It’s been 40 years to the day since one of the most iconic moments in Canadian cultural history; the goal of the century.
Today, is the 40th anniversary of Paul Henderson’s series winning goal from the 1972 Summit Series. In the series, Canada’s finest hockey players went up against the Soviet Union to determine which nation could claim hockey supremacy.
inSide Drumheller caught up with residents and asked where they were when the goal was scored.
“I was teaching here at the high school and we were watching it on TV,” said Dave Wood, Education Director for Drumheller Dragons. “Because it was the final game, we tuned in. It was pretty exciting, we were ecstatic, because we were down 5-3 at one point in the game.”
“I think most people in Canada were watching it.”
Albert Durbano, hockey fan and former off-ice official, has a similar story. At the time, Durbano was working moving furniture in Calgary.
“I was in Calgary at the time. I was working, but we stopped to watch the last period,” said Durbano. “It was a good game. Everybody jumped six feet high when Henderson scored.”
Jim Fisher, who managed the Drumheller Miners wasn’t in Canada at the time.
“I missed out on all the fun back home. I was in Salt Lake City. We had to get the results via telephone, because no American channels were interested,” said Fisher. “I found it hard to believe, coming back on the Russians in the last 20 minutes.”
Throughout the game Fisher, who was working as a play by play announcer for the Salt Lake Golden Eagles in the Western Hockey League, would get phone calls letting him know how the game was going.
Fisher had also run into the Soviets during his time with the Miners. They played a game against the Russians only a few years before.
“We played the Russians in Sweden in 1967 and I was telling everyone then in a few short years it’s going to take the best in the NHL to compete with them. It turned out five years later,” said Fisher. “We ended up beating them 4-3, but it was quite a game.”
Fisher also recalled the Soviet shenanigans when it came to playing hockey against western teams.
“When we played in Sweden in ‘67, you weren’t allowed to go watch hockey in Russia. At that time you didn’t know who you were playing, because the Russians kept things pretty secret. It was only a year before the Summit Series that you could go watch a game in Russia,” said Fisher.
“The Russians would play games with you off the ice. If they knew [western] people were watching, they’d let in goals from the red line just to throw you off.”
Wherever Canadians were on September 28, 1972, it is a moment that sticks out in our collective consciousness as an iconic Canadian moment.
“At that time we had the naive belief we were the hockey gods of the world and the Russians were bursting that balloon a bit,” said Wood. “I think our national pride was restored.”
