1935-36 NIHA Season

 

Facing bankruptcy at the end of the 34-35 season, George Prince had no choice but to sell the team, so he did; he sold it to Edward Willway, owner of E.W. Machine, a factory that makes parts for vehicles, tanks, and more. Edward moved the team from Winnipeg, Manitoba, to Waterloo, Ontario, and renamed it the Waterloo Engineers, named after an amateur hockey team from the old Toronto Hockey League. The jerseys have stripes everywhere on them. On the dark jersey, the stripes sit on the cuffs, while on the light jersey, they sit on the elbows. The main crest is just like the company logo, but the E and W have switched places to mean Waterloo Engineers.

Season Summery

With Winnipeg relocating to Waterloo being one of the big news stories, the other was a feud between New York and Minnesota. The Mad Hatters honoured the 1930 champions and gave them the title of the first American Alex Cup Champions, but there was one problem: in 1928, the Nationals won the Alex Cup, which led to a back-and-forth debate. On the one hand, the 1928 Nats had mostly Canadians on the roster; on the other, New York’s coaching staff were Canadians. Both sides were overhauling to prove once and for all which was the best American team in the NIHA.

NIHA president Jack Haultraugh made some changes across the league; the biggest is that next year the number of games will increase from 36 to 54, along with the introduction of an offside rule.

Even with the Mad Hatters Nationals feud going on, the Detroit Speed raced themselves back to first place for the second season in a row with the addition of 17-year-old forward Allen Talbot, with a 15-20-35 stat record in the first season of his career. After last season's championship loss, the Pittsburgh Iron began their season with a chip on their shoulders and played well enough to finish the season in second place, thanks to their goalie John Hallock winning 20 of 30 games, along with a career-high 8 shutouts so far. Many players within the Chicago Lynx stepped up to the plate, and with a record of 18-17-1, they would finish third place. Even though they lost some players due to an aging roster, they have, little by little, been bringing in new players, including Victor Smyth, a 20-year-old forward who had a good rookie season with 41 points. In the end, the Pros finished fourth. The Nats' Nick Watertown finally got back to the form he was in his first season, scoring goals and setting teammates up to score; he was ten points less than his first season, but it was enough for Minnesota to finish fifth place. In sixth place, the New Brunswick Brown Bears dropped from second place last season due to injuries on the roster; Jack Ranger played in barely 20 games this season. The New York Mad Hatters had a rough season; Rat Robinson was on pace, but his season was cut short due to injuries, and it was tough for rookie John Ruth, who didn’t do much but held his ground as the Mad Hatters finished this season in seventh place. The Buffalo Rams have some improvement, just enough to finish eighth place. Montreal fans just saw the writing on the wall as the Or Rouge finished ninth place, making things hard for Montreal. John Giroux, Marc Dupont, and Etienne Rehnquist announced they had called it a career; the trio had been part of the team since the early 1910’s and won two Alex Cups in the pre-NIHA era and two more in the first two years of the NIHA era. It’s a big loss for the team; many believed it would be a while before the Or Rouge got back into playoff contention. Lastly, the relocated Waterloo Engineers finished last.

1936 NIHA Playoffs

Round 1

For the second season in a row, it’s the first-place Speed vs. eighth-place Rams, and just like last year, it was Speed’s win in three games. This time, Duke Pepper allowed no goals in all three games; with that, the Speed moves on to the second round. In game one, the Mad Hatters took the victory, with controversy that Iron goalie John Hallock got hooked by one of the Mad Hatters players, which allowed Rat Robinson to score the game-winner; it would be the best the Mad Hatters could do, as the Iron would win three games in a row to win the series and head to the second round. It was a back-and-forth series, but in game five, Jack Ranger scored two goals with two minutes left to win it, and the Brown Bears are heading on to the second round. In the battle between the Pros and the Nats, Toronto had the upper hand with two games to one, but in game four, Maple Thomas took a puck to the face and suffered a broken nose; with that, he is out for the rest of the playoffs. Victor Smyth did play well, but the Nats would win game four and game five to win the series and will play in the second round.

Round 2

Detroit set out to return to the Alex Cup, but everyone thought they had no chance of beating the Brown Bears; however, rookie Allen Talbot stepped up and scored goals, giving the Speed a three-game-to-one series win and sending them to the Alex Cup Finals. Both Iron and Nats went all the way to game five, where Greg Washington scored a hat trick, and John Hallock was a brick wall as the Pittsburgh Iron beat the Minnesota Nationals 3-0 to win the series and move on to the Alex Cup Finals.

