Evening star., 1936-01-26
Fast but Fair
Continued from page eleven

socket - that Frank played the most
gruelllng game of his career He could
barely move his arm merely to
skate was agony - and he would not
have been on the ice ii it had not been
plavoff game. And It went 6S min
utes over time - two hours and eight
minutes of agony.
Irrespective of injuries. Frank has
taken plenty of bumps; opponents do
not exactly baby him because he plays
fair. The worst of them. he saws. came
from his brothers. (Oh yes, George.
Bill and Bobby were in the big league
too; the Boucher boys are to hockey
what the Poes were to football.j
"They gave it to me extra hard to
show it was no family picnic. Frank
says.
The game was rougher then, fifteen
years ago. There were only two or
three spare players on team instead
of nine. as now; they tired more
quickly - their tenpers snapped and
fights were plentiful.
But fist fights seldom amount to
much. for the players can't get firm
enough footing on the ice to give their
blows authority. But when they slash
with their sticks --- that's different.
The goriest fight Frank ever saw was
when Bun Cook and Stew Adams of
the Black Hawks went at each other
with sticks, and Bill Cook and Art
Somcrs joined in and started free
for-all. There was blood on the ice in
Chicago that night.
Characteristically, it was another's
herOism and not his own that made
certain game the most thrilling for
Frank. The Rangers were playing the
Maroons, in Montreal. in the spring of
1928, in a Stanley Cup match, the
Worlds Series of hockey. In the
first period puck drove across the eye
of I>orne Chabot. the Rangers goaler,
and put him out of the game. Goal
tending is highly specialized art;
no other Ranger had ever played in the
nets. So Lester Patrick, the coach. put
on the pads and took Chabot's place.
A hockey player is old at 80;
Patrick was a.. He had not played for
seven or eight years. and he had never
tended goal. Yet for the remaining
two periods he held the Maroons to
one goal while his boys, chiefly intent
on keeping the attack away from him,
managed to secure two. 1t thrilled
Frank, and it is an epic they'll never
forget where hockey is played.
Frank figures alone in minor
epic of the ice. Playing against the
New York Americans eight years ago,
he dashed from a corner toward the
Americans goal. was tripped and fell
fiat. The puck stopped five feet away.
The Americans goaler came out to
clear the puck, but before he could
reach it, Frank. sprawled on his
stomach, swung his stick and swept
the puck into the net. They say it's
the only time that ever happened.
Another game in the 1923 series
with the NIaroons was the hardest
won victory he can remember. The
Rangers we're a team of cripples.
Chabot was out. Ching johnson had a
fractured thumb, Bun Cook a cut
ankle and Clipped ankle bone, and
almost everyone else, even Murray
Murdoch the Iron Man, who recently
played his 5O0th consecutive game for
the Rangers. had some sort OF injury
that would have kept him out at less
critical time.
But this was the final. the decisive
game. On it hinged not only the title
but the major share of the prize
money. And the Maroons we're to get
bonus of 5000 man if they won.
When game time arrived there was
no doctor to remove the surgical clips
from Buns wound, but he went on
the ice nevertheless. So did Ching,