The book spends some time talking about Stevie Y's time with the Petes in the OHL and his coach rolling four lines. It turned out to be a good thing later in his career. The author mentions John Tucker a local Windsor boy and also Mike Illich’s Macedonian roots. I am sure that makes my wife happy. The NHL draft in 1983 had lots of hoopla with 3 US born players being selected in top 5 with Lawton going one, Lafontaine three (from the Detroit area) and Barrasso fifth. Not much fanfare for Stevie Y going fourth. Yzerman eventually became a 50 goal scorer and with that he tossed the puck over the boards to the fans. Coach Demers had to go in the stands and get the puck back from a fan and promised him an autographed stick.
As he progressed, the best players in the league were Wayne Gretzky, Mark Messier and Mario Lemieux. But in 1989 Stevie Y won the Pearson award which is voted upon by the NHLPA. The book spent some time talking about the Wings coaches and told me a morsel I never heard. In 1979 Scotty Bowman turn down a contract that would’ve given him 10% of the Washington Capitals organization instead he decided to coach the MontrĂ©al Canadiens. Yes he got many rings out of that but could you imagine owning 10% of a hockey franchise now.
Another mention in the book who had ties to Windsor was Bob Boughner and he was described as nothing special. The 89 draft Detroit was set up so well with the Russians . They almost got themselves Pavel Bure at 95th but they were told he was ineligible and then Vancouver picked him at 113th and the wings were gonna grab him anyways at 116th. Too bad for the wings but I was living in Vancouver then and got to watch him play in his freshman year and he was outstanding. Just before the 95-96 season they mentioned that Windsor was a city where trade talks between Detroit and Ottawa took place for Yzerman. Ottawa wanted their hometown son back and also wanted to unload Alexei Yashin’s contract. Good thing it never happened as we know what happens in the end. Don’t want to spoil the ending lol. On a final note the book also mentioned that Worlds were cancelled in 2003 due to The SARS epidemic. Imagine that.
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