The United States Hockey Hall of Fame is located in Eveleth, Minn., and showcases the history of the game in this country; history made at any level, from coast to coast. However, no place was more fit to host the induction of this year’s five-member class than Boston.
"I think (USA Hockey was) originally thinking of having this out in San Jose, but then they realized that almost everyone is from Massachusetts," Clinton, Mass., native Scott Young said of the Dec. 13 induction ceremony at the Boston Westin Waterfront. "They realized, ‘We’ve got to have it in Boston.’"
In the most fitting place, no person was more fit to speak about the class than Young.
The class included three legendary coaches. Incredibly, Young played for all three; Jack Parker (Somerville, Mass.) and Ben Smith (Gloucester, Mass.) were his head coach and assistant during a two-year career at Boston University, while Providence College alum Ron Wilson guided the 1996 World Cup team for which he played and won a gold medal.
Young, Parker, Smith and Wilson joined the United States Hockey Hall of Fame along with Springfield’s Kevin Collins, who worked for 28 years as an NHL linesman and officiated more games during the Stanley Cup playoffs than any American in history.
In addition, Storrs, Conn., native and two-time USA Hockey executive director Dave Ogrean and retired legal council chair Peter Lindberg were named recipients of the Lester Patrick Trophy for outstanding service to U.S. hockey.
It was a special group with deep New England roots from the top down.
"I went to grad school at BU, grew up in Connecticut, and I’m a third-generation Red Sox fan, so I’m kind of favored to this part of the world," said Ogrean, who retired in January after 18 years over two stints in the head chair at USA Hockey. "I’ve known Jack Parker since the early part of my career, Ben Smith for a long, long time. … These are great, great people. It’s not surprising — with these inductees and being in Boston — that we have the best attendance ever at this event."
Back on the ice, Young — who posted 757 career NHL points and Ogrean calls "maybe the least appreciated superstar" from "The Greatest Generation" in American hockey history — still remembers the lessons his coaches taught decades ago and passes them along to his own hockey-playing children. They are lessons applicable to his new job as the Pittsburgh Penguins’ director of player development, too.
"I like to tell my son right now that you have to show up and play every game. It’s something that you have to learn as you go through youth and college hockey, seeing the ups and downs," said Young. "I learned that from Jack Parker and Ben Smith. They were tremendous at preparing and motivating us. I will always remember playing for those two."
Parker needs no introduction after standing behind the BU bench for 40 seasons, leading his alma mater to 897 wins, 11 conference and 21 Beanpot championships, and national titles in 1978, 1995 and 2009.
He knows exactly where to place credit for his many success during four decades on Commonwealth Avenue, but often thought, ‘How did I get here?’ He, too, was excited to join the hall with more than one familiar face.
"I was a basketball player from Somerville and now I’m in the U.S. Hockey Hall of Fame, but I was also excited to find out who I was going in with," Parker said. "When you look at the people who are already here, it feels pretty good, and it’s really quite humbling.
"You don’t keep that job (at BU) for 40 years unless you keep winning. You don’t keep winning unless you have good players, and I had great assistant coaches who always made sure we had good players."
Smith was surely one of those great assistant coaches. But, it was ultimately his passion for the women’s game that drove his résumé over the top for Hall of Fame consideration. He took three U.S. women’s teams to Olympics, including the inaugural gold medal-winning squad in 1998 — a memory that still stands out to Ogrean among the greatest over his long career as the American game’s headmaster.
"We were doing something for which there was no blueprint," Ogrean said of women’s hockey at the Nagano Games.
A former player at Harvard, Smith spent five seasons as an assistant coach at Yale and nine with Parker at BU, then took over the Dartmouth and Northeastern programs. He also served as an assistant on the U.S. National Junior Team and Olympic staffs.
The game has been real good to Smith.
"It’s an unexpected appointment, but to be with Jack and Scott, having known Ron as long as I have, and now meeting Kevin, it’s just a great Hockey Night in Boston type of thing; it feels like home," Smith said.
"I felt like I got a master’s at Yale and a doctorate at BU, and along the way, I developed friendships (with Parker and the late Yale boss Tim Taylor) that have been lifelong."
Collins enters the hall, really, in a class all his own, having seen the game from a different perspective working more than 2,000 NHL games as a linesman. He joins Bill Chadwick, who was inducted 43 years ago, as the only Hall of Famers honored exclusively for their officiating careers.
At first, Collins had little interest in officiating and his career started much by accident along with former Boston Bruin Dave Forbes, his classmate at American International College. Before practice, a local rink manager asked if any AIC players were interested in refereeing during a new weekend league. Forbes volunteered, and volunteered Collins, too.
"Forbes goes, ‘I’ll do it, then whacks me and says, ‘Kevin’s going to do it, too!’ … He says, ‘You’re my ride, you’re getting me back and forth," Collins remembered. "That was around 1970 or 1971. I got hired in 1977, and I was calling him offsides a year or so after."
No matter where the game has taken this year’s Hall of Fame class and in what area they contributed, New England played a large role. One common theme of the night? From Maine to California, USA Hockey is in a real great place.
"You’ve got the spread of the NHL in what people have called for a while in the non-traditional (markets), but I don’t think you can say that too much longer because there are kids coming out of Florida, Texas, California," Smith said. "That’s the biggest thing that I’ve seen is just the width and breadth of hockey in America.
"I think USA Hockey is riding that wave."
