Reference Page Wednesday #16

Old-timey nicknames are incredible.

The NHL season has started and the Seattle Kraken are officially a team. Because of that, it’s hockey that gets the roulette treatment this week.

Toronto Maple Leafs at Chicago Black Hawks Box Score — February 3, 1932

The page for this game is pretty barren. Aside from the standard scoring summary and penalty summary, the only other information on the page is the roster for each team. It doesn’t give us much in the way of topics to dig into related to this specific game. Sure, the 1931-32 Toronto Maple Leafs won the Stanley Cup at the end of the season, but that doesn’t have much to do with this game. Looking through the rosters though, I got a better idea. Since it’s a game from 1932, the list of names reads like the “Tungsten Arm O’Doyle” meme. Each one is better than the last. Here’s the Maple Leafs:

And here’s the Black Hawks:

Instead of talking about this game like a normal person, I’m gonna rank my 10 favorite names of players who played in this game and give one interesting piece of info on those players.

Top 10 Players on February 3, 1932 (Based on Name):

Honorable Mention: Paul Thompson - Okay, real quick, one note about the actual game. Paul has a very boring name, but he scored 4 goals in this game, the final 3 of which constituted a natural hat trick. He scored in every period. It was the only time in his career that he scored 4 goals and it was half of his entire goal total for the 1931-32 season (in 48 games).

10. Frank Finnigan - It’s not the MOST interesting, but I’m a sucker for alliterative names. He also gets bonus points for being nicknamed “The Shawville Express.” Frank is most famously associated with the Ottawa Senators. The only reason he is on the Maple Leafs for this game is because the Senators suspended operations for the 1931-32 season. After winning the Cup, Frank returned to the Senators. He would later score the final goal of the franchise before it left Ottawa to become the St Louis Eagles. When the new Ottawa Senators came into existence in 1992, his jersey was retired by the team despite having never technically played for the new franchise (one of three players in NHL history to have his uniform retired by a team for which he never actually played).

9. Cy Wentworth - This a fantastic old time name and is also not even his real name. Marvin Wentworth was nicknamed Cyclone, which was later shortened to Cy. He was the captain of Chicago this season and one of the best defensive players in the league. He also assisted Paul Thompson on two of his goals, the only player in the game with multiple assists.

8. Georges Boucher - I like this name because it looks like his parents thought there might be more of him so they gave him a plural name. He is the first of 5 different Hall of Famers to make my list because if you played in Toronto during this era, you were already 80% of the way to getting elected to the Hall. His nickname was Buck, and I think Buck Boucher is a slightly better name (again, alliterations). Georges had 3 brothers that also played professional hockey. Billy and Bobby Boucher (better names but worse at hockey) and Frank Boucher (worse name but much better at hockey).

   

7. Vic Ripley - Vic Ripley is like a stock action hero name. It’s the lead character of a B-list karate movie from the 80’s starring Jean-Claude Van Damme. It’s also this hockey player from the 30’s. After this season, Vic would be traded to the Boston Bruins (the first of 3 trades within 20 months for Vic). During the 37 games he spent in Boston, he would score the 1,000th goal in Bruins franchise history. It was the only goal scored by Boston that night as they lost 4-1 to the Maple Leafs.

6. Hap Day - Clarence Henry Day went as “Happy” and later just Hap. Hap was named captain of the Toronto Maple Leafs in 1926, his 3rd season. He was the first captain in Maple Leafs’ history and his 11 year captaincy would be the 2nd longest (only to George Armstrong). He would form one half of the best defensive pairing in the NHL with another player on this list. After his playing days, he went on to coach Toronto, leading the team to 259 wins (2nd most in team history) and 5 Stanley Cups in 10 years. He would win a 7th Cup as GM of the in 1951, where he remained until being publicly embarrassed by the team owner.

5. Mush March - Harold March was apparently “nicknamed for the old Dick Tracy cartoon villain Mush Mouth.” Sure. Mush was a short king, playing 17 years in the league at just 5’5”. He is most famous for scoring the Cup-clinching 2nd overtime goal in Game 4 of the 1934 Stanley Cup Finals for the Chicago Black Hawks. He also scored the first goal ever at Maple Leaf Gardens in 1931.

4. Ace Bailey - Irvine Wallace Bailey got the nickname Ace, which is a perfect for a high-flying goal scorer in the NHL. This sniper was a machine, leading the league in goals in 1929 with… 22 goals in 44 games. This was a lot! That season he finished 2nd in MVP voting to Wood Report favorite, Roy “Shrimp” Worters. Ace is the fist play to have his jersey retired in professional sports. After a career-ending hit, the league hosted an all-star benefit game for him and his family. This became the impetus for the creation of the annual All-Star game in the NHL.

3. Busher Jackson - Here’s the story of Harvey Jackson’s nickname:

   “Jackson earned his nickname from Leafs trainer Tim Daly. One day the surly trainer asked the rookie to help carry some sticks to the Leafs bench. “I’m not here to carry sticks,” snapped Jackson. “I’m here to play hockey.” Daly snapped back, “Why, you’re nothing but a fresh young busher,” and the nickname stuck.”

   It’s very quintessential old-timey. But Busher was right. He was there to play hockey. He led the league in scoring this season, with 28 goals and 53 points. He was the youngest scoring champion in NHL history, a title he held until a young lad named Wayne Gretzky beat him out in 1981. He once scored 4 goals in a single period, a feat that has only been matched 11 times. And he was later traded to New York for an unprecedented 5 players in return.

2. Baldy Cotton - I don’t really know how to feel about this nickname because Baldy was decidedly not bald.

   

   But it’s still a fantastic name. Somehow, it was so good that it became a spoil of war. Lawrence Northcott earned the nickname Baldy himself when he beat Baldy Cotton in a fight. I did not know nicknames were transferrable in that fashion.

1. King Clancy - The king of the ice and the king of this list, King Clancy. Francis Clancy’s nickname originated from his father, the OG King Clancy. The first King Clancy was a football player for the Ottawa Rough Riders, and was so good at heeling the ball (done instead of snapping) that he became known as “King of the Heelers”. That name was then passed down to his son, Frank, who went on to became one of the best hockey players of all time. King was the other half of the Leafs’ top defensive pair with Hap that powered this team to a Stanley Cup. King would finish in the top 5 of MVP voting 5 times. After his death, the league created the King Clancy Memorial Trophy, awarded annually to “the player who best exemplifies leadership qualities on and off the ice and who has made a significant humanitarian contribution to his community.”

That’s 10 elite sports names in just 1 game from the 30’s. The league was littered with awesome and ridiculous nicknames for basically every player. I would love to hear what broadcasters could do with these names while calling games.

Don’t forget to share and argue my rankings in the comments.

And that’s the story of Toronto Maple Leafs at Chicago Black Hawks Box Score. Sorta.

Keep Sports Fun.

Colin

Twitter - @ColinRingwood12