It’s November 1st, 1959
You could hear a pin drop inside the Montreal Forum.
The crowd falls quiet.
They’re not holding on to dear breath with anticipation, instead, it’s fear and dread that is gripping them in place.
Someone isn’t getting up.
On the ice, the team’s star goaltender is struggling with the pain.
He slowly gets up and skates to the locker room leaving behind a crimson trail.
His face has been shattered, and it isn’t the first time.
For most players, the story would end here.
But not for this Montreal Canadien.
Instead, he gets stitched up like he had many times before.
When the nurse held a mirror up to him, he winced at the image looking back at him.
The blood was beginning to dry; his eye was swollen shut and his nose was bent at an unnatural angle.
Despite his injuries, he had a job to do. He had to finish the game. His team was counting on him because there is no backup goalie available.
Minutes later, he returns to the ice wearing something almost no NHL goaltender would dare to…
The crowd stares.
The opposing players laugh.
But in that moment, the beat-up goalie changed hockey forever.
I’m Craig Baird and this is Canadian History Ehx.
This month, sharing stories of icons from the Original Six Era. Today, I bring you the quiet, inventive man who changed hockey forever with the courage to ignore tradition, challenge convention, and protect the face everyone else thought should remain exposed.
This is…. Jacques Plante: The Man Behind the Mask!
The life of one of the greatest goalies in NHL history began on Jan. 17, 1929, in a simple farmhouse near Mont Carmel, Quebec when Palma and Xavier Plante welcomed him into the world.
Not long after, the family moved to Shawinigan Falls, where winters were long, money was often scarce, and the game of hockey was as much a way of life as it was a pastime.
His father worked as a machinist at a local factory and worked hard.
Jacques would later say his father worked harder than any man he had ever known.
That’s because the Plantes had a lot of mouths to feed.
Jacques was the first of eleven children.
With such a large family during The Great Depression, there was little room for luxuries.
Every dollar counted and every child was expected to help.
Jacques was the oldest, so he helped care for the younger ones.
He cooked, cleaned and even changed diapers.
The children learned early to make do with whatever they had.
Shoes were expensive, they were mostly worn for special occasions and in Church on Sundays, the rest of the time the children were often barefoot.
Jacques said,
“The shoes proved everything is relative. All of us kids in the neighbourhood had to go shoeless for the same reason, except the landlord’s son, because his father had more income.”
Their clothing was handmade and Jacques would mend clothes when needed with needle and thread or knit gloves and toques for the family.
The skill became a source of comfort and years later, as a goalie in the NHL, he dealt with the anxiety of playing by knitting quietly in the dressing room or on the train between games.
But Jacques was never supposed to be an athlete.
As a child, he suffered from chronic asthma that often left him struggling to breathe, especially during the humid summer months.
He was also small for his age and battled frequent illnesses.
Yet when winter arrived and the cold air settled over Quebec, his breathing improved, allowing him to spend countless hours on frozen ponds because like thousands of Canadian children Jacques was in love with hockey.
From the age of three, Jacques had one dream, to play for the Montreal Canadiens.
But equipment was expensive.
The Plantes couldn’t afford skates or a puck, so Jacques played without skates and with a tennis ball.
His first hockey stick was carved from a tree root by his father.
Jacques on ice dreams were delayed further when he fell off a ladder at five years old.
The injury didn’t heal properly and limited his ability to stickhandle the puck.
But nothing was going to keep him off the ice, so he moved into the goalie position.
Jacques quickly developed a love for being a goalie, his first pads were also made by his father. They were stuffed potato sacks reinforced by wooden panels.
He found himself on the ice for hours at a time, through the coldest winter weather, practicing making saves and dreaming of wearing a Montreal Canadiens sweater.
To keep warm, during those bitter cold sessions he always wore a toque which more often than not, he had knitted himself.
And so, the winters passed, year after year, until he was 12 years old and he played his first organized hockey game by chance.
He had been watching his school’s hockey team practice, when the coach got into an argument with the goalie who stormed off the ice.
