Bill Durnan's Amateur Career
Bill Durnan was one of the last great professional players to have spent a significant portion of his career playing senior amateur hockey in Canada. He began in his home city of Toronto, moved up north to Kirkland Lake, then finished in Montreal, where he'd go on to be recruited by the Canadiens to man the goalposts for the remainder of his career, to great success.
One of the big holes in Durnan's resume is his lack of longevity. Is that fair? We aren't talking about somebody like Ken Dryden or Charlie Gardiner, who have nothing outside of their NHL careers, for two very different reasons. Bill Durnan does have relevant hockey outside of his NHL careers - almost an entire decade's worth.
How much stock should we put into senior hockey of the time? The Allan Cup was not always the footnote it's become in modern times - games of the time could rival NHL tilts in attendance, with some of Durnan's highest stakes games filling the Montreal Forum, or Maple Leaf Gardens, to capacity. From my reading, the Manitoba senior teams of the 1910s, and the Toronto senior teams of the 1920s were the strongest Allan Cup contenders of them all, seeing Hall of Famers on every roster. I think they could've done well had they played in the NHA/NHL instead. By Durnan's time, the gap between the NHL and Allan Cup hockey had grown, but we still saw great players come through - Hall of Famers like Edgar Laprade and Buddy O'Connor featured prominently in Durnan's senior career in Montreal. These were real games, with real stakes, versus real opponents. They do matter when assessing a player's career. The question is - how much do they matter?
That's what I hope to cover in this post. When did Bill Durnan become NHL-caliber? Was he in high demand from NHL circles? What kind of teams did he have success under? All of these can give insight and clues that provide context to his NHL career, which is undoubtedly the meat of his resume.
Grab a coffee and settle in, this could be a long one. Let's dive right in...
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Playing Style
I'm not sure how to fit this into the rest of the post so I'll just get it out there early. I was very interested in any passages that gave meaningful descriptions of how he played goal. Him being ambidextrous is well-known, we even have
good film of his unique 'two glove' equipment setup. But we can pick up snippets here and there of more. Here's what I thought was useful, up until 1943:
The Toronto Star - 10 May 1932 said:
Durnan left little to be desired with his work in goal and it was a treat to watch him pick them out of the air. Incidentally, he stopped the majority of his shots with his hands.
The Ottawa Citizen - 23 March 1933 said:
Young Bill Durnan, who spears blue-line shots like a first basemen takes a throw from the other side of the infield, fumbled one tonight...
One of the most polished goaltenders in junior hockey, Durnan had thrilled a mighty crowd of more than 14,000 with his brilliancy for 55 minutes. The youngster, who learned to play hockey and baseball in North Toronto, had caught a dozen with his flashing right hand, throwing the puck into corners and smothering rebounds like a Hainsworth.
Durnan was a genuinely dominant softball pitcher in his day... I found a few clippings that called him one of the best in the country. Many of the great early goalies were notable baseball/softball players, and it's easy to deduce that it helped develop eye-hand coordination.
The Toronto Star - 2 January 1934 said:
It was Durnan who held them up last night. This big boy who seems destined to make pro ranks some day never gets rattled under fire and the nonchalant manner in which he picks the flying pucks out of the air must be disconcerting to opposing sharpshooters.
The Toronto Star - 10 March 1939 said:
Big Bill Durnan and [fellow Kirkland Lake goaler] Lyle Porter have been sharing the goal-tending duties. They are strictly a pair of opposites. Porter is short and of the 'Jumping Jake' Forbes type. Durnan, built along the lines of a policeman, moves in a manner that reminds one of Lorne Chabot.
A 1939 Brantford Expositor article mentioned Lorne Chabot as a goaltender who tended to "move around in the goal area".
The Montreal Star - 9 April 1940 said:
Durnan plays the goal like a first baseman, catching everything two feet of the ice in his huge gauntlets. He has a great pair of hands, as they say... They have a sterling sentinel in Durnan.
The Montreal Gazette - 9 April 1940 said:
Durnan, blessed with the quickest pair of hands for an amateur goaler that this city has seen in a long while, had his work more than cut out for him...
