The NHL / Jerry Crowe : Whaler Coach Brings End to Jarvis’ Record 964-Game Streak

It ended Sunday night not by injury or illness.

Hartford Whalers Coach Jack Evans simply benched center Doug Jarvis, who had played in 964 consecutive games, establishing a National Hockey League record.

It had been agreed by all parties in training camp that Jarvis, 32, would not play in every game for a 13th consecutive season. “His play has fallen off late in the season the last two years and it’s because I overworked him,” Evans said.

So, with the Whalers scheduled to play their third game in four nights, Evans told Jarvis Sunday morning that Brent Peterson would replace him that night against the Boston Bruins.

The remarkable streak started with the first game of the 1975-76 season, when Jarvis played for the Montreal Canadiens.

Jarvis, who has never missed a game because of an injury, played 560 straight games and helped win four Stanley Cups with the Canadiens. He won the Selke Trophy as the NHL’s best defensive forward while playing in 265 in a row for the Washington Capitals. He played the last 139, broke Garry Unger’s record of 914 last December and won the Masterton Trophy for perseverance, sportsmanship and dedication to hockey last season with the Whalers.

“There was no great shock to it,” Jarvis said of his benching. “I think the game dictates nowadays that a lot of players aren’t going to play 80 (games a season).”

Asked if he were sad or relieved that the streak had ended, Jarvis seemed not to be sure.

“It’s a tough call,” he told Jeff Jacobs of the Hartford Courant. “This whole streak has been very positive. There’s no use writing anything negative into it.”

At Toronto last Saturday night, the “Star-Spangled Banner” was played before the start of a hockey game in Maple Leaf Gardens for the first time in 61 years.

Harold Ballard, owner of the Maple Leafs, at first resisted a new NHL bylaw mandating that both the American and Canadian anthems be played, saying he would play the American anthem an hour before the start of the game.

Actually, Ballard probably would have been fined if he’d done that, but he has made it clear in the past that he considers it a waste of time to play national anthems before the start of games.

“If they want a concert,” he has said, “they should go to Massey Hall (a Toronto concert hall).”

The Montreal Canadiens are to Canadians what the New York Yankees are to Americans--either loved or hated.

“You just aren’t ambivalent,” Art McDonald told the Hockey News.

McDonald hates the Canadiens.

So much so that the Halifax accountant said he spent about 500 hours creating a 1988 calendar that charts 366 of the most forgettable dates in Canadien history.

Included are some obvious choices, including June 14 (1977), the date the Canadiens passed up Mike Bossy in the draft, and Dec. 31 (1981), the date Wayne Gretzky scored his 50th goal of the season in Edmonton’s 39th game, breaking the record for fastest 50 goals that had been held by former Montreal great Maurice (Rocket) Richard.

Also included are the not so obvious, including Jan. 1 (1932), birth date of Don Aitkin, whose goals-against average of 10.59 is the worst in Montreal history, and May 29 (1917), birth date of John F. Kennedy, whose administration did not include any Stanley Cup championships for the Canadiens.

“It’s been a labor of love,” the Canadien-hater said.

Good news for the Oilers, bad news for the rest of the league:

From Wayne Gretzky, who had 1 goal and 4 assists Sunday night against the Kings after leading Team Canada to the championship of the Canada Cup last month: “I feel I’ve played as well in the last two months as I ever have.”

In response to the bench-clearing brawl between the Philadelphia Flyers and the Canadiens that took place at the end of pregame warm-ups before Game 6 of the Wales Conference finals last May, the NHL Board of Governors moved last month to eliminate such embarrassing incidents.

NHL President John Ziegler said that “at least seven” such free-for-alls took place last season.

A new rule says that the first player to leave the bench to join in a fight will be suspended for 10 games, or one-eighth of the regular season. A second player leaving the bench will be suspended for five games and a coach can be suspended for five or three games, depending on whether his team left the bench first.

Fines are also included for players and franchises, including a $25,000 assessment to any team that has two or more players enter into a fight before or after a game, or between periods.

And any team that continues to pay a suspended player, or pays his fine, will be assessed $100,000.

“Multi-player brawls have no place in the National Hockey League,” said William Wirtz, chairman of the NHL Board of Governors.