Sport: On Ice

Professional hockey, the first big sport to take a wartime nose dive, is the first to get back in prewar stride. With the 1945-46 season a month old, some 85% of the National Hockey League’s servicemen stars are on ice again. Most of them have Canadian Army discharges; some of them, muscle-stiffened from too much army-style road work, will need another week or two to limber up. Prospective result: the end of the Montreal Canadiens’ honeymoon.

For two years the cocky Canadiens have ridden high & mighty. Now, with few reconversion problems, they are still making hay with their high-efficiency first line of Maurice (“Rocket”) Richard, Elmer Lach and Toe Blake (in nine games, 18 goals). Last week, the league-leading Montrealers buzzed by the Toronto Maple Leafs, who look good on paper but not on ice, twice walloped the seemingly irredeemable New York Rangers.

The other three teams may be hard to keep down. The cagey Chicago Black Hawks are long on speed, and the Detroit Red Wings have the best defense in the league. In the long run the Boston Bruins, despite early-season fumbling and bumbling, may well prove the best of the lot.

The Boston roster is bulging with big names fresh out of khaki, and the names of Woodrow (“Porky”) Dumart, Milt Schmidt and Bobby Bauer lead all the rest. Before they joined the R.C.A.F. three years ago, this trio skated circles around the best defensemen in the league, led the Bruins to three championships in three years. A little rusty, the “Kitchener Kids” (they grew up in Kitchener, Ont.) have not really cut loose so far. Partly responsible is Manager Art Ross, who boasts that he has never had a man go stale on him in 20 years, and now insists on easing his kids back into action.

Meanwhile, the Chicago Black Hawks have a line that kicks up enough chips for the average fan. Center Max Bentley, just out of the Army, is quite a dipsy-doodle artist with a hockey stick; his brother Doug is a deadly shot; Bill Mosienko is perhaps the fastest man on ice. The three of them average just 145 Ibs., but they more than get by in their big-man’s game.