The Montreal Gazette - 18 May 1940 said:
Durnan is rated one of the top goalers in Canada and has the best pair of hands in amateur hockey... that comes from long years of playing softball... he's rated the best softball pitcher in Ontario, and they've got some good ones up there.
The Ottawa Citizen - 15 November 1940 said:
The Royals were strengthened in the most vital spots after bowing to Kirkland Lake last spring and their most valuable addition is Bill Durnan. The former Blue Devil net guardian is known for his refusal to become ruffled under fire and he offers a test for Senators here tomorrow night.
The Montreal Gazette - 4 March 1941 said:
Of Durnan, [Dick] Irvin says, 'He is big, has style and perhaps possesses the 'pro complex' to a greater extend than any of the others [in the Quebec Senior League].
The Montreal Star - 6 March 1941 said:
Kirkland Lake Bill seldom gets rattled. One might go farther and say he never gets ruffled. They may beat him for an easy counter or two now and then but his outward appearance leaves the impression that the matter has been instantly forgotten.
The Montreal Gazette - 8 March 1941 said:
While on the subject of goalkeepers, nobody seems to have reported that Bill Durnan, of the Royals, is the only ambidextrous netminder in existence... Watch Bill tomorrow afternoon against Ottawa Senators at the Forum... He is constantly shifting his big stick from one side to the other...
The Montreal Star - 14 March 1941 said:
[Montreal Royals manager Gus] Ogilvie had confidence in Durnan from the start, even when they said Bill wasn't so good on the low shots. Ottawa couldn't beat him there, and there is nothing coming high that Bill can't put away with a pair of hands that many shortstop would like to have... It's fine to have a man behind you like Durnan, and this has been written before and will be written again.
Interesting that low shots, likely meaning ones that he couldn't snatch with his gloves, are mentioned as a weakness... were they, or did they only seem like it because of how good he was with his hands? Difficult to say, but later in the season there's a stronger indication that it may have been a genuine issue:
The Montreal Star - 14 April 1941 said:
Durnan was beaten on some shots along the ice, but he was playing against a team that knows his every weakness.
The Ottawa Journal - 7 April 1941 said:
Bill Durnan, [Montreal Royals coach Frank] Carlin's cool custodian, does even his falling in the approved fashion. The length of him, with the big pads sticking up, is solidly in the goalmouth.
The Ottawa Citizen - 11 April 1941 said:
Durnan is Mr. Cool himself... You don't get the erstwhile Kirkland Lake goaler off his feet very often... He takes everything in stride although there must have been plenty of nights this past winter when he was a trifle more than ruffled... But [fellow senior goalie Bill] Dickie drops to the ice at every opportunity...
The Montreal Gazette - 4 December 1942 said:
[Montreal Army winger Gordie Bruce] figures it's pretty hard to drive them past Durnan from far out. 'Bill plays them well with his stick in clearings,' says Gordie.
The Montreal Star - 7 January 1943 said:
Only a super performance by Bill Durnan would have stopped the Army. Sometimes Bill isn't so good when they get the first goal past him, as was the case last night.
The Ottawa Journal - 29 October 1943 said:
Canadiens shouldn't be disappointed with Bill Durnan. For one thing he concedes nothing to any goalie in the matter of style. He's the cool type, with as smart a pair of hands as you'll find in any league.
It's a lot, so let's recap... Bill Durnan was dynamite on shots he could pick out of the air with his two gloves, a skill he was able to utilize by adjusting his stick positioning from hand to hand. A 'cool' goalie, which typically meant a goalie who preferred to stay on his feet rather than to drop and flop, Durnan's size allowed him to cover a lot of goal without resorting to great acrobatics like some of his smaller senior counterparts. You could beat him from getting him to move laterally, which would take his hands out of the equation.
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Sudbury/Toronto - 1932-1936
Bill Durnan was considered a top goaltending prospect from an early age, playing junior hockey first in Toronto, then a year in Sudbury, before coming back to start his senior career in Toronto again.
The Toronto Star - 10 May 1932 said:
For the net-minding position the [Sudbury Wolf Cubs] have their eyes on none other than Bill Durnan, 16-year-old star goalkeeper of last year's North Toronto juniors. Bill is rated as the most sensational lad to don the big pads around Toronto in years and it will be a big blow to several clubs if he should take the northern trip.
The Toronto Star - 23 March 1933 said:
You can tie the tinware to any crack about Durnan. Durnan is just about the best looking junior goalkeeper which has appeared in Toronto this year – and we have seen plenty.
The Toronto Star Weekly - 6 January 1934 said:
[Durnan] is billed as the next goalkeeper of the Toronto Maple Leafs.
I don't put too much stock in his early Toronto years, beyond establishing that he was thought of as a serious NHL prospect. He spent most of his time in the Toronto Mercantile League, a slightly lesser level than OHA senior hockey, which he occasionally filled in with.
Things came to a halt in 1935, with a serious knee injury early in the season that wrote him off in most people's eyes. There's not much on how and when the injury took place - one article years after the fact said it came from a "friendly beach wrestling joust" - but by year's end it was noted that Durnan was packing up and heading north:
The Toronto Star - 26 September 1936 said:
Big Bill Durnan will depart for Kirkland Lake when the softball season is over. The husky eastender will try a comeback with the Kirkland Lake N.O.H.A. Entry. Before he injured his knee Durnan was one of the most promising young goalies around these parts and his many friends will be pulling for him to make the grade up north...
The Daily Clarion - 28 September 1936 said:
Durnan, who starred for Sudbury a few seasons back and who was considered one of the greatest prospects in the game, will do his goal tending for Kirkland Lake...
By the end of the 35-36 season, 20 year old Durnan's status as a prospect was tainted, his knee was hurt, and little more can be gleaned from the sources.
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Kirkland Lake - 1936-1940
Northern Ontario was where "Kirkland Bill" earned his stripes. Durnan came to town as a castaway, assumed to have had his professional hockey career ruined by his knee injury, though his reputation from a strong junior season in Sudbury years ago still carried weight.
It's very difficult to find much useful information from the Northern Ontario league of this time. Not many sources, and games had very brief, barren reports, so for these first two seasons I'll just add my own recaps plus a few passages:
In 36-37, he started off as the backup for the Blue Devils before taking over as starter later in the season, and was reported as having a pleasantly surprising season. Kirkland Lake finished 1st in their division, but lost in the league final, and thus missed out on competing in the Allan Cup playoffs. A postseason article stated that Bruins scout Lionel Hitchman extended an invitation for Durnan to attend Boston's training camp in Hershey the following season. It's not clear whether he attended or not, but I'm assuming not.
37-38 was a similar tale, though Durnan was the starter for the entire season. Kirkland Lake won their division and again lost in the league finals. Wikipedia labels these as Allan Cup playoff games, but they weren't, they were just Northern Ontario playoff games.
At this point, Bill is about to turn 22, and I don't see any reason to think he'd be an NHL-caliber goalie at this point. So, nothing doing yet.
1938-39 has a bit more information, as they actually made it to the Allan Cup playoffs. They faced the Toronto Goodyears, a strong team that featured future NHLers like Don Metz and 'Hankus' Goldup. The Blue Devils, powered by a skilled offence and a rushing group of defensemen in front of an improving Durnan, were unable to adjust to playing real competition after totally crushing the Northern Ontario league, and they were swept. Big Bill gives up a bad goal to lose Game 1 in overtime, and in Game 3 is benched in favour of backup Lyle Porter. For me, still not NHL-caliber at 23 years old.
Now we come to 39-40, his big Allan Cup year. This was the first year where his team could beat real competition, so let's take a look at the strengths of this Kirkland Lake team to see how they did it, and how instrumental Bill Durnan was in their success.
There's going to be a lot of unfamiliar names mentioned here, but the focus is meant to be on the perceived strengths/weaknesses of the team, not the names.
The Toronto Star - 28 March 1940 said:
Looking back over the series and studying every game, one realizes that [centre Dick Kowcinak] is the heart of this [unintelligible] puck machine.
Last night the Lake Shore centremen continually beat the Goodies' mid-ice players to the puck, the wings outskated and outchecked the Tiremen's railers, while the defencemen were more alert defensively and far more aggressive and effective on the attack.
