The Goal of My Life (12 page)

Then once again, the questionable officiating we had seen all series reared its ugly head. Much has been said in previous accounts of the series on the work of referee Josef Kompalla, and I’ve resisted bringing him up until now. He called a penalty from the other side of the ice on J.P. Parise for interference and J.P. was so incensed he swung his stick at the West German referee. Naturally he was tossed out of the game, sending the players and coaches and Canadian fans in the stands into a frenzy.

The frustrations had reached the boiling point by then. Some of our fans were even chanting, “Let’s go home!” And to be perfectly honest, I turned to Ron Ellis on the bench and said, “Let’s get out of here.” If Harry Sinden had told us to leave we would have, that’s how much of a joke the officiating was. But really, there was nowhere to go; we had come so far that we had to see this through to the brutal end.

Another Russian power-play goal put them ahead 2–1, but we again tied the score at 2–2 when Jean Ratelle set up Brad Park on a neat passing play.

Vladimir Shadrin scored twenty-one seconds into the period, but Bill White scored at 10:32 to again tie the score at 3–3. This game was going back and forth, and despite our desire to win, we were really in a battle once again, and we knew it.

The Russians were determined to win this game too, and they scored twice more before the period ended, as Yakushev
beat Dryden at 11:43 and Shadrin tallied on yet another power play at 16:44. We were down 5–3 after two periods, and things certainly looked bleak.

During the intermission, we knew we couldn’t gamble too much too soon. But down by two goals now, we knew we needed to score. We had just twenty minutes left, so we came out with lots of energy and anticipation that we could make something happen in time. Our leader, Phil Esposito, scored off a great pass from Peter Mahovlich to get us right back into the game. The Russians started playing a little too defensively and we kept coming, and at 12:56 Yvan Cournoyer tied the game by swatting a rebound off a shot by Esposito past Tretiak.

When the goal light didn’t come on to signal the goal, Alan Eagleson went crazy in the stands. He felt that the Russians were up to no good again, and he wanted the goal judge removed. The Russian soldiers grabbed Eagleson and were taking him away when Peter Mahovlich jumped over the boards and rescued him from the soldiers. Those who witnessed it will know just how high emotions were running at that point. It really was a spectacle.

But there was still work to do. The game was tied 5–5 and the series was tied 3–3–1. The Russians had outscored us 32–30, and they informed us at our bench that if this game ended in a tie, they would be claiming victory because they had scored more goals than we had in the series. We knew that we had to win the game in order to win the series.

Time ticked down. There was less than a minute to play at Luzhniki Arena and the fans were on the edge of their seats. Esposito, Cournoyer, and Peter Mahovlich were on the ice in that final minute as I watched from the bench. I then
did something I had never done before, and would never do again in my hockey career.

“Pete! Pete!” I hollered at him. Don’t ask me how or why, but I felt if I could get out there one more time I could score a goal. I just felt it. For the first time in my life I was screaming at a player to get off the ice so I could get on, just one more time. You just didn’t do that – I had never heard another player do it in my eighteen-year hockey career – but I did.

“Pete! Pete!” I hollered for a second time and then a third. Finally, Mahovlich skated over to the bench, allowing me to hop over the boards and join the play.

As I got onto the ice, the puck went to Cournoyer on the far boards. I charged to the net and yelled for a pass, but when it came I had to reach forward for it and their defenceman tripped me, my momentum making me fall and slide into the boards behind the Russian goal.

I remember thinking that I still had time to get the puck back again and score. The Russians tried to clear the zone, but Esposito was able to whack the puck toward Tretiak, who made the save. I was on my feet again and alone at the side of the goal, and when Tretiak couldn’t control the rebound off Esposito’s shot, I tried sliding a shot along the ice, but he blocked it.

The puck came right back to me. With Tretiak now down, I had some room, and I put the puck in the back of the net, with thirty-four seconds left on the clock. And then … well, perhaps the best way to describe the whole few moments was the way Foster Hewitt did to millions of Canadians watching at home on television.

“Here’s a shot! Henderson made a wild stab at it and fell.
Here’s another shot, right in front. They score! Henderson has scored for Canada!”

I have been asked a million times what went through my mind when that puck slid into the goal. I have answered it a million times, but I will tell you one more time now what I even said to myself out loud when that puck went in the net.

“Dad would have loved that one,” I said. I even had a sense of melancholy for a nanosecond that he wasn’t there to share the moment with me, as he had died in 1968. He was the most influential person in my life when it came to hockey, and at the greatest moment of my hockey life, I wanted to share it with him. After all those years, I guess I was still trying to please my father.

That moment of sadness lasted just a second, though, and was replaced by absolute jubilation! I jumped into Cournoyer’s arms, the guys came pouring off the bench, and the celebration was on. My goodness, what a moment in time that was; I still get tingles thinking about it forty years later.

