TORONTO – Displaying the humility and determination that’s typified his life and career, Willie O’Ree, the NationalHockey League’s first black player, was enshrined in the Hockey Hall of Fame Monday night.
In a moving speech, the 83-year-old pioneer lauded hockey for embracing diversity, but added that there’s still more to do to make the sport more inclusive.
And he expects to be at the forefront of the effort.
“Tonight, I am here to tell you that we are not done because the work is not done,” O’Ree told the packed crowd at the induction ceremony inside the Hall in Toronto. “We have barriers to break and knock down, and opportunities to give.”
He urged the audience to “return to your communities, take a look around.”
“Find a young boy or girl who needs the opportunity to play hockey and give it go them,” he added. “You never know, they may make history.”
O’Ree got that chance on January 18, 1958 when the Boston Bruins called him up for a game against the Montreal Canadiens in the old Montreal Forum.
“All I wanted was to be a hockey player,” he said in his induction speech. “All I needed was the opportunity. To be here tonight is simply overwhelming.”
With no 24-hour news cycle of social media, the feat of him becoming the NHL’s first black player was largely confined to the local press. Even O’Ree said he didn’t know he made history until he read about it in the morning paper.
O’Ree’s NHL career was brief, 45 games over two seasons. The fact that he played that many games in the big leagues at all was amazing considering he was blind in his right eye, the result of a being struck with the puck.
But O’Ree’s Hall entry isn’t about his player’s stats. The Hall of Fame’s selection committee admitted him as a Builder, a category reserved for for coaches, general managers, noted broadcasters and others who are regarded as pillars of the game.
O’Ree has worked tirelessly as the NHL’s Diversity Ambassador since 1996, traveling across the United States and Canada to visit youth hockey programs affiliated with the NHL’s “Hockey is for Everyone”initiative.
He’s also a revered figure to many of the NHL’s players, who seek him out for guidance and advice. O’Ree has been a mentor, role model, and advocate in growing hockey in communities previously overlooked by the sport.
“He’s what a builder is right out of the gate – you couldn’t make a better description of a builder,” said Grant Fuhr, the Edmonton Oilers goaltending great who became the Hall’s first black inductee in 2003. “When you see another person of color playing it gives you that thought that you can possibly play. It opens up a big door.”
O’Ree joins Fuhr and Angela James, a Canadian women’s hockey star who was regarded as the female Wayne Gretzky in her heyday, as the only black members of the Hall of Fame.
Historic moment happening right now. Anson Carter is interviewing Willie O’Ree, Angela James and Grant Fuhr, the three black athletes in the Hockey Hall of Fame. pic.twitter.com/9VUBWx2Mby
O’Ree told the Hall of Fame audience that he stood on the shoulders of others, notably the late Herb Carnegie and Manny McIntyre.
Carnegie, his brother, Ossie, and McIntyre, combined to form the “Black Aces,” the first all-black professional hockey line.
Herb Carnegie played on the semi-pro Quebec Aces with forward Jean Beliveau, who went on to become a Canadiens legend. Beliveau regarded Carnegie as one of the best players he ever skated with.
“As a teen, I looked up to Herb Carnegie and Manny McIntyre,” O’Ree said Monday. “They paved the way for me. They just never got the opportunity I did.”
O’Ree was enshrined Monday with New Jersey Devils goaltending legend Martin Brodeur, former Tampa BayLightning and New York Rangers sniper Martin St. Louis, Russian hockey star Alexander Yakushev, Canadian women’s hockey star and Canadian Women’s HockeyLeague Commissioner Jayna Hefford and NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman.
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TORONTO – Willie O’Ree got his Hockey Hallof Fame ring Friday and Pamela Houston got a thrill watching him get it.
“It’s almost like an Obama moment,” Houston, a member of the Ontario Black HistorySociety said. “First black president, first black hockey player, finally getting recognition.”
O’Ree, the National Hockey League’s first black player, will be formally inducted into the Hall Monday as a member of the 2018 class.
Willie O’Ree, right, shows off his Hockey Hall of Fame ring after receiving it from Hall Chairman Lanny McDonald (Photo/Courtesy Jeffrey Auger).
He’ll join New Jersey Devils goaltending legend Martin Brodeur, former Tampa BayLightning and New York Rangers sniper Martin St. Louis, Russian hockey star Alexander Yakushev, Canadian women’s hockey star and Canadian Women’s HockeyLeague Commissioner Jayna Hefford and NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman as the Hall’s newest occupants.
The induction ceremony will broadcast live on TSN2 in Canada and NHL Network in the United States.
“This is about the highest award that I’d ever get as far as playing hockey and my work with the ‘Hockey is for Everyone’ program,” O’Ree, 83, said at Friday’s ring presentation ceremony. “I’m blessed.”
Each member of the Hall’s Class of 2018 received generous applause as they received their rings Monday. The clapping was a little louder when O’Ree got his.
“Long overdue,” McDonald told me afterward.
O’Ree has been the league’s diversity ambassador since 1996, traveling across the United States and Canada to visit youth hockey programs affiliated with the NHL’s “Hockey is for Everyone”initiative.
O’Ree made history on Jan. 18, 1958, when he skated for the Boston Bruins against the Montreal Canadiens in the old Montreal Forum.
The right wing from Fredericton, New Brunswick, Canada, only played 45 NHL games over two seasons with the Bruins, tallying 4 goals and 10 assists.
He had a long and productive minor league career, finishing as the 16th all-time leading scorer in the old Western Hockey League with 328 goals and 311 assists in 785 games, despite being blind in his right eye.