The Montreal Gazette - 6 April 1940 said:
On the other hand the Blue Devils' big drawback is that they have lacked tough competition all year... They've got to win their games in the first 30 minutes or so because they fade after that... Their defence didn't seem as strong as it was cracked up to be, with [Mel] Snowden looking the pick of the crop and [Doug] Boston a disappointment.. But the forwards can skate, and they back-check relentlessly.
The Ottawa Journal – 8 April 1940 said:
Tommy Gorman is authority for the statement that no less than four of the Royals are excellent pro prospects, who could quite likely leap from amateur ranks to the big time and stay there. Basil O'Meara reports that the four Gorman thinks that highly of are Johnny Atcheson, Russ McConnell, Bert Janke and Buddy O'Connor.
The Blue Devils have a few fellows, however, who can match anything that Royals can dress and send in against them. Mel Snowden, Dick Kowcinak, Hal Cooper, Jo-Jo Graboski and Johnny McCreedy will trade speed and stick-handling with any players that fans here who followed the Quebec Senior League saw in Royal uniforms. Some of their mates aren't quite up to their standards of hockey class, but the team as a whole is impressive.
Durnan not mentioned when the article basically lists half the team as being strong. I'm guessing they were only looking at skaters when putting those names together...
The Montreal Star – 9 April 1940 said:
The Blue Devils showed a nicely balanced team – fast forwards, stalwart defencemen and a cool steady goalkeeper.
The Toronto Star – 15 April 1940 said:
Blue Devils pack tremendous scoring punch in a set of fast-skating, accurate-shooting forwards that might carry them through to the Allan Cup. Billy Durnan is giving them all-star goalkeeping and while the defence appears at times to be pretty slow back of the blue-line they seem to get by.
The Calgary Herald – 23 April 1940 said:
It was a case of two forward lines playing against three sets of clever and resourceful attacking forces. Kirkland Lake had too much class up front, too much poise and cover up on defence and Bill Durnan didn't have a chance to prove he's the mainstay they say he is.
The Toronto Star – 24 April 1940 said:
Professional hockey scouts are not too enthusiastic about the Lake Shore Blue Devils, claiming they are too small... all agree, however, that the northerners, win, lose or draw, really turn on the heat and are box office...
So we're looking at a team with three forward lines, all of whom were strong skaters and willing backcheckers, helping out an inconsistent yet physical defense that was probably a bit too slow, and then Durnan. I won't post any snippets of games from these guys, but from my reading, centreman Dick Kowcinak was their best player and MVP, his winger Johnny McCreedy was probably number two, and then I'd go with Durnan third. It was a very good senior team with skaters too small to make it in the pros, but Durnan was plenty big, and received his fair share of praise:
The Montreal Star – 12 April 1940 said:
Fully 11,00 saw for themselves last night. They saw a team that was robust and fast, alert and smart, backed by a goal sentinel with ice water in his veins.
The man was Bill Durnan.
...
Durnan was a delight to watch, if you didn't care who won.
The Montreal Star – 15 April 1940 said:
Kowcinak and his teammates, with their stickhandling wizardry and speed, and Durnan with his great goaltending brought about the biggest upset years in routing the Royals so handily.
The Ottawa Journal – 23 April 1940 said:
The Western rearguard is overshadowed by the Blue Devils' sturdy, hard-hitting defence, and there isn't any comparison between the goalminders. Bill Durnan, in the Northern nets, is a very real star...
The Toronto Star – 25 April 1940 said:
Now we come to Bill Durnan, the human icicle, who guards the Lake Shore goal. When Bill left Toronto four seasons back he was rated as all washed up. But he hit the comeback trail and proved that he still had the stuff which made him a standout junior with Sudbury by being one of the main cogs in Kirkland Lake's title charge. Well done, Willie, you were great and deserve a place in the hockey spotlight.
And, to answer one of my questions in the introduction to this post, we start seeing rumblings of interest from NHL clubs:
The Sault Star – 18 April 1940 said:
But the Canadiens don't stick close to home entirely. They are said to have Bill Durnan, of Kirkland Lake's Allan Cup finalists, on their list in case Claude Bourque and Wilf Cude don't maintain the goaltending job.
