2007-08 Schultz Award: Most Old-School Moment

[Merlin401]

Here it is, the craziest things we witnessed during the 07-08 year that made us think back to the days when seeing anything on the ice at any time was a definite possability. A distinguished group of nominees presents itself:

Nominees

The Hollweg-Simon Revenge Game - 9/24/07
With the suspended Chris Simon inexplicably allowed to play a meaningless pre-season game against the seething Rangers, fireworks were bound to occur. Five fights had already occurred in the game, including Simon-Orr but not counting a skirmish between Simon and Hollweg, when the real fun began. Hollweg put a hard, late hit on an Islander behind the net. A second later, Simon launched himself at Hollweg putting an even harder, later hit on Hollweg earning another attempt to injure penalty. Soon everyone was fighting, highlighted by the year's only goalie fight between Al Montoya and Rick DiPietro. Decision DiPietro if you're scoring at home. It was a classic revenge game.
Colton Orr fights Chris Simon
Simon Drills Hollweg, The Brawl, and Montoya-DiPietro

Steve Downie - 9/25/07
Ok, ok. So Steve Downie isn't totally old-school. He wears a face shield and doesn't like to take it off. But the new-school treats him like the plague and the violent rookie began a major feud with the NHL and media when he launched himself at an unsuspecting Dean McAmmond in the third major pre-season moment of the year. McAmmond was whiplashed horizontally into the boards where is head smashed violently into the end-boards. McAmmond lay unconscious on the ice as Brian McGrattan teed off on Downie during the resulting scrum. Downie would be villainized for the hit and the NHL came down with an unprecedented 20 game suspension for the rookie. After slowly working off the suspension, Downie returned to the NHL only to sucker Jason Blake in an altercation and become public enemy #2 in the league while Chris Simon played out the rest of his career.
Downie Destroys McAmmond

The Chris Simon Stomp - 12/15/07
Chris Simon just had to out-do himself after the previous year's face slash of Ryan Hollweg. This time he earned a new record suspension: 30 games for slew footing Jarkko Ruutu and stomping on his ankle with his skate blade. Sadly this and the Steve Downie suspension were probably the two biggest hockey stories of the year.
Simon Stomps on Ruutu earning record-setting suspension

Craig Weller vs. the Columbus Blue Jackets - 2/7/08
Within 5 seconds of a shift, Weller takes out three straight Blue Jackets. First he creams Rick Nash into the boards with a borderline elbow. Next Dan Fritsche comes to his teammates aid, only to be flattened by Weller. Ole-Kristian Tollefsen charges in to engage Weller in a fight, but is instead greeted with a fist to the face, knocking him unconscious. It was one of those great shifts where Weller looked like a god among men. The punch also garnered him a nomination for knockout of the year as well.
Craig Weller's devastating shift

New York Rangers at Philadelphia Flyers Brawl - 2/9/08
After Fedor Tyutin put a hip-check on Steve Downie, all hell broke loose. Downie skate inadvertently came up and caught Pat Dapuzzo in the face. He dropped to the ice bleeding profusely. Down ice, all five players squared off simultaneously. Riley Cote and Colton Orr had a great toe-to-toe fight while Downie sought out Tyutin and wasted him away with a onslaught of heavy punches. Other fights broke out around the main bout. The refs are equally responsible for making this old-school though. Though three or four fights occurred, no one was given a game misconduct for secondary fighting majors. Second, Pat Dapuzzo saw the brawl and skated to help out, though he was gushing blood, leaving a trail up the ice. He was escorted off, but his tough spirit is undeniable!
The Brawl, including Orr-Cote II

Edmonton Oilers at Vancouver Canucks Brawl game - 2/15/08
This was like a game from the 80s. Byron Ritchie and Zack Stortini nearly fought off the draw. Merely 21 seconds in was the first major scrum. Five minutes in was the first of 7 fights. Three brawls broke out in the last minutes after an empty net goal gave Edmonton a 4-2 lead. Some nasty stick work led Alex Burrows to wildy swing his stick and a big brawl. The best fight was a great battle between Curtis Glencross and Mike Weaver. The game ended with a season high 193 penalty minutes
Brawl 1, featuring Burrows stick swing
Brawl 2, featuring Glencross vs. Weaver
Brawl 3, featuring Trevor Linden even!

My Pick

This is a solid crop of nominees. My favorite moments were in the pre-season, which takes away from their luster slightly. I have to go with the Vancouver-Edmonton game. That sort of thing doesn't happen in the NHL much anymore. With three brawls and five fights in the last minute, nice job of the refs not calling any instigators and causing a lot of unnecessary fines and suspensions!

Past Winners

2003-04: -
2005-06: Scott Parker climbs the glass
2006-07: Ray Emery fights Biron and then Andrew Peters

[skacore]

Gotta go with the Edmonton and Vancouver brawls... what a game that was, easily my favourite this year. Both teams stacked with middleweights who paired up quite well against each other and it made for one hell of a game.

[bupz91]

Edmonton vs Vancouver brawl, It was great

[Isles4life]

I really enjoyed Weller destroying Columbus on that shift. You don't often see a guy drill the other team's star player and then immediately deck whoever came to talk to him. Even if it never turned into an actual fight, it was pretty awesome.

[HardHitt3n]

haha i cant say downie suckered blake, cuz blake initiated that crap and gloves downie and downie just punched him. Downie just doesnt take crap off anyone..lol funny how bout when he was laughing while fighting clarkson..haha

[R.Middleton]

Between Weller and Vancouver vs. Edmonton Brawl. Really close call. But I gotta go with Vancouver vs. Edmonton.

[UKRedWing]

Oilers and Canucks was the best hockey game Id seen all season, so it gets my vote.

[SnowballIsChamp]

I voted the Rags-Isles game from Pre-Season. I watched the game and you knew something was gonna happen all game. Fights after fights then finally Simon had enough of Hollweg and the brawl started. It was definatly a old time moment with both teams having a bunch of guys willing to scrap.(Thats why I love pre-season)

Vancouver-Edmonton was a very close second for me and it was a hard decision considering all the non-fighters sticking up for there teamates in the game. Stortini was the toughest guy in the game which made this a little less old-time because the heavyweights should have squared off...but Vancouver had no heavyweights.

[IceDog44]

Orr/Cote II was great for me, so I chose the Rags/Flyers brawl. Good ole' donnybrook never hurt anyone.

[BStreetBullies]

You don't see too many games explode likke that Nucks/Oilers game did. Very old school IMO.

[Phila26Flyers]

As much as I enjoyed Weller decimating OKT, and the taunting of Tollefsen's official hockeyfights.com lover-boy that ensued, my vote goes to the Canucks-Oilers brawl.

[BGDDYKWL]

When you think old school I think it's fair to say that brawls are the first thing that come to mind. That being said, Weller's performance was quite possibly the single greatest highlight of the year, and IMO deserves recognition. Just not sure if it's necessarily more "old school" than the brawl.

[DARCY T]

its really difficult to choose in this one but im goin with simon/hollweg revenge.my second choice would be oilers/canucks brawl

[Twister_18]

Weller gets my vote for making me laugh my a$$ off!

[canuckfan]

The Canucks/Oilers game in February easily takes this one. What a game that was, and it features some good scraps and guys from both teams sticking up and standing in for one another. Watching little Mike Weaver take on a much bigger opponent in Glencross and give him all that he could was one of the highlites of my season, while watching Greene fill in Linden was not.

You don't see this kind of stuff very often nowadays - it truly was a great ting to see and harkened back to the good ol days. Easily, easily gets my vote.