GANGNEUNG, SOUTH KOREA I just want to drop a few names on the ChicagoBlackhawks “fans” who had their butts not-so-surgically removed from their UnitedCenter seats Saturday for allegedly hurling racist taunts at Washington Capitals forward Devante Smith-Pelly.
Dirk Graham, Johnny Oduya, Dustin Byfuglien,Ray Emery,Jamal Mayers, and Trevor Daley.
These are black players or players of African descent who skated for the team that you root for – or rooted for before Blackhawks management ejected you from fairly high-priced seats for supposedly directing racial remarks toward Smith-Pelly.
Black players helped make the Blackhawks winners and hoist Stanley Cups.
Oduya was a mainstay on defense on the ‘Hawks 2012-13 and 2014-15 championship teams. Emerywas the solid backup goaltender for the 2012-13 Cup winner.Mayers, a forward, added defensive toughness to that team for 19 regular season games that season.
And Byfuglien was a disruptive power forward that the Philadelphia Flyers struggled to control in the 2009-10 Stanley Cup Final.
Former Chicago Blackhawks goalie Ray Emery.
Graham was a gritty heat-and-soul captain of a Blackhawks teams that were competitive. He even scored a hat trick in Game 4 in the 1992 Stanley Cup Final won by the Pittsburgh Penguins.
These are all men of color who played for your team. For. Your. Team.
Imagine if Oduya, Byfuglien, and Emery adhered to the taunts aimed at Smith-Pelly and they played for, say, the NBA’s Atlanta Hawks instead of the NHL’s Blackhawks?
The idea that you could be shocked and appalled in this day and age at the sight of a black guy being on the ice or in the penalty box at a hockey game means you either don’t know your own team or that Smith-Pelly’s skin simply got under yours.
Either way, it wasn’t a good look. I wonder what recently-acquired Blackhawks forward Anthony Duclairmust be thinking after watching those home “fans” giving an opposing minority player the business by using race as a weapon.
Former Chicago Blackhawks defenseman Johnny Oduya.
Kudos to the management of the Chicago Blackhawks, Washington Capitals and National Hockey League for taking swift action on this ugly incident.
Captials HeadCoach Barry Trotz was right when he said “There is absolutely no place in the game of hockey or our country for racism.”
“It just shows ignorance,” he added.
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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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The puck hasn’t dropped for the 2015-16 hockey season yet and there’s already tons of news – most of it good, some of it worrisome.
First, three cheers for Willie O’Ree. The American Hockey League’s new San Diego Gulls franchise is hosting “Willie O’Ree Night” on Oct. 16 and will honor the National Hockey League’s first black player before the Gulls take on the Bakersfield Condors.
O’Ree skated into the NHL and history on Jan. 18, 1958 as a Boston Bruins forward playing against the Montreal Canadiens at the old Montreal Forum. He 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.
Willie O’Ree, the NHL’s first black player, will be honored by the AHL’s San Diego Gulls next month.
The bulk of his professional hockey career was spent with the San Diego Gulls and the Los Angeles Blades of the old Western Hockey League. In 13 WHL seasons, O’Ree played 785 games, scored 328 goals and 311 assists and amassed 669 penalty minutes. Not bad for a guy who’s blind in his right eye.
“Willie’s a trailblazer and international sports icon,” said Ari Segal, president of
Willie O’Ree, back in the day.
business operations for the Gulls, the Anaheim Ducks farm team. “He’s worked tirelessly throughout his life to promote diversity in our sport, and increase access to hockey for people of all races, ethnicities and socio-economic backgrounds. We feel fortunate to have the opportunity to honor him and celebrate his life and historic career on the day after his 80th birthday.”
O’Ree, the NHL’s director for Youth Development and ambassador for NHL Diversity, said he’s thrilled to be honored by his hometown team.
“I’m proud and thankful that the club has chosen to honor me during its inaugural AHL season,” he said. “This organization has proven time and again its commitment to becoming deeply ingrained in this community, including and beyond the 34 home game dates.”
Shameless plug: I profile O’Ree along with Larry Kwong and Fred Sasakamoose– the NHL’s first Asian and Indian players – in the upcoming issue of the Hockey Hall of Fame’s Legends program guide. It should be available after the 2015 Hall of Fame induction festivities in November.
P.K. Subban is paying it forward, donating $10 million to the Montreal Children’s Hospital.
