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A fan’s mind tends to remember only what it wants to. It will remember their favourite player’s hat trick, but not that one time when they scored in their net. It will remember their favourite goalie’s best saves, but not that one time when they left the net unmanned to handle a puck and that an unfortunate rebound off the boards sent the puck in the net. Similarly, it will remember a player’s time on their favourite team but will somehow delete the time that same player spent with another club. Here are two players who got to play on both sides of the classic Montreal Canadiens – Boston Bruins rivalry.
Somehow, this Massachusetts-born-and-raised player was drafted by the Bruins’ worst enemy, the Canadiens. While some may only remember Nilan as an enforcer, he played pretty well for Montreal. In one of his best seasons, in 1985-1986, Nilan scored 19 goals and helped the team win its 23rd Stanley Cup.
In the 1986-1987 season, he was one of the main actors in the “Brawl in the Hall” at the Boston Garden when both teams fought in the hall behind the Bruins’ bench. However, it’s not so much the fight that I remember. It was the way he antagonized his opponents. The next day, he said in an interview that the Canadiens had taught Boston a lesson, and the way they were consumed by stupid penalties was why the Bs weren’t all that successful in the playoffs. That cracked me up.
Nilan was traded to the New York Rangers following a conflict with head coach Jacques Lemaire during the 1987-88 season, and, in turn, the Rangers sent him to the Bruins. He only stayed in Boston for two seasons (80 games) before he found his way back to the Canadiens in 1991-1992, playing 17 games in the Sainte-Flanelle before he retired. For many Canadiens fans, he was never part of the Bruins.
Recchi arrived in Montreal in February 1995 from the Philadelphia Flyers. The Canadiens received Recchi, a third-round pick at the 1995 NHL Draft in the trade, while the Flyers made out like bandits, receiving John Leclair, Eric Desjardins, and Gilbert Dionne. Leclair would form the “Legion of Doom” line with Eric Lindros and Mikael Renberg, while Desjardins would stay in Philadelphia for 11 seasons as the Flyers’ anchor on defence. To this day, this trade remains a sensitive subject for former general manager Serge Savard. In his biography “Canadien jusqu’au bout” he explains:
