For more than 40 years now, the teams of the National Hockey League have carried out numerous exchanges at the deadline of transactions and some of these barters which seem trivial sometimes take an exceptional turn for the players or the teams.
By the late 1970s, the New York Islanders seemed to have come of age. Seven years after their arrival in the National Hockey League, the team has just finished first in the general classification in front of the powerful Montreal Canadiens, except that the troop of Al Arbor does not manage to transpose the successes obtained in the regular season. in the playoffs.
Over the next few months, general manager Bill Torrey made several changes to his roster. Dave Langevin, Gord Lane and Ken Morrow solidify the defense, Swede Anders Kallur and rookie Duane Sutter enliven the offense, but it’s at the trade deadline that the final piece of the puzzle is put in place with the addition forward Robert “Butch” Goring.
The 30-year-old Goring has an extremely respectable track record so far, as evidenced by his 275 goals and 384 assists in 736 games for the Los Angeles Kings. He only has 30 games of playoff experience, but Torrey is confident that his arrival will make his first line more tired.
“We had wanted to get ‘Butch’ Goring for a long time,” Torrey said in a newspaper post at the time. Goring will allow us to present a more balanced attack and take the tension off the shoulders of Mike Bossy, Bryan Trottier and Clark Gilles. He can accomplish so much on the ice, that even though we had to give up guys like [Billy] Harris et al. [Dave] Lewis, we didn’t hesitate. »
The day before the 1980 trade deadline, the Islanders sit 4th in the Patrick Division and trail the Philadelphia Flyers by 32 points for 1st place. After a 7-game winning streak from January 12-26, they maintain an 8-11-3 record and don’t particularly look like they’re ready to attack the spring tournament.
But the arrival of Goring will change everything. From the moment the Manitoban puts on his new uniform for the first time, the Islanders no longer lose. The team completes the season with an 8-0-4 record to finally finish 5th overall. The magic continues to operate in the playoffs, while Goring scored 7 goals and collected 12 assists in 21 games to lead the Islanders to the 1st of their 4 consecutive Stanley Cup conquests. Goring would even win the Conn Smythe Trophy awarded to the playoffs most valuable player in 1981.
Markus Naslund c. Alek Stojanov (March 20, 1996)
Markus Naslund’s career with the Pittsburgh Penguins didn’t exactly get off to a flying start. He was effectively limited to 4 goals and 7 assists in 71 games, but he was mostly “known” due to a dispute with the NHL over the rights that were guaranteed by the collective agreement then in effect. It might be risky to go into the details and what you have to remember is that Naslund has really struggled in his first two seasons.
But with the departures of veterans Luc Robitaille and Kevin Stevens after the 1994-1995 campaign, Naslund finally manages to do well by scoring 19 goals and collecting 33 assists in 66 games. At one point, he even found himself alongside Mario Lemieux on the Penguins’ 1st line. In short, the Swede was a bit the version Wish de Warren Young.
That said, the Penguins have at this time a strong core of veterans and a few young promoters who are more efficient and useful than Naslund. The latter is therefore traded to the Vancouver Canucks in return for Alek Stojanov, also a former first-round pick.
Naslund’s debut with the Canucks wasn’t particularly amazing, and it wasn’t until Pavel Bure left in 1998-99 that he really took off. Alongside Brendan Morrisson and Todd Bertuzzi, he will form one of the most formidable lines in the NHL. He will score 346 goals and obtain 410 assists in 884 games in a Canucks uniform. Not bad!
At the turn of the 2000s, the Pittsburgh Penguins struggled to find a successor to Tom Barrasso, who had helped the team win the first two Stanley Cups in its history in the spring of 1991 and 1992. During the 2000-2001 season, Jean- Sébastien Aubin, Garth Snow and Rich Parent share the work in goal, but their impressive goals-against averages of 3.13, 2.98 and 3.07 are far from synonymous with excellence in this “dead puck era”. “.
Moreover, before a certain Mario Lemieux returns to the game on December 27, 2000, it is far from certain that the Penguins will participate in the playoffs for an 11th consecutive season. But Mario being Mario – he will score 35 goals and have 41 assists in 43 games! – the Penguins will finish 6th in the Eastern Conference standings. General manager Craig Patrick made several transactions after the return of the “Magnificent”, but the one made at the deadline sending Jeff Norton to the San Jose Sharks in return for Bobby Dollas and Johan Hedberg is very far from making an impression. It is more Norton’s return to San Jose that is emphasized.