Jacques saw the team needed one so he went over to the coach and asked if he could step in since there was no one else willing to do it.
The coach agreed and quickly realized he had made the right choice.
Jacques had more skill than the previous goalie and swiftly his reputation grew.
Over the next two years, Jacques played for five different teams at various levels.
One was even a factory team made up of grown men.
Word continued to spread about the goalie dominating leagues in Shawinigan Falls and by the time Jacques was 15 years old he had offers to play across the pond in England.
He was also asked to join the Providence Reds of the American Hockey League.
Plus, one team even offered him $80 a week, about $1,500 today.
That would really help support the Plantes but despite the family’s financial needs, his parents wanted Jacques to finish high school.
He graduated with honours in 1947, then took a clerk job at a factory.
But that didn’t mean his dreams of playing hockey were over.
Because Jacque Plante was still being watched by recruiters
And one team had their eyes on him more than any other.
The Montreal Canadiens.
In the autumn of 1947, Jacques Plante was working when he got the call he had been dreaming of.
The Montréal Junior Canadiens wanted him to attend their training camp.
Jacques took two weeks off work and travelled to Montreal for the camp.
He impressed the team almost immediately and was offered a contract.
Even though he wanted to play for the big club one day, he wasn’t sure about signing on the dotted line.
He was offered $30 per week, a good salary for a hockey prospect but less than what he was making at the factory.
So, Jacques bit the bullet and refused.
The team offered him $35.
At the same time, the Quebec Citadels were also keeping an eye on the young goalie.
They tried to swoop in and steal him by offering him $85 per week.
He couldn’t pass that up, so he quickly signed with the Citadels.
Frank Selke, the general manager of the Montreal Canadiens, desperately wanted Jacques.
He had heard rumours that the Toronto Maple Leafs and New York Rangers were interested in him as well.
So, he went to the drawing board and negotiated with the Quebec Citadels for a loan.
He would get two games with Jacques on the Montreal Junior Canadiens.
On Dec. 13, 1947, Jacques suited up for the first game and found Frank Selke in front of him with a B-form contract that gave the Montreal Canadiens the rights to him if he ever turned professional.
Jacques signed, played his two games for the farm team, and then went back to the Citadels.
Upon his return, he was a sensation in Quebec City.
He was a stellar player and his habit of wearing a toque during games to stay warm endeared him to fans.
That wasn’t unusual, goalies often wore something on their heads.
Georges Vezina, the great Montreal Canadiens goalie famously wore a small, brimless knitted toque featuring the team’s iconic colors of blue, white, and red while playing in goal.
Then there is poor Hap Holmes, the great early-NHL goalie who wore a baseball cap to protect his bald head from tobacco spit from spectators. Isn’t early hockey history great?
But a head covering isn’t the reason Jacques Plantes stood out.
Fans were delighted he left the net.
Today, that’s pretty common, but back in Jacques’ early career, it was revolutionary.
He essentially became another defenceman on the ice, and it frustrated his opponents immensely.
The media began to call him The Wandering Goalie.
He was a darling to fans, and they were delighted further when thanks in no small part to Jacques’s amazing skills, the Citadelles won the league title.
He would play again in the1948-49 season with the Citadelles, but it would be his last and he went out with a bang.
In 64 games, he recorded 42 wins, 12 losses and seven shutouts.
Then on Aug. 17, 1949, Jacques signed with the Montreal Royals of the Quebec Senior Hockey League.
The move got him a raise of $4,500 for the season, AND he received an extra $500 to be the practice goalie for the Montreal Canadiens.
It wasn’t much, but it was his foot in the door, which was important to try and keep the dream of being a professional hockey player alive.
Remember, at the time, there were only six teams in the National Hockey League which meant only six goaltenders. Jacques may have been talented, but so were other men.
Gerry McNeil had served as the Montreal Royals goalie from 1943-44 to 1948-49 and was now moving up the ladder to the Cincinnati Mohawks while waiting for his chance with the Canadiens.
The man in the top spot was Bill Durnan, and he was one of the greatest goalies in NHL history.
