Alex Mogilny once again snubbed by Hockey Hall of Fame
Mogilny #Mogilny
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The ex-Canucks winger changed the game by defecting from the Soviet Union and was one of the elite right wingers in the NHL in the 1990s.
Published Jun 21, 2023 • 5 minute read
Vancouver Canucks #89 Alexander Mogilny during the pregame warmup prior to playing the Edmonton Oilers in 1999. Photo by Gerry Kahrmann /Province Article content
As wrist shots go, there are few in NHL history who have had a more lethal one than Markus Naslund.
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So when he says Alexander Mogilny’s wrist shot was even better than his, your eyebrows inevitably hit the ceiling.
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It’s yet another reason it’s hard to fathom why Mogilny, one of the greatest right-wingers of his era, isn’t in the Hockey Hall of Fame.
The hall announced its latest class of inductees Wednesday and once again Mogilny, who played for the Vancouver Canucks from 1995 to 2000, wasn’t included. It remains baffling why the small committee of 18 hockey people, who meet once a year to determine that year’s Hall of Fame class, continue to exclude Mogilny.
Vancouver Canucks Alexander Mogilny in 1998. Photo by Gerry Kahrmann /PROVINCE
To gain induction, 14 of the 18 have to put your name on a ballot. This year the committee, comprised mostly of former players but also including a few media members and former coaches and executives, picked players Henrik Lundqvist, Tom Barrasso, Pierre Turgeon, Mike Vernon, Caroline Ouellette and two builders, former coach Ken Hitchcock and former GM Pierre Lacroix.
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Why a player like Turgeon, who did rack up 1,300 points during a fine career in the 1980s and 1990s, is in over Mogilny, who was twice named to end of season all-star teams, led the league in goals once and also changed the game by defecting from the Soviet Union.
Mogilny also won an Olympic gold medal while still in his teens in 1988, the Stanley Cup in 2000 and recording 1,032 points in 990 NHL games, the bulk played during the so-called “dead puck” era.
“He was the first player that I saw with such a quick wrist shot release that goalies were caught off guard,” Naslund said. Naslund was Mogilny’s teammate on the Vancouver Canucks from 1996 until 2000.
“He hid his intentions and could shoot in the middle of a move,” he explained.
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And no, Naslund never quite figured out how to copy Mogilny’s technique.
“He was just too good!”
Mogilny was a player so good, you wondered at times if the game bored him. But if it did, he never showed it off the ice. His old teammates have only positive things to say.
“Easy going and kind person as well,” Naslund remarked.
Toronto Maple Leafs Alexander Mogilny skates though the Ottawa Sentors centre ice during an optional skate at the Corel Centre Tuesday April 13, 2004. SunMedia
On top of his scoring totals, Mogilny also changed the game: he was the first Soviet player to defect to the NHL, quite literally bolting from the national team at the conclusion of the 1989 World Championships into a waiting car outside a shopping mall in Stockholm, steps ahead of KGB agents.
A year later Sergei Federov jumped to the Detroit Red Wings and by the time Pavel Bure flew to Los Angeles in September 1991, with the end goal of finally joining the Canucks, Soviet officials knew the game was up and there was no stopping Bure, instead they dug their financial heels in on releasing him from his contract.
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Fedorov, Mogilny and Bure had played together as a line at the 1989 World Juniors, still considered one of the greatest trios that has ever appeared at that tournament.
“Alex, I think, was the strongest. He has the most agility, the quickest release and the best shot…the leader of our line,” Fedorov told ESPN in 2005.
Mogilny joined the Buffalo Sabres for the 1989-90 season, the team that had drafted him in the fifth round in 1988, knowing full well that it would be exceedingly difficult, if not impossible, to pry a young star away from the Soviet national team. The Soviets were allowing older players to move to North America, but not their next wave of talent.
In 1996, Pavel Bure and Alex Mogilny vs LA KINGS in Vancouver. ARLEN REDEKOP / PROVINCE Photo by ARLEN REDEKOP /PNG
Mogilny was an instant hit, scoring 20 seconds into his first game with the Sabres. He only scored 15 goals that season, but the signs of future success were there. He was a point-per-game player in his second season, scored 84 points in season three and then in his fourth season, he ascended to superstardom, scoring 76 goals, tying him with Teemu Selanne for most in the NHL.
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Two years later, he was traded to the Canucks. Pat Quinn decided his team that had come one win short in the Stanley Cup final a year before needed more octane added to its offence.
He was an instant star in Vancouver, breaking through the 100-point barrier, a timely feat given Pavel Bure blew out his knee early in the year. Mogilny became the team’s go-to guy and while their defensive game ended up sinking their playoff ambitions — the Canucks lost in the first round to the eventual Stanley Cup champion Colorado Avalanche — the Canucks were one of the NHL’s best offensive teams.
Quinn had hoped Mogilny would lead the Canucks into a new era, but the roster proved to be too stale and their results went south. Mogilny wouldn’t play in the playoffs for the Canucks again, as the team’s results only got worse and worse over the next three seasons.
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Mogilny held out for a new contract at the start of the 1997-98 season, a season that would start out as a disaster and somehow only get worse. Quinn had signed Mark Messier that summer, hoping the legend had enough juice left to right the Canucks’ course, but instead the Canucks couldn’t win and Quinn was out of a job by early November.
Days after Quinn’s dismissal, the desperate Canucks signed Mogilny but the team’s tailspin continued. Brian Burke took over as GM the next summer, Pavel Bure demanded a trade and a miserable Canucks squad, including Mogilny, went through the motions in 1998-99.
Burke drafted the Sedins in the summer of 1999 and as part of his rebuild, recognized he would have to move out Mogilny the next season.
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The star winger was flipped to New Jersey for Brendan Morrison and a true new era for the Canucks was about to begin. Mogilny helped the trap-era Devils win their second Stanley Cup, then helped them get back to the final the next season, where they lost to the Colorado Avalanche.
He joined the Toronto Maple Leafs as a free agent that summer, reuniting with Quinn, and helped the Leafs to the Eastern Conference final. He played another two seasons in Toronto, then wrapped up his career with New Jersey in 2005-06.
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