston again led Baltimore in scoring (38g, 49a, 87pts) and the tandem of Denis Herron (3.42 GAA) and Brian Ford (3.66 GAA) replaced Jon Casey but couldn’t duplicate his remarkable success between the pipes.

​

1986-87: Center Alain Lemieux (41g, 56a, 97pts) finished second in the AHL in scoring but no other Skipjacks came close to his level of production. Baltimore improved to a 35-37-8 record, however Gene Ubriaco’s squad again missed the playoff with a 5th place finish in the Southern Division. After the season, the Pittsburgh Penguins announced that they were ending their affiliation with the Skipjacks.

1987-88: With no NHL affiliation, the Skipjacks were far and away the worst team in the AHL. Sixteen consecutive losses to start the season prompted coach Gene Ubriaco to say, “It’s like being dead without being buried.” A 13-58-9 finish resulted in the most forgettable season in the long history of hockey in Charm City. The primary culprit in the horrendous season was goaltending as six different goalies combined to post a dreadful 5.79 GAA.



1988-89: A new and much welcomed era of Skipjacks hockey began as the Washington Capitals took over as the team’s NHL affiliate. Gene Ubriaco was replaced by Terry Murray as head coach and several notable future Capitals like center Michal Pivonka, right wing John Druce and goaltenders Jim Hrivnak and Don Beaupre. Baltimore improved to 30-46-4 with Mike Richard finishing fourth in the AHL in scoring (44g, 63a, 107 pts) but the Skipjacks missed the playoffs for the fourth consecutive year.

​

1989-90: Looking to emerge from their four year doldrums, the Skipjacks jumped out to a 26-17-2 mark before Terry Murray was promoted to coach the Washington Capitals. Led by outstanding goaltending from Jim Hrivnak (3.06 GAA, 4 SO), Baltimore finished third in the South Division and took the opening round four games to two over Adirondack before being eliminated by division champion Rochester. Mike Richard was not among the league leaders but still was the Skipjacks top scorer with 41 goals and 42 assists.

​

1990-91: Some of the all-time franchise greats dotted the Skipjacks roster, such as center Alfie Turcotte, left wing Steve Maltais, center Tim Taylor and right wing Reggie Savage as Baltimore again finished third in the Southern Division with a 39-34-7 mark. Maltais (36), Turcotte (33) and Savage (32) each cracked the 30 goal mark with Turcotte leading the team in scoring (52a, 85pts). Jim Hrivnak (3.24 GAA) shared net minding duties with future Capitals star Olaf Kolzig (3.16 GAA). Baltimore didn’t fare better in the playoffs as they were eliminated by Binghamton four games to two.

​

1991-92: The AHL expanded to 15 teams and went to a three division format. Under second-year head coach Rob Laird, the Skipjacks were paired in the newly formed Southern Division along with league powerhouses Binghamton, Rochester and Hershey. The new division proved problematic for Baltimore as they finished last in the division with a 28-42-10 mark. Right wingers John Purves (43) and Reggie Savage (42) each topped the 40 goal mark and center Simon Wheeldon led the Skipjacks in scoring (38g, 53a, 91pts). But their defense was not enough to stop the other top teams in the league.

​

1992-93: Current Capital head coach Barry Trotz was behind the bench for what would be the Skipjacks finals season. With Olaf Kolzig and Jim Hrivnak moving up to the Capitals, the goaltending was substandard as starter Byron Dafoe finished with a 4.38 GAA. Despite a sub .500 record, Baltimore made the playoffs and pushed Binghamton (who set an AHL record with 124 points along with 57 wins) to a deciding game seven in the opening round. But the Rangers won the deciding game seven 5-3 in what would be the final game in Skipjacks history. Citing declining attendance and lack of community support, owner Tom Ebright decided to move the franchise to Portland, Maine for the 1993-94 season; closing the book on one of Baltimore’s most memorable franchises.


BALTIMORE SKIPJACKS RECORDS Single season Goals: 57 (Mitch Lamoureux, 1982–83)

Assists: 81 (Mike Gillis, 1982–83)

Points: 113 (Mike Gillis, 1982–83)

Shut Outs: 4 (Jon Casey, 1984–85)

Penalty minutes: 353 (Mitch Wilson, 1986–87)

GAA: 2.63 (Jon Casey, 1984–85)

SV%: .942 (Don Beaupre, 1990–91)

​

Career Career goals: Mitch Lamoureux, 119

Career assists: Mitch Lamoureux, 133

Career points: Mitch Lamoureux, 252

Career penalty minutes: Gary Rissling, 868

Career goaltending wins: Jim Hrivnak, 55

Career shutouts: Jon Casey, 4

Career games: Tim Taylor, 259[9]

References edit

  1. ^ La Canfora, Jason (August 5, 1995). "Bandits try to ice a success story". The Baltimore Sun. Baltimore, Maryland. Retrieved February 9, 2023.
  2. ^ Fominykh, Katherine (June 9, 2018). "For Baltimore hockey fans, the Skipjacks came first". Baltimore Sun. Baltimore, Maryland. Retrieved February 12, 2023.
  3. ^ Hochberg, Len (November 9, 1994). "Portland's Unbeatable Passion". The Washington Post. Retrieved September 10, 2019.
  4. ^ Whyno, Stephen (September 19, 2011). "Hockey was on thin ice in Baltimore". Washington Times. Retrieved September 10, 2019.
  5. ^ "The Baltimore Skipjacks, holders of the record for the..." UPI Archives. November 16, 1987. Retrieved September 10, 2019.
  6. ^ Pipitone, Tony (January 31, 1983). "Skipjacks Find AHL Ice Hard to Blast Off". The Washington Post. Washington, D.C. Archived from the original on April 28, 2018. Retrieved March 14, 2023.
  7. ^ "Baltimore Clippers EHL Archives". Fun While It Lasted. Archived from the original on March 11, 2018. Retrieved March 14, 2023.
  8. ^ "Baltimore Skipjacks, American Hockey League". Fun While It Lasted. Archived from the original on March 11, 2018. Retrieved March 14, 2023.
  9. ^ "Baltimore Skipjacks History". Baltimore Sports Nest. Archived from the original on March 11, 2018. Retrieved March 14, 2023.
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