Since joining the Canadiens in 1943-44, he had won six Vezina Trophies as the league’s top goalie and two Stanley Cups.
So, Jacques had his work cut out for him if he was ever to reach the number one spot with the Canadiens.
And for that… he would need a little help.
His first season with the Royals in 1949/50 Jacques did well.
He won 27 games by the end of the season and was happily celebrating his wedding to Jacqueline Gagné.
They married on April 30, 1949, in Quebec City at the Notre-Dame church but soon after events were in motion to get him to the big show.
Bill Durnan, despite playing only seven seasons in the NHL, announced his retirement.
The stress of the job, and the injuries that came with it, was too much for the storied goalie.
His career in net brought trophies but also a broken nose, a severely injured knee and a scalp laceration that turned into a staph infection.
Durnan chose to get into coaching, and Gerry McNeil from the Royals moved up to the number one spot.
Which meant that after only one season with the Royals, Jacques was one step closer to being the Canadiens goalie.
So, he put his head down and got to work in the Quebec Senior Hockey League with the Montreal Royals, while he awaited his chance.
He delighted fans by winning no fewer than 20 games per season until his last game in the league in 1953.That was impressive enough for The Montreal Canadiens to be paying attention too.
That’s because on Oct. 29, 1952, Canadiens goalie Gerry McNeil took a shot off the cheekbone in a game in Toronto.
Canadiens coach Dick Irvin could have used the designated backup goalie, but he had never played in the NHL so instead he insisted McNeil stay in net.
Remember, hockey is a brutally violent sport.
And McNeil had suffered a broken cheekbone, and his eye had swollen shut.
Through the injury, he did the best he could but gave up seven goals.
After the game, McNeil found out his injury was bad enough that he would be missing a few weeks of play.
That’s when Dick Irvin made the call.
Jacques Plante was on the train with the Montreal Royals when he received the news every player in the minors wanted to get.
He was going to the big leagues.
On Nov. 1, 1952, Jacques Plante suited up for his debut with the Montreal Canadiens.
But one thing would be missing.
His signature toque.
He had worn it in every game r with the Royals, but the Canadiens coach adamantly refused.
Irvin was old school and didn’t believe his goalies should wear anything on their head.
As the young goalie sat in the dressing room surrounded by players, he had grown up idolizing, he looked down to see his hands were shaking.
Through the dressing room doors, he could hear a packed house at the Montreal Forum clamoring for the game to start.
He was always aware that Hockey Night in Canada would be broadcasting the game to televisions across the nation.
As he tried to calm his nerves, a teammate walked up to him.
He looked up to the striking, coal-black eyes that famously flashed with intense competitive fire on the ice.
Maurice “The Rocket” Richard was staring at him.
Maurice held out his own shaking hands to the young player and shared that his hands also shook before every game but stopped once the puck dropped.
With the reassuring words of a living legend still ringing in his ears, Jacques was ready to hit the ice.
In less than a minute he made his first save. By the end of the game, only one puck had made it past him.
In his first professional game, the Canadiens won 4-1.
He said after the game
“They sure shoot a lot harder in the league. It was the power of the shots I noticed most, just as soon as I stopped one.”
Jacque would be back in net for another two games before McNeil’s return.
In that time, he won two and tied one, while allowing only four goals.
It was a good appetizer for a career that was about to become legendary.
Jacques returned to the Montreal Royals, but his days with the team were already numbered.
If you remember the episode on Jean Beliveau, the Montreal Canadiens bought the entire Quebec Senior Hockey League during the 1952-53 season to force Beliveau to sign with the team.
By doing so, it also forced Jacques to become a professional
On Dec. 29, 1952, he signed his contract with the Montreal Canadiens.
It was time to move on up, but not to the NHL quite yet.
As 1952 turned to 1953, Jacques, his wife Jacqueline and his one-year-old son Michel were on a train to Buffalo, New York.
Jacques was going to suit up for the Buffalo Bisons of the American Hockey League, which was a Canadiens farm team.
For fans in Buffalo, he could not have arrived at a better time.
The team was one of the worst in the league and only drew 1,000 spectators to their home games.
