A New Brunswicker’s Wild Trip To Moscow During The Summit Series
MIRAMICHI — Fifty years ago today, Paul Henderson scored the most famous goal in Canadian hockey history. With 34 seconds left in Game 8 of the 1972 Summit Series, Henderson scored on Soviet goaltending legend Vladislav Tretiak to give Canada a 6-5 lead. That was enough for the Canadian team to squeak out a series win against their Russian rivals.
It’s a series that’s never been repeated. Back then, hockey was an even bigger source of national pride than it is today. It also took place under the swirl of Cold War politics and a team from Russia that fans had never really seen before. And that team took the Canadians by surprise.
The intensity of the series, and the pressure the teams were under to win, led to a level of drama not seen before or since in the sport. It’s hard to imagine an international hockey event today where players kick each other in the shins, break each other’s ankles, or use their sticks to attack members of a foreign military.
The first four games were held across Canada before the series switched to Moscow. It was there that the most intense moments took place. Three thousand Canadians won a raffle to attend those final four games and get a rare peak behind the Cold War’s iron curtain.
David Cadogan, from Woodstock New Brunswick, was one of those lucky Canucks.
Cadogan, who now lives in Miramichi, was the long-time publisher of several New Brunswick newspapers, including the Woodstock Bugle. He went to Moscow with his then-wife, Betty Jean, for an insanely cheap price, even by 1972 standards.
“The trip actually cost — are you sitting down? Are you ready for the shock? — $537 [per person] for the whole thing: flight, hotel, tickets to the game, tickets to the circus, tickets to the opera,” recalled Cadogan.
By the time Cadogan landed in Moscow, most fans were feeling bleak about the series back in Canada. The team, expected to mop the floor with the unknown Soviets, only won once in the first four games, while losing two and tying once.
Canada played so poorly during Game 4 in Vancouver that they were booed by their own fans, leading to Phil Esposito’s famous speech where he expressed shock and disbelief that Canadians would jeer their own.
But Cadogan was excited to go to Moscow despite the team’s uphill battle. As a publisher and journalist, he wanted to learn about Russian culture.
“I wanted to know if the image that we had been given of Russia by our media and our politicians was accurate,” said Cadogan. “I knew that they engaged in propaganda. I assumed we did too. When we got over there we found out that the image that we had was extremely accurate. The details of it were more restrictive than we had imagined.”
The view of this restricted society was reinforced by the number of military officers that seemed to surround the visiting Canadians. But Cadogan soon realized the Munich Massacre, which happened on September 5, 1972, likely played a role in the heightened security.
“We were just absolutely surrounded by the military. They were at every entrance to our hotel and at every intersection. They were halfway down every block. They were just everywhere. And at first we thought that was to control us,” he recalled.
“Eventually we realized that it was because that was the same year as the Olympics when the Israeli delegation were kidnapped from the Athlete’s Village and had been killed.”
Despite the obvious cultural differences, Cadogan had no complaints over the hotel or the Russian food they were served. Some people, however, didn’t give the country much of a chance.
“There was one couple who started complaining as soon as we got off the plane and by noon the next day they were gone. They had paid a huge premium to fly back home. And we just saw thought they were crazy.”
Game 5 ended in heartbreak for Team Canada and its fans. Up 4-1 in the third period, the Soviets would score four straight goals to win the game. Canada would now have to win three in a row on foreign ice to claim a series victory.
It was after this loss that Cadogan had his greatest Russian adventure. He and his friend Mark ended up sharing a cab with a Soviet commissar and his bodyguard. The commissar, confident after the Soviet victory, started playfully taunting the Canadians about the series.
“Esposito, big criminal!” the commissar said while doing an impression of Phil Esposito elbowing Soviet players.
Cadogan and his friend had a retort, accusing Russia’s best player of playing dirty.
“Kharlamov had been slashing Canadians quite a bit during the game,” claims Cadogan. “We went: ‘Kharlamov WHACK WHACK!”
Infamously, Kharlamov would be, effectively, taken out of the series when Bobby Clarke intentionally whacked him across the ankle in Game 6, based on an order given to him by assistant coach John Fergusson. To this day, some hockey fans argue such a dirty play puts an asterisk on Canada’s series win.
