Oilers at Flames, G10, 09-10

This is Frank Mahovlich. The Big M. Mahovlich was a unique combination of size, power and speed and easily one of the finest players of his era. Howie Meeker loved him, saying Mahovlich played the game as it should be played (as a young man, the Big M would race down the ice, belt the puck carrier, grab the puck, skate for a while, get belted, get back up and do the same thing over again) and until the Leafs traded him Frank Mahovlich was pretty much adored by English Canada.They used to say "don't wake up Mahovlich" because the best you could hope for is that the big man would become uninvolved , and that drove his coach (the redoubtable Punch Imlach) crazy. Imlach was an ass, cruel, nasty, vicious and small-minded. He would mispronounce Frank's name on purpose to the media ("I didn't like Mala-hov-ich's game tonight") and several accounts have the coach scheduling two-a-day's so that the big M had to stay in the city between practices.When they traded Frank Mahovlich, all the air ...