| HOUSTON -
The Cincinnati Stingers went to Birmingham for Thanksgiving. They expected to play a
hockey game but ran into a mugging instead. While a man of the cloth read an invocation, a
quarter of Birmingham Bulls stood on the ice waiting to do some punching. That starting
lineup included Gilles (Bad News) Bilodeau, Frank eaton, Steve Durbano, Bob Stephenson and
former Stinger Serge Beaudoin. A real wrecking crew. It only took 24 seconds to start a
full-scale brawl, and before the game had ended with the Bulls winning, 12-2, the Stingers
had been thoroughly intimidated and physically abused. As deplorable as the situation was
the Bulls and their coach, Glen Sonmor, don't take all the blame. The Stingers must accept
a little and the World Hockey Association can shoulder its share. The Stingers let the word get out that their own bad boy, Willie Trognitz,
would be ready for any trouble. With the lineup of goons the Bulls now sport, that's like
waving red. If you go into a bar and say you can lick any man in the house, somebody's
going to try you. Birmingham made no pretense of playing hockey before a wild home crowd.
The Bulls went out to push Cincinnati around and they did their job well, scoring
practically at will in the third period with Cincinnati cowed in submission. Stinger
center Rich Leduc said afterward, "I was skating for my life out there. The sticks
were flying and it was just survival."
Stinger coach Jacques Demers under pressure with a losing record and
concerned about his wife, Linda, confined in a Cincinnati hospital with an illness still
not diagnosed, finally went off the deep end in the second period. After Beaton and Gilles
Marotte tangles, Marotte coming up with double penalties to give the Bulls another power
play (they scored five power play goals) the coach erupted. Demers pitched about 20 hockey
sticks from the bench onto the ice, then jumped out himself to go after referee Peter
Moffat. He was restrained by his players and was ejected. But on the way to the dressing
room he tried to go into the stands after a fan who dumped a drink on him, then even
shoved a security guard in the tunnel leading from the ice. "I don't know who the guy
was and when he came at me I shoved him, said Demers. "I found out he was some kind
of guard and I apologized to him."
Demers faces a fine and there is the possibility of a suspension,
but he is ready to take what comes. "What I did may call for suspension, and I'll
have to accept it," he said. "I just couldn't take any more." It's ironic
that the Bulls' tactics were so similar to the Stingers of three yeas ago. When the
Stingers entered the league, they were known as goons and even caused a boycott by
Winnipeg's Bobby Hull in protest over the rough tactics of the team and coach Terry
Slater.
On the flight from Birmingham to Houston, the Stingers players
talked about the need to recruit bruisers to patrol the ice and retaliate if things got
rough. That brings the WHA right back where it was before the stiffer fighting penalties
were introduced last year. Demers called the fiasco in Birmingham "A disgrace to
hockey" but it reflects directly on the WHA Bulls owner John Bassett, faced with a
franchise that spent a lot of money for hockey players and finished last every year, chose
to go another route. The fans in Birmingham like the Bulls' brawling style and that means
Bassett has full houses for his hockey games. Viewed from that angle, playing goons is
just good business. But it isn't hockey.
The weak-sister WHA office is against the wall now. If Birmingham is
permitted to intimidate other teams, those teams will hire their own goons and every game
will be D-Day at Normandy. Blaming referee Moffatt for allowing the game to get out of
control is easy, especially if you're the loser. But the league must back up its
officiating crew and let the teams know violence won't be tolerated on the ice. Otherwise,
the WHA can hardly expect to be favorably compared to the National Hockey League. |
