The Detroit News’s Mark Falkner spoke with former University of Michigan hockey coach Red Berenson, one Phil Esposito and author Scott Morrison regarding the fact that Paul Henderson (who also speaks in the article), the scorer of the game-winning overtime goal in the 1972 Summit Series, is still not a Hockey Hall of Famer:
Teammates Red Berenson and Phil Esposito say that historic goal, voted the Canadian sports moment of the century by the Canadian Press in 2000, should put Henderson into the Hockey Hall of Fame in Toronto.
“I would vote for Paul, absolutely,” said Berenson, the former University of Michigan hockey coach who also played five years for the Red Wings from 1970-1975.
“Here we are talking about a series 50 years later. How many other series, whether it’s the Stanley Cup final or a Memorial Cup final, are even remembered 10 or 20 years later, except for the few players who are still around that played in them.
“There were 22 million people in Canada at that time and 16 million watched that last game. I can’t tell you he (Henderson) was our best player in that game but it was magical the way the puck was going in on (goaltender Vladislav) Tretiak.”
As for Esposito, who led the Summit Series in scoring with 13 points and assisted on the game-winning goal in Game 8, he was annoyed when asked about Henderson’s hall candidacy on “Octopulse,” The Detroit News/Detroit Red Wings podcast.
“Don’t get me started,” Esposito said. “He’s a Hall of Famer in my mind. End of story.”
Update: The Detroit News’s Ted Kulfan also took part in a new episode of the “OctoPulse” podcast:
