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Thirty-five years ago last week, Lars-Erik Sjoberg accepted the AVCO Cup for the third time in the previous four years and went for a triumphant skate around the Winnipeg Arena.
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Thirty-five years ago last week, Lars-Erik Sjoberg accepted the AVCO Cup for the third time in the previous four years and went for a triumphant skate around the Winnipeg Arena.
Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 29/05/2014 (4392 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.
Thirty-five years ago last week, Lars-Erik Sjoberg accepted the AVCO Cup for the third time in the previous four years and went for a triumphant skate around the Winnipeg Arena.
JON THORDARSON / WINNIPEG TRIBUNE / The Associated Press Files
Winnipeg Jets captain Lars-Erik Sjoberg carries the Avco Cup after the Jets beat the Edmonton Oilers 7-3 to capture the final WHA championship four games to two in Winnipeg, Manitoba, in this May 20, 1979 photo.
The crowd of 10,000 applauded wildly — dozens stormed the ice to celebrate with the players and grab abandoned sticks and other pieces of equipment — but there was a hint of sadness in their euphoria because they knew they were witnessing the end of an era.
The Winnipeg Jets defeated the Edmonton Oilers 7-3 on May 20, 1979, winning the best-of-seven AVCO Cup final 4-2. The victory followed a 4-0 sweep of the Quebec Nordiques in the semis and put an exclamation point on the tumultuous seven-year run of the World Hockey Association.
The Jets were one of four teams “merging” into the NHL the following season, joining Quebec, Edmonton and the New England Whalers. The price of admission, however, was the right to protect just three players from their squads at the time, have the rest of their rosters decimated by existing NHL teams reclaiming former players and draft picks, and then filling out the teams with everybody else’s leftovers.
The Cincinnati Stingers and the Birmingham Bulls did not make the cut while the Indianapolis Racers, who gave a 17-year-old rookie from Brantford, Ont., his first taste of professional hockey, folded after 25 games that season. (The rookie, Wayne Gretzky, was subsequently traded to Edmonton, after Jets owner Michael Gobuty lost or declined — depending on who you talk to — an in-flight game of backgammon to Nelson Skalbania, who owned the Racers.)
PAUL DELESKE / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS Files
A jubilant coach, Tom McVie, and one of his players, Kim Clackson, celebrate Winnipeg Jets' Avco Cup win in 1979.
Kim Clackson, the enforcer who joined the team the year before, said even though the Jets had lost their captain, Lars-Erik Sjoberg for most of the season due to a ruptured Achilles tendon, veteran blueliner Ted Green and most importantly, the Hot Line of Bobby Hull, Anders Hedberg and Ulf Nilsson was no more — Hull retired just four games into the season after his Swedish linemates were lured away to the New York Rangers — the arrival of several members of the defunct Houston Aeros filled the gap. Forwards Morris Lukowich, Terry Ruskowski, Rich Preston and defenseman Scott Campbell might not have been as pretty to watch but there’s no doubt they were effective.
But the team stumbled during the regular season as the cultures of the Jets and Aeros clashed. Clackson blamed the lackluster performance on coach Larry Hillman, with whom he was feuding over ice time. Eventually, “Clacker” decided he wanted to be traded so he started playing gags on the coach.
“I took his hockey stick and sawed it halfway through and put tape over it. He leaned on his stick at practice and fell over. I put Scotch tape on his blades and he wiped out on the ice again. The guys were roaring,” he said.
It got to the point where after a bad storm caused a giant tree branch to crack off and fall on to Hillman’s car, “he had to climb up in the tree to see if I had sawed it halfway though,” Clackson said.
The Jets finished the season with a record of 39-35-6, good for third place behind Edmonton and Quebec. Hillman was fired partway through and replaced by Tom McVie, who led the Jets to the last professional hockey championship this city has seen.
geoff.kirbyson@freepress.mb.ca
1: Joe Daley
Age: 35
Regular season record: 7-11-3
Playoffs: 0-0-0
FAST FACT
The only Jet to play all seven season in the WHA and retired as the winningest goalie in league history with 167 victories.
AFTER AVCO
Runs a sports cards and collectables shop in Winnipeg.
One of several former Jets players to become a coach (Bobby Hull, Larry Hillman, Bill Sutherland, Rick Bowness.)
