SportsLit

An Olympic misstep might be how the public defines a career, but it hardly defines a high-performance athlete’s life. When Perdita Felicien crashed into the first hurdle in the 100-metre final at the 2004 Summer Games in Athens, all the reigning world champion from Canada could do was watch the race play out on a video screen high above the track. Though her dreams were dashed, she would stand pro...

Hockey player’s are told to go to the net but Ryan Minkoff took his shot from the perimeter of the sport's universe. Through his path in the game, readers gain an idea of how the sport operates on the far reaches of its icy landscape. Minkoff’s premise in Thin Ice (Lyons Press) is essentially that if you have some talent and take your approach seriously, you can make a go of it. Now a player agent...

In the sport of Kings, Eurico Rosa da Silva (Seven-Time Outstanding Jockey – The Jockey Club of Canada) reigned at Woodbine Racetrack, but for most of his life, he was living in a mental dungeon. When writing his biography with Bruce McDougall, he held steadfast that this would not just be a book about his success as a jockey.  The pages had to paint an unvarnished portrait of struggling with demo...

The analytics wave had yet to sweep over the NHL when Brantt Myhres played in the league from 1994-2003. To be frank, goals, assists and plus/minus didn’t even matter that much in his role as enforcer. It was win lose or draw, no different from a heavyweight fighter.  So why do metrics apply to a man that last played a game almost 20 years ago?  Because the numbers show his memoir is a top seller...

Breathe easy Canada. This isn’t the only country where parents have gone crazy over watching their kids play minor hockey. Esteemed writer Rich Cohen (Contributing Editor - Rolling Stone, Vanity Fair), navigated the Connecticut interstate with his son Micah during the Ridgefield Bears 2018-19 AA Pee-Wee season and emerged on the other end with his latest book, Pee Wees: Confessions of a Hockey Par...

The reason that players like James Worthy and Michael Jordan were able to leave college “early” and enter the NBA draft or later, Kobe Bryant and Lebron James could do the same from highschool was because Spencer Haywood challenged the system and won.  50 years ago, the concept of “one-and-done” or “early entry” was born after a landmark Supreme Court ruling and the landscape of pro basketball sei...

In hockey, either you are trying to keep the puck out, or put it in the net.  Whether you are Wayne Gretzky, who has scored an NHL record 894 times or a member of the NHL's one goal club, they all count the same. Ken Reid (Sportsnet) tracked down 39 players who have lit the lamp just once, and in the process, turned footnotes into features, bringing to life the stories of men who have accomplished...

Hockey fans in Canada know Paul Romanuk best from his broadcasting days at TSN and Hockey Night in Canada (Sportsnet), but for well over 30 years, he has also written Hockey Superstars, an annual release that showcases the NHL's best, to kids. The 2020-21 edition was released on Oct. 6, and Romanuk joined us to discuss the challenges of producing the most recent installment during the pandemic, a...

Serge Savard grew up in rural Quebec following WWII in an era known as Le Grand Noirceur (The Great Darkness), but he didn't see it that way. Confident and astute, Savard went from playing hockey on outdoor rinks reminiscent of illustrations in Roch Carrier's The Hockey Sweater, to starring for the Montreal Canadiens from 1966-67 - 80-81.  Once he retired from the NHL, he returned to become their...

When journalist Dave Shoalts joined us for Season 2, Episode 5 to discuss Hockey Fight in Canada, his book about the rights battle for Hockey Night in Canada (HNIC), he told us that his print stories about the storied program always moved the dial. It's true, HNIC gets people talking...and writing. Al Strachan had a long history with the show as a panelist on Satellite Hot Stove, the second interm...

Joe Murphy lives in the precarious crack that lies between an uplifting ending or a tragic conclusion. Once upon a time he was the first NCAA player selected in the NHL Draft, a Stanley Cup winner and an eccentric teammate, but today he is homeless and in clear need of mental health care. Could a vicious hit sustained in one of the 779 career games he played from 1986-2000 have significantly alter...

Ron Hawkins sings of "a wounded soldier from the bad old days," in his song Peace and Quiet, which Tim Thompson wove together with archived footage to create his acclaimed ode to the Toronto Maple Leafs. That lyric rings true when examining the tenure of former captain Rick Vaive. A prolific scorer, he was named team captain at the age of 22 and netted three-consecutive 50-goal seasons while endur...

Manon Rheaume was always in a league of her own.  Mention her name to hockey fans and most will remember the media frenzy that accompanied her appearance in net with the Tampa Bay Lightning during NHL exhibition play in 1992.  While GM Phil Esposito got the attention he sought for his expansion team, Rheaume’s professionalism under the spotlight illuminated the way forward for women’s hockey.  Ins...

