P.A.-born goalie led Toronto to four Cups
Johnny Bower has the distinction of being the last Toronto Maple Leafs starting goaltender to backstop the team to a Stanley Cup win.
Bower, now 92, was born in Prince Albert, and at 16, he lied about his age to enlist in the army during the Second World War.
“I wanted to go with my other buddies,” he told The Canadian Press in 2014. He didn’t get to go to the front, rheumatoid arthritis got in the way.
After the war ended, he started his professional hockey career at 19, first with the AHL’s Providence Reds, then moved to the Cleveland Barons. He recorded four shutouts in his first season. He made his NHL debut in 1953 with the New York Rangers, recording five shutouts and a 2.60 GAA in 70 games.
He moved around, playing in Vancouver and going back to Providence, before playing one more season with Cleveland, where he recorded eight shutouts.
In 1958, he began a 12year stint with the Toronto Maple Leafs, where he won four Stanley Cups and earned the nickname “the China Wall.”
During his career, he won two Vezina Trophies, given to the NHL’s top goalie. He retired after the 1969-1970 season. He only began to wear a goalie’s mask the season before.
Inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame in 1976, Bower has been ever present in the limelight, honoured on a stamp, a star on Canada’s Walk of Fame and launching his own line of wine.
Bower is still well-respected by Leafs fans, many of whom were born after the team’s last Stanley Cup win in 1967.
He told the Ottawa Citizen in 2011: “I find it very flattering that they know me no matter where I go at home.”