Dave Keon

Dave Keon
Hockey Hall of Fame, 1986
Keon with the Toronto Maple Leafs in the 1960s
Born (1940-03-22) March 22, 1940 (age 84)
Noranda, Quebec, Canada
Height 5 ft 9 in (175 cm)
Weight 163 lb (74 kg; 11 st 9 lb)
Position Centre
Shot Left
Played for Toronto Maple Leafs
Minnesota Fighting Saints
Indianapolis Racers
Hartford Whalers
Playing career 1960–1982

David Michael Keon (born March 22, 1940) is a Canadian former professional ice hockey centre. He played professionally from 1960 to 1982, including his first 15 seasons with the Toronto Maple Leafs where he won the Calder Memorial Trophy and four Stanley Cup Championships, and was inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame in 1986. Keon was inducted into the Ontario Sports Hall of Fame in 2010.[1] On October 16, 2016, as part of the Toronto Maple Leafs centennial celebrations, Keon was named the greatest player in the team's history.[2][3] In 2017, Keon was named one of the 100 Greatest NHL Players in NHL history.[4] In 2018, Keon was awarded the Order of Sport, marking his induction into Canada's Sports Hall of Fame.[5]

Playing career

Junior hockey

Keon played junior hockey in Toronto for the St. Michael's Buzzers of the Ontario Hockey Association's Metro Junior B league in 1956–57; on December 20, 1956, he scored seven goals in one game.[6] In February 1957, he was named to the league's eastern all-star team and was picked by NHL scouts as the top prospect in the league. Keon was selected as the league's rookie of the year, finishing second in scoring, and his team won the league championship. He played some games that season for the Junior A St. Michael's Majors, and moved to that club full-time for the 1957–58 season. Keon played for St. Michael's through the end of the 1960 season, when he turned professional and joined the Sudbury Wolves of the Eastern Professional Hockey League for four playoff games. They would be the only games he would ever play in the minor leagues.

Toronto Maple Leafs

Keon joined the Toronto Maple Leafs of the National Hockey League for the 1960–61 season, winning the Calder Memorial Trophy as the league's top rookie with 20 goals and 45 points in his first season. It was his first of six consecutive 20-goal seasons. In his second year in the NHL, Keon was named to the second All-Star team and won the Lady Byng Memorial Trophy as the most gentlemanly player, taking only one minor penalty through the entire season. He repeated as Lady Byng winner in 1962–63, again taking only a single minor penalty all year.[7]

He was the Leafs' leading scorer in the 1963–64, 1966–67 and 1969–70 seasons, and the team's top goal-scorer in 1970–71 and 1972–73. Keon was considered one of the fastest skaters in the NHL, and one of the best defensive forwards of his era.[8] He would usually play against the opposing team's top centre, and developed a reputation for neutralizing some of the league's top scorers. In 1970–71, he scored eight shorthanded goals, setting an NHL record for most shorthanded goals scored in a single season, which would later be broken by Marcel Dionne in 1974–75, with 10 shorthanded goals (Dionne's record would be broken by Wayne Gretzky in 1983–84 with 12 shorthanded goals. In turn, Gretzky's record would be broken by Mario Lemieux in 1988–89, when Lemieux scored 13 shorthanded goals in a season).[9]

Keon won four Stanley Cups with the Leafs, playing on the Cup-winning teams of 1961–62, 1962–63, 1963–64 and 1966–67. In the 1967 Cup Final, he shut down Jean Béliveau, the star centreman of the Montreal Canadiens, in the last two games of the series and was voted the most valuable player of the playoffs, winning the Conn Smythe Trophy. Keon's eight points are the fewest ever by a non-goalie Conn Smythe winner, and he remains the only Leaf to have won the trophy named for the former owner of the club.

He was named team captain on October 31, 1969, succeeding George Armstrong who was said to be retiring from hockey. Armstrong returned to the Leafs two weeks later and played for another two seasons, but Keon remained captain and would wear the C through the rest of his years with the Leafs.

Keon hoped to make Team Canada for the 1972 Summit Series, but was coming off one of the worst years of his career, finishing the 1971–72 season with his lowest points-per-game average since his rookie year. The final pick for Team Canada came down between Keon and Bobby Clarke. It is believed that Clarke was selected because he had more points.

