The Barn, Hockey a Look Back

Howie Hanson – Howies Blog

Back when I laced up the Tacks, for the mighty Cloquet Jacks and Bill Kennedy in the early 1970’s, you either played with fearless toughness and unmatched passion or you found yourself sitting on the bench. Or worse, playing shinny hockey full-time after school and on weekends at a Wood City frozen pond.

There was no co-warding in Kennedy’s no-nonsense, tough guy system. What his players lacked in skill they made up for in ol’ fashioned hard work and determination. He called his coaching system, “playin’ with guts.”

Bruce Plante was our left-handed goaltender. His nickname was “Weed,” since he was as pencil-thin and flexible as a weed. He had a tremendous catching glove hand, though we always teased him that he caught the with the wrong hand. He was an even better first baseman, and saved my bacon more than once on short hops he always seemed to gobble up with ease.

We built the original “barn” in the ridiculously hot summer of 1971, for $35,000 for materials and labor donated by community contractors and mostly hockey players and their daughters. There was no artificial ice plant, no cement floor, and I remember that Kennedy “encouraged” us to do stops-and-starts in preseason workouts to dislodge the rocks that bullied their way to the top layer of the natural ice surface. Eventually, the rocks were gone and the ice was hard and fast.

There was no Zamboni, and between periods of games volunteers would sweep the ice with large brooms. Once the snow was removed, the ice was resurfaced by a makeshift riding lawn mower pulling a 55-gallon barrell that spread hot water not unlike today’s modern Zamboni’s.

There were two small locker rooms at the barn, divided by only a thin sheetrocked wall. Each locker room, which was about 400 square feet, contained one toilet, but without the privacy walls. This made for some interesting between-periods chuckles whenever a teammate had to take a dump, especially if he had diarrhea.

There was no plexiglass around the rink, as there is now at nearly every indoor rink, and cyclone fencing was installed above the wooden boards only behind the nets at each end of the rink. Because we wore no facefasks, it was not uncommon for most players to have their face stitched up after being checked into the fencing or taking a stick or puck to the chops. Players frequently broke their noses (I broke my nose four times).

It wasn’t exactly the movie Slap Shot, but bench-clearing brawls were part of the game back then. We prided ourselves on our toughness, and we never backed down to teams that challenged us to drop our gloves. I was a little fart, a slick-handed centerman who weighed about a buck-forty, so I never dropped my stick whenever the gloves came off. Kennedy was also smart enough surround me with big, tough wingers, since I was usually the instigator of verbal and physical debates.

Every preseason we scrimmaged against Eveleth, and we usually spent most of the 90-minute morning workouts chasing young phenom Mark Pavelich around the rink. Pav was small, quick and highly-elusive — and later played for the Bulldogs, competed in the Olympics and eventually had a strong pro career in the National Hockey League.

I also played against Bemidji’s stud defenseman Gary Sargent, who played like a man against boys. My speedy winger, Steve Oakes, once woke up in the 14th row at the Bemidji arena after taking a mid-ice hit by Sargent, who later starred for the Los Angeles Kings and Minnesota North Stars. Believe me, I kept my head up looking for Sargent every time I had the puck on my stick for the rest of that game.

Duluth East, Duluth Marshall, International Falls, Hibbing, Virginia and Eveleth were the elite teams to beat during my era. Duluth East rolled a senior, junior and sophomore line, and usually featured four strong defensemen and strong goaltenders such as 11-year starter Clark Coole. Hilltoppers defenseman Pokey Trachsel was a Wayne Gretzky-like prep hockey rock star, another defenseman who sent players into orbit with open-ice checks. Virginia featured the original Hansen brothers, though other than the toughest of them all, Jack, were racehorse players that few opponents could contain. Proctor had goaltender Billy Moen, who made over 50 saves on most nights.

Our best players were the legendary defensive duo of Cha Karulak and Rick Wahtera, Greg Kujawa, Larry Raushel, Jeff Anderson, Scott Hambly (who scored the first-ever Cloquet goal at the original barn) and Oakes. Jamie Langenbrunner, Corey Millen and Derek Plante would follow, taking the purple-and-white to new heights of excellence and success.

Though the rinks are fancier, the equipment is more expensive and the players are bigger and stronger, the game is still the same.

Shoot, score, win — it’s a simple game, Kennedy used to say.