Mike Bossy, Hall of Famer on Champion Islander Teams, Dies at 65

Mike Bossy, the Hockey Corridor of Fame wing who performed a key function in propelling the New York Islanders to 4 consecutive Stanley Cup championships within the early Nineteen Eighties, has died. He was 65.

The Islanders introduced his demise however gave no different particulars. Bossy revealed in October that he had lung most cancers.

The Islanders, based as a Nationwide Hockey League enlargement workforce in 1972, received solely 12 video games of their first season on the Nassau Coliseum on Lengthy Island and weren’t a lot better the next season.

However they started reaching the playoffs underneath Normal Supervisor Invoice Torrey and Coach Al Arbour, who assembled groups that featured Bossy at proper wing and his linemates Bryan Trottier at heart, Clark Gillies at left wing, Denis Potvin on protection and Billy Smith in purpose. (Gillies died of most cancers on Jan. 21 at 67.)

The Islanders defeated the Philadelphia Flyers, the Minnesota North Stars, the Vancouver Canucks and the Edmonton Oilers of their Stanley Cup championship run from 1980 to 1983, then misplaced to the Oilers within the 1984 cup ultimate.

The Canadian-born Bossy was among the many N. H.L’s quickest skaters, and he possessed an uncanny skill to get off wrist pictures earlier than opposing goalies had any notion that the puck was coming their method.

“Mike’s received the quickest palms I’ve ever seen,” Arbour, a former defenseman who had performed alongside Gordie Howe’s with the Detroit Pink Wings and Bobby Hull with the Chicago Black Hawks, as soon as stated.

Bossy twice led the N.H.L. in objectives, with 69 within the 1978-79 season and 68 in 1980-81. He scored at the very least 51 objectives in every of his first 9 seasons earlier than a again harm restricted him to 38 objectives in his final season. His 85 objectives in 129 playoff video games had been essentially the most in N.H.L. historical past on the time.

Bossy scored 573 objectives and had 553 assists in 752 regular-season video games over 10 N.H.L. seasons, all with the Islanders.

He was elected to the Hockey Corridor of Fame in 1991.

A finesse participant and barely constructed, Bossy eluded exhausting checks and refused to get into melees.

“Guys knew he wouldn’t battle,” Trottier informed Sports activities Illustrated in 1999. “They’d punch him, spear him, it didn’t matter. He didn’t want a lot room. The man was so artistic, he might make one thing particular with only a half inch.”

“I in all probability developed what scouts known as my fast palms and fast launch extra out of self-defense than anything,” Bossy recalled in his memoir, “Boss: The Mike Bossy Story” (1988, with Barry Meisel). “The N.H.L. was zoom, zoom, zoom in comparison with junior. I realized to make fast passes and take fast pictures to keep away from getting hammered each time I had the puck.”

Bossy received the Woman Byng Trophy for gentlemanly play in 1983, 1984 and 1986. He incurred solely 210 penalty minutes.

He was chosen by the Islanders because the No. 15 choose within the 1977 N.H.L. newbie draft after being handed over by groups who, regardless of his outstanding goal-scoring in junior hockey, believed he didn’t have the checking expertise to outlive within the N.H.L.

It didn’t take lengthy for Bossy to show in any other case. He received the Calder Memorial Trophy for 1977-78 because the N.H.L.’s rookie of the 12 months, scoring a rookie-record 53 objectives that stood for 15 years. He received the Conn Smythe Trophy as essentially the most precious participant within the 1982 Stanley Cup playoffs.

Michael Bossy was born on Jan. 22, 1957, in Montreal, one in every of 10 youngsters of Borden and Dorothy Bossy. His father was of Ukrainian descent, and his mom was English. Borden Bossy flooded the yard of the household’s house constructing throughout winters to create an ice rink, and Mike realized to skate at 3.

He dropped out of Laval Catholic Excessive Faculty to affix the Laval Nationwide workforce of the Quebec Main Junior Hockey League close to the tip of its 1972-73 season and performed in 4 full seasons for Laval, scoring 309 objectives.

Then got here his choice by the Islanders within the draft.

Bossy’s N.H.L. profession was lower brief by a continual harm. In the beginning of the Islanders’ 1986 coaching camp, he skilled again pains. He missed 17 video games through the common season and injured his left knee within the playoffs, when the Flyers eradicated the Islanders in a preliminary spherical. Docs ultimately discovered that he had two injured discs that couldn’t be repaired by surgical procedure. He sat out the 1987-1988 season, then retired from hockey in October 1988.

The Islanders retired Bossy’s No. 22 in March 1992, making him their second participant accorded the distinction, after Potvin.

Bossy married Lucie Creamer and had two daughters along with her. Full data on his survivors was not instantly accessible.

Bossy, who was bilingual, pursued enterprise ventures and broadcasting work in Canada after his taking part in profession ended. When he was discovered to have most cancers, he took a depart from his put up as a hockey analyst for the Montreal-based French-language channel TVA Sports activities.

For all that Bossy and his Stanley Cup champion Islanders completed, they lacked the charisma of his modern, the Oilers’ Corridor of Fame heart Wayne Gretzky and Gretzky’s Edmonton groups that received 4 Stanley Cups within the Nineteen Eighties.

“We by no means received one millionth of the popularity we must always,” Bossy as soon as informed Sports activities Illustrated. “We had a really low-key group. They didn’t need guys doing an excessive amount of as a result of they thought the hockey would possibly endure. Folks don’t speak about us within the first point out of nice groups.”

He added: “I suppose as I grow old I get uninterested in telling individuals I scored greater than 50 9 consecutive years. Every little thing I’m saying makes it sound like I’m bitter, however I’m not in any way. It’s simply that if you do one thing nicely, like our workforce did, you’d prefer to get acknowledged for it.”

As for comparisons with Gretzky, Bossy informed The New York Instances in January 1986, when he grew to become the eleventh participant in N.H.L. historical past to attain 500 objectives: “Folks name him the Nice Gretzky. I can’t compete with that. I do really feel comfy with what I’ve helped my workforce obtain. Whether or not I consider Wayne Gretzky as the best factor since apple pie is one other query.”