He’ll become the third black person enshrined in the Hall, joining Edmonton Oilers goaltending great Grant Fuhr and Angela James, a Canadian women’s hockey superstar who was regarded as a female Wayne Gretzky.
O’Ree will continue his trailblazing ways by becoming the first person of color to be inducted in the Hall as a Builder, a category reserved for those who have contributed to the foundation of the game.
His plaque will keep company with revered names like Herb Brooks, the 1980 “Miracle on Ice” U.S. Olympic men’s team hockey coach, “Hockey Night in Canada” broadcaster Foster Hewitt,Detroit Red Wings owner Mike Ilitch, and Conn Smythe, who built the TorontoMaple Leafs into five-time Stanley Cup champions between 1945 and 1951.
“Those are some pretty big names, and Willie richly deserves to be there,” McDonald said. “You can build in different ways. You can be an owner who’s a phenomenal philanthropist, a great visionary for his hockey team. Or you can be Willie, who has lived a life of setting an example, and such a great example, for so many young people and so many of the older generation to say ‘Wow, this guy is richly deserving of this honor.'”
Avry Lewis-McDougal, host of “Avry’s Sports Show” podcast and YouTubechannel, agreed. Like Ryrerson’s Cummings, he was all smiles Friday as he watched O’Ree receive his Hall of Fame ring.
“It finally means the game is truly growing, it means we’re finally seeing true diversity in the fact we have Willie O’Ree in it (Hall of Fame), women in it,” McDougal said. “It’s incredible because we’ve waited so many years for Willie O’Ree to be in the Hall of Fame – for decades. And the fact that people finally said ‘You know what, this is wrong, Willie needs to be in here’ and the fact that the push finally worked, it’s incredible. It’s great to see.”
Kia Cummings, a 21-year-old Ryerson University sports media senior from Toronto, who interviewed O’Ree Friday as part of a documentary project said she wouldn’t be interested in hockey if it weren’t for him.
“As a Canadian, as a woman of color, as someone who is passionate about hockey, I wanted to take the opportunity to honor him,” she said. “It’s meeting the person who made your dreams a possibility…I have a passion for hockey that goes so much further. If I want to work within a hockey organization I can do that because Willie did it before me.”
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Hockey Hall of Fame goaltender Grant Fuhr is our guest. this episode. He discusses the new “Making Coco: The Grant Fuhr Story” documentary, what it was like winning five Stanley Cups with the Edmonton Oilers from 1984 to 1990, and who he thinks are the best goalies ever.
Hall of Fame goalie Grant Fuhr (Photo/Derek Heisler)
“We had a lot of fun over the years, good, bad, and otherwise,” Fuhr said of his NHL career. “Most people don’t want their life up on the big movie screen, it took a little sell job on that. It’s fun to live your life, but it’s definitely different seeing up on the big screen.”
Hall of Fame center Wayne Gretzky, Fuhr’s teammate on those Edmonton powerhouse teams, calls Fuhr “the greatest goalie that ever lived.”
Fuhr compiled a 403-295-114 (ties) record and posted 25 shutouts in 868 regular season games with Edmonton, the Toronto Maple Leafs, Buffalo Sabres, St. Louis Blues, Los Angeles Kings and Calgary Flames from 1981-82 to 1999-2000. He had a 92-50 record in 150 Stanley Cup playoff games, including six shutouts.
But his career wasn’t all amazing highlight reel saves and championships. The NHL suspendedhim for one year in 1990 after he admitted that he abused cocaine between 1983 and 1989. The league reinstated him after he served five months of the penalty. Still, it was a painful experience.
“The hardest part was living through it,” Fuhr says on the podcast. “The getting suspended, having what you love to do taken away from you, at that time, was hard.”
“Making Coco” will have its world premiere at the Calgary International Film Festivalon Saturday, September 29, as part of the festival’s closing gala. It will be televised on Canada’s Sportsnet in December. The film’s producer is still working on when and where it will be shown in the United States.
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Grant Fuhr was a man of few words during his National Hockey League career.
“Back then, five words was a long conversation for me,” Fuhr told me recently.
Grant Fuhr was Edmonton’s first-round draft pick in 1981.
Fuhr preferred to let his play in goal do the talking, winning five Stanley Cupchampionships with the Edmonton Oilers from 1984 to 1990, capturing the Vezina Trophy as the NHL’s best goaltender in 1988, being named one of the NHL’s 100 Greatest Players, and becoming the first black player to be inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame in 2003.
“The Great One,” Hall of Fame center Wayne Gretzky, also vouched for his former Oilers teammate, calling him “the greatest goalie that ever lived.”
Fuhr tells his story with the help of Gretzkyand other NHL legends in Making Coco: The Grant Fuhr Story,” a Sportsnet documentary that goes behind the mask of one of the league’s most acrobatic, dominating, and enigmatic goaltenders.
“I think the biggest thing is it’s a chance for people to see what my life was actually like,” said Fuhr, who was nicknamed “Coco” during his playing days. “There has always been speculation, guessing and such, and everybody thinks that the world is glamorous all of the time.”
Audiences will get a first glimpse of the film at a private screening in Toronto during the TorontoFilm Festival on Tuesday, September 11. The documentary will have its world premiere at the Calgary International Film Festivalon Saturday, September 29, as part of the festival’s closing gala.
“Making Coco” will be televised in December on Sportsnet in Canada. The film’s producer says he’s still working on when and where it will be shown in the United States and elsewhere.
“Grant’s often forgotten on those great Oliers team because there were so many great players,” said Adam Scorgie, producer of the documentary directed by Don Metz. “You had arguably one of the greatest players to ever play (Gretzky), one of the greatest leaders in Mark Messier and you forget how good Grant Fuhr was backstopping that team and all the boundaries he broke within the NHL. He was the first black superstar, the first to win the Stanley Cup and the first black to be inducted in the Hall of Fame.”
