Sport: Hockey

Tom Watt, former coach of the University of Toronto Varsity Blues hockey team, shared a memorable story from the late 1960s involving one of his players, Paul Laurent. During a time when Varsity Arena was unavailable, Watt managed to secure ice time at Maple Leaf Gardens for early morning practices. One day, while practicing in a dressing room at the Gardens, Laurent noticed a pile of banners on the floor that were being used as paint drops. Among them was a banner commemorating the 1936 Memorial Cup champions, the West Toronto Nationals, a team that Laurent’s father, Bobby Laurent, played for. Paul took the banner home, much to his father’s delight, as it had been hanging from the rafters of the Gardens.

Paul Laurent’s own hockey career began in the Faustina House League in 1954, leading him to join the Toronto Marlboros system in 1958. He later signed with the Toronto Maple Leafs’ junior team and played for the Lakeshore Goodyears Jr. B team, where he was named Rookie of the Year. Laurent then joined the Jr. A Marlboros and won the Memorial Cup in his first year, followed by leading the club in scoring in his second year.

After his junior career, Laurent joined the University of Toronto Varsity Blues hockey team under Tom Watt’s coaching. Laurent helped lead the team to five consecutive Ontario league titles and four CIAU national championships. He received numerous accolades during his time at UofT, including being named a league All-Star in each of his five seasons and receiving the Dafoe Trophy as team MVP.

One of Laurent’s highlights at UofT was scoring the winning goal in the 1970 CIAU Gold Medal match in the last minute of regulation time. After graduating, Laurent went on to have a successful career in law and continued to play hockey with the Lakeshore and Etobicoke Oldtimers clubs until he was 69 years old. Despite turning down an opportunity to play for the Toronto Maple Leafs due to exams, Laurent has enjoyed a fulfilling career in both hockey and law.

Clarke Pulford was born in Newton Robinson and grew up in Weston, a talented and skilled all-round athlete from a family of athletes. He played football and hockey for Weston Collegiate, junior lacrosse for his local league and Junior B hockey for Woodbridge, winning the Ontario Hockey Association Junior B Championship in 1954.

At the University of Western Ontario, where he studied Physical and Health Education, he played football and hockey for the varsity teams.

On graduation, he was drafted – ninth overall – by the Saskatchewan Roughriders, but he had always wanted to teach high school, and went to the Ontario College of Education instead. He started at Northern Secondary School the next year and remained there until his retirement, teaching physical education and math, and coaching senior football, junior and senior hockey, swimming, and track and field.

During his thirty-five year career he coached eleven TSSAA Senior football championship teams. One of those teams went on to win the Metro Bowl, and one of his hockey teams won the Toronto District Catholic Athletic Association Junior Championship. In 1970, he coached the Lakeshore Maple Leafs Junior Minto Cup champions.

Several of the players he coached and taught went on to pursue successful professional football careers. He himself continued playing and coaching lacrosse outside of school – he played (forward) for the Brampton Excelsiors and coached the Toronto Maple Leafs professional lacrosse team, as well as junior lacrosse.

In honour of his personal accomplishments in sport and the outstanding contribution he made to young athletes, the new sports field at Northern Secondary School has been named the Clarke Pulford Field, after him.

Clarke and his wife Joan now live in Stouffville. They have two children, Sandi and Jill and 5 grandchildren.

Bruce Driver was born in Etobicoke in 1962. At 4 he started playing organized hockey here, showing early promise that never failed him.

He moved into the Metro Toronto Hockey League in 1970, was named a Toronto Telegram all-star and played on 4 MTHL championship teams. He stayed with the MTHL through 1980, ending up with the provincial Junior A Royal York Royals. In his second year with them, Bruce was top league scorer among defencemen and voted onto the all-star team.

The Oshawa Generals of the OHL drafted him, but instead he accepted a hockey scholarship at the University of Wisconsin. During his 4 years with the Wisconsin Badgers, they won 2 NCAA Championships. Bruce became captain by his second year and an all-American, as well as an NCAA all-star. He was drafted by the Colorado Rockies – a New Jersey Devils team – and inducted into the Wisconsin Hockey Hall of Fame.