But almost as soon as Jacques arrived, the Bisons went on a six-game winning streak and attendance rose to 9,000 a game.
Jacques had transformed the team into a winner, but with the season almost over by the time he arrived, the Bisons missed the playoffs.
So, Jacques went to Montreal to serve as the Canadiens’ reserve goalie during their Stanley Cup playoffs run.
Jacques expected to practice with the team but sit in the stands during games.
What he didn’t know was that Gerry McNeil, like Bill Durnan before him, was struggling.
McNeil was under incredible stress in goal.
By the fifth game of the first round of the playoffs, McNeil told coach Dick Irvin that he couldn’t take it anymore.
He recommended that he be replaced and put one name forward.
Jacques was standing in the hotel lobby prior to game six.
He watched as Dick Irvin walked up to him and then the blood in his ears started pumping.
It was so loud he almost didn’t hear him say that he would be in goal tonight.
He suited up in his childhood team’s colours.
He listened as the fans at Chicago Stadium chanted for their team.
Not only was Jacques Plante playing professional hockey.
He was now playing in the Stanley Cup playoffs!
He was living the dream of thousands of Canadians.
And if that weren’t enough, Dick Irvin was now upping the ante.
He bet anyone in the room a dollar that Jacques would get a shutout.
No pressure.
Doing his best to hide his nerves, Jacques stepped onto the ice and took his place in goal.
As he stood there, someone threw an egg at him.
When an ice cleaner came by to clean up the mess, he was hit with a tomato.
It was an undignified and unruly start, but Jacques quickly made the fans pay for their disrespect.
He stopped 24 shots on goal by Chicago.
And Montreal got a 3-0 win.
Jacques got that shutout and won the bet for his coach.
The next game, he was back in net.
And once again. The Canadiens won, but this time it wasn’t just the game.
They won the series and were moving on to the Stanley Cup Final.
They would be facing… the Boston Bruins.
Jacques stepped onto the ice for the first game on April 9, 1953.
By the end, the Montreal Canadiens were up by one.
Boston responded with gusto during the second game when they scored four times on 19 shots.
Irvin worried the nerves had finally gotten to his young goalie, and he tapped McNeil to come back into the net for the third game.
With McNeil in net, the Canadiens won the next three games on their way to a Stanley Cup Championship.
Jacques sat on the bench as the team raised the Cup and once he came back to Earth after winning the championship, he prepared to rejoin the Buffalo Bisons.
At the beginning of the 53/54 season Jacques won 32 out of the 55 games he suited up for.
I’m sure he would’ve continued winning, but fate had other plans.
On Feb. 11, 1954, in an on-ice collision, Gerry McNeil suffered a badly sprained ankle.
Canadiens GM Frank Selke immediately knew who to call.
Jacques Plante.
He would be playing with the Montreal Canadiens for the remainder of the season.
In those final 17 games the Canadiens won seven games, lost five and tied five.
Most impressively, Jacques had five shutouts and helped the team into the playoffs and then helped them reach the Final.
They would be facing the powerful Detroit Red Wings but unfortunately, after four games the Canadiens were down three, so Jacques was told to sit on the bench.
McNeil who had not played in months, would be suiting up for game 5.
The Canadiens fought back to tie the series and force a game seven but, in the end, lost 2-1 in overtime.
They watched the Red Wings carry the Stanley Cup on the ice and Jacques expected to be back in Buffalo for the 54/55 season.
Afterall, Gerry McNeil was only three years older than him and in the prime of his career.
He was the goalie for one of the top teams in hockey, and his future in net was secure.
But McNeil wasn’t so sure.
Much like his predecessor Bill Durnan being a goalie proved to be too much.
I mean, put yourself in his shoes…sorry skates.
As goalie you’re the last line of defence for your team.
In Game 7 of the 1954 Stanley Cup Final, McNeil allowed the goal that lost his team the championship.
On top of all of that, there was barely any protective equipment.
As a goalie you lay your body on the line, game in, and game out.
It could rattle anyone.
