St. Paul native Jack McCartan fell into the goalie position and turned it into an Olympic and pro hockey career
Last Updated on Wednesday, 25 February 2015 16:36
By John Hamre
Let’s Play Hockey Guest Columnist
Before USA Hockey’s current generation of elite goaltenders, there was a guy from Boston University named Jim Craig. And before Craig there was a youngster from St. Paul and the University of Minnesota named Jack McCartan (born August 5, 1935). A select few have played in goal for Team USA at the Olympics. Each generation has placed the hopes and fate of the U.S. Olympic Hockey Team ultimately on the shoulders of these individuals.
A generation before Craig’s 1980 Miracle On Ice, McCartan was the goaltender and backbone of what has often been referred to as the 1960 ‘Forgotten Miracle’ Olympic Hockey Team. McCartan and his American teammates returned from Squaw Valley, Calif., with their gold medals in tow, and lifetimes ahead to be lived.
Christmastime is the season to share memories and gifts, to share time with those most important to us, to hear wisdom from our elders amidst the most joyous season of the year. Gifts of wisdom, perspective, and heart felt values often come from our elders. These are the most priceless gifts – given within the wrapping paper of memories and stories lived out long ago, not forgotten, and passed forward in trust to the younger generations.
Jack McCartan’s wisdom, perspective and humility are treasures, from which much can be learned and smiles of enjoyment will form. McCartan is an understated, an elder statesmen of the game. His keen sense of observations hold within his memories much wisdom, which is a gift to pass pass forward.
McCartan is now a retired scout for the Vancouver Canucks, a retired goaltender for the St. Paul Fighting Saints (WHA) and New York Rangers (NHL), a gold medal-winning goaltender in the 1960 Winter Olympics, an All-American and team captain for the University of Minnesota hockey team, an All-American and NCAA Champion baseball third baseman at Minnesota, a 1958 U of M graduate, a veteran of the U.S. Army, a 1983 inductee of the U.S. Hockey Hall of Fame, and a St. Paul native who got his start playing hockey in St. Paul’s park system and at Marshall High School.
McCartan began playing hockey on an organized team, as a goaltender his freshman year in high school.
“I played high school hockey at Marshall High School in St. Paul. As a freshman, they had a goaltender. The only goaltending experience I had was playing at Dunning Playground in St. Paul. We didn’t have equipment then, we would just take turns in goal. When I went to Marshall, I loved hockey so I thought I’d go out for the high school team. I figured I would have to play in goal. I mean, I was just a freshman…
“They didn’t have a lot of kids come out for hockey at Marshall. It was getting towards the first games. One day I saw Ronnie Jones. He was supposed to be the senior goaltender on the team my freshman year. I saw him, and he told me, ‘I quit and now you’re the goalie.’ It was baptism by fire. I had never played goal with goalie pads, just shin pads. That was all the city could muster up (at the parks program). We might have won one or two games that year.”
From there, it was off to the University of Minnesota where McCartan joined the baseball team. In those days, freshmen were not eligible for NCAA varsity teams. Originally, McCartan didn’t go out for hockey at the University of Minnesota as a freshman.
“Freshmen hockey practices started around November 1. I didn’t go out at first because of all those all-state players from St. Paul Johnson. I was walking by the old glass windowed west end of Williams Arena, and heard the pucks banging on the boards inside. After a couple of weeks, I asked (Gopher coach) Marsh Ryman if I could still go out for hockey. He said, ‘We’ve got eight goalies and no equipment left. Come back in a couple weeks. I’ve got some cuts to make first.’ I figured he was just saying that to get rid of me. A friend of mine in an outdoor league said I could use his equipment. So I went back and asked Ryman if I could come out. He kind of liked that.”
The next season both of the University of Minnesota’s hockey and baseball teams had returning players at McCartan’s positions – a returning third baseman and goaltender. So McCartan redshirted his sophomore year in both baseball and hockey. He then played varsity baseball and hockey for three years. McCartan was an All-American in both hockey and baseball, and won the 1956 NCAA Championship in baseball. He was the captain of the 1957-58 hockey team. Upon graduation in 1958, McCartan was recognized with the Big Ten Conference’s Medal of Honor for outstanding athletic and academic achievements.
Upon graduation, McCartan was drafted into the Army. While serving in the Army he played on the U.S. National Team in the 1959 World Championships in Prague.
McCartan served in the Army from July 1958 through July 1960. He was stationed at Fort Carson, in Colorado. In the Army, besides regularly assigned duties, he coached baseball, taught tennis and led other sports activities on base. He played in the 1959 Pan-Am Games, held in Chicago.
Going into the 1960 Winter Olympics the U.S. hockey team was unheralded, and certainly an underdog pre-tournament pick at best. Canada, Russia, Sweden and Czechoslovakia were the favorites for medals. Jack Riley was the 1960 U.S. Olympic Hockey Team coach. Throughout most of the pre-Olympic preparatory tour, two of the team’s ultimate top players were not yet with the team. Minnesota’s John Mayasich was going to join the team about a week before the Olympics and Harvard’s Billy Cleary would not join the team without his brother Bob being invited, too.