At Sarajevo in ‘84 he was top-scorer among defenceman on the Canadian Olympic Team. His sweater is in the Hockey Hall of Fame.

After Sarajevo, he went to the Maine Mariners in the AHL, helping win the Calder Cup. He started with the Devils next, staying with them for 12 seasons, some as assistant captain, and then for a year as captain. In 1995, he brought the Stanley cup home to Etobicoke.

He retired in 1998, after 3 years with the New York Rangers, and 15 seasons of professional hockey.

A true sportsman, Bruce accumulated fewer than 700 minutes in penalties in over 1,000 NHL games. The New York/New Jersey media presented him with the “Good Guy Award” for his leadership and dignity as a player.

In his free time, he coaches youth hockey and baseball, helping to repay those who sacrificed their time for him when he was a boy.

Claude Lemieux has heard it all. Lemieux was equally loved and reviled during his 18-year NHL career, but no one can argue with four Stanley Cups, a Canada Cup gold medal, and a track record of big game success that puts the pesky right winger from Buckingham, Quebec, in the upper echelon of playoff performers.

The scrappy forward did more than needle opponents into taking costly penalties. Maddening as he was on the ice, his penchant for postseason heroics infuriated his adversaries even more.

Three times, Lemieux scored more goals in the playoffs than he did in the regular season, most notably during a remarkable run that saw him net 13 goals to help the New Jersey Devils win the franchise’s first ever Stanley Cup in 1995, a performance that earned Lemieux the Conn Smythe Trophy as playoff MVP. His 80 career playoffs goals in 234 games are ninth most in NHL history. An astonishing 19 of those goals were game winners, a feat bettered only by Wayne Gretzky and Brett Hull.

“I love playoffs. You know what it’s like when teams play back-to-back games in the regular season—there’s usually a lot of intensity, and bad feelings grow. In the playoffs it is even more intense,” said Lemieux. “The physical side of the game really became more important and I think that is where I have been able to give my team an edge.” Reaching the playoffs in 18 different seasons is a surefire way to gain big-game experience, but Lemieux has been a clutch performer since his years in the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League, where he was 1985 playoff MVP. In the bigs, Lemieux is one of just five players in NHL history to win the Stanley Cup with three different teams. He completed the equally rare feat of winning the Cup with different teams in back to back seasons.

Lemieux and his brother Jocelyn, who also had a solid NHL career, came by their abilities naturally. “There weren’t a lot of hockey players in my family background, and we never had the financial capability for me to take any special power-skating clinics the kids get today. It was just something I picked up and went with and loved,” he told Maclean’s.

The Lemieux legend was born in Montreal. The Canadiens selected him in the second round of the 1983 NHL entry draft, and he made his debut that same year before being sent down to the minors for more seasoning. Lemieux thrived with the Verdun Junior Canadiens and Sherbrooke of the AHL before making his return to Montreal late in the 1985–86 season. He led the club with ten playoff goals, including a Game 7 overtime winner against Hartford. Lemieux and fellow rookie Patrick Roy powered the surprising Canadiens to a Stanley Cup victory.

Over the next four seasons, Lemieux garnered a reputation as an abrasive upstart with a deft scoring touch. A trade sent Lemieux to New Jersey in 1990, where he reached new offensive heights with a 40-goal season. Lemieux’s 18 points in 20 playoff games took the Devils to within one game of the Stanley Cup finals in 1994, before his stellar postseason production propelled the team to its first championship in the lockout-shortened 1995 season.

By now well-known for his on-ice intangibles and knack for playoff fireworks, Lemieux found himself a member of the Colorado Avalanche after a three-team deal just before the 1995–96 season. The altitude didn’t affect his scoring prowess, as the winger followed up a productive regular season on a line with Peter Forsberg and Valeri Kamensky with four game-winning playoff goals that helped the former Quebec Nordiques take home the championship during the team’s first year in Colorado.

Lemieux won another Cup with New Jersey and made stops in Phoenix and Dallas before hanging up his skates for good in 2003—or so he thought. Five years later, after finding his sea legs in China, the 43-year-old returned to the NHL for a short comeback with the San Jose Sharks. Lemieux retired with 379 goals and 406 assists for 785 points in 1,197 regular season games. He added 80 playoff goals and 78 assists.

