Seattle Totems Beat The Soviets


I added this program of the Seattle Totems from the Western Hockey League to the Den recently. It's from a game in March 1974 but pictures a terrific cover shot of the Totems playing the Soviet National team. Gennady Tsyganov is shown battling Seattle forward Dave Wisener.

The game took place on January 5, 1974 when the touring Soviet National team rolled into Seattle, Washington. In lieu of playing NHL teams due to financial problems, the Russians toured through the Western Hockey League. Having already beaten Phoenix, San Diego and Portland as well as trouncing Seattle 9-4 just over a year prior, this last game of their tour was expected to be a cake-walk.

The Totems who would not even make the playoffs in this the last ever season of the WHL somehow surprised the Soviets with a convincing 8-4 win. This Soviet squad was pretty much the same one that Team Canada had narrowly beaten 15 months before. Vladislav Tretiak was in net for them on this night and Soviet goals were tallied by none other than Boris Mikhailov, Valery Kharlamov, Alexsandr Yakushev and Alexsandr Bodunov. All were veterans of the Summit Series and the first three scorers along with Tretiak may very well be the four greatest Russian players ever.

On this night however, they were no match for the Totems. Seattle's line of Wisener, Dave Westner and Don Westbrooke scored five of the eight goals with Westbrooke earning the ONLY hat-trick ever by a North American player against the Soviets. This threesome would play exactly zero National Hockey League games over their combined careers.

The Soviets fired 49 shots on the Seattle goaltending duo of Bruce Bullock and Dan Brady while Tretiak was aerated for 8 goals on 31 shots. Bullock was a Vancouver Canuck in their inaugural NHL season playing 16 games over three seasons with a 4.79 GAA, Brady never made The Show.

Of course a mere three months after losing in Seattle, the Soviets would capture their thirteenth World Championship allowing only 18 goals over the 10 games of the tournament.


Comments

Unknown said…
Bring back the Wester league
December 14, 2020 at 10:33 PM
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Team Canada 1972, What Might have Been

Image
Guy Lafleur, if he had played in the 72 Summit Series "No way. Can you imagine what our fans would say if we allowed Bobby Orr and Phil Esposito to play for Canada in that series and either...suffered an injury that might prevent them from playing with us for a year or more?" This was the concern of Weston Adams Jr, president of the Boston Bruins as quoted on April 20, 1972. After being speculated and discussed since February 1972 at the Olympics in Sapporo Japan, the series was set to go. Early on however, controversy stirred as to who exactly would be representing Canada. Bruins GM, Milt Schmidt agreed with his boss saying, "My only interest would be to see the Russians play the Bruins for the world championship...or whatever team wins the Stanley Cup." In the Vancouver Sun a few days later, the legendary Jim Coleman responds to the American naysayers suggesting that Team Canada should be made up strictly of players from Toronto Maple Leafs and Montreal
Read more

WHA Ottawa Civics, The Two Week Franchise

Image
Tom Earl, Daryl Maggs, Mark Lomenda, Gary MacGregor, Garry Swain "Please let the fans make up their own minds," Henry Feller told a press gathering. "Let them decide if they want pro hockey here. We have to average 7,000 or 8,000 in the remaining 19 home games for a break-even point." Feller was a director of the Founders Club who had interest in buying the WHA's Denver Spurs club. Ivan Mullinex, owner of the Spurs had brought his team to Ottawa in an attempt to drum up interest and save his investment. The date was January 2, 1976 and Mullinex was in debt to a Denver bank to the tune of $1 million dollars. This same day, the newly christened Civics lost their first game under the new moniker by a score of 2-1 at Cincinnati. Star of the team, Ralph Backstrom said after the game, "Our first official notice of the move hit us when we entered the Cincinnati rink and the names on the big scoreboard read: Stingers and Civics. Until that moment we were un
Read more

Denman Arena, Vancouver - "The Pile"

Image
Situated at the corner of Denman and Georgia Streets in Vancouver, sitting on the shore of Coal Harbour, the Denman Arena was once the largest in the world. Built in 1911 by Frank and Lester Patrick at a cost of $300,000 it was the main venue for their newly formed Pacific Coast Hockey Association. Until the Montreal Forum was built in 1926, it was the largest artificial ice arena in the world seating 10,500. Constructed of wood and brick, the large brick facing led Vancouverites to refer to it as The Pile. The Patrick brothers simultaneously built the 3,500 seat Patrick Arena in Victoria to help house their three team league which also included New Westminster. They would proceed to raid the established National Hockey Association of much of it’s top talent to stock their teams. The Pile would host the Vancouver Millionaires Stanley Cup championship in March, 1915, boxing matches featuring Max Baer and “Cinderella Man” James Braddock, movie star Rudolph Valentino as well as bicycle r
Read more