Happy 40th Birthday to the Canada/Soviet 1972 Summit Series

Do yourself a favor and read Norm MacDonald's Twitter feed. Really. (@normmacdonald) He's stopped the golf tweets to recollect the series, and how it felt on his 8yo self as a little boy in Montreal. It's riveting. Really.

 

TSN Alert @ 7:30 Sept 26

They're showing game 8, technical glitches and all.

 

Finally got around to watching TSN's special on Game 8.

This had little resemblance to the game of hockey as we know it today. Little speed, pace or creativity, especially from the Canadians. There was little of the obstruction and physical play that we see today. Nobody shot the puck hard but the goalies seemed to struggle with everything, kicking rebounds all over the place while the defencemen stood around and watched.

Couple of other thoughts:

- The one Russian who looked like he would be a monster - to steal the loathsome Pierre McGuire's phrase - in today's NHL was Yakushev. He looked and played like a 21st-century NHLer 40 years ago.

- No idea what you would get in today's NHL for swinging your stick at an official the way J.P. Parise did.

- The whole incident rescuing a furious Eagleson from the clutches of the big, nasty Commies is still unreal to watch.

- Considering the time and place I thought the production values from the original telecast were pretty good, technical glitches aside of course.

 

I remember watching Oldtimer Original Six hockey in the 1980s. I think it was on Global TV.
I don't think it was a formal league or anything like that. Just got the Original Six alumni together for television and filmed games at a mostly empty arena in a Toronto suburb.
The thing I remember as a young hockey player, is that even though the players were in their 50s and 60s, every pass was crisp and they were always in the right spot. As a young hockey player watching those games it taught me the mental part of hockey is important.

 

Good points. For me, the goaltending stands out like a sore thumb. Dryden in particular couldn't handle the Soviet's East-West game.

It's astonishing how much the position has changed in the last 40, hell, 20 years.