CAPITALS ON TOP NOW, BUT BACK THEN ...
Washington might be swept up in the excitement surrounding the Capitals’ capturing their first Stanley Cup, but one of the players dating back to D.C.’S dog days of hockey has his own special memories.
“I don’t watch a lot of hockey,” says Tony White. “Maybe a little every now and again.”
It’s not that White, the former NHLER from Grand Falls-windsor, loathes the game, but it’s changed since he last played in the 70s, and he’s not a big fan of today’s product.
“It’s a bit of a track meet now,” White said. “You flip the puck in and out and you chase it down. The guys today are so fast.
“But that’s the evolution of the game. Everything now is 100 miles per hour, and if it’s not that fast, it doesn’t work.”
White, a Newfoundland and Labrador Hockey Hall of Famer, was the fourth player from this province to play in the NHL (behind Alex Faulkner, Joe Lundrigan and Doug Grant), appearing in five games for the Caps during their inaugural 1974-75 season.
“I loved playing hockey, and I wanted to play in the NHL … That said, the losing was tough to take. Even though I was 21, with lots of energy, constantly losing like that is not a great thing to go through.”
Lundrigan made three starts for the Caps that season, marking the first time two Newfoundlanders played for the same NHL team in the same season.
And what a year that was. Washington managed only eight wins that season, setting the standard for fewest victories in a single NHL season.
White secured fulltime NHL employment the next year, appearing in all 80 games for Washington and enjoying a banner season with 25 goals and 42 points.
Those totals stood as the best single-season NHL performance by a player from this province until Michael Ryder came along and tallied 25 goals and 63 points as a Montreal Canadiens’ rookie in 2003-04.
But it was otherwise another frustrating season for the Capitals, who could muster only 11 victories, fewest in the league. The equally hapless Kansas City Scouts had 12 wins that year.
“With the first 25 games of the season, you’re just trying to get your feet under you. The next 25 kind of determines what your year will be like. And when you’re still losing 25 games after that, well, it can wear on you,” said White, 64, a retired firefighter in Vancouver.
White played virtually all of 1976-77 in Washington as well, but his production dropped off to 12 goals and 21 points in 72 games.
He spent the next year in the American Hockey League, with the Hershey Bears, with one game in Washington, and all of 1978-79 with Springfield of the AHL.
A free agent, White hoped for a new start when he signed with the Minnesota North Stars. But the Stars had just merged with the Cleveland Barons, and any available jobs in Minny evaporated.
He would appear in six games with Minnesota, spent two seasons with Oklahoma City of the Central Hockey League before winding up his career with a couple of seasons in Germany.
White liked his time in Europe, and is planning a retirement vacation back there soon.
As for D.C., he’s never been back to the U.S. capital since his playing days.