Things You Didn't Know About The 1972 Summit Series

Not everyone knows this: En route to Moscow for their 4 famous games against the Soviets, Team Canada 1972 stopped over in Stockholm for a two game set against Team Sweden. Canada won the first game 4-1, and tied the second game at 4.

The purpose of the stop over was as much to get Team Canada used to the bigger ice surface as it was to grow the game. Good thing, because Canada didn't leave the best impression. Swedish journalist Ulf Jansson followed the rest of Canada's journey to victory in Moscow, and filed this report in Lshockey Magisnet. (translated into English, of course)

Another interesting side note: It was in this set of games that the NHL discovered Borje Salming, its first European trained star.

Here's some other things you probably didn't know about the 1972 Summit Series:

*** In August's training camp Team Canada had three junior players join the team: John Van Boxmeer, Bunny Larocque and Billy Harris.

*** Paul Henderson was reluctant to join Team Canada because he had a vacation on the Rhine River planned with his wife.

*** Russian poet Yevgeny Yevtushenko must not have been impressed with the literary scene in Canada. But he was greatly impressed by Phil Esposito. He acknowledged Espo as Canada's greatest poet.

*** Canada had an American on the team: trainer Frosty Forristall. That's okay, Russia's trainer was a Canadian: UBC's football trainer Rick Noonan.

*** Even weirder - The public address announcer at the Luzhniki Ice Palace in Moscow was a man named Karil Yugorov. He spoke perfect English as well as Russian. That's because he was born as Carl Watts in Winnipeg, but he defected to the Soviet Union! He was secretly cheering for Canada, however.