Herb Brooks the Inside Story of a Hockey Mastermind
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HERB BROOKS THE INSIDE STORY OF A HOCKEY MASTERMIND BY JOHN GILBERT Herb Brooks 001-111•.indd 3 9/12/08 3:45:17 PM First published in 2008 by Voyageur Press, an imprint of MBI Publishing Company, 400 First Avenue North, Suite 300, Minneapolis, MN 55401 USA Copyright © 2008 by John Gilbert All rights reserved. With the exception of quoting brief passages for the purposes of review, no part of this publication may be reproduced without prior written permission from the Publisher. The information in this book is true and complete to the best of our knowledge. All recommendations are made without any guarantee on the part of the author or Publisher, who also disclaims any liability incurred in connection with the use of this data or specific details. We recognize, further, that some words, model names, and designations mentioned herein are the property of the trademark holder. We use them for identification purposes only. This is not an official publication. Voyageur Press titles are also available at discounts in bulk quantity for industrial or sales-promotional use. For details write to Special Sales Manager at MBI Publishing Company, 400 First Avenue North, Suite 300, Minneapolis, MN 55401 USA. To find out more about our books, visit us online at www.voyageurpress.com. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Gilbert, John, 1942- Herb Brooks : the inside story of a hockey mastermind / John Gilbert. p. cm. ISBN 978-0-7603-3241-2 (hb w/ jkt) 1. Brooks, Herb, 1937- 2. Hockey coaches—Minnesota—Biography. I. Title. GV848.5.B76G55 2008 796.962092—dc22 [B] 2008023137 Editor: Dennis Pernu Designer: Jennifer Bergstrom Printed in the United States of America Herb Brooks 001-111•.indd 4 9/12/08 3:45:18 PM This one’s for Herbie, and for a friendship I’ll always cherish. He did it his way, and he did it well. Nobody can ever replace his dedication, honesty, and mystique, and I hope this helps keep him alive and forever young in our hearts and minds. Herb Brooks 001-111•.indd 5 9/12/08 2:48:20 PM CONTENTS INTRODUCTION 9 Chapter 1 ONE OF A KIND 21 Chapter 2 EAST SIDER TO THE CORE 26 Chapter 3 HERBIE THE PLAYER 30 Chapter 4 HERBIE CROSSES OVER 36 Chapter 5 A MATTER OF PRINCIPLE 42 Chapter 6 TRANSITION TO GOPHERS 46 Chapter 7 RETURNING TO WILLIAMS ARENA 51 Chapter 8 INHERITING THE LAST-PLACE GOPHERS 56 Chapter 9 RIGHTING THE GOOD SHIP GOPHER 62 Chapter 10 BIGGest Goal—INCREDIBLE SEASON 67 Chapter 11 AND NOW, THE FINAL 73 Chapter 12 EXPECTATIONS, AND ONE ASSUMPTION 77 Chapter 13 REBUILT FOR A TITLE RUN 87 Chapter 14 THIRD FINAL, SECOND TITLE 95 Chapter 15 MAJOR TURNOVER 99 Chapter 16 TYING IT ALL BACK TOGETHER AGAIN 107 Chapter 17 BEST TEAM IN COLLEGE HOCKey’s Best YEAR 112 Herb Brooks 001-111•.indd 6 9/12/08 2:48:20 PM Chapter 18 LASTING LEGACY 125 Chapter 19 OLYMPIC BLUEPRINT 141 Chapter 20 SPORTS FESTIVAL DRAMA 148 Chapter 21 LONG SEASON TO PREPARE 154 Chapter 22 FINAL ROSTER FOR LAKE PLACID 162 Chapter 23 SUPPORT FOR HERBie’s World 170 Chapter 24 NOT READY FOR PRIME TIME 178 Chapter 25 MINI-MIRACLE AGAINST SWEDEN 185 Chapter 26 CANCELED CZECHS 190 Chapter 27 NORWEGIAN BREEZE 195 Chapter 28 ROMANIAN ANTI-ROMP 198 Chapter 29 ESCAPE FROM WEST GERMANY 201 Chapter 30 MEDAL-ROUND INTRICACY 204 Chapter 31 RUSSIAN MASTERPIECE 209 Chapter 32 FINNISH FINISH 220 Chapter 33 AFTERMATH 226 Chapter 34 THE SOUND OF DAVOS 233 Chapter 35 PLOW HORSES TO THOROUGHBREDS 238 Chapter 36 LEAVING NEW YORK 248 Chapter 37 TEAM MINNESOTA MIRACLE 255 Chapter 38 A LITTLE COACHING, A LOT OF INFLUENCE 263 Chapter 39 STUBBORN SUCCESS IN THE 1990s 275 Chapter 40 GROW, NURTURE, TRANSPLANT, REPEAT 284 Chapter 41 OLYMPIC FLAME REKINDLED 288 Chapter 42 VISIONARY INTERRUPTED 300 AFTERWORD AND ACKNOWLEDGMENTS 310 INDEX 314 Herb Brooks 001-111•.indd 7 9/12/08 2:48:20 PM | 9 INTRODUCTION here are a lot of reasons I had to write this book. Mainly, though, I owe it to THerbie. Watching, studying, and writing about hockey have been, and continue to be, an exciting and gratifying career. Trying to stay close to professional, college, and high school teams has been both challenging and rewarding, whether in the formative years of the 1960s, or in the highly sophisticated twenty-first century. Without question, the game will never be the same as it was in the late 1960s and through the 1970s. Among other teams I’ve covered, the University of Minnesota hockey program has been near and dear to my heart since I was a journalism student at “the U” in the 1960s and John Mariucci was the coach. When I started at the Minneapolis Tribune in 1967, I covered the Gophers and Minnesota’s fabulous high school hockey, as