Puzzle Description:

The Jeopardy answer/question would be "What are four things you won't see at an NHL game?" In 1979, the World Hockey Association (WHA) folded and its four strongest franchises were allowed to join the National Hockey League (NHL): the Hartford Whalers (top left), the Quebec Nordiques (top right), the Winnipeg Jets (bottom left), and the Edmonton Oilers (the team of 18-year-old Wayne Gretzky, who wore #99 -- team logo not shown). The Oilers went on to win the NHL championship (the Stanley Cup) five times. Wayne Gretzky is widely considered to be the greatest hockey player of all-time, and his number 99 is retired leaguewide so that no player in the NHL can use it. The other three teams did not win a Stanley Cup and all three teams have relocated and chosen new names and logos (as the NHL chose poorly to move to less traditional markets in the South and West); the Whalers became the Carolina Hurricanes, the Nordiques became the Colorado Avalance, and the Jets became the Phoenix Coyotes. The Coyotes franchise has experienced extreme financial difficulty in the past few months and the team is expected to be soon sold and/or moved.

#1: Sylvain "WCPman" (qwerty) on Feb 6, 2009 [SPOILER]

great job, being from Montreal ( the real hockey capital of the world) this puzzle is really touching a special something. Great job on doing all three logo in such a small space.

To add to your hockey lesson we can tell the ironic fact that both the Colorado Avalanche and the Carolina Hurricane won the Stanley cup after the team transfer from they original city. ( in case of the Quebec Nordique it was in the year of the transfert and that made a few angry fan in Québec city)

good luck in the contest

Yes, very true. And to tie it together further, Gretzky is now the coach of the team that did not win a Stanley Cup -- the Coyotes.

Great Job !!!
The Winnipeg Jets logo that you show must be a mix of their two logos because the original (which design you have made here) was white letters on a blue background ( possibly signifying the blue puck that the WHL used).Their 2nd logo had blue letters with a white background but the design was somewhat different.

I also wish you good luck in the contest.

I think that the Jets had a home and away logo in the original design. Your description sounds like the home logo and I was trying to do the away logo:


http://www.winnipegjetsonline.com/images/content/logoJersey/hi-res/80s-Logo-Away.jpg .

Great puzzle, very fun to solve. I wish you luck in the contest!

Thanks for you entry and the hockey history lesson.

Wow - great puzzle! Lots of detail for the size, and interesting to solve.

Thanks for the kind words.

This was like having 4 puzzles in one, since I solved each section individually.

Ditto# 9. I knew it was hockey early on and just needed to solve to get the relationship. All are well drawn.

To tie it back to Sylvain's Montreal Canadiens, if the WHL had not started up and used the under-age draft to draft some players that by NHL rules were not yet elible to be drafted by NHL teams, Gretsky would have played for Montreal. Sam Pollock (Montreal's General Manager in those days) spent a few years trading to get the first round draft pick for the four bottom ranked teams to be sure to have the absolute first pick the year Gretsky became eligble. (Gretsky was being watched by NHL scouts before he was a teenager - that's how good he was.) Just imagine Gretsky paying with the ilkes of Guy LaFleur, Boom boom Geoffrion, Larry Robinson, Ken Dryden, Yvan Cournyier, ... - he would likely have won more than just 5 Stanley Cups. He was a wonderful player to watch.

Goto next topic

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