The Oilers teams of Fuhr’s era were known for their offensive prowess, not their defensive skill. Yes, they had a Hall of Famer in smooth-skating offensive-minded defensman Paul Coffey, who states flatly in “Making Coco” that “I don’t block shots.”
The Oilers’ defense was its offense, which often left Fuhr to fend for himself at the other end of the rink.
“I licked my chops every time we were going to play them ’cause I knew I was going to get three or four two-on-ones guaranteed,” Tony McKegney, the NHL’s first black player to score 40 goals in a season, told me recently. “Well, we did and we would lose out there 7 to 4 or something like that. During those games, Grant would make five or seven spectacular saves. Obviously, Wayne and Messier and Glenn Anderson were the story, but if you asked them today they would admit they had four guys up the ice all the time to score knowing Grant was back there.”
Grant Fuhr won five Stanley Cups during 10 seasons with the offensively-gifted Edmonton Oilers. On many nights, the netminder nicknamed “Coco” had little help defensively.
Because of Edmonton’s go-go offense and gone-gone defense, Fuhr has a career goals-against average of 3.38 – the highest among all Hall of Fame goaltenders.
Other Hall inductees with regular season GAA’s over 3.00? Georges Vezina (3.28) – yeah, the trophy guy- and the New York Islanders’Billy Smith (3.17), who has four Stanley Cup rings to Fuhr’s five.
Fuhr compiled a 403-295-114 (ties) record and posted 25 shutouts in 868 regular season games with Edmonton, the Toronto Maple Leafs, Buffalo Sabres, St. Louis Blues, Los Angeles Kings and Calgary Flames from 1981-82 to 1999-2000. He had a 92-50 record in 150 Stanley Cup playoff games, including six shutouts.
And Fuhr wouldn’t be a true Oiler if he didn’t provide some offense. His 46 points – all assists – that places him third among NHL goalies behind Tom Barrasso’s 48 points and soon-to-be Hall of Fame inductee Martin Brodeur’s 47 points. Three of Brodeur’s points are goals that he actually scored or was given credit for.
Fuhr’s accomplishments aren’t bad for a player who many hockey experts thought was overweight, broken-down, and washed up when the Blues signed him in 1995-96.
He revived his career in St. Louis, thanks in large part to training with Bob Kersee, a world-class African-American track coach and husband of U.S. Olympic track Gold Medalist Jackie Joyner-Kersee.
After appearing in only 49 games for three different teams in 1993-94 and 1994-95, Fuhr played in a whopping 79 games in 1995-96 and 73 contests in 1996-97 for the Blues and posted a 63-55-27 record in those two seasons.
Grant Fuhr shows off the bling from five Stanley Cup championship rings won with the Edmonton Oilers (Photo/Derek Heisler/www.derekheisler.com).
“It saved my body, it got my body through a lot,” Fuhr said of the training. “The body was good, but it became so much better. And I got a better understanding of it, what I was capable of, and how I could play around certain injuries.”
Fuhr’s legacy and longevity captivated another goaltender of color, Fred Brathwaite, who became a teammate in Fuhr’s final NHL season in Calgary.
Growing up in Ottawa, Brathwaite so idolized Fuhr that he put up a poster of the veteran goaltender in his bedroom at his mother’s house, where it still hangs today.
“Just the way he could raise his game to the level it could be,” said Brathwaite, a HockeyCanada goalie coach who was the New York Islanders’ goalie coach last season. “He might let in a goal or two, but when it came down the final thing, he’d raise his game up to help his team win Stanley Cups, or Canada Cups, and all those other things. I was very fortunate, very lucky, to play with him in his last year of hockey.”
Former NHL goalie Fred Brathwaite is such a Grant Fuhr fan that he keeps a poster of the five-time Stanley Cup winner in the bedroom of his boyhood home in Ottawa. The two became teammates on the Calgary Flames in Fuhr’s final NHL season in 1999-2000 (Photo/Fred Brathwaite).
Fuhr considers considers himself lucky, despite the ups and downs he experienced in his life and career.
The child of black and white biological parents, he was adopted by a white family in Spruce Grove, Alberta, Canada, and was lured to the net by all the neat gear that goaltenders wear.
Small town Spruce Grove and Western Canada served as an incubator of sorts for Fuhr in the early stages of his career.
He said he never really experienced racial hostility on or off the ice the way players like forwards Devante Smith-Pelly of the WashingtonCapitals, Wayne Simmondsof the Philadelphia Flyers and Nashville Predators defenseman P.K. Subban have endured in recent seasons.
“The Great One,” former Edmonton Oilers center Wayne Gretzky, calls Grant Fuhr the greatest goalie ever in “Making Coco: The Grant Fuhr Story.”
“Some of the (minority) guys that played in the minors in the states, they did all the heavy lifting,” Fuhr said. “Guys like Val James, Bill Riley, Mike Marson, they did the heavy lifting, they went through all the abuse.”
He said he didn’t feel or sense racism’s sting until he was traded to the Sabres in 1992-93 and after a suburban country club where other Sabres players and team officials were members initially denied him membership.
Retired Calgary Flames captain Jarome Iginla being interviewed about what it was like being an opponent and later a teammate of Grant Fuhr in “Making Coco: The Grant Fuhr Story).
“The more you traveled in the states, the more you could see it (racism). You live in an element where race matters a little bit and people have some pointed views on it,” he said. “You would think that as time progresses and as history progresses that it would get better. And, if anything, in the last for or five years, it has taken steps backwards.”