One of the greatest goalies in history, Glenn “Mr. Goalie” Hall, got so nervous before games that he threw up in a bucket in the dressing room.
Every time.
So, at the start of the 1954-55 season, McNeil made his decision.
He was going to retire.
He informed the Canadiens Coach, and GM and they responded that he should take some days to think about it.
McNeil didn’t waver.
Dick Irvin and Frank Selke really only had one choice.
They called Jacques Plante and summoned him into Selke’s office to inform him that he was now the starting goaltender for the Montreal Canadiens.
Compared to McNeil, Jacques had nerves of steel.
Sure, he got nervous before games but that was because of his drive to win.
Jacques was also so confident that in his mind he never made a mistake.
If any were made, they were at the hands of the defencemen in front of him.
McNeil said,
“It was a great way to go to sleep. I was the opposite. I would figure if I did it this way or that way, I could have stopped it.”
McNeil was supportive of Jacques too.
He left the team to become a sales representative for various companies, while playing the odd game with the Montreal Royals and Rochester Americans.
He returned only nine more times to the NHL between 56/57 to replace Jacques when he was out of the Canadiens lineup.
Otherwise, he had made way for the young goaltender to go from being an incredible rookie into immortality.
Jacques Plante began his first full season as a professional goaltender with a bang.
In the first 11 games of the 1954-55 season, he allowed only 19 goals.
Everything was looking up for the young goalie until injury derailed him.
Like the many before, and after injury would ultimately shape the rest of his career.
In this instance it happened during a practice drill when Jacques took a puck to the face from his teammate Bert Olmstead.
It shattered his cheekbone and he spent six days in the hospital.
He wasn’t able to return to the ice for a month.
By the end of his first full NHL season, Plante recorded 33 wins in 52 games and earned the team a spot in the playoffs.
He played incredibly well, but much like the previous season in Stanley Cup Final the Detroit Red Wings once again defeated Montreal in seven games to capture the championship.
I hope that team relished in the win because the team would go into a championship drought until 1997.
Meanwhile Jacques Plante and the Montreal Canadiens went on an unbelievable championship run.
From 1955 to 1960, the Montreal Canadiens won five straight Stanley Cups.
No other team has ever been able to accomplish this feat in history, and it is likely no team ever will.
Those teams were powerhouses that rolled over the competition.
While they had icons like Maurice Richard, Bernie “Boom Boom” Geoffrion, Doug Harvey and Jean Beliveau, on the ice Jacques served as their last line of defence.
And he was tough to beat.
Jacques never had fewer than 31 wins per season which means he won four straight Vezina Trophies as the league’s top goalie.
The team was also a close-knit group.
They lived close to each other, went on vacations together and were like one big family.
Maurice’s younger brother Henri once said.
“We were a close team. We all got together after the game for a beer. Everyone, that is, except for the goalie.”
But Jacques wasn’t interested.
He believed that if a goalie got too close to his teammates it could lead to arguments over who made mistakes, who gave up a goal or and who was responsible for a loss.
He was also frugal.
His upbringing made him conscious of his finances and even though the was a star in a championship winning team he didn’t want his hard-earned money on drinks and meals out with the guys.
During the season he focused on the game and performance by staying at home or in his hotel room
Jacques’ teammates allowed the isolation because they knew he was committed to winning and they never questioned his loyalty to the team.
His skill, determination and innovative thinking helped the team dominate the NHL of the late-1950s.
And being a lone wolf also allowed Jacques to change the game forever without the help of anyone else.
On Nov. 1, 1959, Madison Square Gardens was at capacity.
In front of 15,925 the New York Rangers were taking on the Montreal Canadiens.
Rangers’ star Andy Bathgate had the puck as he had many times before.
He skated past Jacques, who left his net to poke the puck away from the Ranger. Bathgate tripped on the stick and went headfirst into the boards.
Things were about to escalate.
In the next period, Bathgate once again had the puck but this time he was also angry and on the hunt for revenge.
He said that with a quick wrist shot, he sent the puck towards Jacques’ face.
“It wasn’t a hard shot, but I tried to give him the same as me and I guess I caught him.”
