Martin Nicholas Pavelich (born November 6, 1927) is a

Canadian Canadians (french: Canadiens) are people identified with the country of Canada. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Canadians, many (or all) of these connections exist and are collectively the source of ...

former

ice hockey Ice hockey (or simply hockey) is a team sport played on ice skates, usually on an ice skating rink with lines and markings specific to the sport. It belongs to a family of sports called hockey. In ice hockey, two opposing teams use ice h ...

left winger A midfielder is an outfield position in association football. Midfielders may play an exclusively defensive role, breaking up attacks, and are in that case known as defensive midfielders. As central midfielders often go across boundarie ...

. He played ten seasons for the Detroit Red Wings of the

National Hockey League The National Hockey League (NHL; french: Ligue nationale de hockey—LNH, ) is a professional ice hockey league in North America comprising 32 teams—25 in the United States and 7 in Canada. It is considered to be the top ranked professional ...

from 1947 until

1957 1957 ( MCMLVII) was a common year starting on Tuesday of the Gregorian calendar, the 1957th year of the Common Era (CE) and ''Anno Domini'' (AD) designations, the 957th year of the 2nd millennium, the 57th year of the 20th century, and the 8th year ...

. Pavelich is the last surviving member of the Red Wings 1950 Stanley Cup team.

Early career

Pavelich played three seasons (1944–47) of junior-league hockey with the Ontario Hockey Association (OHA) Galt Red Wings in

Galt, Ontario Galt is a community in Cambridge, Ontario, Canada, in the Regional Municipality of Waterloo, Ontario on the Grand River. Prior to 1973, it was an independent city, incorporated in 1915, but amalgamation with the town of Hespeler, Ontario, the t ...

. He played 74 regular season games for the team, scoring 52 goals, with 66 assists for a total of 118 points.

NHL career

Pavelich joined the NHL Detroit Red Wings in 1947. He played a total of 634 regular season NHL games, scoring 93 goals and 159 assists for 252 points. His post-season record is 13 goals, 15 assists for 28 points in 93 games. The Red Wings won the Stanley Cup four times (1950, 1952, 1954, 1955) during his career and he played in the NHL all-star games for those seasons. Pavelich is regarded as an unsung hero of the early 1950s powerhouse Red Wing squad that also included

Gordie Howe Gordon Howe (March 31, 1928 – June 10, 2016) was a Canadian professional ice hockey player. From 1946 to 1980, he played 26 seasons in the National Hockey League (NHL) and six seasons in the World Hockey Association (WHA); his first 25 seaso ...

and

Ted Lindsay Ted Lindsay (born Robert Blake Theodore Lindsay; July 29, 1925 – March 4, 2019) was a Canadian professional ice hockey player who played as a forward for the Detroit Red Wings and Chicago Black Hawks of the National Hockey League (NHL). Linds ...

. Wings manager, Jack Adams, referred to Pavelich as "one of the four key men around whom we build our hockey club." Hockey journalist

Stan Fischler Stan Fischler (born March 31, 1932) is a historian of hockey and the New York City Subway, as well as a broadcaster, author, and professor. During his career, Fischler was best known for covering the New York Islanders, New Jersey Devils and New ...

, ranked him as the 4th best defensive forward of all time in his book ''Hockey's 100: A Personal Ranking of the Best Players in Hockey History''. Considered one of the best "shadows" of his time, his role was to check other team's top scorers, including the likes of Maurice "Rocket" Richard.

Post-NHL

Pavelich left the Red Wings at the end of the 1956-57 season. He and

ran a successful plastics manufacturing business together that supplied parts to the automotive industry. He rejected a 1958 contract which called for a minor-league option. "I told him I could get him a $7,000 base salary in the minors, which is a good contract, but Marty said he'd retire first," Detroit General Manager Jack Adams said. Pavelich retired after the 1956-57 season, rather than risk being moved away from the Wings and his business.

Career statistics

References

1927 births Living people Canadian ice hockey left wingers Canadian people of Croatian descent Detroit Red Wings players Sportspeople from Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario Stanley Cup champions Ice hockey people from Ontario World Hockey Association broadcasters {{canada-icehockey-winger-1920s-stub