1983 MEMORIAL CUP
Portland Winter Hawks, Lethbridge Broncos, Oshawa Generals and Verdun Junior
at Portland (Memorial Coliseum)
And then there were four.
Beginning with 1983, the Memorial Cup would be decided using a four-team round-robin format.
Officials had decided to allow a host team automatic entry.
"This format, with a home-team as a participant, is the only economical salvation for the Memorial Cup tournament,” Brian Shaw, general manager of the WHL's Portland Winter Hawks, explained. "You can't play in buildings with only 2,000 or 3,000 fans, considering the cost of bringing in teams.”
(Ironically, that is exactly what would happen in the spring of 1994 in Laval, Que., and the Canadian Hockey League immediately began exploring the possibilities of returning to a best-of-seven Memorial Cup final featuring East versus West.)
But, for now, it was a four-team event and the first one would be played in Portland's Memorial Coliseum, meaning the Winter Hawks would be the first host team.
Major junior hockey was in for the time of its life as the Winter Hawks sold more than 6,500 eight-game ticket packages.
There was no denying that Portland was the most successful major junior franchise in North America.
"We are successful because of our people,” Shaw said. "We're a family that has stayed together for seven years.
"There has been virtually no turnover, from the general manager to the coach to the scouts to the trainer. We've been here from Day 1 -- July 21, 1976. We all share in everything.”
The 1982-83 edition of the Winter Hawks would go on to write one of the more intriguing stories in Memorial
It became the first team to win the Memorial Cup without winning a league championship, the first host team in a Memorial Cup tournament and the first host team to win it all.
(During the week, Verdun Junior centre Pat LaFontaine would become the first American player named the Canadian Hockey League's player of the year. He would repeat his acceptance speech in French, for which he drew a rousing salute from his teammates. And when it was over, Portland centre Alfie Turcotte would be the first American player named the tournament's most valuable player.)
And Portland, under coach Ken Hodge, won the Memorial Cup with a goaltender who never played one WHL regular-season or playoff game in a Winter Hawks uniform.
Still, if you were going to pick a host team, well, it was tough to go against the Winter Hawks.
They may not have won the WHL championship, but they did get to the final.
Their 50-22-0 regular-season record was the best in the West Division and second only to the Saskatoon Blades (52-19-1) in the WHL. And the Winter Hawks set a WHL record by scoring 495 goals.
The Winter Hawks swept the Seattle Breakers in four games in an opening-round playoff series and then won the West Division championship by ousting the Victoria Cougars in five games.
Portland lost the championship final in five games to the Lethbridge Broncos, a team that caught fire in the playoffs after a 38-31-3 regular-season record left them fifth in the East Division.
Seven Portland players had 100 or more points -- Ken Yaremchuk (160), Randy Heath (151), Alfie Turcotte (127), 17-year-old right-winger Cam Neely (120), Grant Sasser (119), team captain Richard Kromm (103), whose father, Bobby, coached the Trail Smoke Eaters to the world championship in 1961, and defenceman Brad Duggan (100). Ray Ferraro had 90 points in 50 games.
There were nine 20-goal scorers on that 1982-83 Portland team that averaged almost seven goals a game. On defence, the Hawks gave up the incredible total of 387 goals (almost 5.5 goals a game) -- only the 1988-89 Winter Hawks were able to finish on top of a division and surrender more goals (395).
Portland goaltender Bruno Campese went into the 1983 Memorial Cup with a 5.45 goals-against average in the regular season. In the postseason, that figure was an incredible 5.75. Ian Wood, Campese's backup, had his season ended by a neck injury in the playoffs.
Portland added goaltender Mike Vernon from the Calgary Wranglers and he would play in three games, including the final.
Lethbridge, under head coach John Chapman, got off to a dismal start and was 12-23-2 halfway through the regular season. The Broncos, however, put together a 26-8-1 finish and were on a roll going into the playoffs.
