Vintage Lafleur-Lemieux photo a study of stars
Habs fan identifies Pittsburgh superstar in crowd shot
MONTREAL — It is March 4, 1981, and Guy Lafleur is standing at the Canadiens’ bench, waving his gloved hand to thank the Montreal Forum crowd for its standing ovation.
Lafleur has just earned his 1,000th NHL point, scoring his 21st goal of the season 54 seconds into the third period on assists from Keith Acton and Larry Robinson, giving the Habs a 9-0 lead over the Winnipeg Jets in what would be a 9-3 victory.
For the Flower, his 1,000th point has come in his 720th NHL game. He is the 14th player to have reached that magical plateau and, at the time, is the fastest to have arrived there — 20 games more quickly than Marcel Dionne two months earlier.
The moment, captured on black-andwhite film by award-winning Canadian Press photographer Doug Ball, shows a joyful Lafleur flanked by teammates and in the front row behind the bench, on the aisle, wearing a sports jacket and a wide necktie, is 15-year-old Mario Lemieux, then a net-filling Midget Triple-A player for Montreal-Concordia who worshipped the ice on which Lafleur was skating.
Super Mario-to-be was one of thousands of Lafleur-adoring fans at the Forum that night, but in this photo he’s just another star-struck young man in the crowd who was witness to history.
Every morning on my Twitter account, I post details of a few moments in the rich history of the Canadiens. On March 4, Lafleur’s 1,000th point was the second of three events I featured on my Twitter account, including a microfilm-archived story from the March 5, 1981, Montreal Gazette headlined “Lafleur gets 1,000th point as Canadiens bomb Jets.”
Ball’s cropped photo was displayed beneath the headline, within the game story written by the late Glenn Cole.
And that’s where the story ended — until alert Twitter follower Jaret Dicks of South Porcupine, Ont., tweeted me three days later: “Is that Mario Lemieux in street clothes?”
Upon reading the tweet, the “discovery” of Mario hit me like a bolt of lightning.
I immediately emailed the microfilm frame to Pittsburgh Penguins communications staff. Lemieux was vaguely aware of a photo that had celebrated Lafleur’s 1,000th point and was keenly interested in it. The Penguins staff receiving it by email, meanwhile, were blown away.
It is a classic shot of hero worship, but it is more than that. This is two superstars, one at an NHL milestone, the other having just finished his midget-class season, bound to become a major-junior sensation and, in time, another of the greatest players the game has known.
I emailed Ball, now retired in Oakville, Ont., about his photo and, incredibly, he found a pristine, full-frame print of this image.
Lafleur has no special recollection of the night or the fans’ salute; when I put the print in front of the Flower a week ago, he identified late Forum vice-president Gerry Grundman and his wife, standing directly behind Lemieux, before he noted Mario.
Lemieux can’t exactly recall how he wound up at the Forum that night, in the front row, no glass separating himself from Lafleur, his favourite player.
He is happily off the public radar today, choosing not to do interviews. But through the Penguins’ vice-president Tom McMillan, Lemieux recalls a few details of Lafleur’s milestone night.
“Mario knew Guy had a chance at 1,000 points that night, but it was just happenstance that he got the tickets,” McMillan related. “And he didn’t meet Guy after the game. Nothing like that was arranged. He was just at the game as a fan.
“It’s incredible to me that the player beside Guy on the bench is Pierre Larouche. Mario and Pierre didn’t know each other at the time, of course, but they have been longtime best friends (Larouche also lives in Pittsburgh).”
Ball, a legend in Canadian photojournalism who was photo editor of the Montreal Gazette from 1984-87, shot countless Canadiens games for Canadian Press and takes special delight that his frame of Lafleur and Lemieux has resurfaced.
Ball will make prints now for Lemieux, Lafleur, the Canadiens and Penguins. Both teams will have copies, signed by both players, to be sold at their charity auctions.