This Day in Hockey History – November 3, 1974 – When Johnny Comes Marching Home

Nov 3, 2019

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Johnny Bucyk was a left wing with serious scoring power. Spending all but the first two seasons of his 23-year career with the Boston Bruins, he only had a handful of seasons in which he dipped below 20 goals or 50 points. On November 3, 1974, Captain Bucyk scored his 1,154th point to surpass Bobby Hull as the highest-scoring left wing in NHL history.

Boston Garden hosted an audience of 15,003 to see them run the Minnesota North Stars out of the rink. For the first seven minutes, the odds seemed in Minnesota’s favor, thanks to their goalie, Cesare Maniago. According to Boston coach Don Cherry, “In the first 10 minutes, we could have had seven goals. It was our best effort of the season but Maniago was unbelievable in those first minutes.” Phil Esposito agreed, “You couldn’t say we ran into an easy goaltender, really. Maniago started out as if he’d never let one in. but we kept coming back.”

Bucyk assisted on the very first goal of the game, at 7:04 of the first period. He helped Wayne Cashman, who “passed from behind the net and Gregg Sheppard fired a short shot.” Cashman had been switched from his left wing position on Esposito’s line to fill in as right wing on Sheppard’s because Bobby Schmautz had a broken metacarpal bone in his right thumb. This point allowed Bucyk to tie Hull’s left wing record of 1,153 points.

From that point on, according to the Minneapolis newspapers, “it was lights out for the North Stars. Or, red lights on for the Bruins.” After another Boston goal, Minnesota had their only score of the game. The Bruins roared back with two more goals.

The substituted Cashman notched the final goal of the first period at 14:54, thanks to assists by Bucyk and Sheppard. According to the Boston Globe, “Cashman knocked one under Maniago on a pass from Bucyk.” With this second assist, Bucyk officially passed Hull’s record to become the highest-scoring left wing and sixth in the NHL’s career scoring.

With one goal in the second period and four in the third, Boston won 10-1. Interestingly, every single goal was scored by a different player. Cherry claimed he could not remember another instance of reaching double digits without any duplications, so the Boston Globe thought it must be an NHL record for goal distribution in one game. Funny enough, the night before, Cherry had been upset at having broken their six-game winning streak and remarked, “It’s very simple. We just have to have more than one man (Phil Esposito) scoring for us.” Naturally, after this victory, he crowed, “That’s the kind of team I thought Boston was when I started here. You saw the real Bruins for the first time.”

For the poor North Stars, the Minnesota news claimed they suffered the most one-sided or worst margin of defeat in their history. What’s more, they still had yet to win a single game at Boston Garden. Against the North Stars, the Bruins had a 16-0-4 record at the Garden and a 27-4-9 record overall.

Approximately a year later, Bucyk scored his 500th goal, as the seventh to reach the milestone. His fellow left wingers (including Cashman) gave him a gold medal engraved with the number 500. Bucyk was touched, saying, “It’s not from the League or from the team, but from the four guys who were fighting for my job. I’ll never forget that gesture.”

When Bucyk retired in 1978, he had earned 1,369 regular-season points from 556 goals and 813 assists. These totals are enough to keep him in 25th place in the NHL’s all-time rankings in each category. He has more assists than any left wing in NHL history. In points scored by left wings, he is only topped by Luc Robitaille. Bucyk’s goals place him sixth among NHL left wings. Among the Bruins, Bucyk ranks first in goals (545) and second in assists (794) and points (1,339).