No. 5: The Corner Brook Royals

They had skill. They had speed. They could play tough. And they got superb goaltending.

The Corner Brook Royals, circa 1986, were pros masquerading as amateurs.

"I don't know if a professional team could beat us," Dave Matte once said.

That we'll never know, but this much is certain: no other amateur senior hockey team in Canada could beat the 1985-86 Royals, who remain Newfoundland's first and only winners of the Allan Cup, one of Canada's oldest trophies awarded to the country's best senior team.

For that reason, the Royals are No. 5 on The Telegram's list of this province's best teams.

The Royals, general manager Cliff Gorman's creation, was a team that boasted some of the best to ever play senior hockey in Newfoundland.

Oh sure, the vast majority were mainlanders - the handsomely-paid "imports" - but to the folks of Corner Brook who rocked old Humber Gardens every second weekend, the Royals were their own, whether the players hailed from Curling or Halifax.

Want talent? How about Tim Cranston and Robbie Forbes, two little forwards whose skills were unmatched? Or Steve McKenzie, the big defenceman with the big-league game added to the lineup for the Allan Cup? Then there were Dan Cormier and Gus Greco, forwards who combined toughness and finesse long before Jarome Iginla was Jarome Iginla.

And what about goaltender Matte - "Okie" to most - who delivered MVP performances between the pipes?

The spring of '85 had been a bitterly disappointing one for the Royals and their supporters, who came crashing down from the high of winning their first Herder Memorial Trophy since 1977 with a victory over the Stephenville Jets in the Newfoundland Senior Hockey League final.

The Royals were slated to play host to the Allan Cup that year, and the Riverview Trappers were their first-round opponents.

Corner Brook made easy work of the New Brunswick team, dusting off the Trappers in straight games. The Hamilton-Dundas Hawks from Ontario were next, and didn't fare no better as the Royals swept that four-game series at Humber Gardens.

That set up a final with the powerful Thunder Bay Twins. The Twins didn't exactly look like defending champs, dropping the first three games in the best-of-seven series.

But just as Allan Cup parade route plans were being drawn up, Thunder Bay rallied, reeling off a trio of wins before capping the improbable comeback with a 5-4 win in Game 7, stunning the Royals and an entire city.

After a long summer of discontent, Gorman began building his Royals in the fall, and the first piece of the puzzle came in the form of a slick little centreman from Halifax. This being long before the Internet and www.hockeydb.com, little was known of Forbes, other than he had led the University of New Brunswick in scoring the previous season.

He didn't disappoint, leading the provincial senior hockey league in scoring with 53 goals and 117 points (Forbes was probably the best hockey player in his family at the time; that's since changed, after his sister, Tina Crosby, gave birth to a son, Sidney, in 1987).

Matte, the big goalie from outside Sudbury, Ont., was the league's MVP.

Cormier, from Bathurst, N.B., was back for another season and would finish third in the scoring race. He was the prototypical power forward, a player who could hurt you in the corners and in front of the net.

Cormier had minor pro experience, with the AHL's Moncton Golden Flames. That was after three years in the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League, where he was a teammate of Mario Lemieux in Laval.

Stephenville finished first in the watered-down senior league in 1985-86, 13 points ahead of Corner Brook. St. John's was third. The league had been reduced to just three teams when Grand Falls opted out in the fall and Port aux Basques folded after winning only two of their first 22 games.

The '86 Herder final was a rematch of the '85 series, only this time the Royals had beefed up their offence with the additions of Cranston and Todd Stark of Guelph, Ont.

Cranston joined the Royals following a stint in Austria. The Nova Scotia product had left to go overseas following a stellar junior career in the Quebec major junior ranks. In 1980-81, he led the Sherbrooke Beavers in scoring, registering more points than a pair of future NHLers who were junior teammates at the time - Gerard Gallant and Sean McKenna.

Cranston would land in Corner Brook from Europe in time for the playoffs a couple of times over the next few years, before settling into the British Hockey League where he would play for 11 seasons.

The Royals defeated the Jets in a six-game Herder final, capping the series with a 7-4 win behind Forbes's three goals and Stark's goal and three helpers.

Forbes finished the series with eight tallies.

Not long after the Herder celebration had concluded, the Royals began gearing up for another run at the Allan Cup. Corner Brook picked up four players from the Stephenville Jets - McKenzie, Sheldon Currie, Cal Dunville and Dan Longe, who would be Matte's understudy in goal.

