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HomeMy WebLinkAboutTimes-Advocate, 1978-04-06, Page 8Page 8 Times-Advocate, April 6, 1978 Fog cancels second game Next contest here Friday Sports Spotlight b,j\ '0/7 Hawks lose first game to St. George By Ross Haugh Salute amateurs The prelude to the Toronto Blue Jays first home game at Canadian National Exhibition stadium on Fri­ day, April 14 will feature a salute to amateur baseball. Pre-game festivities for the Jays home opener against the Detroit Tigers will feature a starting lineup of 11 youngsters from Metro Toronto sandlots who will take the field for the season’s ceremonial first pitch. The first pitch of the 1978 season will be thrown out by five year-old Robin Godfrey son of Toronto’s metro chairman Paul Godfrey. He will pitch to nine year-old Joe Jurus who plays in the Mississauga minor baseball program. Several girls will be participating in the opening ceremonies. The pre-game entertainment which will begin soon after the gates open at 12 noon for the 1:30 game will also see the return of Canada’s singing superstar Anne Murray to sing the National Anthem. The well known Canadian songstress performed “0 Canada” at last year’s historic and snowy opener and once again this year will donate her fee to the Canadian Association for the Mentally Retarded of which she is honorary national chairman. Also liven­ ing up the colorful pre-game show will be the Cana­ dian Legion Colour Guard, the United States Marine Corps Colour Guard and the Governor General’s Horse Guards band, The Exeter Hawks dropped a 3-2 verdict to St. George Lions in their OHA semi-final opener at the rec centre, Sunday while Tuesday night’s game was cancelled when the team bus turned around and came home due to dense fog. That forced a switch in the playoff schedule. The Lions will return to Exeter this Friday for the second game of the best-of-seven series and the next two games will then be in St. George. The third game will be on Sunday at 2.00 p.m. and the fourth contest is scheduled for Tuesday at 8.15. The Hawks won the coin toss for the extra game and will host the fifth contest at the rec centre a week from Friday. Team and bus company officials deliberated for some time before embarking on Tuesday night’s trip to St. George. The fog had slowed traffic in the area to a crawl, and resulted in several accidents but it was finally decided to make an effort to reach the destination. It took the bus over 40 minutes to get to Elginfield, and when radio reports in­ dicated there had been a 30- car pileup in the Stratford area, it was decided to abort the outing. Ironically, area cleared the fog in this minutes after the game had been cancelled and by the time the bus returned to Exeter, con­ ditions were returning to normal. Several local unaware that the game had been cancelled, showed up in St. George and then had to turn around and come home. fans, FLIPS IN BACK-HANDER — Fred Mommersteeg (17) scored one of his two goals Sunday night on this play. His back-hander sent the puck into the net behind a sprawling Ken Kirby in the St. George net. Other Hawks shown are John VanGerwen beside Mommersteeg and Ken Pinder at the side of the net. T-A photo Come up Flat “I thought we’d be up for this one,” lamented coach Ron Bogart as he emerged from the dressing room following Sunday’s 3-2 loss in the home opener. The Hawks played in­ consistently throughout the contest before 1,025 fans, and never were able to get any sustained offence underway after the first half of the first period when they dominated play. The defence got caught out of position on two of the goals and the winner came when Bob Parkhill took the puck off one defender’s stick outside the blueline, deked around another defenceman and skated in alone to lift a high shot into the net behind Steve Beer at the 5.51 mark of the final period. The Hawks started the game in high gear and Fred Mommersteeg blinked the light at the 2.59 mark when he blasted a shot into the lower corner on a play with linemates Ken Pinder and John VanGerwen. In the final minutes of the first period, the Hawks appeared to run out of steam and St. George knotted the count on a shot by Dick Morrison from near the blueline. Beer managed to get his glove on the shot, but it trickled over the top and dropped behind him into the net. The Hawks started off quickly again in the second when Mommersteeg picked up his second of the night after only 17 seconds. He was given a puck in front of the cage and made no mistake. Pinder and Jim Ferguson drew the assists. At the midway mark of the middle stanzg, an Exeter defender attempted to keep the puck in the St. George end, but his attempt failed and the visitors broke out with three men with only one Exeter player back and they managed another clear shot on Beer to even the count at 2-2. After St. George scored in the third, the Hawks pressed for the equalizer, but Ken Kirby came up with several key saves in the Lions net to preserve the win. St. George picked up 10 of the 17 minor penalties called but the Hawks failed to score on their power play at­ tempts. Beer was credited with 39 saves in the Exeter nets, while Kirby handled 50 shots. Steer This Way By LARRY SNIDER Avoid driving during rush hour, if you can. It's not only un­ pleasant—driving in heavy traffic uses more gasoline per minute than steady driving. * * * Unbelieveable One of the most amazing athletes in sports history celebrated his 50th birthday Friday. No, he isn’t sit­ ting back with his feet up to the fireplace and counting his money. The fellow in question is the fabulous Gordie Howe who intends to play at least one more season in professional hockey. The famous No. 9 seems to be like Ole Man River and just keeps on going. Late last fall he scored the 1,000th goal of his NHL and WHA career. Howe has proved