While Keon was not selected for Team Canada, the Ottawa Nationals of the World Hockey Association made a strong effort to sign Keon, whom they had placed on their negotiation list earlier that year. Harold Ballard, who had become the Leafs' majority owner in March 1972, said that Keon did not provide the leadership the team needed during the previous season and was refusing to give Keon a big salary increase after a poor year. Keon signed a letter of intent with the Nationals and received a $50,000 cheque from the team, but the deal fell apart just before training camp. Keon signed a three-year deal with the Leafs, and rebounded strongly in 1972–73, scoring 37 goals. On November 22, 1972, he scored his 297th goal as a Leaf, passing Armstrong and Frank Mahovlich to become the team's all-time leading goal scorer.

Early into the 1974–75 season, Ballard publicly blasted Keon, saying that the team was not getting good leadership from its captain and vowing never again to agree to a no-trade clause in a contract, as he had with Keon. When Keon's contract expired at the end of the season, Ballard made it clear that there was no place for him on the Leafs. The Leafs believed they had some strong young prospects at centre who needed more ice time, and Keon was again asking for a contract with a no-trade clause. The 35-year-old Keon was told he could make his own deal with another NHL team, but any club signing him would have been required to provide compensation to the Leafs. Ballard set the compensation price so high that other teams shied away from signing him, even though the Leafs had no intention of keeping him. In effect, Ballard had blocked Keon from going to another NHL team.[10]

WHA

In August 1975, with the Leafs still controlling his NHL rights, Keon reluctantly jumped to the World Hockey Association, signing a deal with the Minnesota Fighting Saints reportedly worth $300,000 over two seasons. Keon chose to play for the Saints after they agreed to a no-trade clause, and also because head coach Harry Neale was an old friend of Keon's. The team, and Keon, played well, but the team struggled badly financially due in large part to being in direct competition with the NHL's Minnesota North Stars. With 21 games left in the season, the team folded. Keon refused to waive his no-trade clause since he had always planned to return to the NHL once his stint with the Saints was over. He was thus not included in the dispersal sale of Saints players to other WHA teams. The New York Islanders expressed a strong interest in signing Keon, but they needed to negotiate a deal for his NHL rights with the Leafs. Again, the Leafs' asking price (said to have been a first-round draft pick) was too high, and a disappointed Keon signed with the WHA's Indianapolis Racers in March 1976.

The Fighting Saints were revived for the start of the WHA's 1976–77 season, and Keon agreed to a trade back to Minnesota. However, the team folded for good in January 1977 (with Keon as its leading scorer). Keon's WHA rights were briefly claimed by the Edmonton Oilers, but they immediately agreed to trade him to the New England Whalers. The move re-united Keon with Neale, who had taken over the Whalers after the original Fighting Saints' demise.

Return to NHL

He would remain with the Whalers through the rest of his career. In the 1977–78 season, Keon was joined on the Whalers by Gordie Howe who, at age 50, was the team's leading scorer that season. Keon returned to the NHL in 1979 when the renamed Hartford Whalers became one of four WHA teams to join the NHL. The merger agreement allowed existing NHL teams to reclaim most of the WHA players whose NHL rights they held. Nevertheless, even though Keon was not protected from reclamation by the Whalers in the reclamation draft, the Maple Leafs declined to reclaim their former captain, allowing him to remain in Hartford. Bobby Hull joined the Whalers that season, with Keon, Howe, and Hull sometimes playing as a forward line. Howe and Hull retired at the end of the season. Terry Harper's retirement in 1981 left Keon as the oldest active player in the NHL. Keon played two more seasons with the Whalers and announced his retirement on June 30, 1982, at age 42. Keon was the last active player who played a full season in the Original Six era.

Retirement

Following his retirement from hockey, Keon moved to Florida and worked in real estate for several years.

Bitter over his treatment by Ballard and the Leafs, Keon refused for many years to have any relationship with the Leafs organization, even after Ballard's death and after the club changed ownership several times.[10] Other Leaf players who clashed with Ballard's management did reconcile, most notably Keon's successor as club captain, Darryl Sittler, who accepted an invitation from GM Cliff Fletcher to return as a consultant after the team came under the ownership of Steve Stavro.

