Noted Burlington sports writer takes an amusing look at how NHL games should be played starting in January

By DENIS GIBBONS

December 11, 2020

BURLINGTON, ON

Nothing good occurs during a pandemic, yet some of its side effects could bring positive changes.

The NHL, for instance, has decided to create an all-Canadian division for the 2020-21 season so that players do not have to cross the U.S. border, potentially leading to a spread of the COVID-19 virus.

The Calgary Flames, Edmonton Oilers, Montreal Canadiens, Ottawa Senators, Toronto Maple Leafs, Vancouver Canucks and Winnipeg Jets will play only in their own group.

I’m suggesting they take things a step further and award the Stanley Cup to the champion of the Canadian division.

Only the goals scored by Canadian players should count, except those scored against Canadian goalies, which would not!

However, the goalies who surrendered those goals would issue a coupon entitling the shooter to one free penalty shot.

That shot, if successful, would count as a goal.

Canadian networks, alone, should have the rights to telecast the games. And to steal a page, in reverse, from Donald Trump’s notebook, commercials should promote just Canadian-made products.

Before the season starts in January, each of the seven Canadian clubs would be allowed to draft five Canadian-born players from the rosters of the other 24 American teams. In return, each American club losing a player would be compensated with their choice of either two Europeans or three Americans.

That is deemed to be fair market value, according to the results of the last two Olympics and last two World Cups of Hockey, all of which have been won by Canada.

The champagne, traditionally sipped out of the Cup, would be replaced by Canadian Club whiskey, for those who imbibe. Tee-totallers could use maple syrup harvested from a Canadian bush.

Let’s make this a genuine Canuck Stanley Cup final by having the final series played in Ottawa, the nation’s capital, where the Ottawa Silver Seven defeated the Dawson City Nuggets to win Lord Stanley’s mug in 1905.

Much has been written about the 1905 Stanley Cup Challenge when the Silver Seven played host to the Nuggets, a team with no league that traveled 4,000 miles from the Yukon by dogsled, ship and train to compete for the Cup.

It took them a month and, naturally, exhausted, they suffered humiliating losses by scores of 9-2 and 23-2. One-eyed Frank McGee, who lost the use of his left eye during an amateur game for a local Canadian Pacific Railway team scored 14 goals for Ottawa in the second game.

Sadly, McGee was killed fighting during the First World War in France. He was among the original inductees of the Hockey Hall of Fame in 1945.

Since the Dey’s Rink, which hosted the 1905 games, no longer exists, I recommend the series be played in the ornate Aberdeen Pavilion, the steel and glass structure at Lansdowne Park that was the site of the 1904 Stanley Cup challenge, also won by the Ottawa Silver Seven.

The pavilion was designated a national historic site because it is the only large-scale exhibition building in Canada surviving from the 19th century.

There are plenty of good reasons to exclude American teams from competing for the Stanley Cup.

When the Cup first was awarded to the Montreal Hockey Club in 1893, it was designated for Canadian amateur teams only. That was 24 years before the NHL even began.

Professional clubs did not become eligible to compete for the Cup, which was donated by Canada’s Governor General at the time, Lord Stanley of Preston, until 1906.

Besides Lord Stanley, who was born in England, authorized the construction of an outdoor rink on the grounds of Rideau Hall and was a benefactor of the Ottawa Hockey Club.

Two of his sons, Arthur and Algernon, were teammates of James Creighton on the Rideau Rebels team.

It was Creighton who organized the first official indoor game of hockey at the Victoria Skating Rink in Montreal in 1875.

Lord Stanley’s daughter, Isobel, participated in the first recorded women’s ice hockey match, which took place on the Rideau rink on February 10, 1891.

This old blusterball welcomes the comments of all readers of The Burlington Gazette.

Denis Gibbons, a former editor of the Burlington Post has written frequently about hockey at both a local and international level.  He learned to speak Russian at McMaster University and served as a translator during several of the international contest.

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