1936 Alexander Cup Finals

Two days before the championship began, NIHA president Jack Haultraugh announced that this season's championship would now be a best-of-7 series. Pittsburgh took both game one (3-2) and game two (4-1); in game three, Detroit bounced back with a 3-1 win, two days later, in game four, led by Allen Talbot, who scored three goals, Detroit won 5-2 to even the series two games apiece. Game five was anyone's guess as to who could win, and Detroit did just that with the score of 5-3. Game six could be Detroit's chance to finish this series, but one problem: in game five, Luke Pepper elbowed three Iron players in the head, which led to a one-game suspension; with that, the Iron took it as a chance and with Greg Washington scoring 2 goals and 5 points, they won 6-3 to even the series at three games apiece. Winner-take-all Game Seven was for all the marbles; Detroit’s Allen Talbot didn’t score, but he did set up four of his teammates for goals to take a 5-0 lead halfway through the second period; however, Pittsburgh was making a comeback, scoring four goals, two of them made by Greg Washington and one by Mitchell Stevenson. With five minutes left in the third period, Pittsburgh poured on the shots, but Duke Pepper held his ground, and Luke Pepper came back from his one-game suspension, knocking forwards down till the clock hit zero. Detroit won game seven, 5-4, and the Detroit Speed is 1936 Alexander Cup Champions for the second time in a row.

1934-35 NIHA Season

 

For the third straight season, the Detroit Speed made it to the top three, but this time they finished in first place thanks to Luke Pepper topping the team’s stats (15-24-39), and his brother Duke had a turnaround by getting his second 25-of-30-game season along with seven shutouts. Even with other players pinching in with goals and points, the 1934 Alex Cup champions, the Brown Bears, took second place; however, Jack Ranger missed the last three games due to injuries, and chances are he might not be able to play in the playoffs. The Pittsburgh Iron takes third place in the standings for the third time in four years. To top it all, James Lake announced that he bought land and is going to build a nice new arena for his team. Maple Thomas had a big fall this season, going from 87 points last season to 57 points this season, a 30-point drop; however, thanks to his teammates stepping up, the Toronto Pros won enough games to take fourth place. New York had a rough season; even though they finished in fifth place, the big news was that Rat Robinson suffered a broken arm in the last game of the season, and he’ll be out for the playoffs. The team is hoping that Rat can heal up for the next season. After signing new players, the Lynx improved from eighth place to sixth place; what’s lucky for them is that they signed David Boweville to a two-year contract worth $300 a year. After two years of being in the bottom two, the Nats got back on track and finished seventh in the league, and Nick Watertown is slowly and steadily playing like his first-season performance. In their second season of existence, the Buffalo Rams made a huge impact with their star player William “the Magic” Durocher leading the team into their first playoff appearance in team history. The Montreal Or Rouge had some hard times this season, with their top line not playing right, which led to losing streaks, and they even made one of their biggest mistakes by changing the lines in order to at least win some games, but in the end they finished in ninth place. In last place is Winnipeg Northmen; not only did they play badly, but they also did not sign their players to come back and to top all of it, they are bleeding money so badly to the point that George Prince had no other choice but to sell the team to anyone; sadly, it could be bought by someone who wants to move the team elsewhere.

1935 Playoffs

The first round was wild; the Detroit-Buffalo series was supposed to be one-sided; however, all three games ended by one goal, with the Speed scoring a goal with one minute to go in game two, to in game three, when Luke Pepper scored the tiebreaker with one second left to win the series. The Brown Bears kept their playoff winning streak going with a 3-0 sweep over the Nationals thanks to Jack Ranger, who scored 8 goals and 14 points within three games, and they proved everyone wrong about where he would play in the playoffs despite his injury. The Pittsburgh Iron were determined to go all the way; however, the Chicago Lynx had other plans, back-and-forth all the way to game five, where Mitchell Stevenson made a slap shot from the center line into the net with four seconds left in the game and with that, the Pittsburgh Iron moved on to the second round. The series between Toronto and New York was a war like no other, with high-scoring games; the total score in all five games was 35-33, and in the end, the New York Mad Hatters became the victor, winning the series 3-2 to move on to the second round.

The semi-finals were very different; in one series, Detroit Speed took out the New York Mad Hatters in three games; all three of their wins were by Duke Pepper, who didn’t let any pucks past him at all, leading him to become another goalie in NIHA history to win those three games in shutouts. In game one, Brown Bears' Jack Ranger suffered the same injury as he had before the season ended, with him out, which meant the Brown Bears' luck had run out. After losing game one, the Pittsburgh Iron won three in a row to win the series and head to the Alexander Cup Finals.

1935 Alexander Cup Finals

This is Pittsburgh Iron’s first Alex Cup Finals appearance, which is good news for them, but the bad news is this is Detroit Speed’s third Alex Cup Finals appearance in a row, and this time the Speed are determined to win it all. The Speed won both game one, 4-2 and game two, 3-1; however, the Iron took game three out of nowhere with a 2-1 win to stay alive, but in game four the Detroit Speed took the win 4-1 to win the series three games to one and become the 1935 Alexander Cup Champions.