Maurice Richard

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Joseph-Henri-Maurice "Rocket" Richard PC, CC, OQ (born August 4, 1921 in Montreal, Quebec, Canada, died May 27, 2000 in Montreal, Quebec) was a professional ice hockey player, and played for the Montreal Canadiens from 1942 to 1960. He was also the first coach of the Quebec Nordiques, but resigned after losing his first game.

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Playing career

Maurice Richard (pronounced ree-SHAR) was the first to score 50 goals in one season (the 1944-45 NHL season), doing so in 50 games and the first to score 500 goals in a career. "50 goals in 50 games" continues to be a marker of scoring excellence to this day, and few players have surpassed that mark. Richard also played on eight Stanley Cup teams in Montreal, and was elected eight times to the first all-star team and six times to the second all-star team, and played in every National Hockey League All-Star Game from 1947 to 1959. In his career, he scored 544 goals, amassed 421 assists for a total of 965 points in 978 games. Teamed with Elmer Lach as centre and Hector 'Toe' Blake playing left-wing, they formed the "Punch Line".

Richard was the quintessential Québécois hero. He pulled off a five-goal game after a day spent moving house - including the piano - in 1944, and scored the series-winning goal of the 1952 Stanley Cup semifinals as blood dripped down his face from an earlier injury. Richard's role as a Québécois icon was epitomized in the short story Le chandail de hockey ("The Hockey Sweater") by Roch Carrier.

Richard was turned down a total of 3 times by the military, twice for combat and once as a machinist. The first was in 1939 at the age of 18, (the height of World War II) and yet again at age 19, in 1940 for combat duty. X-rays showed that his ankle and femur bone as well as his wrists had broken and had not healed properly during Junior hockey and was therefore unfit for military action.

In 1940, at the age of 20, Richard inquired about a position as a machinist in the military, but was again refused citing his lack of a high school diploma or technical trade certificate. Richard tried to explain that he had dropped out of school to help his family and had been working as a machinist at a local Montreal factory at the age of 16. They still refused, and was told he needed a machinist certificate. Upon hearing this he decided to train as a machinist at the Montreal Technical School the following year and therefore fulfill his desire to help in the war effort.

The war was soon over before Richard ever received his certificate, which was a 4 year process. He was disappointed that the Canadian military had not given him the opportunity to participate in some capacity.

Although Richard was often perceived as a pre-Quiet Revolution hero excelling in an anglophone world, he always insisted that he was an apolitical man playing hockey for the love of the sport.

Richard's career began and ended before the beginning of huge salaries. The largest yearly salary he ever made was $25,000. His jersey #9 was retired on October 6, 1960 by the Canadiens, less than a month after he announced his retirement. His brother Henri "The Pocket Rocket" Richard joined him with the Canadiens in 1955 and would go on to win 11 Stanley Cups with the team, an NHL record.

He was inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame in 1961, the customary three-year waiting period being waived in his honour.

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The Richard Riot

As Montreal's great star, it was common for Richard to be antagonized on the ice. Teams would reportedly send one or two players to do nothing more than annoy him, and throughout his career Richard was fined and suspended several times for retaliations and assaults on officials. One such incident would spark one of the worst hockey-related incidents in history.

On March 13, 1955, Richard was given a match penalty for deliberately injuring Hal Laycoe, in a game against the Boston Bruins. Laycoe had moments earlier high-sticked Richard in the head, and dropped his gloves to fight as Richard skated towards him. The incident was exacerbated by Richard repeatedly breaking away to attack Laycoe with hockey sticks, and then assaulting linesman Cliff Thompson who attempted to restrain him. Richard later said at a league hearing that he thought Thompson was one of Boston's players grabbing him.

Given that it was Richard's second assault on an official in that season alone, a formal inquiry took place after which NHL president Clarence Campbell suspended Richard for the remainder of the regular season and the entire Stanley Cup playoffs, a move considered by many in Montreal to be unjust and severe. Detroit GM/Coach Jack Adams leapt to Campbell's defence, saying that Richard was becoming "too big for the league" and needed to be "put in his place."

The suspension came when the Rocket was leading the NHL in scoring and the Canadiens were battling for first place with the Detroit Red Wings. Richard's suspension also cost him the scoring title, the closest he ever came to winning it. When teammate Bernie Geoffrion passed him on the last day of the regular season, he was booed by the Montreal faithful.

Public outrage from Montreal soon poured in. Local radio call-in shows became so inundated with calls that radio stations were begging people "not" to call in. For his part, Campbell did not budge, and announced that he would be attending the Habs' next home game against the Detroit Red Wings in four days. Security was increased at the game, which itself was uneventful. However, it saw many protesters with signs that read "A bas Campbell" or "Vive Richard", with much of the crowd noise directed at Campbell, and few paying attention to the game or to the fact that Richard had also taken a seat at the game. As Montreal coach Dick Irvin pointed out, "the people didn't care if we got licked 100-1 that night."

Midway into the first period, Campbell arrived with his fiancee. Outraged Habs fans immediately began pelting them with eggs, vegetables, and various debris, with more being thrown at him each time the Red Wings scored, who built up a 4-1 lead. The continuous pelting of various objects stopped when a tear gas bomb was set off inside the Forum not far from immediately where Campbell was sitting.

The Forum was ordered evacuated and Campbell ruled the game forfeited to the Red Wings. The victory would ultimately provide Detroit with the margin it needed to win first place overall and be guaranteed home ice throughout the Stanley Cup playoffs. Said Detroit GM/Coach Jack Adams after the game: "I blame [the media] for what's happened. You've turned Richard into an idol, a man whose suspension can turn hockey fans into shrieking idiots."

The tear gas bomb and forfeiture had also altered the mood of the incident, turning it destructive and violent. A riot ensued outside the Forum, causing $500,000 in damage to the neighborhood and the Forum itself. Hundreds of stores were looted and vandalized within a 15-block radius of the Forum. Twelve policemen and 25 civilians were injured. The riot continued well into the night, with police arresting people by the truckload. Local radio stations, which carried live coverage of the riot for over seven hours, had to be forced off the air. The riot was eventually over at 3 am, and left Montreal's Rue Ste-Catherine in a big mess.

Reporters lined up to see both Campbell and Richard that day. Richard was reluctant to make a statement, fearing that it could start another riot, but eventually gave the following statement:

Because I always try so hard to win and had my troubles in Boston, I was suspended. At playoff time it hurts not be in the game with the boys. However, I want to do what is good for the people of Montreal and the team. So that no further harm will be done, I would like to ask everyone to get behind the team and to help the boys win from the New York Rangers and Detroit. I will take my punishment and come back next year to help the club and the younger players to win the Cup.

His words would prove prophetic, as the Habs would lose the Cup final to Detroit in seven games, but would win the Cup in the year after - and the four years after that. Richard retired in 1960 after the Canadiens' fifth straight Stanley Cup (still a league record).

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Honours

Image:Richard sculpture.JPG In 1999, the Maurice 'Rocket' Richard Trophy was donated by the Montreal Canadiens hockey club to the NHL to be awarded annually to the goal-scoring leader during the regular season.

In 1996 at the closing of the Montreal Forum, a tearful "Rocket" received the longest standing ovation in the city's history. Over 16 minutes of adulation poured over him, chanting his name over and over again. Richard, always the reluctant hero, looked around in surprise for the first few minutes. When he realized the crowd was not letting up and their love for him real, he gave in to his popularity, and broke down in tears all the while waving and mouthing "thank you". He rarely showed this side of himself, as he always tried to remain humble. The last few minutes of adulation saw Richard closing his eyes, while the crowd chanted, "GO HABS GO!" over and over again. Richard later stated that when he closed his eyes and heard the crowd, it brought him back to his younger days. He thought it was a very loving gesture by the fans.

Although long retired by the time of his death in 2000, an estimated 115,000 people of all ages paid their respects while his body lay in state at the Montreal Canadiens' Molson Centre. Flags were lowered to half mast as Quebec's National Assembly was suspended for the day. He was given a state funeral broadcast live across Canada, the first time such an honour was accorded an athlete. Among those who attended were Gordie Howe and Jean Beliveau, various politicians (Jean Chrétien, Lucien Bouchard), and current team captain Saku Koivu. He was buried in the Cimetière Notre-Dame-des-Neiges in Montreal.

A junior hockey team is also named after him, the Rocket de Montreal, playing out of the Maurice Richard Arena (in 2003-04 this team moved to Prince Edward Island). On June 27, 2001, the Canadian government unveiled a monument in Jacques-Cartier Park, in Hull, Quebec honouring Maurice Richard. He has been inducted into Canada's Walk of Fame.

In 1967 he was made an Officer of the Order of Canada (one of the first distributions of the Order) and was promoted to Companion in 1998.

In 1992, he was made a member of the Privy Council of Canada. However, his appointment by Prime Minister Brian Mulroney was somewhat controversial.

Richard was married to Lucille Norchet from September 17, 1942 until her death on July 18, 1994. They had 7 children.

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Depiction in popular media

  • Richard's hockey career, and in particular the folk legend of his NHL game played after having moved, was featured in one of a series of patriotic television advertisements aired in Canada by Canada Post.
  • A feature film, Maurice Richard (or The Rocket in English), was released in 2005 (the French version), starring Roy Dupuis in the title role and directed by Charles Binamé. It was shot in Quebec for a budget of ~$8mln CAD by AllianceAtlantis and Odeon. It is being released in English for the first time in April 2006. See: http://www.allianceatlantisfilms.com/Synopsis.asp?TitleID=81557
  • See also:

Ramos, Howard, and Kevin Gosine(2001). “The Rocket”: Newspaper coverage of the death of a Quebec cultural icon, a Canadian hockey player. Journal of Canadian Studies, 36(4), 9-31; 2002, JCS, 37(1), p. 250 (published erratum).

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Career achievements and records

  • Won the Hart Memorial Trophy in 1947
  • Named to the First All-Star Team from 1945, 1946, 1947, 1948, 1949, 1950, 1955, and 1956.
  • Named to the Second All-Star Team in 1944, 1951 to 1954, and in 1957.
  • Played in NHL All-Star Game in 1947, 1948, 1949, 1950, 1951, 1952, 1953, 1954, 1955, 1956, 1957, 1958, and 1959.
  • First player to score 50 goals in a season.
  • First player to score 50 goals in 50 games.
  • First player to score 500 goals in a career.
  • Led the NHL in goal scoring in 1945, 1947, 1950, 1954, and 1955.
  • Played for Stanley Cup winning teams in 1944, 1946, 1953, 1956, 1957, 1958, 1959, and 1960 (the fourth most of any NHL player).
  • Eclipsed record for career NHL goals scored with 544 (previously held by Nels Stewart).
  • Ranks 21st all-time in career goals and 73rd in career points.
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Career statistics

    Regular Season   Playoffs
Season Team League GP G A Pts PIM GP G A Pts PIM
1942-43 Montreal NHL 16 5 6 11 4 -- -- -- -- --
1943-44 Montreal NHL 46 32 22 54 45 9 12 5 17 10
1944-45 Montreal NHL 50 50 23 73 46 6 6 2 8 10
1945-46 Montreal NHL 50 27 21 48 50 9 7 4 11 15
1946-47 Montreal NHL 60 45 26 71 69 10 6 5 11 44
1947-48 Montreal NHL 53 28 25 53 89 -- -- -- -- --
1948-49 Montreal NHL 59 20 18 38 110 7 2 1 3 14
1949-50 Montreal NHL 70 43 22 65 114 5 1 1 2 6
1950-51 Montreal NHL 65 42 24 66 97 11 9 4 13 13
1951-52 Montreal NHL 48 27 17 44 44 11 4 2 6 6
1952-53 Montreal NHL 70 28 33 61 112 12 7 1 8 2
1953-54 Montreal NHL 70 37 30 67 112 11 3 0 3 22
1954-55 Montreal NHL 67 38 36 74 125 -- -- -- -- --
1955-56 Montreal NHL 70 38 33 71 89 10 5 9 14 24
1956-57 Montreal NHL 63 33 29 62 74 10 8 3 11 8
1957-58 Montreal NHL 28 15 19 34 28 10 11 4 15 10
1958-59 Montreal NHL 42 17 21 38 27 4 0 0 0 2
1959-60 Montreal NHL 51 19 16 35 50 8 1 3 4 2
NHL Totals 978 544 421 965 1285 133 82 44 126 188
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See also

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External links

Preceded by:
Emile Bouchard 		Montreal Canadiens Captains
1956 - 1960 		Followed by:
Doug Harvey
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fr:Maurice Richard (hockey) ja:モーリス・リシャール

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