He was no slouch on the world stage, either. Lemieux followed up a 1985 world junior gold medal in Helsinki with another gold at the 1987 Canada Cup as part of the famous squad that included Mario Lemieux and Wayne Gretzky. To round out his international career, Lemieux won a silver medal at the 1996 world championships, racking up 19 penalty minutes in eight games.

Off the ice, Lemieux became president of the now-defunct ECHL Phoenix Roadrunners in 2005. He took on wannabe athletes during a guest spot on Pros Vs Joes, and is a recurring guest on TSN’s Off the Record with Michael Landsberg. In January 2011, Lemieux was named president of the North American Chapter of 4Sports and Entertainment, headquartered in Etobicoke. Two of Lemieux’s four children attended John G. Althouse Middle School in central Etobicoke, and Lemieux coached his son Brendan on the Toronto Red Wings major bantam team. In January 2012, Lemieux joined other Canadiens alumni in a charity game at the Powerade Centre in Brampton to benefit pediatric services at Brampton Civic and Etobicoke General hospitals.

Television audiences saw a different side of the pugnacious NHL star when Lemieux joined the cast of the CBC reality show Battle of the Blades in 2009. It was a case of ‘beauty and the brawler’ when a surprisingly dainty Lemieux donned figure skates and twirled partner Shae-Lynn Bourne to a second place finish. “I thought it would be a fun experience, a journey, but I definitely did think this could be an opportunity to show the Canadian people, really, who I am,” Lemieux told Maclean’s about his decision to follow fellow tough guy Tie Domi onto the show. “In hockey, you put on this suit of armour, you go out on the ice in your equipment and you perform as well as you can with the gifts you’ve got. But most of the tough guys are great people off the ice, real soft-spoken and sensitive guys. It’s the complete opposite of what one would expect.”

The result, according to a Maclean’s review, was a “creative, downright sensual” performance that impressed audiences and fellow competitors, but didn’t surprise Lemieux himself. “When you’re a dedicated, focused, zoned-in type of person, you’re just going to do whatever it takes—within boundaries. In hockey, we pushed those boundaries further because we were physically confronting our opponents. Here, you’re really competing against yourself,” he said. Being a figure skating fan with an ear for music helped Lemieux master the on-ice routines. Skating along to his own voice singing a recorded version of Leonard Cohen’s Hallelujah was yet another surprise for his fans.

Though many in the game did not approve of his no-holds-barred style—such detractors usually being found on the opposing bench—Claude Lemieux antagonized his opponents on his way to carving out a career marked by overtime winners, playoff stardom, and an undeniable track record of success.

Dave Bolland was born in 1986 in Etobicoke, a suburb of Toronto, Ontario, and lived in the Mimico. He started playing hockey at the local Mimico Arena, where he played for the Queensway Canadiens.

He then played minor hockey for the Toronto Red Wings in the Greater Toronto Hockey League (GTHL) from 2000 until 2002. The Redwings would go on to win the OHL All Ontario Bantam Championship with Bolland recording four points in the championship game.

Bolland was drafted by the Chicago Blackhawks in the second round (32nd overall) of the 2004 NHL Entry Draft. Prior to joining the Blackhawks full-time, Bolland played in the American Hockey League (AHL) for the Norfolk Admirals and Rockford IceHogs.

While playing junior hockey in the Ontario Hockey League (OHL), Bolland helped the London Knights capture the 2005 Memorial Cup. He also competed at the 2006 World Junior Championships, where he helped Canada capture the gold medal.

Bolland has won the Stanley Cup with the Blackhawks in both 2010 and 2013. He is currently property of the Arizona Coyotes of the National Hockey League.

Bolland earned the nickname The Rat for his ability to get under the skin of opponents, similar to the play of Ken Linseman, the first player to have the nickname.

Eddie Litzenberger was born in 1932 in Neudorf, Saskatchewan. He played Junior Hockey with the Regina Pats, and was signed by the Montreal Canadiens in the early 50s.

