Edina native Bill Nyrop was the unsung fourth defenseman of the Montreal Canadiens’ “Big Three”
Last Updated on Wednesday, 25 February 2015 16:34
By John Hamre
Let’s Play Hockey Guest Columnist
The Montreal Canadiens have won the Stanley Cup 24 times in the franchise’s storied history, claiming five Cups in the 1960s and six in the 1970s, before winning their most recent two in 1986 and 1993. To play for the Canadiens is to play for one of the most successful and history-laden teams in all of sport.
During the Canadiens’ Stanley Cup championship years of the 1970s, they had three defensemen – Larry Robinson, Serge Savard and Guy Lapointe – who were considered the three best NHL blueliners on the same team, and three of the best defensemen in NHL history. They were referred to as the “Big Three,” and each are in the Hockey Hall of Fame. On those Canadiens teams, Bill Nyrop of Edina, Minn., also played in the top two defensive pairings – an American playing for ‘Les Canadiens de Montreal.’
“Billy was a terrific player! He was the underrated fourth defenseman of the ‘Big Three,’” said Brian Engblom.
Engblom, one of today’s premier NHL game analysts on NBC and ESPN broadcasts, was a teammate of Nyrop’s on the Canadiens from 1976-78.
Engblom shared his perspective of Nyrop’s role and impact on the Canadiens in those championship years, as the fourth member of the “Big Three” defensemen.
“Scotty Bowman loved Billy,” Engblom said. “He played his (rear) off all the time. He was a throwback to the Tim Horton era. He was this underrated defenseman. Robinson and Savard were partners, and Lapointe and Nyrop were partners. He got as much ice time as the ‘Big Three’ because he played with Lapointe.”
Nyrop played high school hockey at Edina High School, graduating in 1970. He then played college hockey – and football for a brief time – as an All-American defenseman at Notre Dame, before graduating in 1974. Drafted with the 66th overall pick in the 1972 NHL Amateur Draft, Nyrop became a part of the Canadiens’ defensive corps and was one of the top four defensemen by the end of the 1975-76 season.
In his NHL career, Nyrop played in 207 games, recording 12 goals and 63 points. He helped the Canadiens win three Stanley Cups, and earned the respect of a team roster filled with future Hall of Famers, before surprisingly walking away from the game and Canadiens in his first retirement in the fall of 1978.
Nyrop enjoyed a tremendous high hockey career at Edina. In 1968, his sophomore season, Edina qualified for the Minnesota State High School Hockey Tournament. In 1969, Nyrop and his Edina teammates won the state title. In the 1969 state championship game, Edina claimed a 5-4 overtime victory over Warroad in what is considered to be one of the greatest games in Minnesota state high school tournament history. Edina again qualified for the state tournament in 1970, Nyrop’s senior season, but lost 1-0 in an overtime thriller to Minneapolis Southwest.
“He was one of the top three defensemen recruited out of Minnesota in his senior year,” longtime Bloomington Jefferson coach Tom Saterdalen said. “I was at Minnesota at the time as an assistant coach for Glen Sonmor, and we didn’t get him. One guy went to Denver, one went to Wisconsin. He was one of the top three defensemen in the state of Minnesota. He was big, strong, a great player – and a great person.”
Steve Curry was Nyrop’s defensive partner at both Edina and at Notre Dame.
“Bill made me a much better hockey player. He worked extremely hard. He brought me along. I worked much harder than I ever would have because of him. I truly believe because of that drive, he made people better – whether he was a coach, or a general manager, or playing with him. People would say he made them better players.
“Even at Notre Dame, (Nyrop) could be offensive minded. But he played a style that people don’t notice unless you know hockey. That’s why Scotty Bowan would have loved him. He would move the puck out of the zone, but people might not notice. He was just solid. His style was so solid and understated. That’s what the Canadiens probably loved about him. He was so understated. His head was always screwed on straight – and he always tried to help make sure other persons’ heads were screwed on straight.”
Ric Schafer, a Minneapolis native, was a teammate of Nyrop’s on the Notre Dame hockey team from 1971-74. Later, Schafer went on to become the head coach at Alaska-Fairbanks (1980-87), and then at his alma mater of Notre Dame (1987-95).
“Nyrop was a tremendous athlete. He elevated a lot of us other guys, practicing against him every day. He was a good sound defenseman, especially to play for the Montreal Canadians as an American. He was just a big, strong, steady defenseman. He was mobile, he could handle the puck – he was the prototypical hockey player of today’s world.”
Les Larson, a St. Paul native and current Breck School boys’ hockey coach, was a temmate of Nyrop’s at Notre Dame from 1971-74.
“Bill was quite a guy. He was 6-3, 210 pounds – all-state in hockey and football at Edina. He was the most unassuming guy. He almost got embarrassed after he scored a goal. He played kind of like Thomas Vanek played when Vanek was at the University of Minnesota – everything came easy to him.”
Larson shared of Nyrop’s overall athleticism and abilities as a football player.
“After his sophomore year at Notre Dame, he went out for the football team in the spring. He started as the ‘12th string’ quarterback and worked his way up to third string. In the spring football game he ran a quarterback sneak for a 90-yard touchdown. And that was playing against top players in the Blue-Gold game. Ara Parseghian (then Notre Dame’s football coach) said if he would have gone out for football as a freshman he would have been the quarterback for the next three years. Joe Theismann was a senior in Nyrop’s freshman year.”
Larson said of Nyrop’s humility, “He was on a few Cup teams. Bill said, ‘I play with Guy Lapointe. How can I not do well?’ The neat thing about him, he was never looking for the limelight. You would never know his dad owned Northwest Airlines. He just wanted to be a regular guy.”
Bill Nyrop helped Edina to three state tournaments, winning a championship in 1969.
Doug Risebrough has been part of five Stanley Cup Championships as a player, coach or hockey administrator. He was the General Manager of the Minnesota Wild from 1999-2009 and currently is a pro scout for the New York Rangers. From 1976-78 he was teammates with Nyrop in Montreal.
“From a personal standpoint, he was a really enjoyable guy, and a bright guy. He was a very unassuming person, a very confident person, but not out there to tell you who he was.
“As an athlete, he was outstanding. He was a rated racquetball player, an accomplished hockey player, an accomplished football player – whatever he did as an athlete he did well. He was into weights and training long before we all were. He made himself. He was solid defenseman, a two-way player. He was just big and strong – naturally strong – and honed through his training. He was a good skater, stickhandler, and he played within himself. It was a real accomplishment when he joined the Canadiens. That team had won Stanley Cups, and he made his way onto the team. When those teams won Cups, it took something special to come in to win more Cups.
“Billy was a good defensive partner. He was reliable, safe – he wasn’t going to make mistakes at the wrong time. We were playing with Hall of Fame players. We didn’t know that at the time, but we knew our roles were to add value. Could he have played power play? Yes, but there were other guys. He had come into a championship team.
“A team always has a routine for games – who goes on the ice first, who goes on the ice last. Billy was always in the middle. There was a game in Minnesota, Billy was so excited and intense to play well at the Met Center. Ken Dryden was the first on the ice, and he turned to the boards and stopped. All the guys that went on the ice turned and stopped. There was only one Canadien skating around the Met Center ice – Billy. He didn’t realize it until he was three-quarters of the way across the ice. That was a statement of how much the guys liked him. The Canadiens wanted Nyrop to have his moment in front of his hometown crowd.”
Engblom spoke about Nyrop’s physical conditioning and on-ice style of play in tones both insightful as an analyst and remembering of a close teammate and friend.
“Bill was a fitness nut. In our generation not many guys did that. At that time, most hockey players weren’t in the weight room. Bill loved it! He had a long fuse. He was big and physical. He didn’t run at people on the ice. He played the game the right way. He was solid. Guy Lapointe was so much more offensive. Bill would be back defensively. Ken Dryden and Bunny Larocque (the Canadiens’ goaltenders) thought a lot of him.”
The 1970s NHL was an era of fighting, bench-clearing brawls, and the use of intimidation within hockey as a tactic.
“Bill didn’t agree with the bench-clearing brawls of the 1970s,” Engblom said. “He didn’t want to fight, but he could. If he got mad, you didn’t want to be in it with him.”
At seemingly the prime of his hockey playing career, after three consecutive Stanley Cup Championships (1976, 1977, 1978), Nyrop retired from the NHL at the age of 26. He came back briefly, playing for the Minnesota North Stars in 1981 and 1982, before retiring from the NHL for good to pursue law school. Nyrop went on to practice law, and then to own, manage and coach championship teams in the Sunshine Hockey League, until passing away of cancer at the age of 43 in 1995.
Nyrop’s retirement from the NHL in the fall of 1978 was a surprise to the Montreal Canadiens, his teammates and coaches. Risebrough shared about the day his roommate retired from the Canadiens.
“We were heading into the rink. He said, ‘You find your own way to the rink, I’ll meet you there.’ He wanted to tell the coaching staff first. He had called and said he was going to retire. He accomplished a lot in a short career. He had other things in life he wanted to do.”
“The way he abruptly left was typical of Bill,” Engblom said. “We were at practice one day. He was late. Guys were laughing and joking at him through the glass because you were fined when you were late. Scotty Bowman was called in. He said, ‘Bill’s done. He’s decided he’s had enough.’ It was strange.”
