Blog from the Broadcast Booth - Les Stoodley

Reflecting on games and events during my eight years with the Wildcats brings back moments that have a special place in my almost 50 years of broadcasting. The game of May 9, 2004 is one of them.

The Wildcats had made it through to the final series by disposing of Baie-Comeau, the PEI Rocket, the Rimouski Oceanic with a young Sidney Crosby in the line-up, to meet the Gatineau Olympiques in the Presidents Cup final. It was clear the Olymipques were the class of the QMJHL and the series went only five games. In the games played at the Robert Guertin Centre, I had the pleasure of having my son Kurt join me as a color commentator. He had been a good minor hockey player and would have made the Dalhousie Tigers except for a career ending shoulder injury suffered in a playoff game during his final year of midget. He’d also done play-by-play of AHL games in Halifax with the late Bob Boucher as his broadcast partner. Kurt was delighted to join me since the assistant coach of Gatineau was his minor hockey team mate John Chabot.
The Olympiques won the fifth game 3-0 to take the championship. That game stirs my emotions because to the best of my knowledge, it marked the first and only time a father and son team, had called a championship game in the QMJHL.

The Cats were knocked out of the 2005 playoff series in the quarter finals but it was during one of the playoff games at the Coliseum that gave me chills. We had been carrying the games on the internet all season and our audience was continuing to grow. I was perhaps a little unaware of the power of this new method of broadcasting. The two European players with the Cats that season were Martins Karsums and Oscars Bartulis both from Riga, Latvia. We were in the second intermission when I was tapped on the shoulder and told there were people in the press box who wanted to meet me. I was introduced to the parents of Martins Karsums. Mrs. Karsums could not speak English but her husband, who was a cab driver in Riga, shook my hand and said, “I’ve very much been looking forward to meeting you,” he said and then continued, “it is one o’clock in the morning in Latvia when I log on to the Wildcats website and wait for your voice to say, ‘this is the Moncton Wildcats hockey broadcast.’ He left me with a lump in my throat when he added, “you need to understand that all season long, you have been my contact with my son which I deeply appreciate.” His sincere thank you left me speechless.

Fans of the Wildcats were more than delighted when in the early summer of 2005, Mr. Irving announced that Ted Nolan, former coach of a Memorial Cup winning team in Sault Ste. Marie, the Greyhounds and winner of the Jack Adams Trophy for the NHL’s best coach with Buffalo was coming out of retirement to put together a contending team for the 2006 Master Card Memorial Cup which was to be hosted by Moncton. What followed was the most remarkable year in the history of the Wildcats and the development of a friendship with a man I came to greatly admire.

There are a dozen Ted Nolan stories I could tell but space doesn’t permit them all, so I’ll highlight two. People are drawn to Teddy, especially people in the native community; he has a strong but humble persona. We were in Cape Breton early in November 2005. It was a cold, damp night. We had dinner up the street from the hotel. When we left the restaurant, Ted and I were legging behind the rest of the crew. A young native boy from the local reserve, stood under a street lamp near the hotel entrance. As we approached him he stepped toward us and looking at Ted said, “Excuse me sir but are you Ted Nolan?” “Yes, I am,” Teddy replied. “Excuse me Mr. Nolan but could I talk with you for a few minutes sir please?” the boy, who I figured was around 12, asked. “Of course” was the immediate response from the man considered by his people to be an icon. The boy’s eyes lit up like Christmas tree lights and I knew I had no place in that conversation and went into the hotel. It was 15 minutes or more later when a damp Ted Nolan with a smile a mile wide came into the hotel’s lobby. “What a great young man,” he said to me. “What a kind older man to talk with him,” I responded. Teddy’s eyes glistened a little and he said, “people in my community did things like that for me when I was young, I owed the same thing to that boy,” was his reply. I know that night was special for that young native boy, special too for Ted Nolan and special for me because I had seen the kindness of this gentle man.

The second story is all about hockey. Ted, Danny Flynn and Dan Lacroix had made some great moves from the start of the season and during the trading period to make the Wildcats a contender for the League championship.
It was game four at the Colisee Pepsi, the Wildcats were up 3-1 early in the third but Quebec came back, tied the game and sent it into overtime. Philippe Dupuis of the Wildcats was given a penalty at the 7:38 mark of the OT and a minute and 11 seconds later Brent Aubin scored to win the game for the Remparts and tie the series at two games each.

The ride on the bus to the post game meal at the Hotel Quebec was deathly quiet. You could feel the disappointment the Cats players were experiencing. When the bus stopped in front of the building, Ted got up from his seat and moved toward the back of the bus. Knowing he wanted to talk with the team, I went to get out of my seat but the Coach stopped me. “It’s ok Les, you can stay,” he said softly. With a voice carefully modulated to reach the back of the bus, Ted said, “boys, we lost the hockey game and sometimes you learn more by losing than you do winning. Here’s what I want you to do, first get your -------heads up,” there was a ripple of laughter. “Go into the hotel, enjoy your meal, we’ve ordered a special dessert, walk the two blocks back to our hotel, get a good nights sleep and tomorrow night boys, we’ll show ‘em.” The applause from the Wildcats was like thunder. It was the perfect motivation speech. As we stopped outside the hotel, I said to Ted, “that was some speech and if I were a player with the Wildcats after losing the way they did and the coach giving a talk like you gave, I go through a wall for the coach. I got the famous Nolan smile again and this response, “Don’t you know Les that’s what that speech was all about.” The Cats won the next night when Karsums scored 13 seconds into overtime and came back home to win their first Presidents Cup in six games.

Calling that championship game was, up to now, the highlight of my work with the Wildcats. When I got home late that night my wife asked me if I remembered what I had said when the game was over. I told her I had no idea, I was caught up in the moment. She then told me what had happened when the buzzer ended the game. “You said with increased intensity, your voice getting louder with each sentence, ‘the Wildcats have won the Presidents Cup, the Wildcats have won the Presidents Cup, THE WILDCATS HAVE WON THE PRESIDENTS CUP.”

I guess I’m somewhat selfish but no other broadcaster in the history of the Moncton Wildcats will be able to say, “I’m the guy who called the game on May 14, 2006, when the Wildcats won their first League title.” What a moment, what a thrill.

I’ll cover more of 2005-2006 in my next blog in a couple of days.