-The image quality is frightful, in its little square box, all fuzzy and all. Some brilliant minds should be put to work on this, the NHL should spend its untold billions on restoring these videos of classic games. I'm guessing all it would take is a software program that sharpifies the image, determines that this pixel should be the place on the sweater where the white of the number borders on the glorious red of the Canadiens' sweater, and makes it so. I assume after a lot of image rendering, bingo bango, you have HD quality images.
Make it happen, Bettman. Earn your keep, if that's at all possible by now. Realistically, this is how you can start to earn back your soul and give yourself a fighting chance to not roast in hell for eternity.
-Lots of fan banners to be seen, with messages such as "WHATEVER HAPPENS YOUR STILL #1" and "WE KNOW THAT FOUR IN A A ROW IS HARD, BUT YOU'LL ALWAYS BE CHAMPIONS." Flyers fans, their shameful hockey team down 3-0 in the series, know what time it is, despite being ignorant brutes.
-Reggie Leach opens the scoring. 1-0 Flyers. Flyers players I can tolerate: Reggie Leach, Bill Barber, Rick MacLeish. That is all.
-The pace of play is torpid, disjointed. There isn't really much passing, just a succession of zone clears, broken plays, errant dishes, hopeful whacks at the puck. Where is the tic-tac-toe precision passing of the 70s Canadiens that I clearly recall with my infallible memory?
This year's Detroit Red Wings, if you teleported them back to 1976, would wipe the floor with the Canadiens. It would be no contest.
-Ken Dryden looks like a stork with swollen legs, all gangly and ungainly. It's striking how small he looks in the net compared to the modern goalies all sumo-suited up. His mask is a classic, and that lean-on-the-stick pose, how I've missed that.
-Canadiens play as if they're just trying to not get assassinated in this game, and then win it in Game 5 on Forum ice. I say this with respect, that's the sensible thing to do. I'm not saying I would have been braver. It's just that they're on the lookout for goonery and lunacy. At one point, Peter Mahovlich is tangled up with a Flyer, the whistle goes, yet Gary Dornhoefer skates in with intent, seemingly. Peter assumes an offensive lineman position, arms raised, ready to pass block, to fend off a defensive lineman's helmet slap, seemingly.
Not a bad idea. Every contact along the boards, the Flyers unleash a jab to the back of the head, a high stick in the face, it's definitely their, um, culture?
So it looks, for long periods of the game, as if the Canadiens know they're up 3-0 in the series, that they can return to the Forum up three games to one if need be and clinch it then, no need to suffer a broken jaw now.
-The refs actually make a couple of calls early in the game to cool things down, to send a message. Dave Schultz, that scum, actually is caught punching Serge Savard in the kidneys who is otherwise engaged along the boards, and after everyone is separated, they give le Sénateur two minutes, but the Flyer goon gets four. Almost a Solomonic decision.
-I keep seeing this defenceman wearing #6 always out of position, and I can't tell who it is. Is it Don Awrey? It's not Chartraw is it? It wasn't Chuck Lefley, he was gone by then, I know that much. It's not John Van Boxmeer, one of my childhood favourites, I'd have heard his name called. Bill Nyrop maybe? It takes me most of the first period to see that it's Jimmy Roberts. I'd pretty much forgotten about him.
-The first period ends 2-2. The Canadiens had scored twice (Steve Shutt and Pierre Bouchard) to quiet down the crowd, before Bill Barber tied it up again with a couple of minutes left.
-That Steve Shutt helmet though... Not sure what's worse, the lack of protection it offers, or how unflattering it is. I never liked the Jofa unit he wore the rest of his career, but that was definitely an upgrade on that Cooper jobbie from the 60s.
-The second period ends at 3-3. Bill Barber had scored early in the period on the powerplay to revive the crowd, but Yvan Cournoyer inherits a loose puck in front of the net and backhands it home, with eight seconds left.
-Larry Robinson is as magnificent as I remember. Long, lanky, with that shock of curly brown hair and that mustache, he's large and in charge and you can't miss him when he's on the ice, he's charging with the puck, directing traffic in his zone, pacifying Flyers. Man he was great.
-I formulate the thought that Guy Lafleur is pretty much invisible in this game. One shift later, he takes a pass from Peter Mahovlich and drives it home, midway through the third. Big, big goal.
And a minute later, Guy returns the favour, and sets up Mahovlich for the insurance goal. Bonsoir la visite, Merci-Thank you, à la prochaine, c'est fini.
How could I ever doubt Guy in the playoffs?
-A new fan banner is unfurled: "WE LOVE YOU ANYWAY".
Final score is Canadiens 5, Flyers 3, the Canadiens sweep the hateful Flyers, and end their reign of terror.
