WASHINGTON— A shutout by the Washington Capitals is rare by itself. But one accomplished with two goalies is truly the “piece de resistance.”
Ron Low combined with Roger Crozier to hold the Rockies from changing the scoreboard in mid-March. It upped the Capitals whitewash average to one a season.
Two years ago (Feb. 16, 1975) Low turned aside 32 shots to blank the franchise then in Kansas City. Then, on this past Jan. 10 his partner, Bernie Wolfe, handled 26 drives in Detroit, ending a 143-game string in which the Caps had permitted one score or more.
Just 31 games later the zero hour came again. In his first action in 15 months. Crozier had played two periods in Detroit five days earlier—leaving Wolfe to handle the job in the third period. Bernie got official credit for the tie when both the Wings and Caps settled for a goal a period. Obviously, Low didn’t dress for that one, his fifth miss in 231 Washington games.
But on Friday, March 18 (with green beer selling a day late) Low had the number one jersey on again—watching Roger Crozier keep his finger in the Denver dike for 40 minutes.
As had happened in his first start, Crozier admitted weariness to coach Tommy McVie and the third period fell to the mustachioed farmer from Manitoba. This time, unlike the previous Sunday, Roger’s relief wasn’t entering a tie game. The special pressure was of a different sort—the Rockies hadn’t scored yet, down 2-0.
Another goal for D.C. pretty well iced it with 17 minutes left. The big thing was the shutout (20 saves by Roger, nine by Ron) although Low downplayed that aspect.
“The big thing is the win,” says Ronny, “Thats the main thing all the time.” Low should know. Incredibly, there have been only five shared-shutouts in the NHL in the last five years—and he has been in four of them.
The last one previous to the Caps’ feat was by Chicago against Atlanta on Feb. 23, 1975, more than two years ago. In that one Hawk netminder Tony Esposito needed some minor equipment repair. The league had just instituted a rule against goalies slowing down the game for things like that so Michel Dumas came in, played less than half a minute between whistles. Back came Tony O, completed the quenching of the Flames, but it went in the books as a shared shutout.
The two before that came just over a month apart, near Thanksgiving and Christmas of 1972. Both involved the Toronto pair of goalers, the celebrated Jacques Plante — and a rookie stand-up type whose style belied his name, Mr. Low.
On Nov. 25 the Leafs hit double figures in crushing the visiting Seals. Low struggles to remember, “I think I played the third period. Plante was tired and it was seven to nothin’. So I got to play.”
The following Dec. 29 was a different ball of wax altogether. For one thing Ron started. For another he played 59 minutes and 50 seconds in the win at Pittsburgh. Low explains his brief disappearance.
“With about 10 seconds to go in the second period I got knocked out. It was on a shot between somebody’s legs. I was looking through a screen when Syl Apps’ shot hit me in the forehead.” After Plante finished the final seconds before intermission, the revived rookie played the third period…and now must be the only goaler in NHL history with more shared shutouts (three) than solo ones (two). Unfortunately, only the latter kind count officially.
RON LOW… Shares Four Shutouts
But then they’re all wins and like Ronny says, “That’s the main thing all the time.”
ICE CAPS: The dynamic duo from Ottawa rode into Capitals-town the other day. Drs. Hal Hansen and Al Reed applied chapter three of their stressstrength-stamina tests to the hockey club and found the players’ conditioning had held up through all areas but one. That was upper body strength. Result: Caps practices will probably be extended yet another half-hour next season while the players work on molding and keeping a mighty torso and arms. The experts had tested some players last June and even more when training camp began in the fall. ■
