Maple Leafs great George Armstrong dead at 90

TORONTO — George Armstrong, who played more games than any other Maple Leaf and was captain of their last four Stanley Cup teams, died Sunday morning at age 90 the team said in a statement.

“George is the part of the very fabric of the Leafs organization and will be deeply missed,” club president Brendan Shanahan said. “A proud yet humble man, he loved being a Leaf, but never sought the spotlight.”

Indeed, in his later years Armstrong kept his distance from being recognized as others were in public ceremonies, though he often got together with former teammates on social occasions. As a long-time Leafs and Quebec Nordiques scout, he was a constant presence around various arenas. He was also coach and parttime general manager of the Leafs in the 1980s at the behest of owner Harold Ballard.

Armstrong was honoured with a statue on Legends Row outside of the then-Air Canada Centre (now named the Scotiabank Arena), but declined to read his full speech, which was to have ended “Hockey is a great game and I love it. I am part of a fading generation that you will never have again. Every one of us is one of a kind that will never be repeated.”

In the ensuing years, Red Kelly, Johnny Bower and Eddie Shack have passed.

After the last Toronto championship in 1967, several Leafs were either claimed in the expansion draft, retired or traded, but Armstrong stayed on to complete 1,187 games remaining the franchise leader in many longevity categories.

Armstrong was known almost universally by his nickname “Chief,” a nod to his Indigenous heritage. He was born to a Scottish-Canadian father and part-Ojibway mother outside Sudbury, Ont., his birthplace in 1930 listed as Skead.

His father worked as a miner in Falconbridge, though Armstrong often talked about attending the same Sudbury high school as Copper Cliff's Tim Horton, a future teammate. Armstrong left school in Grade 11 to pursue hockey.

His father played soccer and his mother was a canoeist of note, but athletics weren't his strong point as a youngster. He began as an awkward skater, which his father linked to a childhood bout of spinal meningitis, before blossoming as a player in his mid-teens, joining Horton on the Copper Cliff Redmen in 1946-47.

A Leaf scout spotted Armstrong, but as he was underage, his mother had to sign his first contract. Toronto placed the 6-foot-1 right winger with a junior team in Stratford for a year and then brought him to the junior Toronto Marlboroughs, where he had 62 points and was a league MVP. As a Marlie senior, his team won the 1950 Allan Cup, during which he had 38 playoff points, summoned earlier that season to the parent Leafs. On Dec. 3, 1949, a game headlined by all-star goalie Turk Broda's return from a team suspension for being overweight, Armstrong debuted in a 2-0 win over the Rangers.

Dave Keon, who played on those Toronto teams and followed Armstrong as captain, said Sunday: “He will be missed. A great teammate, a great captain, a great teacher. He was a funny guy to be around, the life of the party. He was the last one of us to carry the Cup off the ice and the last to score a goal in a Cup final.”