Fuhr doesn’t shy away in the film from discussing perhaps the lowest point in his career – a one-year suspension by the NHL in 1990 after he admitted that he abused cocaine from 1983 to 1989. The league reinstated him after he served five months of the penalty.
“I went to the school of life and, unfortunately, not everything runs as smoothly as it’s supposed to. You make mistakes along the way, and there’s a great price to pay,” he said. “I think the biggest thing is that I lived life – good, bad and otherwise.
“I wasn’t sheltered from anything. I didn’t protect myself from anything. So, yeah, you can make mistakes and still have a positive life out of it,” he added. “There are things in school that they don’t teach you. The only way to learn ’em is by falling on your own. Yeah, I tripped and fell on my face a few times.”
But from the falls, Fuhr said he’s now able to teach others on how to avoid stumbling.
“Kids that I help out now, talk to and such, I get a little bit of credibility because of having been through it instead of someone telling them ‘Hey, this is how it has to be’ having never been through it. Having been though it, and been through it in a public way, I get a little more credibility from them.”
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My choices span eras – from a time when goalies stood up and sticks were actually made of all wood – to today’s fast-paced, high-tech game. You’ll recognize some of the players chosen for the team while others named may not be familiar to new hockey fans.
Let’s be clear, this isn’t affirmative action on ice. These current and former players have distinguished themselves at hockey’s highest levels – their Stanley Cup rings, NHL awards, Olympic medals or Hockey Hall of Fame inductions prove that.
So who would you choose for your all-time team? Share your picks via the Color of Hockey Facebook page or Twitter @ColorOfHockey.
In the meantime, let the debate begin!
Grant Fuhr,goaltender. Owner of five Stanley Cup rings, a seven-time National HockeyLeague All-Star, the first black player inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame in 2003, and one of the NHL’s 100 Greatest Players, Fuhr is a no-brainer to be the All-Time team’s starting netminder.
Fuhr won all five Cups with the Edmonton Oilers in the 1980s and early 1990s. But he also played for the Toronto Maple Leafs, Buffalo Sabres, St. Louis Blues, CalgaryFlames, and Los Angeles Kings in an NHL career that spanned from 1981-82 to 1999-00.
A 1988 Vezina Trophy winner as the league’s best goaltender, Fuhr is only one of six NHL goalies with over 400 wins.
His stats: 403 wins, 295 losses, 114 ties and a 3.38 goals-against average in 867 NHL games. Not bad for a player who many thought was washed up after a season with the Kings in 1994-95. His career was resurrected by a trade to the Blues and hooking up with fitness guru Bob Kersee, husband and trainer of Olympic Gold Medal sprinter Jackie Joyner-Kersee.
Fuhr gave a special shout-out in his Hall of Fame induction speech to another person who influenced his life and career – Willie O’Ree, the NHL’s first black player.
“It just shows that hockey is such a diverse sport that anybody can be successful in it,” Fuhr said in 2003. “I’m proud of that, and I thank Willie for that.”
Jarome Iginla become the NHL’s second black captain as a member of the Calgary Flames.
Jarome Iginla, right wing. Iggy will be the second black NHL player in the Hall of Fame after he retires. He should be a first-ballot inductee just for the length of his full name: Jarome Arthur-Leigh Adekunle Tij Junior Elvis Iginla.
Iginla, whose father is Nigerian, is one of Canada’s most-decorated and loved players. He scored two goals that helped power Canada to a 5-2 win over the U.S. at the2002Winter Olympicsin Salt Lake City that gave the True North its first Olympic hockey Gold Medal in 50 years.
He scored 5 goals at the 2010 Winter Games in Vancouver, but he’s best known for his assist on Pittsburgh Penguins center Sidney Crosby’s overtime goal that clinched another Gold Medal for Canada over the U.S.
Iginla has 625 goals, 675 assists in 1,554 NHL games, most of them with the Flames from 1996-97 to 2012-13. He has 37 goals and 31 assists in 81 playoff games.
But it’s the big trophy, the Stanley Cup, that Iginla covets most to cap his career. That Cup quest has taken him to the Pittsburgh Penguins, BostonBruins, Colorado Avalanche and Los Angeles Kings.
An aside: With all his accomplishments, why was Iginla left off the NHL’s 100 Greatest Players list? Just asking.
Bryan Trottier, center. A seven-time Stanley Cup winner – four straight with the New YorkIslanders, two with the Penguins and one as an assistant coach for the Avalanche – an eight-time NHL All-Star, and winner of both the Hart Trophy as the league’s MVP and the Art Ross Trophy as its top scorer in 1979.
Of Metis, Chippewa, and Cree heritage, Trottier was the glue of the Islanders’ Cup dynasty. He won the Calder Cup as the NHL’s best rookie in 1975-76, a season in which he scored 32 goals and 63 assists.
He played 1,279 NHL regular season games between 1975-76 to 1993-94 and tallied 524 goals and 901 assists. He notched 71 goals and 113 assists in 221 playoff games for the Islanders and Penguins. He also performed a rare feat by representing the United Statesand Canada in international competition.
Trottier entered the Hockey Hall of Fame in 1997 and is on the NHL’s 100 Greatest Players list.
Paul Kariya, left wing. One of the mightiest of the then-named Mighty Ducks of Anaheim when it came to goal scoring.
The 5-foot-10, 180-pound wing played 15 seasons NHL with Anaheim, Colorado, St. Louis and the Nashville Predators. He scored 402 goals and 587 assists in 989 regular season games and 16 goals, 23 assists in 46 playoff contests.