The North Bay Nugget – 24 April 1940 said:
Hockey gossip here has it that at least six members of the Kirkland Lake Blue Devils will be invited to 'try out' with National Hockey League clubs next fall.
Lake Shore players said to be in demand are Bill Durnan, Mel Snowden, Doug Boston and Johnny McCreedy. They haven't been offered contracts, but it is believed that some of them will before return to Kirkland Lake.
... though Bruins manager Art Ross was less enthusiastic on the team as a whole:
The Sault Star – 18 April 1940 said:
After watching the initial Allan Cup duel, Ross coldly said there isn't a player on either club that interests him.
Durnan moves east for Montreal that summer, and his Northern Ontario chapter is closed. To conclude this section, I'd say that 1940 is the earliest year I would argue Bill Durnan could've played as a solid NHL goalie, and that's backed up by him garnering interest from pro circles, five years after he was last pegged as the future in nets for Toronto.
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Montreal Royals - 1940-1943
We wrap things up in Montreal, the city he'd go on to earn his fame in. Bill remains an amateur and joins up with the Montreal Royals of the Quebec Senior Hockey League, who he defeated in the Allan Cup semifinals a year prior.
The Canadiens essentially treated the QSHL like a feeder system, especially during wartime, and often looked at plucking goalies they liked to replace their inconsistent netminders at the NHL level. We will see lots of talk of that in 1941, which was an even stronger season for him than 1940:
The Montreal Star – 29 October 1940 said:
'Bill' Durnan, goalkeeper for last year's champion Kirkland Lake Club, came down to [Canadiens' training camp] yesterday and was in the nets for a while. He made a good impression. Durnan will be with the Royals in the Quebec Senior Hockey Association this season. He will likely remain here for the balance of the training season.
The Montreal Gazette – 14 December 1940 said:
Although Bert Gardiner is reported to have played a strong game in Toronto, the Habitants are on the lookout for another 'spare' goaler... They say that Wilf Cude's bread-and-butter job will keep him so tied down here, that he would not be available for any emergency appearances except at home, so the club is anxious to obtain another 'insurance policy' for [Bert] Gardiner... They have had both Jimmy Franks and Mike Karakas (the ex-Hawk goaler who was with them for a while last season), recommended in the past week, but turned thumbs down on them... Canadiens don't want to disturb the Q.S.H.L. set-up by signing [Concordia goalie] Lionel Bouvrette, [Senior Canadiens goalie] Paul Bibeault or Bill Durnan.
In fact, in 1941, Durnan was playing well enough that he very well may have been plucked from the QSHL a few years early, but the Canadiens didn't want to put a damper on the Royals' Allan Cup run:
The Montreal Gazette – 4 March 1941 said:
Coach Dick Irvin, of Canadiens, has his eyes on three senior amateur goalkeepers hereabouts and is mulling over the possibility of signing one of them before the NHL season ends. The man he'd really like to get is Bill Durnan, of Royals, but Irvin would be reluctant to mar the [Royals'] prospects of going places in the amateur playdowns by taking Durnan away.
...If Royals should be knocked out by Ottawa, it wouldn't be a great surprise if Durnan is offered a Habitant contract. The other amateur goalies Irvin has in mind are Paul Bibeault and Conny Dion, but Durnan is the one he prefers above all.
The Montreal Gazette – 4 March 1941 said:
Dick Irvin will probably journey to Ottawa to look over the Senior Group play-off games. There is no chance of Bill Durnan even considering a National League offer until the Royals have wound up their season. Paul Bibeault would appear to be the most likely candidate as an understudy for Bert Gardiner.
Paul Bibeault did wind up being signed by the Canadiens a few days later, instead of Durnan.
The Montreal Star – 24 March 1941 said:
Most people think Durnan would be a Jim-dandy in the NHL...
The Toronto Star – 27 March 1941 said:
'We will lose several to Canadiens this season... They would also like to get Durnan, but Bill has a good job and is getting along rather nicely without pro hockey. I think he will remain with us,' stated [Royals manager Gus Ogilvie]...
The Toronto Star – 27 March 1941 said:
Canadiens are almost sure to sign Johnny Acheson and Bert Janke, of Royals, next fall – if they'll accept contracts – and there's a chance the Habitants may also take up Goaler Bill Durnan..