Lethbridge had scored 211 fewer goals than had Portland. But the Broncos had also allowed 116 fewer goals.
Centre Doug Kyle was the Broncos' leading scorer. His 103 points, including 47 goals, left him tied for 26th in the WHL scoring race.
Next in line on the Broncos was Ivan Krook, with 88 points.
The Sutter twins -- Ron and Rich -- combined for 72 goals and 150 points, but it was their character that meant so much to this team.
Other forwards like J.C. McEwan and Troy Loney brought grit to the lineup.
On defence, there were the likes of Mark Tinordi, Bob Rouse, Darcy Kaminski, Gerald Diduck and Marty Ruff.
And in goal there was Ken Wregget, who had a 3.49 GA, second to Vernon's 3.26 during the regular season. Unfortunately, the Broncos wouldn't have Wregget's services in the Memorial Cup tournament after he injured an ankle in the last game of the WHL final.
In the playoffs, the Broncos simply got on a roll.
Led by Ron Sutter, who would top all playoff scorers in goals (22) and points (41), the Broncos swept a best-of-five first-round series from the Winnipeg Warriors, then eliminated Saskatoon in six and Calgary in six.
In the WHL final, the Broncos took out the Winter Hawks in five games.
And, yes, familiarity does breed contempt.
By the time the teams arrived in Portland, there wasn't any love lost between the Winter Hawks and the Broncos.
Oshawa, meanwhile, had finished third in the OHL's Leyden Division, with a 45-22-3 record.
The Generals, of head coach Paul Theriault, had also been through a roller-coaster of a season. They opened with left-winger Tony Tanti and defenceman Joe Cirella, both of whom were expected to be in the NHL, on their roster. Left-winger Dave Andreychuk, though, was with the Buffalo Sabres.
Eventually, Andreychuk was returned and the Generals put together a 24-game unbeaten string.
Then came the world junior tournament, with Andreychuk, Cirella and Tanti joining Team Canada. Only Cirella returned, as Andreychuk went back to Buffalo and Tanti ended up with the Vancouver Canucks.
"For a month and a half, we were at rock bottom,” Theriault said. "It was the lowest point of the season
"We had to change our style completely. By the middle of February, we started to win. We began believing we could win.”
Up front, the team was led by right-winger John MacLean, who totalled 98 points, including 47 goals, and Dave Gans. In the postseason, MacLean and Gans totalled 37 points each.
The best of Oshawa's defencemen was Cirella, the team captain. He had played 65 games with the NHL's Colorado Rockies in 1981-82. Back in Oshawa for 1982-83, he had 55 assists and 68 points in 56 games.
And the Generals, who allowed 255 regular-season goals, relied heavily on goaltender Peter Sidorkiewicz. He was 36-20-3 with a 3.61 GAA in the regular season. In the postseason, he won 15 of 16 decisions and posted a 3.53 GAA.
The Generals, in winning their first OHL championship since 1965-66 when Bobby Orr was the star attraction, swept the Peterborough Petes, got past the Ottawa 67's and then, in the final, swept the Sault Ste. Marie Greyhounds.
Head coach Pierre Creamer's Verdun squad was the first Montreal-area team to win the QMJHL title since the league was formed prior to the 1969-70 season.
The Junior had one star, but oh, what a star he was.
Centre Pat LaFontaine, an 18-year-old from Detroit, had won the QMJHL scoring title with an incredible 234 points. He was also tops in goals (104) and assists (130).
Jean-Maurice Cool was sixth in the scoring race, with 149 points, including 65 goals. Gerard Gallant, who came over from the St. Jean Castors in a trade, was 10th. He had 128 points, including 54 goals.
Still, Verdun, which scored a league-high 486 goals, didn't have the QMJHL's best record. At 50-19-1, it trailed centre Mario Lemieux and his Laval Voisins (53-17-0) in the Robert Lebel Division, the league having returned to a two-division format. Shawinigan Cataractes were 52-16-2 and on top of the Frank Dilio Division.
