Al MacInnis

Allan MacInnis (born July 11, 1963) is a Canadian former professional ice hockey defenceman who played 23 seasons in the National Hockey League (NHL) for the Calgary Flames (1981–1994) and St. Louis Blues (1994–2004).

MacInnis left home in 1979 to join the Regina Pat Blues of the Saskatchewan Junior Hockey League (SJHL).

He appeared in 59 games, scoring 20 goals and 48 points with the Pat Blues, and appeared in two Western Hockey League (WHL) games with the Regina Pats.

He then moved to Ontario and joined the Kitchener Rangers of the Ontario Hockey League (OHL).

Following a season in which he scored 39 points in 47 games and winning the League Championship with Kitchener in the 1980–81 OHL season, MacInnis was rated as the second best defensive prospect at the 1981 NHL Entry Draft.

A first round selection of the Flames in the 1981 NHL Entry Draft, he went on to become a 12-time All-Star.

MacInnis made his NHL debut with the Flames on December 30, 1981, against the Boston Bruins.

The team won its second consecutive OHL title, and captured the 1982 Memorial Cup.

He played a third season in Kitchener in 1982–83, and was again named a first-team All-Star after an 84-point season.

Additionally, MacInnis was voted the winner of the Max Kaminsky Trophy as the OHL's top defenceman.

He appeared in two games that season, and an additional fourteen in 1982–83 in seasons spent primarily with Kitchener at the junior level.

He scored his first NHL point against the Toronto Maple Leafs on October 23, 1982.

MacInnis began the 1983–84 season with the Colorado Flames of the Central Hockey League, scoring 19 points in 19 games before joining Calgary full-time.

With the Flames, he scored 11 goals and 34 assists in 51 games and appeared in his first 11 postseason games during the 1984 Stanley Cup playoffs.

A point-per-game pace in 1984–85 (66 points in 67 games) earned MacInnis his first All-Star Game appearance, playing in front of his hometown fans at the 1985 game in Calgary.

He was voted a second-team All-Star for the 1986–87 NHL season, and started his first All-Star Game in 1988.

He tied Bobby Orr's OHL record for goals by a defenceman in one season with 38 (subsequently broken by Bryan Fogarty's 47 in 1988–89), and holds the Canadian Hockey League record of five goals in one game by a defenceman.

He was named the Conn Smythe Trophy winner as the most valuable player of the playoffs in 1989 after leading the Flames to the Stanley Cup championship.

He was a finalist for the James Norris Memorial Trophy as top defenceman in the league in three consecutive seasons, 1989, 1990 and 1991, but failed to win the award each time.

Internationally, he was an all-star on defence as Canada won the 1991 Canada Cup and twice participated in the Winter Olympics.

He was voted the winner of the James Norris Memorial Trophy in 1999 as the top defenceman in the league while a member of the Blues.

He was a member of the 2002 team that won Canada's first gold medal in 50 years.

An eye injury suffered early in the 2003–04 NHL season forced MacInnis into retirement.

He finished his career third all-time among defencemen in goals, assists and points and was named to seven postseason all-star teams.

He was elected to the Hockey Hall of Fame in 2007, and his jersey number 2 was retired by the Blues and is honoured by the Flames.

MacInnis remains a member of the Blues organization, currently serving as the team's senior advisor to the general manager.

He was selected by the Calgary Flames in the first round, 15th overall.

The Flames invited him to their training camp, although they did not expect him to play for them immediately, and he was returned to junior.

Most of his season was spent with Kitchener where MacInnis was named to the OHL first All-Star team after scoring 75 points for the Rangers.

In 2017, MacInnis was named one of the '100 Greatest NHL Players' in history.

MacInnis was most famous for having the hardest shot in the league.

He tied Bobby Orr's Ontario Hockey League (OHL) record for goals by a defenceman, and won two OHL championships and a Memorial Cup with the Kitchener Rangers as a junior.

He famously split goaltender Mike Liut's mask with a shot, and became only the fourth defenceman in NHL history to score 100 points in a season.

When the Blues won the Stanley Cup in 2019, he got his name engraved on the Stanley Cup for a second time.

MacInnis was born in Inverness, Nova Scotia, and grew up in nearby Port Hood, a fishing village on Cape Breton Island.

He is the seventh of eight children born to Alex and Anna Mae MacInnis, and one of six brothers.

His father worked as a coal miner and later as the assistant manager of the arena in Port Hood when the mine closed while his mother was a school teacher.

The brothers all played hockey in Port Hawkesbury during the winter.

MacInnis often assisted his father's work at the arena, collecting pucks that he used to shoot repeatedly against a sheet of plywood set against the family barn during the summer.

It was through this practice, which occasionally left him with blistered fingers, that he developed his powerful slapshot.