On Nov. 3, 1995, the Toronto Raptors tipped off against the New Jersey Nets and changed the sports landscape of the city. The Raptors are now a team to be reckoned with but it wasn’t long ago that people would have laughed at the notion they would ever win an NBA title, let alone by the time their 25th anniversary rolled around. Why did they become champions? What were the turning points? How come...

If you are a hockey fan, you probably know the story of Willie O’Ree.  In 1958, he became the first black player to skate in an NHL game when his Boston Bruins faced the Montreal Canadiens. The feat wasn’t heralded at the time and Mr. O’Ree’s NHL career lasted just 45 games, though he would go on to play professional hockey until 1979.  Following his retirement, he remained far from the public eye...

Whether it is an attention-grabbing quote, transaction or ruling, Brian Burke has always made a splash wherever he has worked, from the NHL head office, to running a marquee franchise. He is well known for his tenure as the leagues’ disciplinarian and his time at the helm of the Hartford Whalers, Vancouver Canucks, Toronto Maple Leafs, Calgary Flames and Anaheim Ducks, where he won the Stanley Cup...

As a child, Sami Jo Small had visions of summer Olympic glory, but those podium dreams would be realized through a winter sport.   When she began playing hockey as the only girl on a boys team in Winnipeg, there had yet to be an IIHF Women’s World Championship or competition at the winter games. An excellent athlete, she landed a scholarship to Stanford University as a track and field competitor w...

As we entered a new millennium, the LA Lakers were in search of the sequel to Showtime.  GM Jerry West was looking for answers after the curtain had dropped on Magic, Kareem and Worthy. He found them in Shaq, a larger than life centre and a petulant, singularly focused, rising superstar named Kobe. In assembling this new era of dominance under head coach Phil Jackson, The Lake Show was flying high...

Before Auston Matthews, there was another American star that wore No. 34 for the Toronto Maple Leafs. Twenty years ago, on March 11, 2000, his life changed forever and a promising career was compromised in an instant. Bryan Berard was a dynamic defenseman, drafted first overall in 1995, he won the Calder Trophy as rookie of the year after his first season. Just days after turning 23, and on the ri...

It’s a first!  We cover a children’s book.  Put your preconceptions aside, because although The Ice Chips series is aimed at kids, the historical and contemporary themes carry a weight that people from all ages and walks of life can appreciate.  So, who created this ongoing tale of a diverse time-traveling minor hockey team?  Prolific Canadian journalist/author Roy MacGregor (O.C. - 2005, Hockey H...

It’s a hat-trick! For the third time, Ken Reid (co-anchor - prime time weeknight edition of Sportsnet Central), joins SportsLit to discuss a new book. So clear your audio tracks, it’s time to learn about Eddie “The Entertainer” Shack. Hockey player. Outlier. Salesman.   Shack, now 82, is a living link to the Maple Leafs’ last Stanley Cup in 1967, one of four he won with Toronto in the 1960’s.  The...

The NHL annually celebrates diversity with the campaign "Hockey is for Everyone", because at one time it wasn’t. Before Willie O’Ree, there was Herb Carnegie. The racial barrier that O’Ree was able to penetrate in 1958 when he became the first black player to play in the NHL, was the same one that kept Carnegie from ever reaching that goal. Born in Toronto, Ontario in 1919, he was a dynamo on the...

The roots of this country and the game so many love are intertwined…but there is a problem, there has been for a long time. Canadian hockey is approaching a state of crisis because of cost and exclusivity. Reasons as to why this is the case have been thoroughly explored in a new book titled: Before the Lights Go Out: A Season Inside a Game Worth Saving (McClelland & Stewart), by journalist Sean Fi...

Tom Cheek and Jerry Howarth were like extended family for Toronto Blue Jays fans, all you have to do is mention their first names, and people in Canada know exactly who you are referring too. From 1982-2004, the duo broadcasted the sights and sounds of Major League Baseball into cars, garages, workplaces and homes across the country via radio and later, the internet. When a cancer diagnosis forced...

His name is so obscure, it doesn’t even grace the title of a new book about him.  Even if author Mark Hebscher included George Washington Orton in the title, would you know who he was? Orton is Canada’s first ever Olympic medallist, reaching the podium with bronze in hurdles and then winning gold in steeplechase at the 1900 Summer Olympics held in Paris.  For decades, what should have been a celeb...