both skyrocketed to prominence through the 1970s. It was no coincidence that both Minnesota high school hockey and the University of Minnesota hockey blossomed in parallel. The University of Minnesota teams comprised homegrown players throughout that era, arguably the most important and exciting two decades in the sport’s history in Minnesota. Having written about all the top high school players and teams, it was easy to be close to the Gophers, who were like a select team of the best prospects the high schools could produce. There was no Junior “A” United States Hockey League in the United States at the time, and no USA Hockey development program. Minnesota high school players were devoted to their communities, and equally devoted to go to “the U,” even as walk-ons, for the chance to take on the constant horde of skilled Canadian players imported by other prominent American colleges. True, there also were top players from small pockets in New England and Michigan, and for a while an all–New England Boston College team joined Minnesota in comprising 100 percent U.S. players. But a lack of national championships eventually drove BC to add a few Canadian imports. No other college could have even imagined being made up of 100 percent home-state players, a feat the Gophers pulled off for most of three decades. Herb Brooks was still playing when I first got to know him, and the first time I ever saw him coach, he was a young assistant to Glen Sonmor at Minnesota. It was definitely a career highlight of my thirty years at the Tribune (and later the Star Tribune) to cover those Gopher teams for the seven years Brooks coached them, from 1972 through 1979. It meant apportioning my time, because I was also covering the Herb Brooks 001-111•.indd 9 9/12/08 2:48:21 PM 10 | INTRODUCTION National Hockey League’s Minnesota North Stars, the World Hockey Association’s colorful Minnesota Fighting Saints, regional small colleges, the national and Olympic programs, and the high schools. It was pure pleasure to try to capture and portray the color and passion of Gopher and high school games, because in those days, none of the players dreamed of playing beyond high school or college. And because there was little thought of careers with huge professional contracts, they played the game they loved with 100 percent intensity, for only their pride and their teammates. I treated college and high school games with the same passion as the Stanley Cup Finals, because they deserved it. When Mariucci died, it was a stunning blow to all of us who knew and loved him. I was credited with being first to refer to Mariucci as the “Godfather of Minnesota Hockey,” although that hit a nerve with Louie Nanne, who played for Maroosh at Minnesota and apparently had referred to John as his “Godfather,” a nod to their common Italian heritage. That was before my time, but regardless, my christening of John as the whole state’s godfather was because his impact on hockey went beyond nationality—he was most accurately the “Godfather of U.S. Hockey.” Mariucci was never against Canadian players coming to U.S. colleges. In fact, he recruited Canadians such as Nanne and Murray Williamson, both of whom became All-Americans at Minnesota, and others, “Just to show I don’t discriminate,” he would grin. But he did fight to get the National Collegiate Athletic Association to restrict “over-age” Canadian recruits, who would play high-test Canadian major junior hockey through age twenty, then, if they didn’t get an NHL offer, come to the States for a college scholarship. Mariucci saw that as exploiting U.S. hockey rather than helping it. While fighting that fight, Mariucci cultivated the fertile but lightly seeded Minnesota youth and high school hockey fields, nurturing and finally generating a genuine movement. It was the same sort of craze that had afflicted his native Eveleth and first spread throughout Northern Minnesota, eventually reaching the Twin Cities and its fast-growing suburbs. That was about when I came onto the scene, in the mid-1960s, just in time to chronicle the rise of the Gophers and the upsurge in high school hockey. There were a lot of big-time sportswriters who knew every facet of the NHL—and there still are. Fewer in the media pay attention to college hockey, and fewer still to the high schools. My determination, and pleasure, was to try to encompass all of them and watch as that unique Minnesota perspective ultimately became intertwined. The enthusiastic Glen Sonmor had been Mariucci’s assistant and protégé, and he appreciated Mariucci’s influence so much that when he succeeded Mariucci in Herb Brooks 001-111•.indd 10 9/12/08 2:48:21 PM INTRODUCTION | 11 1966, he took Maroosh’s dream and ran with it.