HOCKEY
This was not a particularly happy year on the ice, either, although there was nothing like the debacle in basketball. The principal item of news is that Dartmouth did not win the Pentagonal League trophy, as they have done seven times in the previous nine years. Followers of the game have become so accustomed to Dartmouth winning that they consider themselves bitterly defrauded when the boys drop a few. Judged by the standards of fifteen or twenty years ago, the Green had a good season. But the customers are spoiled. Coach Jeremiah's boys can't win all the time.
To get down to cases, Dartmouth ended the regular season with an overall record of 11 wins and 9 losses. Considering the calibre of the opposition, this is not anything to be ashamed of. In Pentagonal League competition, the team finished in third place, with a record of 4 wins and 4 defeats. On several occasions, the team rose to great heights, notably in their defeat of Boston University in Hanover and in their win over Princeton in the final league game. On other occasions, they played well but lost, as illustrated by their narrow defeat at the hands of Boston College just before Carnival. Incidentally, the two Boston institutions boast among the best college teams currently operating.
The high point of the season, from the Dartmouth viewpoint, was the scoring performance of senior Arnie Oss. This talented speedster had been somewhat eclipsed in former years by the formidable combination of the Riley brothers. But this year he really came into his own. In several league games, as well as a couple of others, he went on wild scoring sprees, coming up with 3-4-5 goals on numerous occasions. Against Harvard, for example, Arnie came through with 5 goals. Against Princeton, in the final encounter of the year, he also scored 5 goals, which represented the sum total of the Dartmouth scoring and was enough to ensure victory for the Green. His scoring activities culminated in his breaking the league record for goals (not points) scored in a single season. His total of 21 goals surpassed the previous record of 20 held by Dick Rondeau and set in 1941-42. Teamed with Cliff Harrison and first Tom Warner and then Hank Waters on the first line, Oss represented the most formidable unit of the Green scoring punch. On his record this year, he deserves to rank well up among the Dartmouth hockey immortals.
In what was probably the gaudiest exhibition of plain and fancy, helter-skelter, Katy-bar-the-door hockey ever seen on the local ice, the Dartmouth varsity nosed out the Alumni All-Stars by the score of 13-12. In what has now become a traditional encounter following the regular season, Coach Jeremiah summoned his stalwarts of yesteryear back to the Hanover plain for a go at his current varsity. The lineup of the Alumni looked like a roster of the all-time Dartmouth greats. The first line was the famous trio of Jack Riley, Dick Rondeau, and Bill Harrison, which functioned with such devastating power just before the war. For "spares," the Alumni had such famed operatives as Joe Riley, Bruce Mather, Bobby Merriam, Danny Sullivan, Charlie Holt, and Bob Amirault on the forward walls and such rock-ribbed defense men as George Pulliam (the Cranston Crusher), Mike Thayer, Whitey Campbell, and Jack Kilmartin in front of the nets. Only dashing Dick Desmond at goalie was absent from this glittering aggregation. Billy Riley, sidelined with a broken arm, managed this galaxy. There was one other sterling defense man for the Alumni, whom Coach Riley inserted in his starting aggregation. Fellow named Jeremiah, of the Class of 1930. The venerable mentor really showed the youngsters how it was done. And why shouldn't he? He wrote the book.
Space precludes our giving you a playby-play report of this epic encounter. Despite the aforementioned cast of famed characters, however, the star of the game was one Arnie Oss of the varsity, who came up with the unbelievable total of 7 goals for his personal contribution to the event. Virtually unstoppable all evening, Oss climaxed his evening's performance by scoring three goals (the "hat trick") in 56 seconds in the third period. The rest of the scoring was as follows. For the varsity: Choukas-3; Kerivan—2; Crowley-1. In the alumni: Sullivan—3; Joe Riley—2; Bill Harrison—2; Bruce Mather—2; Bob Amirault— 1; Whitey Campbell—1; and Buster Snow—l. All in all, it was a big evening. And the immortals of Dartmouth hockey can move over on their pedestals and make room for Arnie Oss.