The Montreal Gazette – 7 April 1941 said:
...The bulk of the pressure was on Bill Durnan, and the Royals' netminder stood up under it with a spectacular exhibition that made him appear to be a pretty good bet for Canadiens to lay their hopes on next season, if they can induce him to sign...
The Montreal Star – 12 May 1941 said:
Bill Durnan is another goalie the Flying Frenchmen would like to sign on the dotted line. Bill can be had if the right kind of money is laid on the line. At least that is what the big Toronto boy said on his last visit to this city.
It looks like Durnan was ready to star in the NHL by 1941, but either wasn't willing to sign due to money demands, or wasn't able to be signed because of his Royals making a playoff push.
Speaking of the Royals, let's do what we did with the Blue Devils and look at their strengths and weaknesses - again with the disclaimer about unfamiliar names:
The Montreal Star – 18 November 1940 said:
Royals like the NHL Canadiens are none too well staffed back of the line. They could do with two good defenders. They have neat forwards and right now the brainiest, best-looking line in the group is the O'Connor, Heffernan, Morin trio. But they have to do so much back checking, fill in so many spaces for the spinning defencemen that they may be wearing that peaked look before their usual time, which is about the end of February...
Buddy O'Connor was their number one centre, and their best player. He'd go on to be a Hart winner in the NHL later in the decade, and a Hall of Famer. More to come on him whenever we do the centres project...
The Montreal Star – 24 December 1940 said:
The Royals are habitually a better team in the second-half running. They have only two scoring lines, however, this time.
The Ottawa Journal – 1 January 1941 said:
[Royals coach] Frank Carlin has a raft of high scoring forwards and a good goalie in Bill Durnan. His defence has been a worry.
The Ottawa Journal – 6 January 1941 said:
Royals are a team that will come on, the sort of hockey club that will be tough when the playoff stage is reached. They've got four husky defence men, and if they aren't any powerful puck carriers they make a pretty fair job of protecting their end of the rink and no one is going to be too 'mean' to their smaller forwards. Their front lines are fast, they check back smartly, and few opposing forwards can get set into any attacking pattern against them.
The Montreal Gazette – 31 March 1941 said:
Royals, it must be conceded, lack the balance that a true championship team requires. Their strength lies up front, and when their forwards are 'hot' and are skating there are few clubs that can touch them in this department. Bill Durnan is a good goalkeeper, but the Royals are trying to get by with only two regular defencemen. They have held up well so far in the playoffs, but when the forwards let down in their skating, fail to carry their share of the attack and do not back-check, then Royals' defensive weakness becomes apparent.
The Toronto Star – 1 April 1941 said:
[Royals] get good goaltending from Bill Durnan who should be up in the big time come next season. Their one weakness is on the defence and that might be the flaw in the Allan Cup hopes of the Montrealers.
The Toronto Star – 7 April 1941 said:
Royals missed out on their Allan Cup bid in the past two years primarily because of defensive weakness. They turned that weakness into strength this season by carrying only two defencemen in the playoffs to make way for an extra forward line.
The move was made possible by the addition of Bill Durnan, goalie of the Allan Cup Kirkland Lake Blue Devils last season. With the brilliant Durnan taking up most of the defensive slack, the Montrealers have spelled their two defencemen by playing five forwards at intervals.
Lots of good stuff here for Durnan fans... the team was so confident in him that they were willing to just scrap their two defensemen and play five forwards in front of him at times? Yikes. It looks like a replay of the previous year's Kirkland Lake team, with the strength of the team up front, Durnan strong in goal, and a weak defense, only this time the defense is even slower and weaker, and the forwards were more overworked as a result.
Despite all of this, Durnan was lauded for his play:
The Montreal Star – 5 December 1940 said:
Active with hands, feet, pads and stick large Bill Durnan earned the zero. He is showing himself a goalkeeper of class now... Durnan never lost sight of the puck.
The Ottawa Journal – 1 January 1941 said:
Bill Durnan, who comes here Saturday with Royals, is rated one of senior hockey's top goalies now... he was strictly on a comeback when he came to Kirkland Lake in 1936-37 as the Allan Cup build-up started. His place since then has confounded his critics. He deserves top rating.
