Newcomer at the Net

Poor Phil Esposito. For weeks now, the hard-driving forward of the Boston Bruins has been threatening to overtake Teammate Bobby Orr as the National Hockey League's leading scorer. He might already have succeeded were it not for a pesky new goaltender with the Chicago Black Hawks who shut him out in all but one of their first five confrontations this season. To make matters worse, whenever the young upstart catches a Bruin game on TV, he calls Phil and gives him a few pointers. Phil would be outraged--if the Hawks' new netman were not his kid brother Tony, 26. As it is, Phil is unabashedly proud. Tony, he says, "is the best goalie in the league."

For this season's N.H.L. All-Star Game, Tony was the only Black Hawk elected to the East division team. For a goalie to win that honor in his first full season of N.H.L. play (he appeared in 13 games for the Montreal Canadiens last year) is roughly akin to a Little Leaguer's slapping a home run off Tom Seaver. The Black Hawks could not have survived with anything less. Last season the hapless Chicagoans had the most porous defense in the N.H.L.; this season, with the curly-haired, 190-lb. Esposito plugging the nets, they have been among the league leaders in defense. As of last week, Tony was the stingiest regular N.H.L. goalie, with an average of only 2.26 goals-against per game and eleven shutouts--just two shy of the modern record set in the 1953-54 season by the Toronto Maple Leafs' Harry Lumley.

Pirouetting Pachyderm. No one, including Tony, is quite sure how he does it. There are two basic styles of goaltending: the stand-up and the flipflop. Esposito excels at neither. Instead, he patrols the net in a fashion that might be described as roam around, fall down and scramble. "Unorthodox but effective" is how Black Hawk Coach Billy Reay tactfully describes it. Against Boston last week, the pudgy, heavily padded Esposito whirled around the goal like a pirouetting pachyderm, deflecting shots with his elbows, knees and shoulders. Occasionally he even used his stick as Chicago won 6-3 and moved into contention for the Stanley Cup playoffs. Says Teammate Bobby Hull: "Tony will try to stop that puck with any part of his body, any time." During a game last year when Esposito was in the nets for the Canadiens, Hull rocketed a high, hard shot directly at Tony's head. "He saw it coming," recalls Hull, "and just closed his eyes and let it hit him in the mask. It's not luck: he's cool--a very brave goaltender."

While growing up on the rinks of Sault Ste. Marie, Ont., Esposito yearned to play forward like his big brother Phil. "But every time I was picked for a team, they would stick me in the goal," he says. By the time he was 17, he was so disgusted he quit hockey altogether. He hadn't minded being pelted by pucks; it was the chilly, accusing stares that hurt. "Every time we'd lose, the guys would look at me and raise their eyebrows. No matter how the team plays in front of me, I have the last say on the puck. If it gets past me, it's my fault."

Deal to Forget. Coaxed back into competition, Esposito won a scholarship to Michigan Tech, where he earned a degree in business administration and a place on the All-America Hockey Team. He turned professional in 1967 and after a stint in the Canadiens' farm system, he was called up to the N.H.L. last year to fill in for the injured Gump Worsley. The Black Hawks saw and thought enough of Esposito to get him in an off-season deal the Canadiens would now like to forget. In Chicago's first game against Montreal this year, Tony stopped the Stanley Cup champions cold on their home ice with a 5-0 shutout.

Stopping Big Brother Phil is another matter. During the summer, the two brothers practice together, with Phil shooting endless breakaway shots at Tony. "That's how he beats me," says the older Esposito. "I start to make the moves I was making this summer and he sees them coming." Replies Tony, grinning: "I play him like Howe, Beliveau, all those tricky players." But neither brother can really explain Tony's moves. The young goalie occasionally tries, but after several long minutes of explaining what he does not do, he wrinkles his brow and concludes: "Sometimes I'm pretty awkward. I guess I just do whatever I have to to stop the puck."

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