McCartan described how the 1960 team came together in the weeks prior to the Olympic beginning.
“About two weeks before the Olympics, the team played an exhibition game in North Dakota, ending in an 8-8 tie. Riley said, ‘That’s it, I’m taking both Clearys.’ That made us better. Mayasich joined us in Los Angeles for a game against the Czechs (a week before the Olympics began). Those three guys made our team. We had a good team – a lot of good hockey players. Billy and Roger Christian, Tom Williams, Bob McVey, the two Clearys, Paul Johnson, Weldy Olson, Dick Meredith – a lot of good players. Herb Brooks and Larry Alm were the last players cut.
“We played the preliminaries and got better. We beat the Swedes and Czechs, and worked up to the Canadians. I think our guys, maybe the same now, wanted to beat the Canadians more than the Russians. We played the Russians after the Canadians, and beat the Russians on Saturday. We had to play the Czechs at 8 a.m., on Sunday. They made the tournament schedule before and figured the gold medal would be decided in the afternoon game between the Canadians and the Russians. We beat the Czechs 9-4. Roger Christian scored four goals. It kind of snowballed.”
McCartan reflected on the impact of the 1960 Olympic team’s gold medal experience.
“It was big then. But they didn’t televise hockey like they do now. They were going to do the first period of the Russian game. A lot of people say they saw the Canadian game. They didn’t, because they didn’t televise the Canadian game.The Canadian game was the toughest game (of the Olympics). The Russian game – they played the same style – they just held on to the puck.”
The United States went 7-0-0 en route to the gold medal. In the preliminary round, they defeated Czechoslovakia (7-5) and Australia (12-1). In the medal round, the U.S. defeated Sweden (6-3), Germany (9-1), Canada (2-1), the Soviet Union (3-2) and Czechoslovakia (9-4) in the team’s final and gold medal-clinching game on Feb. 28, 1960. McCartan played all games, going 7-0-0 with a .922 save percentage.
It was a different era then, McCartan shared in perspective.
“John Mayasich played on Sunday morning and won a gold medal. He was back in Green Bay on Monday working at the radio station. Mayasich worked for Hubbard Broadcasting’s radio station, and played for and coached the Green Bay Bobcats.’”
After the Olympics, McCartan went on to a professional playing career spanning 15 years. Stops included playing in the NHL, the Eastern Professional League, Western League, Central League and World Hockey Association (WHA). He signed his first professional contract with the New York Rangers, and went to their training camp in the fall of 1960.
“When I went to training camp with the New York Rangers, each team carried one goalie. If New York went to Chicago, and Gump Worsley got hurt, they’d have a trainer or junior player fill in until Gump recovered. My first game I played I shut Chicago out. Then I went and played in Detroit and Montreal … it was a different story. After one month I was sent to Kitchener, Ontario (Eastern Professional League) and played there a couple years. I was picked up by Chicago in the Reverse Draft.
“When we went to training camp it was for five weeks, and everyone went without a contract. You went to training camp to get in shape. You wouldn’t see a puck for 2-3 days at first, and you wouldn’t see a game for a couple weeks. In the minors there was no money, so if they sent you down, you got nothing. In the majors you got money. Back then, there wasn’t a lot of ice in the summer. Now, players can’t afford to be out of shape. Now you go to training camp and three days later they are playing games.”
“Back then the owners had the hammer. There were only six teams with 20 guys per team, so there were not many jobs. Back then, everyone stayed in college. They didn’t leave early. You had to be exceptional to go to an NHL training camp. And that was at 23 or 24 years old.”
McCartan then spent most of his professional career playing in the old Western League, made up of teams in Los Angeles, Portland, Seattle, San Diego, San Francisco, and so on. At age 36, after playing four years in San Diego, McCartan found himself near the end of his playing career. Glen Sonmor was then with the St. Paul Fighting Saints of the WHA, and brought McCartan back to Minnesota. McCartan finished his playing career in 1972-73 with the Fighting Saints, backing up and mentoring a rising star goaltender of the WHA, Mike “Lefty” Curran, who had himself won a silver medal at the 1972 Olympics. McCartan then stayed on as an assistant coach. In 1976, the Saints folded.
McCartan was 41, and with his wife had a family of five children. He bought a Dairy Queen franchise and ran it for five years. While running the DQ, McCartan stayed in hockey, scouting part-time for the Hartford Whalers of the WHA in the winter, while the store was closed for the winter season. Several years later McCartan was approached to sell the DQ franchise he’d bought.
He commented, “I had to call Harry Neale as the GM in Vancouver to see if I could get on full-time scouting. From 1983-86, I scouted full-time with Vancouver. Harry had gone from Hartford in the WHA, to Vancouver in the NHL. I was scouting for both Hartford and Vancouver. Harry thought it was OK if I gave both teams my list of players, since they were in different leagues.”