The Montreal Star – 12 March 1941 said:
At play-off time Royals are liable to beat any team. Carlin legged them up in smart style. He has the type of goal-keeping to go with this year that has been lacking for a couple of seasons. Durnan has been a tremendous factor in all play-off games to date.
The Montreal Star – 7 April 1941 said:
Those who saw Durnan play his greatest game on Saturday, came away convinced that here is a man who will crash in like [Calder runner-up Johnny] Mowers if he cares to take the big jump.
The Toronto Star – 7 April 1941 said:
Bill Durnan turned in another star performance in the winners' goal... it looks as if Toronto's Bill is NHL bound.
The Royals wound up losing in the Allan Cup semifinals to the Sydney Millionaires, who'd managed to wrangle a number of Blue Devils to play for them, such as Kowcinak, McCreedy, and Mel Snowdon. It was said that Durnan, having played many more games this season than in any prior year, combined with his day job working him long hours, had worn out by season's end.
Helping my task is that the QSHL handed out an MVP award, known as the Ken Stewart Cup, which was voted on by 17 local sports writers, and high-scoring winger Albert Lemay of the Ottawa team won. Plus:
The Montreal Star – 17 February 1941 said:
Each sports writer cast seven votes, selecting the most valuable player from each team on a graduating scale...
Six goalkeepers, including both Ottawa netminders, were mentioned. Paul Bibeault topped them all with 23 points while Lionel Bouvrette had 22. Bill Durnan drew 11; Louis St. Denis four; Trevor Higginbottom, three; and Andy Goldie, one.
Bibeault would be signed later in the season to play for the Habs. Bouvrette was probably the best goalie in the league over the time period I looked at, frequently being the goalie all others were compared to, and grabbing an MVP of his own later on. So, Durnan finished third behind them.
The Montreal Star came up with an all-star team, too:
The Montreal Star – 18 February 1941 said:
Lionel Bouvrette is generally accepted as the best goalkeeper in the Quebec Senior Hockey League... He is unlucky to a minor degree in being anchor man with the weak Concordias...
We asked the coaches, managers, league officials, even fans before coming up the 'All Stars' of the waning 1940-41 season...
There was a wide diversity of opinion on the second man. Many liked Bill Durnan, others like Trevor Higginbottom, Louis St. Denis, Paul Bibeault. St. Denis had the best record, so he went into the place.
Seems rather dubious here, almost as though Durnan was the favoured option for the second team but they defaulted to Louis St. Denis based on team record.
The Ottawa Journal – 19 February 1941 said:
There might be a sympathy vote [on the QSHL all-star team] with Lionel Bouvrette. If it's to be for a goalie playing behind a shaky defence we'd say Bill Durnan. On the other hand Bouvrette was not playing behind much of anything.
All in all, I'm going to say Bill Durnan was either the best or the second best goalie in the QSHL this season. He went on a deep playoff run, carrying a very bad defense as far as he could take them, and was frequently mentioned as being NHL-caliber, or in demand by the Canadiens. Dick Irvin was singled out as having real interest in him, even above other goalies like Bouvrette. He was certainly NHL-ready by now, and possibly could've been a star.
The next two seasons, unfortunately, feature much less material to work with, as the Royals went back and became non-factors in the QSHL, mostly due to their top line, the 'Razzle Dazzle' trio led by O'Connor, all jumping ship to the Habs, in addition to much of their depth simply moving on from the team. Noted team-jumper Dick Kowcinak came in once again and replaced O'Connor as the star centreman, but it was for naught.
A few tidbits from 41-42, a season in which Durnan received just a sliver of MVP support (4th among all QSHL goalies)... looks like Durnan 'survived' another close call with the NHL in February, when the Black Hawks needed a quick replacement for Sam LoPresti, a spot that ended up going to a 'diving type' goalie named Bill Dickie:
The Montreal Gazette – 10 February 1942 said:
First, they tried to enlist the services of Legs Fraser, of the amateur Canadiens, and then of Bill Durnan, of the Royals. But they were refused point-blank – by the pro Canadiens, because the local NHL sponsors both those QSHL clubs and had a say in that phase of the negotiations...