Canadiens defenseman P.K. Subban hasn’t played a game yet this season but he already scored a huge goal when pledged $10 million to the Montreal Children’sHospital.
Subban’s gesture is the largest philanthropic commitment ever by a professional athlete in Canada. For his generous donation, the hospital renamed its atrium “Atrium P.K. Subban.”
The flamboyant and sometimes controversial defenseman, a Toronto native, sent a message with his contribution: Hockey-insane Montreal is his town.
“The P.K. Subban Atrium is not only my footprint to the city but, more importantly, it is my sole promise to give back to those who have given me so much.”
Subban’s been on a roll in recent years. The 26-year-old won an Olympic Gold Medal at the 2014 Winter Games with Team Canada, he’s a two-time All-Star, and a 2013 Norris Trophy recipient as the NHL’s best defenseman. And he’s rich. He signed an eight-year contract with the Canadiens reportedly worth $72 million in 2014.
“P.K. is a person of character, who strives for success, always working at new ways to stay on top of his game and he understands the value of teamwork,” said Martine Alfonso, the Montreal Children’s Hospital’s associate executive director. “He is an outstanding role model for our patients and personifies the excellence for which the Children’s is world-renowned.”
Ray Emery isn’t trying to catch lightning in a bottle. He’s trying catch on with the Tampa Bay Lightning. The unemployed goaltender signed a professional tryout offer with the Lightning after the team saw most of its goaltending depth get wheeled into the emergency room.
Andrei Vasilevskiy, starting goalie Ben Bishop’s primary backup, is out for 2-3 months following surgery earlier this month to remove a blood clot from under his left collar bone. Kristers Gudlevskis suffered an injury while playing in a prospects tournament recently.
That leaves an open lane for Emery. The 32-year-old, 11-season NHL vet had a 10-11-7 record with the Philadelphia Flyers last season. He had a 3.06 goals-against average and an .894 save percentage for a team that failed to make the playoffs.
Emery appeared to struggle with explosive lateral movements last season, raising
Ray Emery wants to prove he’s still got game at the Lightning’s training camp.
questions about whether his right hip, surgically-repaired in 2010, was giving him trouble. The injury was devastating enough back then that many hockey people thought his career was over.
The Flyers opted not to re-sign Emery as SteveMason’s backup. Philly signed former Washington Capitals-Buffalo Sabres-New York Islanders netminder Michal Neuvirthto a two-year deal reportedly worth $3.25 million.
Emery told the Tampa Bay Times that he’s “not done,” his hip his fine, and it wasn’t the problem last season. He chalked his 2014-15 pedestrian numbers to playing on a bad Flyers team.
“It was a frustrating year on that team,” Emery told The Times. “My season definitely reflected that as well. When you don’t make the playoffs, that’s normally how your season is. You’ve got some good parts, but they don’t outweigh the bad parts.”
Emery is auditioning for the Lightning under the watchful eye of goalie coach Frantz Jean, one of the few coaches of color in the NHL.
It was over before it began for Josh Ho-Sang. The Islanders 2014 first-round draft pick, the 28th overall selection, arrived late for the first day of the team’s training camp. Quicker than a New York minute, the Isles cut the controversial but talented forward and shipped him back to the Niagara IceDogs, his Ontario Hockey League major junior team.
Not even one, but done. Ho-Sang was reportedly late for Day 1 of Islanders camp and sent back to his junior team.
Arthur Staple, the Islanders beat writer for Long Island’s Newsday, wrote that Head Coach Jack Capuano had planned to have Ho-Sang working on a training camp line with team captain John Tavares and Anders Lee.
“Enough with the bull,” Snow told Newsday Saturday. “It’s time to grow up.”
Snow told the newspaper that Ho-Sang is “obviously talented, but talent isn’t the issue.”
“It’s about becoming a professional and acting like one,” he told the newspaper. “Hopefully he takes this lesson and learns from it. It’s really up to him now – we can’t do anything else for him in this area.”
Team management was so miffed by Ho-Sang’s tardiness that they made the 19-year-old run the stairs of the Nassau Coliseum for three hours, Newsday reported.
Ho-Sang is one of the most talented hockey players to come out of Canada in years. He has scary scoring hands and speed to burn on the ice. But he also scares hockey establishment people because of his outspokenness and what they perceive as his immaturity.
