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 loss of life however gave no different particulars. Bossy revealed in October that he had lung most cancers.
The Islanders, based as a Nationwide Hockey League enlargement staff 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 beneath Normal Supervisor Invoice Torrey and Coach Al Arbour, who assembled groups that featured Bossy at proper wing and his linemates Bryan Trottier at middle, Clark Gillies at left wing, Denis Potvin on protection and Billy Smith in aim.
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 last.
The Canadian-born Bossy was among the many N. H.L’s quickest skaters, and he possessed an uncanny skill to get off wrist photographs earlier than opposing goalies had any notion that the puck was coming their method.
“Mike’s bought the quickest fingers I’ve ever seen,” Arbour, a former defenseman who had performed alongside Gordie Howe’s with the Detroit Purple Wings and Bobby Hull with the Chicago Black Hawks, as soon as mentioned.
Bossy twice led the N.H.L. in targets, with 69 within the 1978-79 season and 68 in 1980-81. He scored not less than 51 targets in every of his first 9 seasons earlier than a again damage restricted him to 38 targets in his final season. His 85 targets in 129 playoff video games had been essentially the most in N.H.L. historical past on the time.
Bossy scored 573 targets 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 struggle,” 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 fingers 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 discovered to make fast passes and take fast photographs 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 decide within the 1977 N.H.L. newbie draft after being handed over by groups who, regardless of his exceptional 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 targets that stood for 15 years. He received the Conn Smythe Trophy as essentially the most worthwhile participant within the 1982 Stanley Cup playoffs.
Michael Bossy was born on Jan. 22, 1957, in Montreal, one in all 10 kids 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 discovered to skate at 3.
He dropped out of Laval Catholic Excessive Faculty to affix the Laval Nationwide staff 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 targets.
Then got here his choice by the Islanders within the draft.
Bossy’s N.H.L. profession was minimize quick by a persistent damage. In the beginning of the Islanders’ 1986 coaching camp, he skilled again pains. He missed 17 video games in the course of the common season and injured his left knee within the playoffs, when the Flyers eradicated the Islanders in a preliminary spherical. Medical doctors finally 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 respect, after Potvin.
Bossy married Lucie Creamer and had two daughters along with her. Full info 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 publish 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 middle Wayne Gretzky and Gretzky’s Edmonton groups that received 4 Stanley Cups within the Nineteen Eighties.
“We by no means bought one millionth of the popularity we should 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 undergo. Folks don’t discuss us within the first point out of nice groups.”
He added: “I assume as I grow old I get bored with telling individuals I scored greater than 50 9 consecutive years. Every thing I’m saying makes it sound like I’m bitter, however I’m not in any respect. It’s simply that while you do one thing properly, like our staff 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 turned the eleventh participant in N.H.L. historical past to attain 500 targets: “Folks name him the Nice Gretzky. I can’t compete with that. I do really feel comfy with what I’ve helped my staff obtain. Whether or not I consider Wayne Gretzky as the best factor since apple pie is one other query.”