From 2000-06 McCartan scouted part time for Vancouver before retiring from scouting and professional hockey.
McCartan was gracious to share observations he has seen in hockey, from his early playing days, through his career and recent retirement on scouting the game. The following are some of McCartan’s shared thoughts:
On where players are coming from now: “It’s amazing to me now the different places that kids are coming from. When I first started scouting, you’d go to Minnesota, New England, maybe Michigan and Canada. Now, New York, New Jersey, Las Vegas, Los Angeles. A lot of kids go up and play junior hockey in British Columbia. Give a kid ice time and a good pro or college team to watch and some coaching, they can come from anywhere. Phoenix, Dallas, Los Angeles … anywhere.”
On college vs. junior hockey: “In college hockey they play two games on the weekend and practice the rest of the week, which is good. In juniors they play 50-60 games, and are hardened to an NHL schedule, but they don’t get the practice time. My theory was, you’re going to be a better player in 1-2 years of juniors versus high school. But after 1-2 years of college the high school kid will catch up or pass the kid that went to juniors early. The USHL and Elite League have been great for kids. The competition night after night makes a player better. But if it were my kid, I would not send my kid away to live with another family. That’s just my opinion. There’s both sides of it, no doubt. If you’re on a fast track to the pros, you’re probably going to play juniors. Both teams are going to be scouted.”
On European skill players coming to North American hockey: “The Europeans play a lot of soccer, and can play with their feet as much as their hands. The Europeans are all skilled players, really skilled. With the Russians, if they put their sticks on yours, you’re not lifting it. They are strong. And they played that system. They’d work the puck around and get the puck to a guy in the slot for a one-timer.
“When I began scouting, the communist countries wouldn’t let their players come over. Buffalo drafted Alexander Mogilny. At a tournament he was playing at in Alaska he defected. We (Vancouver) took Pavel Bure in the 6th round. We didn’t know if we were going to get him. In Vancouver we invited in Tretiak, Larionov, others. We started developing relationships. Then the Swedes, Czechs and the other Europeans started coming over.”
On John Mariucci’s impact and the era: “If not for John Mariucci, there wouldn’t have been a lot of kids like me playing. The old league (Western Intercollegiate Hockey League, the predecessor to the WCHA) was mostly Canadian (players), except for Mariucci’s teams at Minnesota. John would have a couple of Canadians – Mike Pearson, Murray Williamson – but mostly Minnesotans. When John MacInnes was coaching at Michigan Tech he had a defenseman on the team older than him. They played major juniors first and then came down to college hockey. Denver had Bill Masterton, George Konik. It was tough getting a win in that league for us.”
On affordability in hockey today: “Once when I was playing, I did an interview with a sportswriter for an article. The sportwriter took a picture of me in uniform and put the cost of the equipment line to each item. The total cost of my goalie equipment was $200. Now, you can’t buy a catch glove for $200. If it wasn’t so expensive...”
On access to hockey today: “The biggest source of untapped hockey talent are minority. There are lots of good athletes. The biggest untapped resource is the access for some minorities to the game.”
On year-round hockey: “I don’t know how kids do it. I suppose parents have a lot to do with it. They think they their kids are going to the NHL. They don’t know.”
Repeatedly in conversation, McCartan would refer to a term – the hockey fraternity of players in the game. He would refer to people who get ‘hockey in their blood.’
“That hockey fraternity is a funny fraternity. Kids get it in their blood and they want to play hockey. At the U, after practicing hockey for two years while not playing, my dad wanted me to play baseball. I said I’d like to go up to Canada and play hockey. Kids get it in their heart and they’ll do almost anything to play hockey. You can say you should do this or that to a kid, but you can’t change their mind. That’s a big reason why the Wild are doing so well today. Kids want to see the Wild play. There is a fraternity of them playing.”
Speaking with Jack McCartan, you hear an appreciation for the history of the game, and a respect for the foundational values that hockey in the U.S. has been developed upon. McCartan is one of the individuals that lived our hockey history, and has helped shaped the sport played worldwide today.
Society, sports and hockey have changed and evolved. Perhaps the days when a high school freshman can take up playing goalie and then become an Olympic gold medalist have passed. Yet a reminder of the historical values, of a genuine love for the game, respect for teammates and an appreciation for the camaraderie among true hockey persons are timeless values relevant in any era. Gifts like these, unwrapped from within the stories of history, can be shared only by persons of McCartan’s lived experiences. To pass along memories that shaped his values, and the values of so many in hockey today, is a special gesture. Recalling and reflecting upon McCartan’s observations and experiences may inspire improvements upon today’s great game of hockey moving into the future.
So, like Paul Harvey would say a generation ago on his ABC radio broadcasts, “... and now you know the rest of the story.” Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.
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.
