![]() ![]() What followed was a classic hockey donnybrook that ended with O'Ree being sent to the Bruins locker room for medical treatment. O'Ree's teammates came rushing to his aid as both teams' benches emptied. He took his stick and smashed Nesterenko over the head with it. After calling O'Ree a particularly vile racial slur, Nesterenko took the butt-end of his stick and rammed it into O'Ree's unsuspecting face.Ī broken nose and two missing front teeth later, O'Ree had had enough. In Chicago, he was targeted for abuse for bruising Blackhawks forward Eric "Elbows" Nesterenko. At New York City's venerable Madison Square Garden, for instance, fans showered him with racial insults before he even stepped onto the ice. O'Ree wasn't so well received at other NHL venues. For his standout effort, O'Ree received a rousing standing ovation from the home crowd that lasted several minutes.įred Kfoury III/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images On a breakaway, a teammate fed him a perfect pass, which he deposited under the glove hand of Montreal goaltender Charlie Hodge. His first NHL goal - a game-winner against Montreal at the Boston Garden on New Year's Day, 1961 - proved memorable. O'Ree returned to the Bruins in 1960-61 and notched four goals and 10 assists in 43 games. "I'm just happy to get a chance up here, that's about all I can say," he told The Boston Globe. O'Ree suited up for only one more game as a Bruin that season before returning to the minors. "O'Ree is not only fast, but he's a strong skater," Montreal coach Frank Selke said after the game. He's up with the Bruins,'" O'Ree wrote.ĭespite his nervousness, he did nothing to embarrass himself during a rare 3-0 Boston shutout over their hated archrivals. "I could see fans pointing, 'There's that black kid. O'Ree could barely control his excitement. Sure enough, that January, the Boston Bruins were short a roster player and called him up from their minor league club for a road contest against the Montreal Canadiens. "They knew what I could do," O'Ree later recalled in his 2000 memoir, "The Autobiography of Willie O'Ree: Hockey's Black Pioneer." Although he failed to make the final cut, team officials were impressed enough by his overall performance to tell him he needed only "a little more seasoning" to reach the big time. His big break came when the Bruins invited him to attend training camp before the start of the 1957-58 season. A speedy skater with an intuitive feel for the game, he played organized hockey since he was 5 years old and had scored 22 goals with 12 assists in his first professional season with Quebec. O'Ree had always known he possessed the talent to play in the NHL. ![]()
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