Keon turned down several offers of reconciliation from the team, including an invitation to the closing ceremony for Maple Leaf Gardens in 1999 and a proposed ceremony to honour his number.[11]

On March 22, 1991, with the Leafs under new management after Ballard's death, Keon played on a team of Leaf all-stars against their counterparts from the Montreal Canadiens in an old-timers game at Maple Leaf Gardens called Legends' Night in Canada. "After that, I figured out the new ownership was no different than Ballard, and I had no use for it," Keon later said.[12] In 2005, he told the Toronto Sun that the new owners (majority equity owned by the Ontario Teachers' Pension Plan, chaired by Larry Tanenbaum) "would like to say they are different, but they are all the same."[13]

In January 2007, the Toronto Maple Leafs announced that Keon would attend a pre-game ceremony to honour its 1967 Stanley Cup-winning team. Keon was one of several members of the 1967 team to appear on-ice at the Air Canada Centre before the Leafs' game on February 17, 2007 — the 80th anniversary of the first game played by the Toronto franchise after being renamed the Maple Leafs in 1927. Keon was introduced to the crowd second last, just before 1967 captain George Armstrong, and received a long-standing ovation. On February 16, 2013, Keon was a part of a pre-game ceremony honouring the 1963 Stanley Cup-winning Leafs team. He similarly appeared on February 8, 2014, with other members of the 1964 Cup winners.[14]

His granddaughter, Kaitlyn Keon, played on the Brown Bears women's ice hockey program from 2011 to 2015,[15] accumulating 34 points.[16]

On January 21, 2016, it was announced that Keon, along with former Maple Leafs Turk Broda and Tim Horton, would be commemorated with a statue on Legends Row in front of the Air Canada Centre, joining former Maple Leafs greats Syl Apps, Teeder Kennedy, Johnny Bower, George Armstrong, Darryl Sittler, Borje Salming, and Mats Sundin.[17]

On October 14, 2016, the Toronto Maple Leafs released their list of the top 100 Leafs of all time. Based on the votes of fans and a 31-member expert panel, Keon was voted the greatest Toronto Maple Leaf.[2]

On October 15, 2016, the Maple Leafs retired Dave Keon's number 14 at a ceremony honouring the Maple Leafs' centenary.[18]

Personal life

Keon is of Irish descent on his father's side, with roots in County Sligo.[19]

Awards and honours

Career statistics

Regular season and playoffs

Regular season Playoffs
Season Team League GP G A Pts PIM GP G A Pts PIM
1956–57 St. Michael's Buzzers MetJHL 23 30 22 52 14
1956–57 Toronto St. Michael's Majors OHA-Jr. 4 1 3 4 0
1957–58 Toronto St. Michael's Majors OHA-Jr. 45 23 27 50 29 9 8 5 13 10
1958–59 Toronto St. Michael's Majors OHA-Jr. 47 33 38 71 31 15 4 9 13 8
1959–60 Toronto St. Michael's Majors OHA-Jr. 46 16 29 45 8 10 8 10 18 2
1959–60 Kitchener-Waterloo Dutchmen OHA-Sr. 1 1 0 1 0
1959–60 Sudbury Wolves EPHL 4 2 2 4 2
1960–61 Toronto Maple Leafs NHL 70 20 25 45 6 5 1 1 2 0
1961–62 Toronto Maple Leafs NHL 64 26 35 61 2 12 5 3 8 0
1962–63 Toronto Maple Leafs NHL 68 28 38 66 2 10 7 5 12 0
1963–64 Toronto Maple Leafs NHL 70 23 37 60 6 14 7 2 9 2
1964–65 Toronto Maple Leafs NHL 65 21 29 50 10 6 2 2 4 2
1965–66 Toronto Maple Leafs NHL 69 24 30 54 4 4 0 2 2 0
1966–67 Toronto Maple Leafs NHL 66 19 33 52 2 12 3 5 8 0
1967–68 Toronto Maple Leafs NHL 67 11 37 48 4
1968–69 Toronto Maple Leafs NHL 75 27 34 61 12 4 1 3 4 2
1969–70 Toronto Maple Leafs NHL 72 32 30 62 6
1970–71 Toronto Maple Leafs NHL 76 38 38 76 4 6 3 2 5 0
1971–72 Toronto Maple Leafs NHL 72 18 30 48 4 5 2 3 5 0
1972–73 Toronto Maple Leafs NHL 76 37 36 73 2
1973–74 Toronto Maple Leafs NHL 74 25 28 53 7 4 1 2 3 0
1974–75 Toronto Maple Leafs NHL 78 16 43 59 4 7 0 5 5 0
1975–76 Minnesota Fighting Saints WHA 57 26 38 64 4
1975–76 Indianapolis Racers WHA 12 3 7 10 2 7 2 2 4 2
1976–77 Minnesota Fighting Saints WHA 42 13 38 51 2
1976–77 New England Whalers WHA 34 14 25 39 8 5 3 1 4 0
1977–78 New England Whalers WHA 77 24 38 62 2 14 5 11 16 4
1978–79 New England Whalers WHA 79 22 43 65 2 10 3 9 12 2
1979–80 Hartford Whalers NHL 76 10 52 62 10 3 0 1 1 0
1980–81 Hartford Whalers NHL 80 13 34 47 26
1981–82 Hartford Whalers NHL 78 8 11 19 6
NHL totals 1,296 396 590 986 117 92 32 36 68 6
WHA totals 301 102 189 291 20 36 13 23 36 8

