Before Gene Carr became somewhat of a cultural icon, before he buddied up with the Eagles and Glenn Frey and became the inspiration for the band’s “New Kid in Town” megahit when he played in Los Angeles, he was a 20-year-old trying to fit into the best Rangers’ team since the 1940 Cup champions.
In New York in the spring of 1972, Carr was the flashy blond with perhaps the greatest straight-away speed in the NHL — a blond demon for Manhattan — and was supposed to provide the missing link after having been acquired early in the 1971-72 season.
That’s not quite how it had played out. Drafted fourth overall by St. Louis in 1971 as a speed-and-skill guy on the wing, Carr scored eight goals in 60 games while primarily skating in the left wing spot on the Bulldog Line beside Walt Tkaczuk and Billy Fairbairn. He had not, at age 20, lived up to advance notices that had been delivered by general manager-coach Emile Francis.
The Blueshirts rolled nevertheless. They rolled even after Jean Ratelle’s Year of His Life (46-63-109 in 63 games) came to a screeching half on March 1, when he sustained a broken ankle after being hit by a shot from teammate Dale Rolfe.
The Blueshirts rolled through the Canadiens in six games in the first round and then they rolled through the Blackhawks in the first three games of the Cup semifinals, a year after having been beaten by Chicago in seven games in the same round.
The Rangers had not been to the final in 22 years since losing to the Red Wings in a Game 7 double-overtime match in Detroit in 1950. That was during the era when the circus took over the Garden during the NHL playoffs, forcing the Blueshirts to play a number of their home games elsewhere.
In 1950, the Rangers played their two designated home games of the final — why two? who knows? — in Toronto. These were Games 2 and 3 — why those? who knows? The rest of them were played at the Detroit Olympia.
There had not been a Stanley Cup final contest played in New York since Game 2 against the Maple Leafs on April 3, 1940. After the first two, the remainder were scheduled in Toronto.
So anyway, 32 years later, the Rangers were one victory away from the finals after taking the first two in Chicago and Game 3 at home. They were on the precipice.
They took a 4-2 lead deep into the second period when Carr burst in on left wing, blond hair waving in the air, before putting the puck behind Tony Esposito at 18:22.
It was 5-2 and it was bedlam. The arena shook. The Garden exploded in as loud of a hockey noise I have ever heard in that building. The Rangers were going to the final! The Rangers were going to get Bobby Orr and the Animals from Boston.
The Golden Child had delivered. Carr was going to be all that. He was going to be all that in New York. He was going to be the Next Gen Ranger before there was a Next Gen. He was going to be Ricky Middleton before there was … oh, no, never mind.
But that, of course, is not how it happened for Carr on Broadway. The 5-2 goal en route to the 6-2 Game 4 victory and the sweep, on April 23, 1972, represented his zenith as a Ranger.
The team would lose the final in six games to the Bruins. Carr would go on to be in and out of the lineup. He would be injured. His production did not come close to his skill level.
Steve Vickers, who would win the Calder as Rookie of the Year the following season in 1972-73, took over for Carr as the Bulldog Line left wing. Carr scored nine goals in 50 games.
The next season, after getting one goal in 29 games, he was traded to the Kings on Feb. 15, 1974 for a 1977 first-round draft choice that became Ron Duguay.
Carr’s final stat line as a Ranger featured 18 goals, 23 assists and 41 points in 139 regular-season games plus one goal and four assists in 17 playoff contests.
But there was that one shining moment in New York for Carr. It was Camelot. That is how Carr, who passed at age 72 on Dec. 13, will be remembered here.
You know what?
It is a fine way to be remembered.
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Opportunity lost
The Rangers awakened on Nov. 15, 1971, with a 12-1-4 record. By the end of the following day, Emile engineered two trades including 11 components (one of those pieces, twice) that may have cost his team a Stanley Cup or two.
I didn’t understand them then as a fan in the original Section 419, and I understand them even less now.
On Nov. 15, the Blueshirts traded Jack Egers, Andre Dupont and Mike Murphy to the Blues for Carr, Wayne Connelly and Jim Lorentz.
The following day, the Rangers sent Dave Balon, Connelly and Ron Stewart to Vancouver for Gary Doak and Jim Wiste.
In essence, the Rangers replaced the 33-year-old Balon with the 20-year-old Carr as the left wing on the Bulldog Line even though Balon had led the team in goal-scoring each of the previous two seasons — with 36 in 1971-72 after 33 in 1970-71. No. 17 had four goals in 16 games when he was traded.
But they also acquired a support veteran defenseman in Doak who had not been good enough to crack Boston’s lineup before he’d been sent to Vancouver after the B’s took the 1970 Cup. The Blueshirts added a defenseman with a physical element — after trading Dupont a day earlier!
Maybe the Rangers would not have won the Cup in 1972 even if they had not made these trades. Maybe they never were going to be able to overcome the effects of Ratelle’s injury.
But even if not in 1972, I’d sure have taken my chances in 1973 and 1974 with a lineup featuring Dupont and Murphy.
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