Bathgate hit his target.
Blood poured on to the ice as Jacques held on to his broken nose. As you can imagine, Plante had been struck in the face by a puck before.
Doctors had recommended that he wear some form of facial protection while playing.
Following their advice, he had experimented with crude masks, often fashioned from leather or other available materials.
They were uncomfortable, restricted his vision, and were viewed with skepticism by players and coaches alike. Even so, the idea stayed with him.
While others accepted injuries as part of the game, Jacques Plante wondered: Did they have to be?
That curiosity became one of his defining characteristics.
Remember. Jacques wasn’t just a talented goaltender, he was studious.
He thought about angles, experimented with positioning, kept detailed notes on shooters, and questioned traditions that others accepted without hesitation.
Years before analytics became part of hockey, Jacques was already treating the game like a science.
So, when he suffered ANOTHER broken nose, Jacques looked at his uniform still covered in blood and went into the Canadiens’ dressing room.
He reached into his bag and pulled out something he had been working on.
He had already worn versions of it during practices and even in exhibition games, where the stakes were lower and experimentation was tolerated.
But the regular season was another matter.
For years, he had argued that there was a better way.
And now he was going to put it into action.
After suffering countless facial injuries, he had worked with fiberglass experts to create a lightweight molded mask that fit the contours of his face.
That sounds more sophisticated than the Hannibal Lector looking mask he wore that day against the Rangers.
Canadiens Coach Toe Blake, argued against it.
He was no fan of the mask and considered any goalie who wanted to wear one in a game to be cowardly but with no other goalie at his disposal, he had no choice but to let Jacques wear his for the rest of the game.
The Canadiens won the game 3-1.
Then they went on an 18-game unbeaten streak until March 8, 1960, when Blake ordered Jacques to leave the mask in the locker room since the facial wounds had healed.
The Canadiens lost the game 3-0.
The next night, Jacques was back on the ice and wearing the mask, and this time it would be for good.
The Canadiens earned a spot in the playoffs and their fifth straight Stanley Cup that year.
The success made it clear to everyone that Jacques mask had not impeded his abilities.
It was a watershed moment because within just a few years, several more goalies in the NHL began to wear a mask.
The last holdout was Andy Brown of the Pittsburgh Penguins.
He played without a mask until April 7, 1974.
Following the career high fifth Stanley Cup win Jacques had to take a backseat to Dave Hodge for the 1960/61 season because of a nagging knee injury.
He finished that season with only 23 wins as the Canadiens missed the championship.
He returned to form for the 1961-62 season by winning 42 games out of the 70 he played, which was the most ever played.
In the process he tied his own career high and earned him his sixth Vezina Trophy and the Hart Trophy as the league MVP.
Unfortunately, the Montreal Canadiens once again did not win the Stanley Cup, extending their drought to three seasons which was unacceptable.
Oh, if they could only see the 33-year Stanley Cup drought the team is going through right now.
Team management wanted to shake things up and Jacques’ persistent health problems were also beginning to annoy coach Toe Blake.
The two had a fractured relationship.
Jacques was angry that Blake seemed to always downplay his injuries and asthma attacks, while Blake believed Jacques had a poor work ethic.
Blake went to General Manager Frank Selke and gave him an ultimatum.
If the Canadiens kept Jacques for the 1963-64 season, then he would not return as coach.
This put Selke in a tough position.
He had to choose between the coach that won the team five Stanley Cups in a row, and the goalie.
On June 4, 1963, the decision was made and a special bulletin was released to the media.
“One of the most spectacular trades in National Hockey League history has just been announced by the Montreal Canadiens. A seven-trade player trade with the New York Rangers revolving around their 10-season goalie star, Jacques Plante.”
Jacques had been driving to a meeting in downtown Montreal.
He was listening to the radio when the music stopped, and he learned he was being traded.
He immediately pulled the car over and sat motionless in his car.
Jacques had spent his entire life dreaming of playing for the Montreal Canadiens.
He had helped the team win six Stanley Cups as he won six Vezinas, along with a Hart.