He led the University of MaineBlack Bears to the 1993 NCAA Division I championship and won the Hobey Baker Award that year as U.S. college hockey’s best player. The Mighty Ducks chose him with the fourth overall pick in the 1993 NHL Draft.
Kariya was named to the NHL’s All-Rookie team in 1995 and was an NHL All-Star in 1995-96, 1996-97, 1998-99, 1999-00 and 2002-03.
Kariya, whose Japanese-Canadian father was born in an internment camp during World War II, played on Canada’s 1994 Silver Medal-winning Winter Olympics squad and on the 2002 Olympic team.
Jim Neilson, defense. Nicknamed “Chief,” Neilson played at the dawn of the era of rushing defensemen like Bobby Orr and Brad Park. Part Cree, part Dane, Neilsonwas a 6-foot-2, 205-pound defenseman who was agile enough to occasionally play left wing.
N.Y. Rangers defenseman Jim Neilson zeroes in on Montreal Canadiens goaltender Loren “Gump” Worsley (Photo/Courtesy Hockey Hall of Fame).
But D was where Neilson’s heart and mindset were and he helped solidify the Rangers’ blue line from 1962-63 to 1973-74. He finished his career playing for the old CaliforniaGolden Seals, Cleveland Barons and the WHA’s Edmonton Oilers.
“I don’t go out of my way to score goals,” Neilson once told Inside Hockey. “I get a much better feeling when I break up a scoring play or block a shot.”
Neilson scored 69 goals and 299 assists in 1,023 NHL games and 2 goals and 16 assists in 65 post-season contests.
His numbers aren’t as eye-popping as offensive-minded Hall of Famers Orr, Park, Paul Coffey, and Ray Bourque. But his talent level can’t be disputed. He was an NHL All-Star in 1966-67, 1969-70, and 1970-71.
Nashville Predators defenseman P.K. Subban.
P.K. Subban, defense. Subban is currently in his playing prime, yet he’s already accomplished enough to earn a spot on this list.
He won the James Norris Trophy as the NHL’s best defenceman in 2013. He was a member of the Canadian team that won the Gold Medal at the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi – although he only played 11 minutes during the entire tournament. He helped Canada capture gold at the International Ice Hockey Federation World JuniorChampionship tournaments in 2008 and 2009.
He has 73 goals and 245 assists in in 500 NHL regular season games and 13 goals and 36 assists in 74 career playoff games. Most of his career points came as a member of the Canadiens, the team that selected him in the second round with the 43rd overall pick of the 2007 NHL Draft.
Subban anticipated being a Canadien for life, establishing roots in Montreal and pledging $10 million to Montreal Children’s Hospital – the largest philanthropic commitment by any athlete in Canadian history.
But Subban was sent to the Predators in June 2016 in a controversial trade for defenseman Shea Weber.
SECOND TEAM
Ray Emery, goaltender. A netminder known for dropping the gloves as well as using them to make dramatic saves, Emery’s career is a tale of two goalies. He was the brash youngster who led the Ottawa Senators to the Stanley Cup Final in 2006-07.
Goaltender Ray Emery played for four NHL teams in his career.
After suffering a career-threatening hip injury, he morphed into a steady, mature veteran who served as a backup goalie on the 2013 Stanley Cup champion Blackhawks. But even as an aging vet, Sugar Ray enjoyed fisticuffs.
Still, Emery, a 2001 Ottawa fourth-round draft pick, was one of the best puck-stoppers in the business. He compiled a 145-86-28 win/loss/overtime loss record in 287 regular season games from 2002-03 to 2014-15.
He appeared in 39 playoff games for Ottawa, Philadelphia and Anaheim and had a 21-17 record.
Tony McKegney, left wing. McKegney was the NHL’s first high-scoring black player, the first to score more than 20 goals in a season.
He scored 20 or more goals for five straight seasons from 1979-80 to 1983-84. His best season: 40 goals and 38 assists in 80 games for the Blues in 1987-88.
McKegney tallied 320 goals and 319 assists in 912 games from 1978-79 to 1990-91 for Buffalo, St. Louis, Detroit Red Wings and Chicago Blackhawks.
McKegney’s route to the NHL was rooted in racism. He initially signed a contract with the Birmingham Bulls of the defunct World Hockey Association, but the team’s owner had second thoughts after fans in Alabama complained about the prospect of having a black player on the team’s roster. So McKegney, the 32nd player chosen in the 1978 NHL Draft, joined Buffalo instead.
Tony McKegney was a high-scoring forward for Buffalo, St. Louis, Detroit, Quebec, N.Y. Rangers. and Minnesota North Stars (Photo/Buffalo Sabres Archives).
Angela James, center. The first woman of color inducted to the Hockey Hall of Fame in 2010, James was a trailblazer regarded as the Wayne Gretzkyof women’s hockey. She was a dominant player in the Ontario Women’s Hockey Association in the late 1970s and a fixture on Canada’s international women’s teams.
She led Canada to a Gold Medal at the first International Ice Hockey FederationWomen’s World Championship in 1990, scoring 11 goals in five games. She powered Canada to gold medals in 1992 in Finland, 1994 in Lake Placid, and 1997 in Kitchener, Ontario.
James was also a force for Canada on gold medal teams in 1996 and 1999 at the Three Nations Cup tournament.
Despite those impressive credentials, Canada left James off its roster for the 1998 Winter Olympics in Nagano, Japan- the first Winter Games that women’s hockey was featured.
Canada’s Angela James is one of two black players in the Hockey Hall of Fame (Photo/Courtesy Hockey Hall of Fame).
