Edwin Vernon Westfall (born September 19, 1940) 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

professional A professional is a member of a profession or any person who works in a specified professional activity. The term also describes the standards of education and training that prepare members of the profession with the particular knowledge and ski ...

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 ...

player who played 18 seasons in 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 ...

with the

Boston Bruins The Boston Bruins are a professional ice hockey team based in Boston. The Bruins compete in the National Hockey League (NHL) as a member of the Atlantic Division in the Eastern Conference. The team has been in existence since 1924, making t ...

and the New York Islanders from

1961 Events January * January 3 ** United States President Dwight D. Eisenhower announces that the United States has severed diplomatic and consular relations with Cuba (Cuba–United States relations are restored in 2015). ** Aero Flight 311 (K ...

until 1978–79. Notable as a defensive specialist often tasked with defending against the star scorers of opposing teams, Westfall played most of his career as a right wing, although he played stints on defence in his earlier years and at centre in his later years. After his playing career ended, he became a color commentator on Islanders' broadcasts until 1998 when he retired from that position.

Playing career

He played his

junior hockey Junior hockey is a level of competitive ice hockey generally for players between 16 and 21 years of age. Junior hockey leagues in the United States and Canada are considered amateur (with some exceptions) and operate within regions of each cou ...

with the

Barrie Flyers The Barrie Flyers were a junior ice hockey team in the Ontario Hockey Association from 1945 to 1960, from Barrie, Ontario. The Flyers played home games at the Barrie Arena from 1945 to 1960. History The Barrie Flyers junior team was founded ...

and

Niagara Falls Flyers The Niagara Falls Flyers were two junior ice hockey franchises that played in the top tier in the Ontario Hockey Association. The first, a Junior "A" team existed from 1960 until 1972, and the second in Tier I Junior "A" from 1976 until 1982. ...

, and started his professional career with the Kingston Frontenacs. By

he joined the Bruins, although he had stints the next two years with the Frontenacs and the

Providence Reds The Providence Reds were a hockey team that played in the Canadian-American Hockey League (CAHL) between 1926 and 1936 and the American Hockey League (AHL) from 1936 to 1977, the last season of which they played as the Rhode Island Reds. The t ...

of the

American Hockey League The American Hockey League (AHL) is a professional ice hockey league based in the United States and Canada that serves as the primary developmental league for the National Hockey League (NHL). Since the 2010–11 season, every team in the le ...

(AHL). By 1966, he was firmly ensconced on Boston's checking line. Westfall won the Stanley Cup with the

1970 Events January * January 1 – Unix time epoch reached at 00:00:00 UTC. * January 5 – The 7.1 Tonghai earthquake shakes Tonghai County, Yunnan province, China, with a maximum Mercalli intensity of X (''Extreme''). Between 10,000 and ...

and

1972 Within the context of Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) it was the longest year ever, as two leap seconds were added during this 366-day year, an event which has not since been repeated. (If its start and end are defined using mean solar tim ...

. He was on the ice on

Bobby Orr Robert Gordon Orr (born March 20, 1948) is a Canadian former professional ice hockey player, widely acknowledged as one of the greatest of all time. Orr used his ice skating speed, scoring, and play-making abilities to revolutionize the pos ...

's famous Stanley Cup-winning goal in 1970 and also scored the second of the three fastest goals in

(NHL) history, when the Bruins scored three goals in 20 seconds in a 1971 game with the

Vancouver Canucks The Vancouver Canucks are a professional ice hockey team based in Vancouver. They compete in the National Hockey League (NHL) as a member of the Pacific Division (NHL), Pacific Division of the Western Conference (NHL), Western Conference, and ...

. During those seasons he made his reputation as a preeminent penalty killer (generally paired with centre Derek Sanderson or winger Don Marcotte), enough so that he was named to play in the All-Star Game in 1971, 1973, 1974 and 1975. Westfall scored 18 shorthanded goals for Boston during the regular season and added six more in Stanley Cup play for the Bruins. The latter mark--which he shares with Sanderson--is still the club record. Westfall was chosen by the New York Islanders in the 1972 NHL Expansion Draft. He was subsequently made the first captain of the team, a position he held until the 1976–77 season. Westfall scored the first goal in franchise history in their first game against the

Atlanta Flames The Atlanta Flames were a professional ice hockey team based in Atlanta from 1972 until 1980. They played home games in the Omni Coliseum and were members of the West and later Patrick divisions of the National Hockey League (NHL). Along with t ...

on October 7, 1972. Westfall was the first player to represent the Islanders in the NHL All-Star Game. His best season statistically was 1974–75, when Westfall led the Islanders into their first playoffs and all the way into the Stanley Cup semifinals, exploding in the playoffs with five goals and ten assists to cap a 22-goal, 55-point regular season. He remained an effective scorer through the 1976–77 season, in which he was awarded the Bill Masterton Trophy for perseverance and dedication, after which he relinquished the team captaincy to

Clark Gillies Clark Gillies (April 7, 1954 – January 21, 2022) was a Canadian professional ice hockey player. He played for the New York Islanders and Buffalo Sabres of the National Hockey League between 1974 and 1988. Gillies served as captain of the Island ...

. His scoring declined sharply in his final two seasons, during which he spent his time on checking lines and penalty killing.

Retirement

Westfall retired having played 1226 career NHL games, scoring 231 goals and 394 assists for 625 points. After the end of his playing days, Westfall became the Islanders'

color commentator A color commentator or expert commentator is a sports commentator who assists the main ( play-by-play) commentator, typically by filling in when play is not in progress. The phrase "colour commentator" is primarily used in Canadian English and ...

for what was then known as SportsChannel New York. He was often dubbed "18" by his confidant and broadcasting partner

Jiggs McDonald John Kenneth "Jiggs" McDonald (born November 28, 1938) is a sportscaster who has done play-by-play announcing for NHL games for more than 50 years. In 1990, McDonald received the Foster Hewitt Memorial Award from the Hockey Hall of Fame. Biograph ...

because during his playing career he wore that number. He was also known by that nickname by his former Islander teammates. Westfall continued in that position until he retired in 1998. Former NHL player

Joe Micheletti Joseph Robert Micheletti (born October 24, 1954) is an American ice hockey analyst and reporter, and a former defenseman who played in 142 World Hockey Association (WHA) games with the Calgary Cowboys and Edmonton Oilers between 1977 and 1979, a ...

took his spot in the broadcast booth. He made occasional appearances on Islanders' broadcasts for several seasons after that. Westfall was part of CTV's broadcast team for the

1984 Canada Cup The 1984 Labatt Canada Cup was a professional international ice hockey tournament played during the first three weeks of September 1984. The best-of-three final took place between Canada and Sweden, with Canada winning a two game sweep. Canadian ...

tournament. He provided reports and did interviews from ice level. On November 19, 2011, Westfall was inducted into the New York Islanders Hall of Fame. The Islanders held "Ed Westfall Night" in his honor. He and his former partner in the booth "Jiggs" McDonald called the second period in the game that night between two of his former teams, the New York Islanders and the Boston Bruins.

Career statistics

Regular season and playoffs

References

External links