As a matter of fact, Chicago also attempted to land Lionel Bouvrette, of Quebec, it is reported and Roger Bessette, of Shawinigan Falls, but were refused for the clubs' own reasons.
This is not to say that [Montreal Pats goalie] Bill Dickie was the last man approached by any means. [Black Hawks coach] Paul Thompson had cast out lines in every direction in the emergency and met no luck at all, until the Pats consented.
And it looks like Durnan was a 'Black Ace' for the Habs near the end of the season:
The Montreal Gazette – 10 March 1942 said:
In regard to Durnan, Canadiens plan to keep him in readiness in case of any emergency arising in which they would need a spare goaler, through injury to Paul Bibeault, the regular netminder. Durnan will practise regularly with the Habitants, and if Canadiens make the playoff grade, Durnan may accompany them on the road, although he won't be signed unless the necessity arises.
Ending on 42-43, the Royals sink further into mediocrity. Due to the amount of NHLers enlisting in the war effort, former pros like Neil Colville were allowed to join the QSHL this season. The Royals decided not to recruit any such professionals, and as a result lagged behind. Durnan was voted 2nd team all-star by the league's coaches, but I actually found the
article with each coach's voting ballot and the ballots don't add up - it should've been Bouvrette as 2nd team all-star rather than Durnan. Weird.
We still get a few final teasings of Durnan's impending NHL career:
The Montreal Gazette – 2 December 1942 said:
It was reliably reported yesterday, thought executives of the NHL Canadiens would not corroborate it, that the team has offered contracts to three members of the QSHL Royals – Johnny Mahaffy, Bobby Lee and Bill Durnan.
The Montreal Star – 26 January 1943 said:
Dick Irvin is sweet on Bill Durnan, and Bill might get a shot in goal for the pro Canucks in a game or two now that the Royals have Renaud back...
The season ends, the summer goes by, and Bill Durnan is invited to Habs training camp. He beats out the green Gerry McNeil, who performs extremely well, probably just as well as Durnan, but is considered too young and too small to be thrown to the wolves right away. He also beats out Bert Gardiner, who at one point gets the trains mixed up and accidentally travels to the wrong city for camp. The experienced (and big) Durnan wins the job, and the rest is history.
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Conclusion
Let's answer the three questions I outlined in the introduction:
When did Bill Durnan become NHL-caliber? I would say 1940 at the earliest, but certainly by 1941. Therefore, as an example, when we do easy comparisons between him and Brimsek or Broda, we should account for this when considering their respective longevities, rather than just saying Durnan showed up 1943 and that was that.
Was he in high demand from NHL circles? If circumstances within the QSHL had been different, specifically if his team had been knocked out of the playoffs just a bit earlier, Bill Durnan would've been a Canadien in early 1941, without question. Before that, likely not. Without that leg injury in 1935, we're asking an entirely different question here,
one that I tried speculating on in another thread.
What kind of teams did he have success under? The Blue Devils of 1940 won an Allan Cup on the backs of their speedy two-way forwards, which helped make his job easier, though his defense was noted for its sluggishness. The Royals of 1941 made a deep Allan Cup run off of a similar formula, only with an even slower and weaker defense. In senior hockey at least, Bill Durnan did not need a strong defense in order to win games. For me, that eases concerns about how much of a product of the stacked mid-40s Habs he was. I think he was legitimately great on his own.
All that said, there's some room for doubt. He was not a dominant force in the QSHL of the early 40s, not even being the clearcut best goalie in that league. MVP and all-star voters were more than fine with voting for goalies who played on crappy teams, which the Royals of 1942 and 1943 qualify as, yet his all-star record in these two seasons was nothing special. And it was possible to be a dominant force in this league, as we saw just a few years later in young Gerry McNeil, who won three QSHL MVPs as well as an Allan Cup of his own.
I did all of this research about two months ago, and as someone who's very willing to give lots of credit to years spent in amateur hockey, I came into it thinking I'd be more blown away than I ended up being. I'm certain he belongs above Turk Broda, and fairly confident he belongs below Frank Brimsek. After this Durnan research, I think I've settled on there being some more separation between him and Mr. Zero. But if anyone has anything else to add on this, I'm all ears.
