Game No. 400

One evening in November 1926, a brand new hockey team skated out on the ice of Manhattan's Madison Square Garden. First was stocky, mournful-looking Bun Cook, who superstitiously insists on touching the ice before his teammates. Behind him glided his pugnacious Brother Bill, team captain, with whom he owns a big wheat farm in Saskatchewan, big, bald, grinning Ivan Wilfred ("Ching") Johnson, slender Frank Boucher, and a youngster named Murray Murdoch. With a few other teammates they made up the New York Rangers. They played that night against the Montreal Maroons.

One night last week these same five players stood under a spotlight in the middle of the same rink, while adoring home-towners cheered wildly. It was the Rangers' 400th game. These charter members had stuck together from the start, had helped win the Stanley Cup twice, had put the team into the play-offs every season, and, since last Christmas, had hoisted it from bottom to top of the National Hockey League's American division. At the end of the first period of last week's game, with the score 1-to-1, ceremonies took place. Diamond signet rings were presented to the famed forwards--Cook-Boucher-&-Cook; to Johnson, defense man who has raised a five-year-old son since that first game in the Garden; to silver-haired Manager Lester Patrick and to weather-beaten little Trainer Harry Westerby. When Murray Murdoch's turn came, there was a special ritual. Out stepped Lou Gehrig, baseball's "iron man," who has played 1,350 consecutive games with the New York Yankees. He presented the ring to Murdoch, only Ranger to play in each and every one of the team's 400 games, an unheard-of record in hockey. In eight seasons he had suffered nothing worse than flesh gashes and lost teeth. A strong, tireless skater, he has gained 20 lb. during his Ranger career. His most famed exploit was making three goals within a minute in a game against Boston. One of the goals, however, was nullified because he stepped on the puck.

According to hockey tradition, the Rangers should have lost their ceremonial anniversary game. Instead, they swamped the Ottawa Senators 5-to-2.

The case of Toronto's Irvin ("Ace") Bailey, who was injured almost fatally in a game against the Boston Bruins last December, had two new aftermaths last week: 1) Toronto's Manager Connie

Smythe demanded that the League compel the Bruins to compensate Bailey, beyond the $6,700 which he received from a benefit game in Boston. The League governors compromised by ordering another benefit game, between the Toronto club and an all-star team made up of players from the other clubs. 2) Eddie Shore, Boston's crack defense man who was suspended for spilling Bailey, returned to the ice against the Rangers in Manhattan. His team had slipped into last place largely because of his absence. Heartened by sympathetic cheers from a gallery which nearly always booed him, Shore recovered his nerve, played a lusty game but could not save his team from a 4-to-2 whipping.

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