Hockey Heaven
Recalling a Pee Wee hockey tournament experience that meant so much more
The experience began the moment our bleary-eyed coaches herded us aboard a clunky red-and-white bus idling outside the Colosseum in Weyburn, Sask. We slowly rumbled through the dark, deserted streets onto Highway 13 and proceeded east. This 500-kilometre bus trip was the longest of our young lives, and our excitement grew stronger as we drew closer to our destination.
It was April 1974, I was 13 years old and playing minor hockey with the Weyburn AA Pee Wee Young Fellows. We were headed to Winnipeg to play at community rinks in the Gateway to the West Pee Wee Hockey Tournament, but our first destination was one of the hockey temples of Western Canada at the time: the Winnipeg Arena.
The ride itself is mostly a blur, although I remember just about everyone had their noses crushed up against the frosty window panes as we rolled steadily down Portage Ave. towards a long-awaited rendezvous with hockey teams from across Canada and the United States.
When our now-boisterous bus finally came to a standstill, all eyes were transfixed on the largest arena most of us had ever seen. Opened in 1955, the 10,000seat facility was still considered to be one of the finest on the Prairies, then the home of the Winnipeg Jets of the World Hockey Association.
For most of us, this was our first visit to the “big city,” and it left a lasting impression of the close relationship that often exists between cities and their hockey teams. I also began to understand the importance of hockey to Canadians, the reverence in which we hold our heroes of the ice. And for three marvellous days, if you count the bus ride, I felt like I was a part of it all.
Numb-legged, we gathered our precious equipment and overnight bags from the crammed cargo compartments below and trudged up a long stairway leading into a massive lobby reminiscent of a large cathedral. Inside, a dozen or so other teams were milling around nervously while they waited for their turn to be processed. Our jackets were bright gold with purple piping and we wore them proudly.
We were eventually greeted by a pleasant young lady who furnished us with vouchers, tournament passes, name tags and, most importantly, a complementary ticket to Saturday’s playo game featuring the hometown Jets and WHA rival the Houston Aeros.
When she finished, she guided us across the sprawling floor to a
tall, serious-looking policeman, where we waited impatiently for our billets to come collect us.
It was hard to restrain the urge to go exploring, but we consoled ourselves with the fact that in our possession was a ticket to do just that during the big game Saturday night. Our first professional hockey game, the Winnipeg Arena, the playoffs, Bobby Hull and Gordie Howe—it was about as much as we could possibly stand in anticipation of a hockey game!
Boys in the Big City
The annual Pee Wee tournament attracted some of the top teams from much larger centres in Canada and the United States, so we understood going in that we were real underdogs. Weyburn was an agricultural and oil-based city of less than 10,000 people at the time, but nearly half our team came from neighbouring small towns such as Cedoux, Colfax, Creelman, Fillmore and Francis. Mostly farm boys, these “imports” enabled us to ice a very strong team that year. Several players on this team went on to enjoy stellar junior hockey careers, and one of them, Greg Squires, even played professionally for a few years.
Brad Carnegie (Creelman farm boy and right-winger) and I felt light years away from home as our young, motherly hostess zoomed through numerous side streets and traffic lights. During our drive, we stared at the luminous glow of what seemed like a million flickering candles and were totally mesmerized by the brilliant, colourful lights. The city at night, Brad and I agreed, was a truly amazing place.
During the next two days, we satisfied our young appetites for excitement as we blew most of our spending money on blinking pinball machines, O-pee-chee hockey cards and colourful toques, pennants and pucks featuring our favourite hockey teams—i was a diehard Leafs fan.
We were astonished by the variety of ways there are to spend your money in a large city, and it did not take long for some of us to deplete most of our funds— myself included. By the last day, I had only enough money left to buy a small bucket of Kentucky Fried Chicken to see me through till we got home. Some of the guys still like to tease me about that stunt, and my old coach, Jerry Murray, especially likes to bring that one up whenever I run into him.
A Barn Burner
The city was abuzz that weekend with talk of the impending matchup between their beloved Jets and the visiting Aeros. Bobby Hull and Gordie Howe were still in a productive, albeit later phase of their careers, and they were marquee attractions of the WHA. I had rumpled posters of them both from their NHL days adorning the walls of my small bedroom at home. The game had been sold out for days, and we noticed the cocky resellers on street corners preying upon desperate-looking businessmen in long leather coats. Fortunately, my teammates and I were content in the knowledge that tucked away in the securest nook of our wallets, each of us had a ticket to one the city’s biggest sporting events of the year.
Maybe it was the diversion of the Jets game or simply uninspired play, but after winning our afternoon game the day before, we lost two in a row and suddenly found ourselves out of the tournament. Unbeknownst to us, if we had won we would have had to play that evening and miss the big game—our coaches had kept that fact a closely guarded secret.
I distinctly remember sitting in the dressing room feeling ashamed about our lacklustre effort, but before I had even whipped o my sweater, my thoughts had already turned to that other hockey game about to take place across town.
A thousand eager fans were probably jostling for position in sub-zero temperatures outside the Winnipeg Arena at that very moment, hoping for a crack at one of the few hundred standingroom-only tickets left. It would have been a small sacrifice in return for perhaps one last look at two hockey idols.
That evening, my teammates and I were glued to the edges of our seats when the national anthems were over and the referee finally dropped the puck.
Yes sir, the Jets’ faithful really had the Ol’ Barn rocking that night, but only for a short while because the game quickly turned into a real blowout in favour of the Aeros.
At least nobody seemed to mind when we finally got an opportunity to snoop around the enormous arena. We spent the entire third period, in fact, running aimlessly through the lobby and labyrinth of corridors, deliriously happy. ■
Editor’s Note: Jesse says this story is dedicated to his very special granddaughter, Winnie.