He debuted with Montreal in 1954, and was selected as the NHL’s rookie of the year. He was soon traded to Chicago, where he was a 30-goal scorer for the Black Hawks three years running, making him one of the consistent top scorers in the league at the time.

While playing with the Black Hawks in 1955, he was awarded the Calder Memorial Trophy.

In 1961, as Captain of the Hawks, Eddie led the club to a Stanley Cup victory, but was then quickly traded to Detroit, and then onto Toronto. As a Leaf, he played on three consecutive Stanley Cup teams, 1962, 1963 and 1964.

The right-winger, rounded out his NHL career with 178 goals and 238 assists for 416 points in 618 regular season NHL games.

He hung his skates in 1966, but went on to a successful business career in the Stock Market and later, a family owned construction company.

Eddie returned to Chicago in 1996 along with many of the 1961 Stanley Cup team to celebrate the 35th anniversary of their win.

His three children, sons Dean and John, and daughter Kelly, all attended Richview Collegiate. Ed and his wife Gayle have lived in Etobicoke for more than 45 years.

Dave Dryden was born in Hamilton. He was raised in Etobicoke, where he became actively involved in hockey and baseball. He played minor baseball in the early years of the Kingsway Baseball League, and assisted in coaching atom baseball and hockey with his father.

He played minor hockey with the KI/Y, T.H.L and King Clancy leagues before beginning his junior hockey career with St Mike’s and the Toronto Marlboroughs. He later played senior hockey with the Galt Hornets.

During his NHL career, Dave goal-tended for the New York Rangers, Chicago Blackhawks, Buffalo Sabres and the Edmonton Oilers. He played for the Chicago Cougars and the Edmonton Oilers while in the W.H.A. It was in his last season in the W.H.A that he won the league’s Most Valuable Player award.

Dave was one of three goaltenders who transformed modern goaltending and pioneered the redesign of goaltending equipment which has generated the contemporary goaltending style.

Dennis grew up in Etobicoke where he started playing hockey at eight years of age. He began his OHA career with the Toronto Marlies and was later traded to the London Knights.

In the 1975-76 season he was drafted by the California Golden Seals, which after its demise, resurfaced as the Cleveland Barons. That club folded and was later absorbed by the Minnesota North Stars, Dennis included.

Dennis was later traded to the Washington Capitols and became one of the NHL’s top scorers. In his second full season with the club he scored 50 goals. The next year, 1981, he scored 60 goals and 76 assists for a total of 136 points. Today only eight players in history have equalled or surpassed his single season point totals.

Dennis finished his NHL career with the Minnesota North Stars in 1989, ending a stellar 16-year career.

Dennis has three children and lives with his wife, Kimberly, in Aspen, Colorado, where he works at the historic Hotel Jerome.

Born in Toronto in 1965, Peter Zezel was destined to excel at sports – but it wasn’t clear for a while whether that would be soccer or hockey!

Originally drafted by the Toronto Blizzard for his outstanding soccer skills, Peter eventually made the decision that would carve out his life’s path – he chose hockey.

He began his hockey career with the Philadelphia Flyers in 1984/85. Offensively gifted, he managed to set a Philadelphia rookie record for assists in his first year, and embraced the role of checking centre, relentless penalty killer and face-off specialist.

Four years after beginning his NHL career in Phylly, he was traded to the St. Louis Blues, where he played some of the best hockey of his life. Eventually, however, Zezel was traded back to his hometown, becoming one of the most popular Maple Leafs of the early 1990s.

A key contributor in Toronto’s playoff runs in 1993 and 1994, the team came within one game of the Stanley Cup. And while that would always be a disappointment, Peter’s gregarious, enthusiastic nature carried him through. After playing for several other teams in the league, Peter’s NHL career came to an abrupt end in 1998/99 when he returned to his hometown to be with his terminally ill niece.

He opened the Peter Zezel Hockey and Sports Camps in Etobicoke, which helped teach and improve the hockey and soccer skills of young players. Peter also made the time to coach AAA hockey for the Don Mills Flyers and he was a frequent guest on sports talk shows.

In the spring of 2009, at the age of 44, Peter lost his decade-long battle with Haemolytic anemia, but the effects of the enormous contributions he made to his community will continue to live on.