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Remembering MacDonald's Magical Season |
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It’s said of the great players that they have the ability to raise the game of those who surround them, and the evidence of such is there throughout hockey history.
Dave Lumley netted 32 goals skating on Wayne Gretzky’s wing with the 1981-82 Edmonton Oilers. Lumley scored as many as 20 goals just one other time as an NHLer. Warren Young was a 40-goal sniper playing with rookie center Mario Lemieux for the 1984-85 Pittsburgh Penguins.
The Detroit Red Wings foolishly signed Young to a huge free-agent deal in the summer of 1985 and minus Lemieux’s magic, his goal production plummeted to 22.
Really, the Wings should have known better, considering how many linemates Gordie Howe turned into scoring machines over his 25 seasons in Detroit.
Earl (Dutch) Reibel led the Wings in scoring with 66 points in 1954-55 while skating as Howe’s center. Gary Aldcorn potted 22 goals playing with Howe in 1959-60. He’d never account for more than 10 goals in any of his other NHL campaigns.
Perhaps Howe’s most spectacular reclamation project, though, was left-winger Parker MacDonald. MacDonald, who died Friday at the age of 84 in Northford, Ct., was a journeyman pro when the Wings acquired him in 1960. The Wings were MacDonald’s seventh pro team and third NHL stop, and he wasn’t an immediate hit.
MacDonald scored 14 goals in 1960-61, but split the following campaign between the Wings and AHL Hershey, accounting for five goals in Detroit. MacDonald had scored in the minor leagues, twice potting 35 or more goals in the AHL, and Detroit coach-GM Sid Abel hatched an idea to see if he could find a way to transfer MacDonald’s scoring touch to the NHL.
On the verge of sending MacDonald back to the minors when training camp broke in the fall of 1962, Abel instead decided to give him the chance to play on Detroit’s top line with Howe and center Alex Delvecchio, and almost immediately, the trio clicked.
MacDonald collected four goals and seven points in the Wings’ first eight games. In early November, he was the NHL scoring leader.
“On another line, Parker may be less than ordinary,” Abel remarked at the time. “But the three of them together is a happy marriage.”
They finished with 193 points, the most of any NHL forward line that season, and MacDonald ended 11th in league scoring with 33-28-61 totals.
Almost as quickly as he found this elixir, it drained from MacDonald’s grasp. He dropped to 21 goals in 1963-64 and 13 in 1964-65, and with the boo birds on his back, Abel opted to ship MacDonald to Boston.
The Wings reacquired MacDonald during the 1965-66 season, but he scored just eight goals for Detroit over the next two seasons and was left unprotected and claimed by the Minnesota North Stars in the 1967 NHL expansion draft.
He never came close to equaling that glorious 1962-63 season, but for one campaign at least, MacDonald was the toast of Hockeytown.
Chelios Named
Red Wings assistant coach and former Detroit defenseman Chris Chelios was announced as one of the two coaches for USA Hockey’s All-American Prospects Game, which will feature 42 of the top American-born prospects eligible for the 2018 NHL entry draft.
The game is slated for Sept. 21 at the KeyBank Center, home of the Buffalo Sabres.
Howard Grounded
Even in the off-season, the Wings aren’t enjoying much in the way of good fortune.
Friday, Detroit goaltender Jimmy Howard was slated to go for a ride along with the U.S. Air Force Thunderbirds jet team in an F-16 Fighting Falcon this as part of Team Selfridge’s 100th Anniversary celebration at Selfridge Air National Guard Base in Harrison Township, Mich.
Unfortunately for Howard, the chance to fly in a fighter jet was canceled at the last minute and could not be rescheduled.
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