Verdun took out the Trois-Rivieres Draveurs in four games in an opening best-of-seven series, and then ousted Shawinigan in six games to reach the final.
That final went six games with the Junior Canadiens finally sidelining the Longueuil Chevaliers, an expansion team under head coach Jacques Lemaire, who had upset Laval in a five-game semifinal series. Verdun played its home games in the final series in the Montreal Forum and drew almost 60,000 fans.
LaFontaine picked up in the playoffs where he had left off in the regular season. In 15 postseason games, he had 35 points, including 11 goals.
There was plenty of bad blood in this tournament, too, most of it between Lethbridge and Portland.
Part of it was due to the fact the Broncos and Winter Hawks had met in the WHL final. Then, too, there was the situation involving Wregget and Vernon.
With Wregget hurt, the Broncos needed a goaltender and wanted Vernon, who had already joined the Winter Hawks as a backup to Campese.
Vernon had been practising with Portland for three days when Lethbridge lost Wregget. Vernon then apparently refused to join the Broncos, something that had Chapman steaming.
"It's garbage that Vernon should be allowed to play for Portland after he turned us down,” Chapman said. "The rules say the league champion gets the first pick when adding a goaltender.”
Chapman, who added goaltender Dave Ross from the Kamloops Junior Oilers, later apologized.
"I was wrong because if Mike Vernon didn't want to play for us, Dave Ross would have rode a bike from New Haven to be in this series,” Chapman said. "I was flogging a dead horse.”
Unfortunately for the Broncos, they were out of this tournament almost before it got started.
One of the problems associated with a four-team tournament was that it had to start on Saturday and one team could be done by Monday.
Which is what happened to Lethbridge.
But we're getting ahead of ourselves . . .
The tournament opened on May 7 with a doubleheader -- 5,735 fans watched Oshawa whip Lethbridge 8-2 and 7,346 fans saw Portland open with a 7-6 victory over Verdun.
Defenceman Norm Schmidt, who was coming off a severe leg injury, and Gans had two goals each for Oshawa, which led 1-0 after one period before outscoring Lethbridge 4-1 in the second. Cirella, Dale DeGray, Dan Gratton and Jeff Steffen also scored for the Generals.
Rich Sutter had both Lethbridge goals.
In the other Saturday game, Portland, with Vernon in goal, took a 4-1 first-period lead and stretched it to 7-2 after two periods. Verdun then struck for four third-period goals but couldn't get the equalizer.
Sasser and Neely had two goals each for the Winter Hawks, with singles coming from Yaremchuk, Heath and Curt Brandolini.
Gallant, with two, Cool, LaFontaine, Jacques Sylvestre and Daniel Roy replied for Verdun, which outshot Portland 44-31.
On May 8, Verdun beat Lethbridge 4-3 in front of 5,764 fans and Portland doubled up on Oshawa 10-5 with 6,070 fans in attendance.
Verdun got two goals from Sylvestre and singles from Gallant and Roy as it took a 4-2 lead into the third period.
Krook pulled the Broncos to within one at 13:45 of the third period but that was as close as they would get.
Again, Rich Sutter scored twice for the Broncos, who outshot Verdun, 47-33.
In the other Sunday game, Oshawa scored the game's first two goals and actually took a 3-2 lead into the second period. The Winter Hawks outscored the Generals 4-2 in the second and then got the only four goals of the third period.
Yaremchuk and Turcotte each had three goals and two assists for Portland, with Heath adding two goals and Kromm and Sasser getting one apiece.
Don Biggs, Schmidt, MacLean, Cirella and Greg Gravel replied for Oshawa.
Just like that, Portland was guaranteed a spot in the final a week hence. And Lethbridge's hopes were done like burnt toast.
"Our motivation last year was to get to the Memorial Cup,” Hodge said. "This year our objective all along has been to win the Memorial Cup.