The snub didn’t stop the accolades from rolling in. James was inducted into the Black Hockey and Sports Hall of Fame and the Ontario Colleges Athletic Association Hall of Fame in 2006.
She was inducted into the International Ice Hockey Federation Hall of Fame in 2008 along with fellow Canadian Geraldine Heaney and the United States’ Cammi Granato. James entered Canada’s Sports Hall of Fame in 2009.
The Canadian Women’s Hockey League introduced the Angela James Bowl, a trophy awarded to the league’s leading scorer, in 2008. An indoor ice rink in Toronto’s Flemingdon Park was renamed the Angela James Arena in 2009, making it one of the few skating facilities in North America named after a black person.
Forward Reggie Leach, Number 27, scored 19 goals in 16 playoff games in 1975-76.
Reggie Leach, right wing. Nicknamed the “Riverton Rifle” for his Manitoba hometown and his lethal shot, Leach scored 381 goals and 285 assists in 934 NHL regular season games with the Flyers, Bruins, Red Wings, and California Golden Seals from 1970-71 to 1982-83.
He was a prime-time Stanley Cup Playoffs performer with 47 goals and 22 assists in 94 career post-season games.
He scored 19 playoff goals in 1976 – 5 of them in one game against the Bruins. Leach is the only non-goaltender to win the Conn Smythe Trophy as the NHL’s most valuable playoff performer while skating for a losing team. The Canadiens defeated the Flyers for the Stanley Cup in 1976.
The proud member of the Ojibwe Nation is the only member of the Philadelphia Flyers’ famed LCB Line – Leach, center Bobby Clarke, and left wing Bill Barber – who isn’t in the Hockey Hall of Fame, which many hockey aficionados regard as an injustice.
Trevor Daley, D, Pittsburgh Penguins
Trevor Daley, defense. A smooth-skating, offensively-talented and defensively-responsible player who began his NHL career with the Dallas Stars in 2003-04. Daley reached the 20-point mark seven times during his tenure with Dallas.
He has 78 goals and 200 assists in 894 regular season games. He has 6 goals and 11 assists in 69 playoff games – and counting.
An ice-time eater, Daley averaged 21 minutes per game for Dallas between 2008 and 2015. Still, the Stars traded Daley to the Blackhawks for forward Patrick Sharp. After 29 games the Hawks dealt Daley to the Penguins in December 2015.
There, Daley became a cog in Pittsburgh’s drive to the Stanley Cup last year, though an ankle injury prevented him from playing in the Final against the San Jose Sharks.
That didn’t stop Daley from being the first Penguins player to be handed the Cup from team captain Sidney Crosby for a skate after winning it. The gesture fulfilled a wish from Daley’s ailing mother to see her son hoist the Stanley Cup.
A week later, Trudy Daley passed away from cancer at age 51.
Alec Martinez, defense. A two-time Stanley Cup winner, Martinez has been a steady puck-moving defenseman since his first full season the Kings in 2009-10. Los Angeles selected Martinez from Ohio’s Miami University in the fourth round of the 2007 NHL Draft.
Since then, Martinez has tallied 48 goals and 99 assists in 419 NHL regular season contests. He has 6 goals and 10 assists in 60 career playoff games.
In 2014, Martinez became the first NHL defenseman to score clinching goals in two playoff series in the same season. One goal was the Game 5 overtime winner against the Rangers that clinched the Stanley Cup for the Kings.
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Joel Ward has an idea for the National Hockey League to honor the history and growing impact of black players in the sport: Retire the number 22 Willie O’Ree wore with the Boston Bruins when he became the league’s first black player in 1958.
“I definitely think Willie should be recognized for sure,” Ward told ESPNSunday, the media day before his San Jose Sharks face the Pittsburgh Penguins in Game 1 of the Stanley Cup Final. “It’s a no-brainer. Without Willie, it would be tough for me to be sitting here today. I definitely think Willie should be a big part of this.”
O’Ree, who serves as the NHL’s director for youth development and ambassador for diversity, skated into hockey history on Jan. 18, 1958 when he played for the Bruins against the MontrealCanadiens at the old Montreal Forum.
A right wing, O’Ree appeared in 45 games over two seasons for the Bruins – 1957-58 and 1960-61 – and tallied 4 goals, 10 assists and 26 penalty minutes. Though his NHL career was brief, O’Ree enjoyed a lengthy minor league career, playing primarily for the SanDiego Gulls and the Los Angeles Blades of the old Western Hockey League.
His career minor league numbers: 328 goals, 311 assists, 669 penalty minutes in 785 WHL games; 21 goals, 25 assists, 37 PIMs (penalties in minutes) in the Pacific Coast League; and 21 goals, 24 assists and 41 PIMs in 56 American Hockey League contests.
He enjoyed a long professional career despite playing blind in his right eye, the result of a hockey injury.
Diversity on display. Left to right: Philadelphia Flyers forwards Pierre-Edouard Bellemare and Wayne Simmonds with Willie O’Ree and former Flyer goalie Ray Emery (Photo/Philadelphia Flyers).
O’Ree’s contribution to the game can be measured beyond goals and assists. He’s the godfather to players of color, from pee wees to the pros. It’s not unusual for minority NHLers, from rookies to veterans, to seek him out for advice.
“He’s my elder,” high-scoring Philadelphia Flyers forward Wayne Simmonds told reporters during an O’Ree visit to the team in 2015. “I treat him with respect and let him know I have a lot of admiration for him. If it wasn’t for him, I wouldn’t be playing the game today.”
Karl Subban – father of Montreal Canadiens defenseman P.K. Subban, Bruins goaltending prospect Malcolm Subbanand Vancouver Canucks defense draftee Jordan Subban – once told me that if one of his boys felt they were wronged in the hockey world, he’d remind them of what O’Ree and Mike Marson, the NHL’s second black player, endured.