He’s spoken bluntly about race and hockey and he’s blasted Hockey Canada for not inviting him to its summer camp for the world juniors team two years ago after he notched 85 points in 67 games.
Marty Williamson, the IceDogs’ general manager, told the Bullet News of Niagara that the Islanders told him that Ho-Sang was late for training camp because he overslept. He said Ho-Sang is “very upset and humbled by the whole thing.”
The IceDogs GM called Ho-Sang “a good kid” who’s “made a lot of strides in the right direction.” But he also called Ho-Sang out, saying he still has much to do before becoming the elite player that some in the hockey world believe he can be.
“He has some habits he needs to work on,” Williamson told the Bullet News. “He stays up too late playing video games and stuff like that. He sleeps through things and gets himself exhausted.”
Here’s hoping that Ho-Sang takes this oversleeping episode, and the Islanders tough-love approach to it, as a wake-up call.
In a weekend column in The Los Angeles Times, Sandy Banks wrote that it’s time for Los Angeles Clippers’Donald Sterling to give up ownership of his National Basketball Association team in the wake of recordings on which he purportedly makes racist comments about black people. Banks offers a novel solution for Sterling if he wants to stay in the sports business.
Boston’s Jarome Iginla, a superstar likely Hall of Fame-bound when he retires.
“Let the real estate magnate and Clippers owner take his millions and buy a hockey team,” she wrote. “Then he won’t have to worry about black superstars showing up for games on his girlfriend’s arm.”
Nice.
Reading that line saddened me, angered me, and made me think that maybe I haven’t been doing my job with this blog. Her suggestion that Sterling “buy a hockey team” is a zinger, a real humdinger, perhaps designed to add a little levity to a serious problem. The only problem is that if Banks paid a little more attention to hockey maybe she’d know that the zinger has lost its zing – that hockey isn’t exclusively white anymore on the ice, in the stands, in the broadcast booth, or in the owner’s box.
With one paragraph, Banks bought into a stereotype. Hockey has the hat trick – a feat in which one player scores three goals in a single game. Banks scored a double negative by suggesting that Sterling and his alleged racist ways could find a safe haven in the overwhelming whiteness of hockey.
It’s a false image and its wrong.
Blacks and other people of color have a rich hockey history and are a growing presence in today’s game. If Banks watched Sunday’s Anaheim Ducks–Dallas Stars game Sunday she would have seen Anaheim forward Devante Smith-Pelly, who is black, score two goals, including the tying goal in the closing seconds in the third period that sent the game to overtime.
She would have seen Dallas defenseman Trevor Daley, who is also black, score two goals for the Stars. It was stellar game for Daley, even though the Stars lost the game 5-4 in overtime and were eliminated from the Stanley Cup Playoffs. As a teenager, Daley overcame his then-coach and general manager of his major junior hockey team – former National Hockey League goaltender John Vanbiesbrouck – calling him the N-word in the 2002-03 season to not only survive, but to thrive. The ‘Beezer was canned from his position with the Ontario Hockey League’s Sault Ste. Marie Greyhounds for using the slur and Daley has gone on to play more nearly 690 NHL games, all with Dallas. If she watched the entire Anaheim-Dallas series, she might have noticed forward Emerson Etem, an African-American born in Long Beach, California, playing for the Ducks.
If she caught any of the other Stanley Cup Playoffs games on television she might have gotten glimpses of other black players: Philadelphia
Dallas defenseman Trevor Daley.
Flyers forward Wayne Simmonds (a former Los Angeles Kings player) and his teammate, goaltender Ray Emery; Tampa Bay Lightning forward J.T.Brown, who was brought up from the American Hockey League when Lightning sniper Steven Stamkos was injured but was so good that he remained with the team when Stamkos returned; Boston Bruins forward Jarome Iginla, who’ll likely be the third black player enshrined in the Hockey Hall of Fame whenever he retires; Chicago Blackhawks defenseman Johnny Oduya, who played for his native Sweden in the 2014 Winter Olympics; St. Louis Blues rugged forward Ryan Reaves; and Montreal Canadiens defenseman P.K. Subban, who was awarded the Norris Trophy as the NHL’s top defenseman last season.
