The Bruins have surprised many with their great season thus far. Some are even calling them the team to beat in the east.
Chicago has an equally impressive young team, and are not far back from joining the Bruins as one of the truly elite teams of the National Hockey League.
Though they are in different conferences, I think it is fair to say that the matches between Boston and Chicago have not been so interesting since the days of the Esposito brothers.The Bruins had big Phil, acquired from Chicago originally, the great goal scoring machine. He smashed Bobby Hull's single season goal scoring record, going from 58 to 76.
The Blackhawks were backstopped by younger brother Tony, the great goaltender, hockey's shutout king.
This is where I had hoped to dig up some amazing numbers about the brothers going head to head. Wins and losses, goals and saves.
Well, I wasn't able to come up with definitive numbers. A reader at HFBoards.com pointed me to a November 16th, 1978 Globe and Mail article which mentioned Phil had 22 goals in 36 career regular season games by that point in his career.
Phil played for three more seasons after that article, potentially facing his brother 11 more times in that season. I checked the Hockey Summary Project, but they have not yet listed those box scores.
So for now I will have to leave the Esposito sibling rivalry at that until later.
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