O’Ree isn’t in the Hockey Hall of Fame, but he is in the New Brunswick Sports Hall of Fame and the San Diego Hall of Champions. In 2007, he received the Order of Canada, the nation’s highest civilian honor.
But Ward feels the time has come for the NHL to honor O’Ree by retiring his number, the same way Major League Baseball universally retired Jackie Robinson’s 42 in 1997. Ward wears 42 in honor of Robinson.
“It would be great if they did,” Ward told ESPN. “Obviously that’s something that would be a great discussion about. With the amount of respect Willie has around the league, it would definitely be something special if that did come up.”
Ward’s on the cusp of making hockey history himself. Either he or Penguins defenseman Trevor Daleywill be the next black player to have his name etched onto the Stanley Cup.
One of them will join goaltender Grant Fuhr (Edmonton Oilers – 1985, 1985, 1987, 1988, 1990), goalie Ray Emery (Chicago Blackhawks – 2013), defenseman Johnny Oduya (Blackhawks – 2013, 2015), wing Dustin Byfuglien (Blackhawks – 2013), and netminder Eldon “Pokey” Reddick(Oilers – 1990) as Cup winners.
With the Stanley Cup Final opening Monday, here’s a little more black hockey trivia:
Traded to Pittsburgh by Chicago, defenseman Trevor Daley may get his name on the Stanley Cup.
There are only two black players in the Hockey Hall of Fame. Fuhr was inducted in 2003 and Angela James, regarded as one of Canada’s greatest female players, was inducted in 2010.
They will surely have company whenever Colorado Avalanche forward Jarome Iginla retires. Playing with the Avalanche, Penguins, Bruins and Calgary Flames, Iginla has tallied 661 goals, 662 assists and 1,273 PIMs in 1,474 NHL regular season games.
Iginla has 37 goals, 31 assists and 98 PIMs in 81 playoff games. He owns two Winter Olympics Gold Medals, earned in Vancouver in 2010 and Salt Lake City in 2002.
He also has gold from the 2004World Cup of Hockey and 1997International Ice Hockey Federation WorldChampionship.
Iginla, whose father is from Nigeria, will probably have the longest and coolest name on a Hall of Fame plaque if he choose to use the full handle: Jarome Arthur-Leigh Adekunle Tig Junior Elvis Iginla.
Dorrington, a long-time minor league hockey player, began a popular youth hockey program in his adopted city to help kids stay out of trouble and stay in school.
It’s as much a part of hockey as sticks, pucks, and goalie pads. We marvel at FloridaPanthers forward Jaromir Jagr’s business-in-the-front-party-in the back mullet, a style so timeless, so awesome, so hockey, that Montreal Canadiens defenseman P.K. Subban paid homage to it at the NHL All-Star Weekend in January.
Washington Capitals forward Mike Marson had it all – an Afro, mutton chops, and a Fu Manchu.
New York Rangers forward Ron Duguay was all about Sassoon jeans, Studio 54, and curly locks in the disco days of the 1970s. And those of us of a certain age can recall catcalling St. Louis Blues sniper Garry Unger as his long red mane flew when he skated up ice in the early 1970s.
Hair is so synonymous with hockey that there’s a term for it:Flow. Hockey players are perfectionists, dedicating countless hours making sure that a move, a shot, a save is just right. They’re apparently just as fussy about their flow.
So much so that an enterprising anonymous filmmaker has been producing High School All Hockey Hair Team videos since 2011.
The 2015 YouTube video went viral with more than 2.5 million views. And this year’s
Anson Carter stuffed dreadlocks into his helmet during his NHL career.
edition is quickly racking up the clicks and views. Flow is such a serious business that
hockey equipment manufacturer Warrior sponsored the video in 2015, giving the filmmaker $15,000 if the video surpassed 100,000 views.
There aren’t many players of color in this year’s video, but that doesn’t mean minority
hockey players haven’t let it flow.
Mike Marson became the NHL’s second black player when he joined the Washington Capitals in 1974. But he was the first to sport a killer Afro, mutton chops, and a Fu Manchu.
Goalie Eldon “Pokey” Reddick – need we say more?
Edmonton Oilers goaltending great Grant Fuhr rocked an Afro early in his playing days that would’ve made the Ohio Players proud.
He appeared to be as active with the hair activator as he was in net for the Winnipeg Jets, Edmonton Oilers and Florida Panthers in the late 1980s and early 1990s.
High-scoring forward Anson Carter and enforcer Georges Laraque packed dreadlocks under their helmets during their NHL careers. Hockey tough guy Chris Simon wore his dark hair at Rapunzel-length during most of his NHL career to show Ojibwa First Nation pride.
Like their teammates, they just went with the flow.
When last we checked in with Damon Kwame Mason and Everett Fitzhugh they were busy chasing separate hockey dreams. Mason was attempting to make a documentary chronicling the history and growth of blacks in hockey and Fitzhugh was trying to land a gig as a professional hockey play-by-play announcer.
These days, Fitzhugh is proudly calling goals and hockey’s rough-and-tumble action at home and road games for the Cincinnati Cyclones of the ECHL, his latest stop on a journey that he hopes will lead to a National Hockey League broadcasting career.
And after nearly four years, spending about $200,000 of mostly his own money, and shooting more than 50 hours of footage, Mason can finally call himself a filmmaker – and a pretty good one. His “Soul on Ice: Past, Present & Future” won a People’s Choice Award at the Edmonton International Film Festivalearlier this month.