The 25-year-old Swedish goaltender still hasn’t played a single game in the NHL and he doesn’t have any stats to break in the International Hockey League with the Manitoba Moose. Regardless, Hedberg got his first start on March 16 and turned away 41 of 44 pucks faced in a 6-3 win over the Florida Panthers. He finished the campaign with a 7-1-1 record, a 2.64 goals-against average and a .905 save percentage. He’s obviously the Penguins’ go-to guy in the playoffs.
Hedberg’s brilliance allows the Penguins to eliminate the Washington Capitals in six games, then the Buffalo Sabers in seven games, thanks to a goal scored by Darius Kasparaitis in overtime. The course of the Penguins then stops in the final of association against the Devils of New Jersey and a long crossing of the desert will begin until the arrival of Sidney Crosby. But these 2001 series remain firmly anchored in the memory of many because of the “Moose”, who will not experience such intoxication again until his retirement a dozen years later.
Daniel Brière and a 3rd round pick c. Chris Gratton and a 4th round pick (March 10, 2003)
After scoring 170 goals and collecting 246 assists in 198 games over 3 seasons with the Drummondville Voltigeurs of the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League, Daniel Brière finally seems out of his shell in his 5th professional campaign in 2001-2002. The small forward from Gatineau scored 32 goals and had 28 assists in 78 games to finish second in scoring for his club – the Phoenix Coyotes – behind Daymond Langkow.
But things didn’t go as smoothly the following season, so the Coyotes traded Brière and a 3rd round pick to the Buffalo Sabers in return for Chris Gratton and a 4th round pick. Gratton, a former 3rd overall for the Tampa Bay Lightning in 1993, never lived up to expectations, but at 6-foot-3 and 220 there will always be a market for that kind of player. That said, his time in Arizona will be anything but productive…
Brière’s debut with the Sabers was relatively decent, but the team missed the playoffs in 2003 and 2004 and there was no indication that an incredible twist would come when the lockout returned which forced the cancellation of the 2004-2005 season.
The emergence of Ryan Miller, Brian Campbell and Thomas Vanek proved to be a real catalyst for Brière, who scored 25 goals and amassed 33 assists in just 48 games. The magic also works in the playoffs with a harvest of 8 goals and 11 assists in 18 games. The Sabers even reach the conference final for the first time in 7 years. They were, however, eliminated in 7 games by the eventual Stanley Cup champions, the Carolina Hurricanes.
Brière did not slow down the following season, scoring 32 goals and obtaining 63 assists in 81 games and the Sabers once again advanced to the conference final. However, they bite the dust once again in 7 games, this time against the Ottawa Senators. Unsurprisingly, Brière was then one of the most coveted players on the free agent market and he managed to put his signature on the bottom of an 8-year contract worth US$52 million with the Philadelphia Flyers. , much to the chagrin of many Canadiens fans.
Ben Bishop v. Cory Conacher and a 4th round pick (April 3, 2013)
Ben Bishop has exactly 36 games of experience played in the space of 4 NHL seasons when the Ottawa Senators trade him to the Tampa Bay Lightning. Obtained from the Saint Louis Blues a year earlier, Bishop has always played second fiddle to Chris Mason, Jaroslav Halak, Craig Anderson and even Robin Lehner. The Swede claimed in the 2nd round in 2009 is also seen as the goalkeeper of the future for the Senators at that time. Bishop is too much.
He therefore finds himself with the Lightning, who were still looking for a successor to Dwayne Roloson. In his first start with his new team, Bishop stopped all 45 pucks aimed at him to lead the Lightning to a 5-0 victory over the Carolina Hurricanes.
Bishop would become head coach Jon Cooper’s trusted goaltender the following season and the Colorado-born American would quickly establish himself as one of the best in his profession in the NHL, finishing 3rd in the polls for obtaining the Vézina trophy. He will also shine with all his fire in 2015-2016, dominating the League with a goals-against average of 2.06 and finishing 2nd in the ballot for the Vézina. Arrived at the end of the contract, Bishop goes to the Los Angeles Kings, since the Lightning is now betting on a certain Andrei Vasilevskiy.
Bishop, however, did not last forever in Los Angeles and instead signed a lucrative 6-year contract worth $29.5 million with the Dallas Stars. He will be particularly brilliant in 2018-2019, posting a save percentage of .934, but will see the Vézina slip away from him at the hands of Vasilevskiy.