AFTER AVCO
Reclaimed by the Detroit Red Wings in expansion draft in 1979-80. Returned for the ’80-81 season. Went on to become a scout under former Jets GM John Ferguson with the San Jose Sharks.
JON THORDARSON / WINNIPEG TRIBUNE / The Associated Press Files
Lars-Erik Sjoberg carries the Avco Cup after the Jets beat the Edmonton Oilers 7-3 to capture the final WHA championship four games to two in Winnipeg, Manitoba, in this May 20, 1979 photo.
4: Lars-Erik Sjoberg
Age: 29
Regular season: 9 games, 0G, 3A, 3 points, 2 PIM. (Missed most of the season with a torn Achilles tendon.)
Playoffs: 10 games, 1G, 2A, 3 points, 4PIM
JETS FACT
The first Swedish-born captain on a WHA (1975-76) and NHL (1979-80) team.
AFTER AVCO
Sjoberg retired after one season in the NHL and then went on to become a scout with the New York Rangers. He died in October 1987, after a lengthy battle with cancer.
Campbell was a first-round draft pick of the St. Louis Blues but opted to sign with the Houston Aeros.
AFTER AVCO
One of three players protected by the Jets in the expansion draft. Forced to retire because of a chronic asthma condition. Now works in the IT field in southern Ontario.
The Jets and the Minnesota North Stars were the only teams he played on where he wasn’t captain. Wearing the “C” for the Houston Aeros in the WHA and the Blackhawks, L.A. Kings and Pittsburgh Penguins, he was the only player in major professional history to captain four different clubs.
AFTER AVCO
Reclaimed by the Chicago Blackhawks in the expansion draft. Played 10 NHL seasons
KEN GIGLIOTTI / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS Files
Peter Sullivan, in a game vs. Colorado.
Drafted by the Toronto Toros, general manager Gilles Leger made a side deal with the Jets enabling Nilsson to come to Winnipeg in 1977 to play with six other Swedes.
AFTER AVCO
Reclaimed by the Atlanta Flames in the expansion draft. Went on to win a Stanley Cup with the Edmonton Oilers in 1987.
KEN GIGLIOTTI / WINNIPEG FREE PRESS Files
Morris Lukowich
Was a member of the 1970 Stanley Cup winning Boston Bruins.
AFTER AVCO
He retired after the ’79-80 season with the Jets and eventually became the team’s director of scouting. He later held the same post with the Chicago Blackhawks. Lives outside of Winnipeg.
JON THORDARSON / WINNIPEG TRIBUNE / The Associated Press Files
Bob Guindon
One of two NHL Jets to ever score five goals in a game vs. Philadelphia in a 7-6 victory on March 3, 1982. (Alexei Zhamnov is the other.) Scored the last Jets WHA goal.
AFTER AVCO
Became first player to win an AVCO Cup (Jets 1976, 1978 and 1979) and then a Stanley Cup (Edmonton in 1984 and ’85).
A one-time baseball prospect, Moffat tried out for the Montreal Expos.
AFTER AVCO
After retiring in 1981, Moffat stayed with the Jets for a number of years as their community and media relations director. He now works for Pattison Outdoor Advertising in Victoria.
His name was erroneously omitted from the players’ names engraved on the AVCO Cup.
AFTER AVCO
His daughter, Sommer West, competed for Canada in softball at the 2000 Summer Olympics in Sydney.
Courtesy of Joe Daley's Sports Cards
Gary Smith
30: Gary Smith
Age: 34
Regular season: 11-3-2
Playoffs: 8-2
FAST FACT
While a member of the Vancouver Canucks in the mid-1970s, he was introduced to owner Frank Griffiths Sr.’s wife and after being informed that her father was Dr. Ballard of the dog food company fame, he reportedly said he “could see the family resemblance from the can.”
AFTER AVCO
After giving up the last goal in WHA history to Dave Semenko, he retired after the 1979-80 season, splitting time between Winnipeg and the Tulso Oilers.
35: Markus Mattsson
Age: 21
Regular season: 25-21-3.
Playoffs: 0-0-0.
FAST FACT
Traded to Quebec in February, 1978 and reacquired a month later. He was one of three players protected by the Jets prior to entering the NHL.
AFTER AVCO
As a member of the Los Angeles Kings, he ended Wayne Gretzky’s 51-game point streak in 1983-84.