“I knew I was going to finish. Did I know when? No.” Mason told me recently. “There were times I was frustrated – the lack of money, sometimes the lack of support – but I knew, eventually, I’d get it done only because I started out on that mission and I don’t like giving up.”
Damon Kwame Mason (right) interviews Chicago Blackhawks defenseman Trevor Daley for black hockey history documentary.
Making the doc was business and personal for Mason, who hopes the movie will help him make the transition from working in radio to a career in film. As a Canadian, he felt a duty to tell the stories of black players from back in the day and today who sometimes faced racial cruelty and even death threats just for trying to pursue their passion.
“Especially the guys in the 70s and the 80s who were the only ones in the dressing room or the ones that would go to an arena and everyone is yelling ‘nigger’ or ‘spook’ at them,” said Mason, a Toronto native. “They had a choice: Do you want to give up or do you want to continue to do something that you love. And that’s what they did, they continued doing something that they loved. And that’s what I did in making this film.”
The film features chilling footage of a CBS News profile of Val James, the NHL’s first U.S.-born black player, enduring chants of “Spook! Spook! Spook!” as he’s playing a minor league game south of the Mason-Dixon line in Salem, Va., in 1981. One proud “fan” carried a watermelon to the game in James’ honor.
Mason covers the waterfront of black hockey history in his documentary, from the all-black league that played in the Canadian Maritimes from the 1890s to the 1920s, to the great Herb Carnegie’s heartbreak from being unable reach the NHL because of his race, to Willie O’Ree finally cracking that color barrier, to the Subban family having three boys drafted by NHL teams.
He crisscrossed North America to interview a bevy of current and former NHL players of color and their families including James, who played for the Buffalo Sabres, O’Ree, who broke into the NHL with the Boston Bruins in 1958, Mike Marson, who became the league’s second black player when he joined the Washington Capitals in 1974-75, and Grant Fuhr, the all-world goaltender who won five Stanley Cups with the Edmonton Oilers.
Joel Ward of the San Jose Sharks, Wayne Simmonds of the Philadelphia Flyers, P.K. Subban of the Montreal Canadiens and the Chicago Blackhawks’Trevor Daley are among the current black NHLers who appear in the film.
James says he’s no film critic but he gave Mason’s effort five stars are seeing it at a private screening in Toronto earlier this month.
Vancouver Canucks defensive prospect Jordan Subban prepares parents Karl and Maria for their close-ups in “Soul on Ice: Past, Present & Future.”
“Kwame has put together a piece of history,” he said. “It was very enlightening and filled in that gap that most people ask: why, when, and where did (these players) come from. Anyone who’s interested in this type of thing, it’s like candy.”
Mason’s finished work on the film but the work of getting “Soul on Ice: Past, Present & Future” to a theater or television network near you has only just begun. He’s searching Canada and the U.S. for a buyer that will show his product. If one doesn’t materialize, Mason says he’ll still be at peace.
“There were a lot of sacrifices,” he told me. “I’m in the hole – all my money is going out. I hope that some money will come back in. If it doesn’t, I can rest my head and say I accomplished something for my nation and for black Canadians as a celebration.”
Former Washington Capitals forward Mike Marson shares his experience as the NHL’s second black hockey player in the documentary.
It seems fitting that Fitzhugh is living his hockey broadcast dream in the city associated with the television classic “WKRP in Cincinnati.”
“It’s awesome, I still can’t believe it,” Fitzhugh told me. “Everything has happened so fast. I’ve been fortunate to move up the ladder so quickly.”
When we visited with Fitzhugh in March 2014 he was working public relations in the Chicago headquarters of the United States Hockey League, a Tier I junior league that sends many of its players on to NCAA Division I college hockey careers.
He was thrilled to be working in organized hockey but yearned to be behind the microphone calling games like his heroes, Detroit Red Wings broadcaster Ken Kal and NBC’s Mike “Doc” Emrick.
A Detroit native, Fitzhugh called 120 hockey games while he was a student at Bowling Green StateUniversity and thirsted to do more. He got his chance last season broadcasting for the USHL’s Youngstown Phantoms.
At 26, Everett Ftizhugh rocks the mic as play-by-play announcer for the ECHL’s Cincinnati Cyclones.
“If I had to name one person who I may take some tips from or take a little bit from is Jim Hughson who does the “Hockey Night in Canada” broadcast and did the NHL video game series for quite a while,” Fitzhugh said. “Very, very deep voice, very technical, which I love. He’s fun to listen to.”
When the Cyclones came calling with an offer to work the team’s home and away games online, he jumped at the chance to move one rung closer to an NHL broadcasting career.
“I thought I was going to be in Youngstown for three, four, five years, have to struggle, scrap and all that other stuff,” he said. “To be able to make it to the ECHL at 26 and get back on the path I thought I would be on when I left college – the two previous radio guys at Bowling Green before me, they all went straight to the ECHL from Bowling Green. I couldn’t even get a radio job out of college. So to be on this path is a really good feeling.”
But there are still dues to be paid. Fitzhugh’s official title with the Cyclones is Director of Public Relations and Broadcasting, a lofty handle that means he does everything. He writes the press release, tweets the tweets, works with Cincinnati sportscasters in arranging interviews with players, handles web content, and maybe even helps load and unload the team bus – all before and after putting on the headset and calling the game.
And, like Cyclone players whose action he describes on air, Fitzhugh travels to road games minor league-style on the team bus.
“I think this year our longest bus ride in terms of mileage is going to be down to Allen, Texas, that’s got to be about 17-18 hours from here,” he said. “I don’t think I’ll be taking planes until I get to the NHL.”