He never thought for a moment that the team he loved could ever trade him away.
But it had happened, and now Jacques was joining the New York Rangers.
He played the 1963-64, with New York but only won 22 games of the 65 he played.
The next season he played 33 and won 10.
He was eventually demoted to the minors and played 17 games with the Baltimore Clippers.
By the end of the 1964-65 season, Jacques was still devastated by the trade from his beloved team.
To add salt to the wound, the Canadiens had returned to form and were champions once more by winning the first of four Stanley Cups in five seasons.
Plante announced his retirement.
“Hockey has been wonderful to me. You get top money, travel first class and become an idol and hero to the fans. It was a wonderful experience.”
He hung up his skates to work full-time for Molson Breweries, not that he had to.
He had been frugal and had made smart investments, so he was very well off financially.
But even if he was done with hockey, the game wasn’t done with him Only a few months into his retirement, the Russian Red Army hockey team arrived in Montreal to take on the Montreal Junior Canadiens.
The team’s coach, Scotty Bowman, got in touch with Jacques and asked him if he would suit up one more time to take on the Soviets. At first Jacques refused but the prospect of getting back into the spotlight was too appealing.
On Dec. 15, 1965, Jacques played one of the best games of his life against the Soviets as The Montreal Junior Canadiens stunned the Red Army by winning 2-1.
The crowd at the Montreal Forum gave Jacques a standing ovation.
The Father of Russian Ice Hockey, Anatoly Tarasov, said,
“You want me to talk about Jacques Plante? We only knew him by name. Tonight, not only did we meet him, but we also felt his presence. I’d like to ask you to thank him, to say thank you to Jacques Plante on behalf of all of us. I am speechless when I see him play. I hope I can say that the Russian team deserved to meet such a goaltender. It was a great honour for us to play against him.”
After that, Jacques went back to his quiet life away from the ice until the1966-67 season.
The NHL announced that the league would double in size from six to 12 teams.
That meant there would be a very real need for goalies to supply the expansion team and so a draft was held in June 1968.
Rumours swirled that Jacques was going to make his comeback.
They were confirmed when the St. Louis Blues selected Jacques in the draft and signed him to a one-year $35,000 contract.
He suited up alongside fellow goalie great Glenn Hall, and together they helped the St. Louis Blues finish first in the West Division.
Then they made it to the Stanley Cup Final where they were swept in four games by the Montreal Canadiens.
At the end of the season, Jacques, and Glenn won the Vezina Trophy.
It was Jacques seventh which remains a record to this day.
Jacques said,
“It really is hard to believe, isn’t it? I mean it when I say I never played this well before.”
He returned to the Blues the following season where he won 18 out of 32 games, but then he was traded in the off-season to the Toronto Maple Leafs.
In the 1970-71 season with the Maple Leafs, he had 24 wins and let in, on average, less than two goals a game.
Despite his age, Jacques was still a legend.
And he was asked to make his film debut.
In the movie Face-Off, a Maple Leafs rookie, played by Art Hindle, balances hockey and his love for a musician played by Trudy Young.
Jacques would be playing a goalie which was scored on by the lead character.
In each take, Jacques stopped the puck. Eventually, the director came over to talk to him. He needed to let the puck go in the net.
They reached an agreement and a few minutes later the PA announcer, Paul Morris, said “Monsieur Plante wishes it to be known that he is consenting to allow the puck to enter the net.”
After one more take where he stopped the puck to make his final point, Jacques allowed the next one to go in.
His desire to win, and incredible abilities in net made him a valuable teacher.
He mentored future Hall of Famer Bernie Parent when they were teammates on the Maple Leafs.
Jacques formalized his teachings in 1972 when he published On Goaltending, a hockey book that is considered one of the best ever written and remains popular among players and coaches to this day.
But his time with the Leafs ended that season when he was traded to the Boston Bruins where he won 7 of his 8 games with them and had two shutouts.
The team made it to the playoffs, but he lost both games he played in and was forced to watch from the sidelines for the rest of the series as the Bruins lost to the Rangers.
Many thought that would finally be the end of Jacques career.