Cadogan’s new Soviet friend then drew a grid on the fogged-up car windows, writing down the scores of all five games. In the column for game 6, he predicted Canada would lose 7-3, the same score as Game 1 in Montreal.
After Canada won Game 6 by a score of 3-2, the commissar invited Cadogan and his wife to his hotel room where they were offered a drink.
“[The commissar said], in Russia, ‘when we win, we drink,’” recalled Cadogan. “And I said, ‘Oh in Canada when we lose, we drink,’ and he laughed.”
Through an interpreter, the group talked about the facts and history of their respective countries.
“He asked us what the population of Canada was; at the time it was 23 million, and he said ‘oh, we lost 26 million in the war.”
The commissar’s bodyguard had a harrowing World War II story of his own. He told Cadogan that he was captured by the Nazis during the Siege of Leningrad. The bodyguard showed the scar on his arm where he cut out a tattoo the Nazis gave him while he was a prisoner of war.
Game 8 Memories
In a tense Game 7, Canada was able to pull off a 4-3 victory in dramatic fashion. With 2:06 remaining in the third period, Paul Henderson scored an absolutely beautiful goal to break the tie.
On September 28, 1972, schools, factories, and offices closed across Canada so everyone could watch the conclusion to a remarkable series of hockey. Cadogan, of course, would be one of the lucky few who got to watch it in person.
But the game got off to a bad start for Canada. An early march to the penalty box had players and fans enraged. Ever since the series shifted to Moscow, Team Canada felt the officiating heavily favoured the Soviets.
The tension erupted in the first period when another penalty was called on J.P. Parise. The feisty Canadian forward became so enraged that he skated toward referee Josef Kompalla and threatened to swing his stick. Luckily, Parise relented at the last moment. And yet, that wouldn’t be the wildest moment of the historic game.
By the end of the second period, all hope seemed lost for Canada as the team trailed 5-3. During the intermission, even Cadogan couldn’t imagine the team coming back.
“We were resigned to the fact that Canada was going to lose because nobody ever beat the Russians in the third period,” said Cadogan.
Early in the third period Phil Esposito scored to make it 5-4. Then, within the final 10 minutes, Yvon Cournoyer scored to tie the game. Then all hell broke loose.
For whatever reason, the goal light didn’t come on after Cournoyer scored. This sent series organizer Alan Eagleson into a frenzy. He tried to barge into the timekeeper’s bench but was accosted by uniformed Soviet soldiers. The Canadian hockey players, led by Peter Mahovlich, charged at the officers. Cadogan remembers witnessing the moment as it happened.
“The Russian military tackled Eagleson and we’re trying to hustle him away and Peter Mahovlich came tearing over and swiped his stick like a scythe across the boards,” laughed Cadogan.
After all that madness came the moment every Canadian sports fan can recall. Paul Henderson, after crashing into the boards awkwardly, picks himself up and scores on his own rebound with 34 seconds left on the clock, winning the series for Team Canada.
“After Henderson’s goal in Game 8, I remember the Canadians just celebrating like crazy and it went on and on,” recalled Cadogan of witnessing that moment. “But there’s still 34 seconds left. And as fans we’re aware, they [The Soviets] can score three times in 34 seconds.”
“And finally of course the final 34 seconds get played and I don’t think any Canadian breathed any time in the last minute of that game.”
When the buzzer finally sounded, the 3000 Canadian fans in Moscow embarked on an epic celebration.
“I was a heavy smoker in those days and I was overweight and I couldn’t run. But I ran at least three quarters of a mile, leaping in the air and running with thousands of fans toward our buses screaming and, oh my god, the party afterward!”
The fans partied at the hotel after the game with, what else, vodka. Coca-Cola was hard to come by in Russia back then but a diplomat from the American Embassy donated a duffle bag full, which the partiers used for mix.
The reasons the Summit Series is so unique and special are varied. Looking back, Cadogan believes the intensity and passion was so high during that eight-game series because of one thing: Canada’s unofficial religion.
“There’s a lot of talk about politics; national politics, capitalism and democracy versus communism and central control. “I don’t think the politics was as big a deal among the Canadian fans as the religion was; our religion is hockey.”
“It was our religion against the world. We are hockey and for the first time ever, our best is playing against the people who dared to say that we’re not the best.
Derek Montague is a Huddle reporter in Halifax. Send him your feedback and story ideas: [email protected].