THN Archive: Former Bruins President Made Passionate Pitch for Overtime in NHL Games

In the most recent NHL GM meetings, the league’s gatekeepers discussed changes to overtime – and while we support GMs for keeping an open mind collectively and being willing to at least consider continuing changes to the game, there’s one thing we can’t ever go back to. And that’s tie games.

You’ve probably heard one or two fans of ties speak out over the years. “We hate the shootout,” they’ll say before talking about having a true team-based solution (as opposed to the individual-based solution of a shootout). And while those folks make some fair points, we have to guard against the tendency to want to bring tie games back as a solution. Fans pay far too much money to leave the building with no winner and loser decided – and this sentiment has been true almost as long as the NHL has been around.

Indeed, in this Nov. 21, 1951, THN magazine – Vol. 5, Issue 8 – writer Roger Barry spoke to then-Boston-Bruins-president Walter Brown about tie games, and Brown made it very clear what side he was on.

“I’ll probably be read out of the hockey brotherhood for saying this,” Brown told Barry, “but I hope to live to see the day when the tie game is replaced by 'sudden death' overtime. All of our other games except football produce winners.”

Ties were acceptable ends to games when this story was published, but even then, advocates like Brown made very persuasive arguments about moving to OT to always provide a winner and loser in games.

“I don’t like (ties) because I think the cash customers deserve their money’s worth,” he declared. “They come to see games played to a decision, and they don’t see that if the games are stopped.“

Ultimately, Brown called back to the earliest times of sports competition to make it obvious why ties shouldn’t be an option.

“It seems to me that sports have gotten far away from the original idea,” Brown said. “Years ago contests were held to produce winners, and people were drawn to them by the desire to see someone win. That’s what made John L. Sullivan the first great American sports figure. He would fight anyone to a decision, and people wanted to see him do It.”

(For more great stories like the one below, you can unlock access to THN’s 76-year archive by subscribing to the magazine.)

Vol. 5, Issue 8, Nov. 21, 1951

By Roger Barry

BOSTON, Mass.— Advocates of the return of overtime to the National League’s playing agenda have a supporter in the league’s newest club president.

He is Walter Brown, now in his first season of directing the destinies of the Boston Bruins.

Brown is in favor of playing all games until they produce winners.

The Bruins’ president expressed the sentiments which he has harbored for years after his team played to its third tie, against the Toronto Maple Leafs, in its first four games.

“It was a fine game,” he observed, “but it was too bad that it had to end in a tie.

“I’ll probably be read out of the hockey brotherhood for saying this,” he continued, “but I hope to live to see the day when the tie game is replaced by “sudden death” overtime. All of our other games except football produce winners.”

Brown’s reason for his dislike of the tie is typical of a man whose reputation in the sports world is based on honesty of thought and expression.

“I don’t like it because I think the cash customers deserve their money’s worth,” he declared. “They come to see games played to a decision, and they don’t see that if the games are stopped.“

“I don’t want to sound like a pop-off, but there must be something wrong with our games because people are staying away from them by the hundreds of thousands.” Brown continued. “I think one of the things wrong is the tie.

“It was a wartime expedient, but the war has been over for a long time now, and the tie is still with us.”

Brown disagrees completely with the two reasons most generally advanced by the anti-overtimers, the anticipated disappointment of the home fans if their team should lose an overtime game, and the transportation situation.

“How can anyone say that the fans would go home disappointed after a loss when there haven’t been any games played to prove it?” he demanded. “As it is now, sometimes they don’t even see three full periods of hockey when two teams go into the late minutes of a game tied. Neither team wants to take a chance of losing.

“If they knew in advance that they were going to have to play until someone won, they would play accordingly.

“As far as the transportation situation is concerned, that’s no problem confined to hockey,” Walter added. “Those situations develop in other sports, like baseball and basketball. If they can cope with them in other sports, why can’t hockey cope with them?

“It seems to me that sports have gotten far away from the original idea,” the Bruins’ boss continued. “Years ago contests were held to produce winners, and people were drawn to them by the desire to see someone win. That’s what made John L. Sullivan the first great American sports figure. He would fight anyone to a decision, and people wanted to see him do It.”

One of Walter’s enterprises is the Boston Olympics, competing in a league which has eliminated the tie game, except through confliction with curfews. The Eastern Amateur League has gone through the first portion of its season with only one tie, by employing overtime.

A year ago, when Brown’s interest in his present team was that of landlord, as president of the Boston Garden-Arena Corporation, the Bruins played to 18 ties. Also a year ago the New York Rangers’ participated in 21 ties, a new league record for deadlocks.

Frank Boucher, general manager of the Rangers, has been hockey’s most vigorous assailant of the present rule which says that, if the score is tied at the end of three periods, everyone present should go home. 

The Hockey News Archive is a vault of 2,640 issues and more than 156,000 articles exclusively for subscribers, chronicling the complete history of The Hockey News from 1947 until today. Visit the archives at THN.com/archive and subscribe today at subscribe.thehockeynews.com