If she kept watching between periods she might have witnessed the new normal: former NHLers Kevin Weekes, Jamal Mayers, and Anson Carter and broadcaster David Amber – all black men – imparting hockey knowledge and analysis to viewers in the United States and Canada. If Banks attended a Kings or Ducks game, she might run into Oscar-winning actor Cuba Gooding, Jr., rap artist Snoop Dogg, or Isaiah Mustafa, the original Old Spice Guy who’s a hockey player and Kings season ticket holder. Say, wasn’t that director Spike Lee wearing a New YorkRangers jersey at Game 5 against the Flyers Sunday in Madison Square Garden?
If Banks glanced at the organization chart of the St. Louis Blues, she’d find David L. Steward, an African-American who’s chairman and co-founder of World Technology, Inc., is a part owner of the team.
And hockey isn’t just for the black rich and famous. Pamela Merritt – Twitter handle @SharkFu – is a black, life-long Blues fan who’s had her heart broken in the playoffs once again by an early St. Louis exit. Twitter’s @Kia1 is a black hockey mom who knows the price of goalie equipment and the art of negotiating the parental politics of organized youth hockey. Then there’s @IceHockeyDanceMom, a Southern California woman who’s raising a dancer-niece and hockey-playing nephew solo. You could almost feel the tears rise from the keyboards from a tweet she wrote last December that said “a coach just told me; I’m not rich, kid is black & So-Cal. #NHLDream unrealistic.”
Her nephew still plays hockey and he still dreams.
Lord knows hockey isn’t nirvana for players and fans of color, as Adam Proteau of The Hockey News chronicled in a recent column. But to suggest that a Donald Sterling would be at home in hockey isn’t a pithy zinger.
“Razor” and the “Wayne Train” rolled into Madison Square Garden Sunday and rolled out with a 4-2 Stanley Cup Playoffs win against the New YorkRangers.
Flyers goaltender Ray Emery.
Philadelphia Flyers goaltender Ray “Razor” Emery and right wing Wayne “Wayne Train” Simmonds keyed the Flyers victory that tied the best-of-seven series at a game apiece. After surrendering two first period goals to Rangers right wing Martin St. Louis and left wing Benoit Pouliot, Emery played an exceptional game.
He quieted talk about his suspect lateral movement by stopping 31 of 33 shots, including key saves on Rangers rugged forward Rick Nash. Emery, who signed with the Flyers as a free agent during the summer after winning a Stanley Cup with the Chicago Blackhawks, played in place of injured Flyers starting goaltender Steve Mason. He earned his first Stanley Cup Playoffs victory win in exactly three years – April 20, 2011 – as a member of the Anaheim Ducks.
Simmonds sealed the Flyers victory with an empty net goal scored in the closing seconds when he gathered the puck deep in the Flyers zone, muscled through two Rangers players while skating the puck out of the zone, and fired it into the vacant Rangers goal from just past the center ice red line.
The victory tied the series at one game apiece. But it also highlighted the importance of Emery and Simmonds to the Flyers. Emery was brought in to compete with Mason for the starter’s job. When the team tabbed Mason as their Number One goalie, Emery settled in as the consummate back-up, the role he had in Chicago which had Corey Crawford between the pipes.
Simmonds played 16 minutes, 27 seconds of snarly, aggressive hockey with lots of work along the boards and in front of Rangers goaltender
Henrik Lundqvist. But his best and perhaps most-difficult scoring chance came with Lundqvist pulled from the net and with the puck deep in the Philadelphia zone.
The empty night goal was another big moment in what’s been a breakout year for Simmonds, who scored 29 goals, 31 assists and collected 106
Flyers forward Wayne Simmonds.
penalty minutes in 82 games. He led the Flyers in goals. Not bad for a player who wasn’t considered the centerpiece of the 2011 trade that brought him, forward Brayden Schenn and a second-round draft pick from the Los Angeles Kings in exchange for Flyers forward and former captain Mike Richards.
But these days hockey people are talking about Simmonds as one of the National Hockey League’s top power forwards. To Philadelphia fans, the hard-working wing is pure Flyer, especially after he notched Gordie Howe hat tricks – a goal, an assist, and a fight – in February 2013 games against the Pittsburgh Penguins and Winnipeg Jets.
And he’s adding more dimensions to his game, proving he’s more than just a big body player who makes a living scoring close-in goals off rebounds and screens.
“The one area I think he’s improved and he’s starting to establish himself is the Rush game,” Flyers Head CoachCraig Berube told The Los Angeles Times last month. “He’s skating with the puck and doing more things off the rush, a few goals off the rush.”
Sunday’s empty-netter offered a perfect – and timely – example.