I went back to the bench exhausted. I said, “Harry, I’m done, the tank is empty!” There was no way I was going back out there for the final thirty-four seconds. We killed those seconds off, the clock wound down, and we had the greatest victory of our lives. We were desperate to win and it showed, and that was the difference really. We didn’t want to go down in history as the team that couldn’t lose to the Russians but did … and thanks to that third-period rally, we didn’t!

I wound up the series with seven goals and three assists in eight games, third in scoring behind only Phil Esposito (seven goals and six assists) and Alexander Yakushev (seven goals and four assists). I scored the game-winning goals in
games six, seven, and eight, all of which were must-wins for Team Canada.

I had been a streak scorer throughout my career, and I had scored some important goals, especially when I was on a hot streak. Once I got on a roll, I tended to stay that way, and that’s just the way it was. I did score thirty-eight goals the year prior in the
NHL
after all, and I was always the kind of guy who, if you surrounded me with good players who’d get me the puck, could score goals.

That said, of course, that eight-game series was the ultimate high of my career. Harry Sinden said in his book that I never had a bad game, never even had a bad shift in that series. That was very kind of him. I played my best hockey at the time when it mattered the most: when I was representing my country in such an important series. I take great satisfaction in that.

After the game, we went back to the dressing room and I sipped on a beer, absolutely spent after the emotion of it all. I looked around and realized that there wasn’t a single person in that room who didn’t make a significant contribution to what we had accomplished. Players like Gary Bergman, who never got the credit he deserved for being such a terrific stay-at-home defenceman in the
NHL
with Detroit, played brilliantly beside Brad Park, a true Hall of Famer. Esposito was unreal, of course – he was the true leader. Clarke was simply amazing. His enthusiasm and work ethic were contagious. Ron Ellis, the consummate defensive specialist, had a great series despite the fact he was hurting badly throughout it with a neck injury. Even though Ron was less than 100 percent, there were no Russians who wanted any part of him checking them, and I feel we wouldn’t have won
the series without Ron’s great defensive work. Tony Esposito played so well at times in the series, and Ken Dryden didn’t allow a goal under enormous pressure in the third period of the final game, and even Brian Glennie, who didn’t play a game, stayed with us and was the ultimate cheerleader. In their own ways every single person led us to that win. That was one area where the Russians just could not match us – our intense desire to win and our heart. They were great players, but we had the intangibles going for us that they just didn’t have.

What a wonderful experience the series turned out to be for every player who was involved with Team Canada. I will never forget a single moment of it, and I am sure the millions of Canadians who witnessed it will not forget it either. It truly was a great moment in the history of Canadian sport.

After the series ended, I attended a reception for the players on both teams. All of us Canadians attended, but only a handful of Russian players bothered to show up. One of them was their great goaltender, Vladislav Tretiak, who had played tremendously against us.

I went up to him and said through an interpreter that I was really impressed with the way he played through the entire series. He responded, also via interpreter, by telling me I was lucky to have scored the last goal of the series! My response to him was pretty direct – and let’s just say no interpreter was needed to translate. He knew exactly what I thought of his response.

Thank goodness we have been able to get to know the Russians since that series ended. I think I can speak for everybody on Team Canada when I say that once we got to know
them, we found them to be terrific individuals. The oppressive system that they had to live under and endure as athletes in Russia was very difficult on them, and I now admire them for how well they handled themselves under those circumstances. Once we got to know and understand them better, the dislike we had for them softened considerably.

Vladislav has been a part of some of our get-togethers over the years, and I have gotten to know him quite well while attending several different events and making appearances together. Let me say this about him now: he is a classy guy, a consummate gentleman, and I’m a big fan of his. I am so glad I got the opportunity to know him better.

We had to make a brief stopover in Czechoslovakia to play a game against the Czechs, which was anticlimactic at that point. I asked Harry if I could sit this one out since I had really aggravated my groin injury against the Russians, and he said okay. All I remember about that trip was that they had such fine crystal in Czechoslovakia then, and Eleanor made sure I purchased some for us as the gals didn’t get to go to Prague. I did, and we returned home exhausted but happy with what we had accomplished.

What I didn’t know – and what none of us knew – was what was waiting for us when we finally did get back home.

I
HAVE BEEN INVOLVED WITH A WEBSITE CALLED
72project.com
– run by Sean Mitton, the founder of the Canadian Expat Network – where Canadians of all ages can share their remembrances of the 1972 Canada–Russia series with a younger generation of hockey fans.

I think the website offers a great way for Canadians to participate in the fortieth anniversary celebrations, and it is really humbling to see how our victory, and the final goal in particular, affected so many Canadians watching at home. I encourage you to check it out. There is a lot of great stuff there, including stories from people from all walks of life and some famous Canadians as well.

I’d also like to share with you here just a few of these stories from some prominent Canadians as to where they were during the eighth and final game, and their memories.