See also

References

  1. ^ "Dave Keon". Ontario Sports Hall of Fame. Retrieved 21 March 2024.
  2. ^ a b c "Dave Keon chosen greatest Toronto Maple Leaf | CBC Sports". CBC News. 2016-10-14. Archived from the original on 2023-05-15.
  3. ^ "Keon named greatest Maple Leaf in franchise's top-100 reveal". thescore.com. Retrieved 30 December 2017.
  4. ^ a b "100 Greatest NHL Players". NHL.com. January 1, 2017. Retrieved January 1, 2017.
  5. ^ a b "2018 Induction Celebrations". Canada's Sports Hall of Fame. Archived from the original on 29 April 2018. Retrieved 28 April 2018.
  6. ^ "Keon Scores 7, Buzzers Win, 10-0". The Globe and Mail. Toronto. 1956-12-21. p. 23.
  7. ^ "David Keon - Stats - NHL.com - Players". Retrieved 15 September 2014.
  8. ^ "Toronto Maple Leafs Legends: Dave Keon". Retrieved 15 September 2014.
  9. ^ "NHL Progressive Leaders and Records for Short-Handed Goals - Hockey-Reference.com". Hockey-Reference.com. Retrieved 15 September 2014.
  10. ^ a b "Toronto Maple Leafs: Say It Ain't So". Sports Illustrated. CNN. Archived from the original on May 1, 2001.
  11. ^ "CANOE - SLAM! Sports - Hockey NHL - Toronto- Keon keeps distance". Slam.canoe.ca. 2005-09-17. Archived from the original on July 15, 2012. Retrieved 2012-03-18.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: unfit URL (link)
  12. ^ 67: The Maple Leafs, Their Sensational Victory, and the End of an Empire, Damien Cox & Gord Stellick, John Wiley & Sons Canada, 2004, p. 224.
  13. ^ "Keon keeps distance: Reunion with Leafs 'highly unlikely'[usurped]," Mike Zeisberger, Toronto Sun, September 17, 2005.
  14. ^ "NHL Videos and Highlights".
  15. ^ "Kaitlyn Keon Bio". Brown Bears Athletics. n.d. Retrieved 2016-09-19.
  16. ^ "Kaitlyn Keon Career Stats". USCHO. n.d. Retrieved 2016-09-19.
  17. ^ Maple Leafs add Keon, Broda, Horton to Legends Row
  18. ^ "Toronto Maple Leafs retire the numbers of 17 players". NHL.com. October 15, 2016. Retrieved October 18, 2016.
  19. ^ 🖉Hornby, Lance. "Irish eyes smile on Maple Leafs | SaltWire". www.saltwire.com.
  20. ^ "Leafs Honour Dave Keon". Montreal Gazette. June 28, 1963. p. 24.
  21. ^ "WHA Hall of Fame Members". Archived from the original on 17 October 2018. Retrieved 15 September 2014.
  22. ^ "Toronto Maple Leafs retire the numbers of 17 players". NHL.com. October 15, 2016. Retrieved October 16, 2016.
Sporting positions
Preceded by Hartford Whalers captain
1981–82
Succeeded by
Preceded by Toronto Maple Leafs captain
196975
Succeeded by
Awards and achievements
Preceded by Winner of the Conn Smythe Trophy
1967
Succeeded by
Preceded by Winner of the Calder Memorial Trophy
1961
Succeeded by
Preceded by Winner of the Lady Byng Trophy
1962, 1963
Succeeded by