Bill Durnan

It was in 1943, when he was 29, that Bill Durnan made his debut in the National Hockey League with the Canadiens. After seven glorious seasons, he had to leave the Canadiens and hockey in the middle of the 1950 playoffs, following a nervous breakdown. During that short period of time, however, he managed to establish records that still hole today.

During the 1948-49 season, Durnan established a modern record, preventing opposing teams from scoring during 309 minutes and 21 seconds - more than five complete games - and he was also the first goaltender to win the Vezina tropy four years in a row, from 1944 to 1947. Toronto's "Turk" Broda interrupted Durnan's series of successes in 1948, but Durnan came right back and got the Veznia trpphy the following two years, which meant he had won it six times in seven seasons. Durnan was chosen for the First All-Star team six times, including his first season with the NHL. He stopped making the All-Star team when Broda was chosen.

Bill Durnan possessed one unipue characteristic which gave him quite an advantage over the other goaltenders in the league. He was ambidextrous. "This unequalled capability," he would say, "I owe to Steve Faulkner, a coach for whom I played in my younger days in Toronto. He taught me how to change my stick from one hand to the other. That was not easy I assure you, especially in the beginning because, being young, the stick was quite heavy. But Steve always urged me to keep practising with the result that, with time it became a routine for me."

This skill to grab the puck with either hand and clear his territory without difficulty to the right or left, he developed during his long stay in the amateur ranks. He then moved up to the Blue, White and Red. He was the type of golie who hardly ever gave returns.

During his very first season with the Canadiens, Durnan gave up only 109 goals to the enemy in 50 games. That was also the year that Maurice Richard scored 50 goals in as many games, and the Canadiens, as a result of Durnan's and Richard's sparkling performances, amongst other things, lost only five games during the 1943-33 campaign. Durnan never lost a game at the Forum during regular season, and the Canadiens ended the season with the greatest honor, that is by winning the prestigious Stanley Cup.

Bill Durnan, a six foot two-inch tall colossus weighing more than 200 pounds, also became a victim of the great pressure which seemed to eventually overcome every professional goaltender, and Bill said a few years later: "I felt so bad that I could not sleep on the eve of a game. I could not even digest my food. This type of agony is unequalled."

Wounds, as we know are generally tied to the job of goaltender. Bill Durnan did not avoid this rule, and towards the end of the 1949-50 season he suffered a deep cut to the scalp as a result of a blow from an opposing player's skate during a game against the Black Hawks at Chicgo. Durnan missed several games, but he came back at the beginning of the series against the New York Rangers, and it was in the middle of that series that he asked to be replaced.

Bill had just played his last game with the Canadiens and the National League. Durnan did not play for very long in the NHL, but this did not prevent him from performing great exploits and winning several trophies. His greatest dream came true in 1964 when he was elected to the Hockey Hall of Fame. He deserved it.