They would be wrong.
In 1973, the Quebec Nordiques of the rival World Hockey Association hired Jacques Plante to coach the team for the upcoming season.
His coaching career was short-lived, and he resigned just at the end of his first disappointing season.
Four days later, he announced he would be playing for the Edmonton Oilers of the WHA.
He won 15 games, lost 14 and tied two.
After that, Jacques Plante officially retired from hockey.
For good this time.
By then he was a living legend.
In 837 NHL games, he recorded 437 wins, 82 shutouts and let in just over two goals per game.
He won six Stanley Cups, played in eight All-Star Games, won seven Vezinas and a Hart.
Jacques was inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame just three years after retirement and in 1981, he was made a member of Canada’s Sports Hall of Fame.
He was never too far from the rink.
In 1983, he joined the Montreal Canadiens as an assistant coach.
He was overjoyed to be returning to the team he loved.
The goalies on the team had grown up idolizing Jacques and most had read his book religiously.
Now the legend was standing in front of them, teaching them how to be better goalies.
Just three years later, Jacques was named to the Montreal Canadiens dream team as the team’s greatest goalie.
In the ceremony, on Jan. 12, 1985, he skated on the ice of the Montreal Forum where he had his greatest years as a goalie as the crowd cheered him on.
He didn’t know it, but that would be the last time he would ever skate on that center ice.
Just a year later in January 1986, Jacques was asked to work as a goaltending consultant with the St. Louis Blues.
He agreed, by saying
“This has been my life, talking with goaltenders, and knowing they appreciate it. My reward is seeing the big smile on their faces when they see me around. I don’t want any more.”
During his time with the team coach Jacques Demers noticed that Jacques wasn’t eating his lunch.
He told his friend to talk to the team’s physician about his lack of appetite.
The physician discovered Plante had lost 15 pounds in two weeks.
A visit to a specialist discovered that Jacques had stomach cancer.
His health declined fast/
A few weeks later on Feb. 27, 1968, Jacque’s aorta burst and he died almost immediately.
One of the greatest goalies in NHL history was gone at the age of only 57.
The hockey world was in shock as were his many former teammates.
Jacques Plante was buried in Sierre, Switzerland where he had settled with his second wife, Raymonde, as his casket was led into the church for his funeral, it passed beneath two rows of hockey sticks.
A fitting tribute to one of the greatest goalies to ever put on the pads in the NHL.
But as great as he was, and as infallible as he often felt on the ice. Jacques Plante did get something wrong.
When he was with the Canadiens organization, during the 82/83 season Jacques was asked to visit the Granby Bisons’ training camp.
He was there to evaluate the team’s new goalie prospect.
Jacques watched the young goalie then told him d to abandon the butterfly style he was using.
The goalie replied
“I have a lot of respect for you. You’re one of the greatest goalies of all-time, but I don’t believe that what you’re asking me to do is right.”
Jacques was so annoyed he told management that the young goalie would never make the NHL.
He was wrong.
That goalie’s name was Patrick Roy.
Not only did Roy make it to the NHL, but he also challenged Plante for the title of greatest goalie of all time.
Roy won a then-record 524 games, four Stanley Cups, three Conn Smythes as Playoff MVP, three Vezinas all while playing in 11 All-Star Games.
In 2006, he was inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame.
Regardless of his mistake, Roy had one thing to always thank Plante for.
Within a generation, every professional goaltender wore facial protection, by the time Roy made his mark the sight of a bare-faced goalie was unimaginable.
Thanks to Plante, the game that began with blood ended with a revolution.
And for that… Jacques was always right….
*sources*
- Jacques Plante: The Man Who Changed The Face Of Hockey by Todd Denault
- Canadian Encyclopedia: https://thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/jacques-plante
- Canada’s Sports Hall of Fame: https://halloffamers.sportshall.ca/?jacques_plante&language=EN
- The Hockey Writers: https://thehockeywriters.com/jacques-plante-the-man-in-the-fiberglass-mask/
- NHL: https://www.nhl.com/player/jacques-plante-8450066
