Tretiak Shuts out the Montreal Canadiens

This is historic stuff right here. Vladislav Tretiak and the Soviet National Team toured the NHL in late-82/early-83 and that produced some of the finest hockey ever. Tretiak was already in his 30s and after playing for the Soviet National team for close to 14 years had aspirations of making the move across the ocean and play for the Canadiens. Montreal's Ken Dryden retired in 1979 and the team would not have a franchise goaltender until Patrick Roy established himself in 1986. For a while, it seemed like Tretiak may be the answer.

On New Year's eve of 1983 Tretiak shut out the Canadiens (final result of the game was 5-0) and was clearly on his best form. The Montreal crowd chanted his name, perhaps forgetting for a second that the Soviet goalie was on the opposing team. There was gossip in the air that Tretiak was coming over and he wanted to play for Montreal.

Of course, as we now know, Tretiak's request was denied later that year. He came back to play one more season for the National Team in 83-84, mostly due to the fact that the Olympics were to take place. There he was nearly untouchable as the Soviets won gold easily, going undefeated. Tretiak retired almost immediately after that, refusing to play for Viktor Tikhonov and no doubt frustrated at not being able to practice his craft in America.

There is some interesting debate that goes on as to how good Tretiak really was. Most of the time, the debate centers on his performance at the 1972 Summit Series and occasionally touches on the 1979 Challenge Cup and Central Red Army's tour of the NHL in 1975-76. Completely ignored is the fact that Tretiak probably played his peak hockey in the early 80s - especially between 1981-84 (this is backed up not only by his international performances, but also his Russian league numbers). Only 20 years old at the time of the Summit Series, Tretiak was noticeably superior in terms of positioning, puck control and concentration in his later years, often looking downright unbeatable. Notice how much more compact his style is here comparing to the 70s matches. Some may get a hint of Ed Belfour here, a pupil of Tretiak's in Chicago in the early 1990s.

The Soviets never really recovered after the Tretiak retirement. Sure, they won their share of tournaments in those years, but goaltending was always an issue. Belosheikin never quite panned out, after some early promise and Mylnikov was reliable, but not dominant. The National Team suffered serious losses in the World Championships in 1985 and 1987 and came up short in Canada Cups of 1984 and 1987, in part due to shaky goaltending. Viktor Tikhonov tried to compensate for this by making his team defense-oriented, a tactic that drew heavy criticism.

In 1989 Soviet players were finally allowed to play in the NHL. Tretiak was 37 at the time and long retired.

Here are the final 10 minutes of the aforementioned match between the Soviet Union and the Canadiens. Included are goals by Valeri Vasiliev and Vyacheslav Fetisov.

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• Vladislav
• Tretiak
• 1982
• 1983
• Montreal
• Canadiens
• NHL
• USSR
• CCCP
• Canada
• Forum
• Tour
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• hockey
• Lafleur
• Makarov
• Krutov
• Larionov
• Fetisov
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• Gainey