"We've known for some time that we'd get a bye into this series, so the loss to Lethbridge in the league final wasn't as bad as it seemed. We knew we'd have another chance to prove we're the best junior hockey team in Canada . . . and the United States.”
Lethbridge gained a measure of revenge on May 9 when it hammered the Winter Hawks 9-3 in front of 8,811 fans.
"Tonight, you saw the way our hockey club played and beat Portland in the Western Hockey League final,” Chapman said. "I think we showed the other two teams, if they were watching, how to beat Portland with good forechecking.”
Ron Sutter scored three times for the Broncos, with Kyle scoring twice. Singles came from Ruff, McEwan, Rouse and Loney.
Terry Jones, Turcotte and Heath scored for the Winter Hawks.
"You can compare Yaremchuk and Ron Sutter all you want,” Chapman said. "In head-to-head competition over the five-game final Sutter outscored Yaremchuk 12-1. That should tell you why it wouldn't have mattered if he played tonight or not.”
The Ron Sutter versus Yaremchuk siuation had turned into something of a sideshow.
Yaremchuk had taunted several of the Broncos after they were beaten by Verdun. After that came reports that Yaremchuk had been threatened by Lethbridge team personnel.
The Winter Hawks knew going into the game against Lethbridge that they would play in the final, so they sat out Yaremchuk and Vernon, claiming both were injured, the former with a sore thigh, the latter with a sore neck.
"We're the better team and we've proved it by winning five of the last six games against Portland,” Chapman continued.
As for Hodge, he said: "Yaremchuk is vital to our team and it was my decision, not anyone else's, to rest him. Players threaten other players every game in junior hockey. It's a fact of life.
"Verbal intimidation had nothing to do with sitting out Yaremchuk. I'm proud of the effort by my team. They also played with a lot of class under the circumstances.”
In the end, the Broncos didn't get much support from the fans.
"We showed a lot of class tonight by playing good, sound hockey and not getting into any brawls,” Chapman offered. "It's too bad the Portland fans weren't the same. They should remember that we're from the west, too, and represent the same league.”
None of this sat very well with WHL president Ed Chynoweth.
"I'm disappointed that this sort of thing happened because we're putting on a good showcase here,” Chynoweth said.
All of this meant that Oshawa and Verdun would play the tournament's next two games -- the first would be the final round-robin game, the second would be the semifinal game.
The Generals won the first of those games 5-1 on May 10 before 5,764 fans. The game featured 40 penalties totalling 141 minutes.
"Verdun won quite handily in the Quebec league,” Theriault said. "I don't think intimidation is a very sound game plan.
"We were a better team tonight than Verdun, but we'll have to prove again Thursday that we're the better team.”
The Generals spent much of the night trying to soften up Verdun.
"It's been our observation that Verdun has a lot of speed,” Theriault said. "If you give them the ice, they're going to burn you.
"The reason we're here is because we're a good checking team. When you play a team like that, if you don't finish your checks and cut their ice down, they're going to beat you.
"That means being physical on the puck, physical along the boards and in the corners. If we're not going to beat them in the middle, we have to beat them along the boards and in the corners.”
Gravel, Dave Gans, Todd Hooey, MacLean and Todd Charlesworth scored for Oshawa, with LaFontaine getting Verdun's lone goal.
Verdun was hurt by illness -- LaFontaine spent part of the day at a hospital being treated for allergies.
"We beat teams all year in our league who tried to put us out with checking,” Creamer said. "We'll concentrate on scoring more goals Thursday.”
After taking a day off, the two teams met again on May 12, with the winner advancing to the final against Portland.
Again, the Generals were triumphant, this time by a 7-5 count before 5,173 fans.
Oshawa trailed 3-0 and 4-1 in the first period before roaring back to the victory.
"This is something like the 85th game of the season and I can't recall us ever coming out that flat,” Theriault said. "I've never had to concern myself with the players' desire to win.
"Tonight it was a physiological thing. The players wanted to do well, but some of them couldn't. Maybe it's the flu that's been going around, I don't know.
