Vintage Minnesota Hockey - History

JACK H. “JACK” KELLEY
1993 United States Hockey Hall of Fame Enshrinee

Jack Kelley coached Boston University to NCAA championships in 1971 and 1972, while taking the Terriers to four NCAA tournaments altogether over a 10-years span.  At the professional level, his Harford Whalers teams in the professional World Hockey Association were East Division champions three times and won the AVCO Cup playoff title in 1973.

While his coaching exploits at Boston University and Colby College, and later at Harford, gained fame for Jack Kelley, he had earlier been an outstanding hockey player.  In 1945, at Belmont High School, he was named the top Boston schoolboy performer.  In 1949, Kelley competed on an AHAUS team and went to Boston University, leading the Terriers to the NCAA finals in 1950 and 1951.  He was also named their most valuable player and all-ECAC in 1952.

Kelley began his coaching career at Weston High School, where he handled football, baseball, and hockey.  From 1955 to 1962, he guided Colby College to the upper echelon of ECAC hockey.  The lure of coaching his alma mater brought Kelley back to BU in 1962, and in addition to their national success, his teams won six Beanpot Tournament titles.

“We were about half Canadians in those days, but we had a lot of great players and some balanced teams,” Kelley recollected.  When the rebel WHA organized, Kelley formed the Whalers franchise and helped U.S. and collegiate players obtain professional opportunities.  Kelley’s overall college coaching record was 303-147-13 and his pro record was 77-55-6.

Kelley later worked for the Detroit Red Wings, running their affiliate at Glens Falls, N.Y. In 1993, he was hired as president of the Pittsburgh Penguins.

 LANGEVIN, DAVE
1993 United States Hockey Hall of Fame Enshrinee

A rangy, mobile defenseman, Dave Langevin is best known for winning four Stanley Cup rings as a member of the New York Islanders from 1979-1985. But Langevin’s career was characterized by success wherever he played. 

A graduate of St. Paul’s Hazel Park playground, Langevin went on to star at Hill High School (later Hill-Murray), where he played on two state independent championship teams, helping compile a 28-1 record his junior year.

From there, he went on to star at the University of Minnesota-Duluth, where he emerged as one of the team’s star players from 1972-76.  He patrolled the Bulldog blue lines with Authority and was named as a second-team All American after his senior year.

His first professional experience came with the Edmonton Oilers in the old World Hockey Association, which Langevin considered a great opportunity for budding U.S. professional players.  After three seasons, the league folded, and he wound up with the Islanders.  It would be the break of a lifetime, as his first four seasons in the National Hockey League, 1980-83, were all climaxed by Stanley Cup triumphs.

“It was hard to say how great our team was while being part of it”, Langevin recalled.  “All I know is that our practices were a lot harder than a lot of our games.”

In 1982, he represented the United States by playing with Team USA in the Canada Cup series.  Then, after a devastating knee injury, which nearly ended his career, sidelined him, he worked hard to rehabilitate himself back into game shape.  Told he’d never play again before the Islanders fourth Stanley Cup bid, Langevin came back to star in the four-game sweep over former Oilers teammates that included Wayne Gretzky.  Langevin, who earned All-Star honors in 1983, later played a season with the Minnesota North Stars and ended his career with the Los Angeles Kings.  There, after reinjuring his knee, he opted to retire at the age of 33.

Langevin later pursued a coaching career in high school with the Edina Hornets, amateur, and college hockey in St. Paul, MN.

CHARLES M. SCHULZ
1993 United States Hockey Hall of Fame Enshrinee

Here’s a world-famous hockey player, Snoopy, taking on Woodstock on a frozen birdbath.  Here’s the world-famous “Peanuts” cartoonist, arena-builder, and organizer of “Snoopy’s Senior Hockey Tournament,” Charles Schulz, going into the United States Hockey Hall of Fame.

Growing up in St. Paul, Schulz shot tennis balls at his grandmother in the basement, coaxed his mother to make goalie pads out of gunny sacks with rolled-up newspaper sewn inside, and was enthralled when his parents took him to St. Paul Saints and Minneapolis Millers games in the 1930s.  His father made a rink in the family’s back yard, and Schulz and his friends also played by lamplight on frozen streets or neighborhood school rinks.  Thus kindled, his love for hockey traveled with him when his cartooning career led him to California.

Schulz’s five children learned to skate at the only arena in the Santa Rosa area.  When the arena closed, Schulz’s first wife, Joyce, convinced him to build the Redwood Empire Arena near his studio in 1969.  Schulz passed away in 1999.