over the years that he could have excelled as a professional in several other sports. He still is a low handicap golfer, was a promis­ ing baseball player during his teens and the way he handled himself in his 31 years in professional hockey shows he could have been successful in boxing as well. Former Cleveland Indians playing manager Lou Boudreau tells the story of Gordie Howe boasting he could hit major league pitching. Boudreau says, “One day when the Indians were in Detroit we got Gordie into one of our uniforms and sent him onto the field to settle: the bets he had with myself and his team-mates Ted Lindsay and Harry Lumley.” “I don’t remember who pitched, but, it was one of our starters. Anyway, Gordie bunted a couple, ticked a few and then bang, bang, bang. He hit three in a row over the left field fence at Briggs Stadium. I didn’t think anybody could come along and even hit one out of the batting cage.” How long Howe will continue to play is a question which nobody can hope to answer. He continues to sur­ prise with his performances and this year is leading his New England team in scoring. Any player able to score more than 20 goals a year can stay around for quite awhile. The official birthday party for Gordie covered two days. Wednesday night some of the greatest names in hockey were on hand at the Springfield Civic Centre to honour the great Howe. These included the presidents of the NHL and WHA, Bobby Orr, Gump Worsley, Bobby Hull, Eddie Shore, Sid Abel and Bill Gadsby. The following night more than 700 persons attend­ ed a Gordie Howe Roast. Proceeds from this event will provide the seed money to establish a program for the planning of a Gordie Howe Greater Hartford Hockey Hall which will be located in the rebuilt Civic Centre Coliseum. Along with Gordie Howe and New England Whaler memorabilia amateur hockey will be represented. A special Gordie Howe commemorative magazine is being printed and should be available to the public in the near future. The book will contain articles, facts, figures and pictures all relating to Howe’s great career. The final paragraph will probably not be written for some time. Dennis Riggin of London sums up any evaluation of Howe as follows, “As great a hockey player as he is — the greatest — he is a greater human being. Riggin was a goalie with the Red Wings in Detroit when Howe was at the height of his career. Strange noises from un­ der your car usually mean trouble. A clicking noise from the rear may be caused by a bad rear wheel bearing. It should be road-tested by a mechanic. * * * The steel in stell-belted tires is in the form of wire mesh. It's stronger and tougher than fiberglass. * * X- Repainting scratches or chipped paint may not produce a perfect job, but it will look better while helping to avoid Thurman named manager of Dashwood ball club The Dashwood Tigers will be playing for a new manager when the 1978 Huron-Perth intermediate baseball league season opens. Club president Bob Hoff­ man announced Monday that Glenn Thurman would be in charge of the team. The 1977 manager was Joe Fulop. Thurman who has been a valuable member of the Tigers for the past two summers will be the team’s first playing manager. The new Tiger mentor played three years of junior ball and three at the senior level in Stratford. He also coached the junior team for one season. While playing with the Stratford senior Intercounty Phil Knight, recently named as top the western junior "D" grouping, was chosen TOP HAWK defenceman in the western junior "D" grouping, was chosen as the Hawk of the month for March. He receives con­ gratulations from Dean McKnight, along with a $50 gift cer­ tificate at Mcknight's Men's Wear. T-A photo .................................................................................................................................................................I.....IIIIIIUIIIIIIIIIIIIIHIIIIIIIIIillllllll^, club, Thurman’s team­ mates were two who are now in the big leagues. They are Montreal Expo shortstop Chris Speir and Minnesota pitcher Jeff Zahn who is expected to start today, Thursday against Seattle. The present day Tigers were organized in 1964 mainly using the previous year’s good midget players. The first manager was Ron Merner and he was followed by Milton Webb, Lome Kleinstiver, Glen Webb, George Tieman, Jack Schade and Joe Fulop. Bantam year comes to end Exeter’s two bantam teams completed their season this week with a game against each other. The bantam II squad scored the first and last goals of the contest at the rec centre, but the Legion “A” squad scored 10 in between to post a one-sided victory. Dave Bell, Al Gaiser and Pete Tuckey paced the win with a pair of goals each. Registering singles were Dave Jackson, Dave Shaw, Wayne Smith and Kevin Parsons. Mark Vandergunst and Mike Murray potted the tallies for the second team. i■ i■ i i S I R I R ■ i i CLIP & SAVE WITH THIS AD SPRING SPECIAL TUNE-UP New Lincoln coach We would like to pass on our congratulations to the newly appointed coach of the St. Marys Lincolns Junior “B” hockey club. He is Jacques Cousineau who will probably be the smallest coach in the junior league next year, but, we have a feeling he will be a bit larger when it comes to getting the job done. Cousineau came from Smooth Rock Falls in northern Ontario to play with the St. Marys juniors and then followed this up with a very successful career with the Lucan-Ilderton Jets. Two other former L-I Jets have tried the coaching profession. Jack Nairn who was playing coach for the Jets for a number of years is in his fourth year at the helm of the Stratford Cullitons and Barry Hearn coached the Lincolns to an Ontario championship three years ago. R R R R R R R R R R R R R R R R R 1. INSTAL NEW SPARK PLUGS 2. INSTAL NEW POINTS & CONDENSER 3. 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