"Between the first and second periods I wrote down the names of the 20 players and tried to find 10, 11 or 12 who could do the job. We went with them, changed our forechecking system and opened up the game. We played it Verdun's way, wide open, and came back.”
Schmidt broke a 5-5 tie at 6:07 of the third period, just 24 seconds after Jean-Pierre Poupart had tied it for Verdun. Gans capped the rally with an empty-net goal.
Dean DeFazio, Gratton, Hooey, Cirella and Dan Nicholson also scored for Oshawa.
Cool, with two, Sylvestre and LaFontaine had Verdun's other goals.
"This was our 95th game and I won't criticize any one player at this stage,” Creamer said. "But we didn't react too well to the pressure when we had the lead.
"Our experienced defencemen didn't play great hockey. Jerome Carrier was named to the all-star team here and he was our fifth defenceman all season. Our other defencemen should have helped him be even better.”
Creamer used goaltender Marc Hamelin, an addition from Shawinigan, in the semifinal game. Earlier in the tournament, he had used his two regular goaltenders, Gilles Heroux and Michel Campeau.
(The all-star team also included Sidorkiewicz, Cirella, Heath, Yaremchuk and MacLean. Gans was named the most sportsmanlike player and Vernon was the top goaltender.)
The final game, on May 14, belonged to the Winter Hawks. Paced by Neely's three goals, they thrilled 9,527 howling fans with an 8-3 victory over Oshawa.
It was somehow only fitting that Turcotte, a native of Holt, Mich., should be named the tournament's most valuable player. After all, it was the 65th year of the Memorial Cup -- and it was the first time it had been played in the United States and the first time an American team had won it.
The Winter Hawks had one other American player in their lineup -- Sasser was from Portland.
"I felt today, with the fans chanting ‘U.S.A., U.S.A.', just like it was 1980 again,” Turcotte said after he scored one goal and set up another in the victory that included four power-play goals. "I remember watching the Olympics on television from Lake Placid and getting a spine-tingling feeling when the Americans won the gold medal.
"This is the same kind of feeling, in a way, because it's the fans who got us going. They deserve the Memorial Cup and the players were happy to give it to them today.”
"This,” Hodge stated, "is a history-making day for everyone connected with the Portland organization. We wanted to win it for our fans -- and ourselves.”
While Neely had three goals, his linemates didn't do too badly either -- Heath had a goal and two assists, Yaremchuk had three assists.
"We're mostly a Canadian team playing in an American city,” Curran said. "But just as much was 20 guys deserved to win this tournament, those 9,500 people deserved it, too.”
Kromm, Hubbard and Ferraro scored Portland's other goals.
"There's no doubt that this is the biggest moment of my career,” Kromm said. "We had one chance to do it . . . and we did it.”
DeGray, MacLean and Hooey scored for Oshawa.
Cirella, who tied with Heath and Yaremchuk for the tournament scoring lead with 11 points, offered: "They beat us twice here so they deserve to be champions. The better team won today, but in our hearts we're still winners.”
Oshawa general manager Sherry Bassin said the Winter Hawks "kicked our buns twice and were the best team in the tournament.”
When all was said and done, Shaw revealed that the tournament's eight games had drawn 54,090 fans.
The Memorial Cup was, indeed, growing up.
"Everybody knew going in that Portland had a bye going into the series,” said WHL president Ed Chynoweth. "How can anybody think it's embarrassing to have the crowds we've had here?
"I think we're very fortunate that it's worked out this well. This is an event, a happening, a financial success.”
Shaw said: "Most of the general managers and officials I've talked to like the format, with the possible exception of Lethbridge, and I might feel the same way if I were them.”
Chapman wasn't so sure.
"It could have worked the other way and we'd be in the playoffs,” he said. "We just didn't win at the right time.”
NEXT: 1984 (Kamloops Junior Oilers, Kitchener Rangers, Ottawa 67's and Laval Voisins)