Nyrop retired from the three-time defending Stanley Cup Champions, surrounded by future Hall of Famers, coming into the prime of his career. Why?
“He was an interesting guy,” Engblom said. “I’ve wondered at times if he was influenced by Ken Dryden.”
Ken Dryden had held out in a contract negotiation for the 1973-74 season, and used the year to attend law school at McGill University.
Engblom continued, “Who knows? They were of the same ilk, very intellectual guys. Kenny had tremendous respect for him. Nyrop was a well-read, intelligent guy. Those bench-clearing brawls really bothered him. He was so quiet, even when he was on the team.”
“He just got tired of the rat race,” Schafer said. “Money wasn’t a big issue. He wanted to go to law school.”
Les Larson shared what Nyrop told him later in life. “He said, ‘If I never go to Buffalo Stadium again I’ll be happy.’ I think he got tired of pro hockey and the grind.”
Tom Saterdalen said, “ I asked him why he left early,” Saterdalen said. “The fact he played and won the Stanley Cup, the competitiveness of the NHL. Don’t you miss it? He replied, ‘Tom, when I do my job now, I look at it just like playing in the Stanley Cup Finals. I accept every challenge like the Stanley Cup Finals.’ He was such a gentleman.”
Kelly Dyer played on four United States Women’s National Teams as a goaltender, and is a member of the Northeastern University Athletics Hall of Fame. She is a three-time silver medalist at the IIHF World Women’s Championships, and is one of six women to have played professional hockey in a pro men’s league. From 1993-96, Dyer played for Nyrop’s West Palm Beach Blaze, of the Sunshine Hockey League.
“Bill started the Sunshine Hockey League in Florida,” Dyer said. “It had teams in Lakeland, Jacksonville, Daytona and West Palm Beach. His vision was to grow it up the coast. Bill was the general manager, coach and owner of the West Palm Beach Blaze. I think that was his vision, to create the league. He thought it would get bought up by a higher league.”
Nyrop also served as an agent of sorts for Dyer during her pioneering seasons as a female goaltender playing in men’s professional hockey.
“Each year I would go to East Coast Hockey League camps, knowing I’d come back to the Sunshine League. Our goal as women wasn’t to play men’s professional hockey, we had no other options. We were trying to find a place to train for the women’s national team. West Palm Beach would carry three goalies. Bill always let me go to Team USA.”
On the playing experience with Nyrop’s West Palm Beach franchise, Dyer explained, “The building held 5,000 people. We were the only team in the league to sell out on occasion. Professional teams then wanted female goalies for marketing. Bill was smart that way as well, which was fun for me. I had my own fan club. The first seven games I was in West Palm Beach were sellouts. It was cool for me – but my ultimate goal was Team USA.”
Dyer went on to describe Nyrop’s leadership, and the first-class manner in which he ran the West Palm Beach franchise. “Bill told the guys – they were always very good to me – I could totally sense the influence of Bill in the locker room.”
She continued on her time with the West Palm Beach franchise, “I worked setting up all of the clinics, hockey camps and hospital visits for the team. Playing pro hockey was a lot of fun, but there’s a lot of down time. So I worked in the office, too. When he got sick (in the summer of 1995), he sold the team.”
In the offseason, Nyrop would return to his ranch in Idaho. He would take players there to work if they needed additional summer employment while playing winters in West Palm Beach. “He was a constant coach,” Dyer said.
I asked Dyer if Nyrop had ever shared why he left the NHL at such a young age.
“I had asked him that,” Dyer said. “He said, ‘I had accomplished everything I could at the highest level.’ He became a lawyer to be a better general manager, to gain the intellectual knowledge to do contract negotiations. He liked the way to train your mind to think in different ways.”
Nyrop was a true gentleman of the game, and a champion at many levels. Some of the best players to have ever played the game – his Montreal Canadiens teammates – considered him among the best to play his role and style of game.
Nyrop was visionary. He was ahead of his time in hockey regarding nutrition, off-ice training, athleticism, marketing and the business management of the game. He left this world too young, and he left a legacy as a great player and person.
Nyrop was one of the best defensemen Minnesota has ever produced, and one of the best people anyone could hope to know. Speaking to those who knew, played with or were close to him, you will hear genuine fondness of their friendships with Nyrop in the tone of their voices. They describe their friend ‘Billy’ and his life lived respectful of all, within his own vision.
During a 22-year coaching career, John Hamre has coached PeeWee, Bantam, high school, NCAA Division I, Junior A and minor professional hockey. He was the video coach for the 1994 USA Men’s Olympic Team, coached within the USA Hockey NTDP, and at many USA Hockey festivals. He holds a Ph.D. from the University of Minnesota.
Top image: tradingcarddb.com