In McKenzie, the Royals had the best defenceman in provincial senior hockey. An Ontario native, McKenzie, a draft pick of the Pittsburgh Penguins, chewed up tons of ice time, anchoring the power play and was also used on the first penalty killing unit. Before joining the Jets, McKenzie had played two years at the University of Wisconsin where he joined future NHLers Chris Chelios, Pat Flatley and Brian Mullen, and a few seasons of minor pro in the AHL and old International Hockey League.

Currie, built like a fire hydrant, could also play tough, and like Cormier, displayed a nice finish around the net, finishing tied for fourth in league scoring that year. In Dunville, the Royals added a heart-and-soul player, a leader who left it all on the ice.

Corner Brook's first-round Allan Cup opponent would not be an easy one. The Flamboro Motts Clamatoes from Ontario had a handful of former NHLers in the lineup, including former Leaf 24-goal scorer Rocky Saganiuk and ex-Bruins tough guy Stan Jonathan.

The Royals opened the series in Brantford, Ont., with a 5-2 win, but dropped the next two games, 7-4 and 6-2. Game 4 saw the Royals even the series with a 5-2 win, but a chippy Game 5 - four majors, two misconducts and three game misconducts were handed out in the second and third periods - saw Flamboro grab a 3-2 series lead with an 11-5 victory.

The win proved costly to the Ontario team, however, as Saganiuk received a match penalty and automatic one-game suspension for biting Cranston on the finger during a skirmish.

The Royals sent the series to the limit with an 8-4 win in Game 6 behind Greco's two goals.

It was a bruised and battered Royals who showed up at the rink for the pivotal Game 7.

Cranston had stitches in his fingers and a cast on his right wrist (he would later cut off the cast during the first-period intermission).

Stark, Ken Mercer from Gander - the Newfoundland senior league's rookie of the year that season - and dependable veteran Tony Cuomo had all taken cortisone shots to numb the pain in their shoulders.

But the Royals struck early and often in Game 7, scoring three goals in the opening two minutes and 27 seconds - two by Cranston - and hung on for an 8-5 win. Greco and Cormier also had two goals apiece, with Forbes and Dunville notching singles.

"I remember talking to the Flamboro coach after that series," recalled Corner Brook coach Mike Anderson this week. "He said, 'Man, that (Royals) team would have no problem playing in the AHL.'"

The "Drive in '85" had been derailed by the Twins at Humber Gardens, but the Royals were four games closer to the "Fix in '86."

Their final opponent would be the Nelson, B.C. Maple Leafs, winners of the Western International Hockey League. Little was known about the Maple Leafs. There was certainly no big-name recognition like Saganiuk or Jonathan, although Ed Cooper had enjoyed a 47-game cup of coffee with the Colorado Rockies in 1980-81.

After a hard-fought and heartbreaking final in 1985, the Royals made certain lightning wasn't going to strike twice, making short work of the Maple Leafs in the B.C. interior city of Nelson.

Corner Brook won the series-opener 6-4 on three goals by McKenzie, took Game 2 by a 6-5 score and grabbed a commanding 3-0 series lead with a 5-2 decision on the strength of three goals by Stark.

Of course, the Royals weren't taking anything for granted, especially after finding themselves in a similar situation the previous spring.

"I'll be reminding them," Anderson said on the eve of Game 4. "But I'm not going to have to say much. They've got the memory of that."

Whatever Anderson said worked. Matte, who would win series MVP honours, stopped all 34 shots he faced and Currie scored twice and set up three others as the Royals whitewashed the Maple Leafs 7-0 for a four-game series sweep.

Cuomo and defenceman Ed Kearsey, who along with captain Craig Kennedy were the only native Corner Brookers on the Royals in Nelson, each scored twice, while Cranston netted his fourth goal of the series.

"We won the Allan Cup in Ontario," Anderson said, still marveling at the talent that comprised the Royals' roster.

"We had that much depth Cal Dunville was only taking faceoffs," he said. "They all could have and should have played pro or semi-pro or European hockey. But I guess it was a different time and as we know, it's all about being at the right place at the right time."

On the afternoon of April 31, the Royals received a hero's welcome, the likes of which hadn't been seen before in Corner Brook. After touching down in Stephenville, the Royals were met with a motorcade seven kilometres outside Corner Brook.

Humber Gardens was packed with a raucous crowd chanting "We're No. 1!"

The Royals would win another Herder in 1988, but for the first time since 1967, Newfoundland would not send a team to Allan Cup play.

It was the beginning of the end. Following the 1989 season, the Newfoundland Senior Hockey League officially folded.

The league, many pundits observed, had priced itself out of operation.

But for a couple of magical weeks in April of '86, the folks of Corner Brook would argue, it was well worth it.

[email protected]