August 11, 2007

A WHA mystery: where is the 'faux' Avco World Trophy?: In 1973, the New England Whalers had a three games to one lead over the Winnipeg Jets in the league's final series, but the night before the next game, someone from the WHA office realized that the league didn't have a trophy to present to the Whalers if New England was able to beat the Jets in the fifth game.

posted by NoMich to hockey at 06:05 PM - 4 comments

If you go to the site of the old Boston Garden, or to the Civic Center in Hartford, or maybe even to the places where the Carolina Hurricanes have been, you may find the first trophy. You will have to go after dark when no one else is around. Stand there in the darkness and listen carefully. If you hear the sounds of Brass Bonanza , follow the sound. Soon the trophy will be revealed. Be careful! There are spirits there who will not let you have the trophy. You may end up being high sticked through a time warp. Seriously, I had never known about the faux trophy. I was in Japan during that time, so I didn't follow either league, NHL or WHA very closely. I learned something today. Thanks, NoMich.

posted by Howard_T at 10:18 PM on August 11, 2007

What I found interesting is that someone actually reads the NHL website :-)

posted by jc at 05:08 PM on August 12, 2007

Nice link. Also a local (to me) connection: Apparently there are three “legitimate” Avco World Trophy’s: two are on display – one at the Nova Scotia Sports Hall of Fame, one in Toronto’s Hockey Hall of Fame – and the one in Winnipeg. I volunteer to go down and inspect that first one more carefully.

posted by Amateur at 11:22 AM on August 14, 2007

Great piece of hockey nostalgia. Cheers.

posted by SportsNarrative at 11:06 AM on August 15, 2007

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