Who wore number 1 in NHL?

Number one has almost exclusively been worn by goaltenders. Many of them are Hall of Fame players. Three players immediately stand out – Georges Vezina, Johnny Bower, and Terry Sawchuk. This trio consists of three of the best goalies of all-time.

Georges Vezina

Joseph Georges Gonzague Vézina was a Canadian professional ice hockey goaltender who played seven seasons in the National Hockey Association (NHA) and nine in the National Hockey League (NHL), all with the Montreal Canadiens. After being signed by the Canadiens in 1910, Vézina played in 327 consecutive regular season games and a further 39 playoff games, before leaving early during a game in 1925 due to illness. Vézina was diagnosed with tuberculosis, and died on March 27, 1926.

The only goaltender to play for the Canadiens between 1910 and 1925, Vézina helped the team win the Stanley Cup in 1916 and 1924, while reaching the Stanley Cup Finals three more times. Nicknamed the “Chicoutimi Cucumber” for his calm composure while in goal, Vézina allowed the fewest goals in the league seven times in his career: four times in the NHA and three times in the NHL.

In 1918, Vézina became the first NHL goaltender to both record a shutout and earn an assist on a goal. At the start of the 1926–27 NHL season, the Canadiens donated the Vezina Trophy to the NHL as an award to the goaltender who allowed the fewest goals during the season. Since 1981, the award has been given to the most outstanding goaltender as determined by a vote of NHL general managers. In Vézina’s hometown of Chicoutimi, the sports arena is named the Centre Georges-Vézina in his honour. When the Hockey Hall of Fame opened in 1945, Vézina was one of the original nine inductees, and in 2017 the NHL included him on their list of the 100 greatest players in league history.

Johnny Bower

John William Bower, nicknamed “The China Wall”, was a Canadian Hockey Hall of Fame goaltender who won four Stanley Cups during his career with the Toronto Maple Leafs. In 2017 he was named one of the “100 Greatest NHL Players” in history.

Terry Sawchuk

Terrance Gordon Sawchuk was a Canadian professional ice hockey goaltender who played 21 seasons in the National Hockey League (NHL) for the Detroit Red Wings, Boston Bruins, Toronto Maple Leafs, Los Angeles Kings and the New York Rangers. He won the Calder Trophy, earned the Vezina Trophy in four different seasons, was a four-time Stanley Cup champion, and was elected to the Hockey Hall of Fame the year after his final season, one of the few players for whom the three year waiting period was waived.

At the time of his death, Sawchuk was the all-time leader among NHL goaltenders with 447 wins and with 103 shutouts. Sawchuk will forever remain the all-time leader in wins and shutouts by goaltenders who played in the Original Six era. In 2017, Sawchuk was named one of the “100 Greatest NHL Players”.

Jacques Plante

Joseph Jacques Omer Plante was a Canadian professional ice hockey goaltender. During a career lasting from 1947 to 1975, he was considered to be one of the most important innovators in hockey. He played for the Montreal Canadiens from 1953 to 1963; during his tenure, the team won the Stanley Cup six times, including five consecutive wins. In 2017 Plante was named one of the “100 Greatest NHL Players” in history.

Plante retired in 1965 but was persuaded to return to the National Hockey League to play for the expansion St. Louis Blues in 1968. He was later traded to the Toronto Maple Leafs in 1970 and to the Boston Bruins in 1973. He joined the World Hockey Association as coach and general manager for the Quebec Nordiques in 1973–74. He then played goal for the Edmonton Oilers in 1974–75, ending his professional career with that team.

Plante was the first NHL goaltender to wear a goaltender mask in regulation play on a regular basis. He developed and tested many versions of the mask (including the forerunner of today’s mask/helmet combination) with the assistance of other experts. Plante was the first NHL goaltender to regularly play the puck outside his crease in support of his team’s defencemen, and he often instructed his teammates from behind the play. Plante was inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame in 1978, was chosen as the goaltender of the Canadiens’ “dream team” in 1985, and was inducted into the Quebec Sports Pantheon in 1994. The Montreal Canadiens retired Plante’s jersey, #1, the following year. Plante ranks seventh among NHL goalies for all-time career wins with 437.

Plante was one of the first goaltenders to skate behind the net to stop the puck. He also was one of the first to raise his arm on an icing call to let his defencemen know what was happening. He perfected a stand-up, positional style, cutting down the angles; he became one of the first goaltenders to write a how-to book about the position. He was a pioneer of stickhandling the puck; before that time, goaltenders passively stood in the net and simply deflected pucks to defencemen or backchecking forwards.

Plante was inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame in 1978, and into the Quebec Sports Pantheon in 1994. His no. 1 jersey was retired in 1995 by the Montreal Canadiens. The Jacques Plante Memorial Trophy was established in his honour as an award to the top goaltender in the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League. The Jacques Plante Trophy was established in Switzerland after Plante’s death; it is given out annually to the top Swiss goaltender. The main arena in Shawinigan, the town he grew up in, was renamed to Aréna Jacques Plante.

Plante was selected by Sports Illustrated magazine to its 1991 all-time All-Star team, as the backup to goalie Vladislav Tretiak.

His injury and subsequent donning of a mask was depicted in an installment of Canada’s Heritage Minute series.

Roberto Luongo

Roberto Luongo is a Canadian former professional ice hockey goaltender. He played 19 seasons in the National Hockey League (NHL) for the New York Islanders, Florida Panthers and the Vancouver Canucks. Luongo is a two-time NHL Second Team All-Star (2004 and 2007) and a winner of the William M. Jennings Trophy for backstopping his team to the lowest goals against average in the league (2011, with backup Cory Schneider). He was a finalist for several awards, including the Vezina Trophy as the league’s best goaltender (2004, 2007 and 2011), the Lester B. Pearson Award as the top player voted by his peers (2004 and 2007), and the Hart Memorial Trophy as the league’s most valuable player (2007). Luongo played 1,044 games as an NHL goaltender and won 489. He employed the butterfly style of goaltending.

Born in Montreal, Quebec, Luongo is of Italian and Irish ancestry. Prior to his NHL career, he played in the Quebec Major Junior Hockey League (QMJHL) for the Val-d’Or Foreurs and the Acadie-Bathurst Titan, winning back-to-back President’s Cups and establishing the league’s all-time play-off records in games played and wins. Following his second QMJHL season, Luongo was selected fourth overall by the Islanders in the 1997 NHL Entry Draft.

After splitting his professional rookie season between the Islanders and their American Hockey League (AHL) affiliate, the Lowell Lock Monsters in 1999–2000, he was traded to the Panthers. In five seasons with Florida, Luongo established team records for most games played, wins and shutouts; despite several strong seasons, however, the Panthers remained a weak team and were unable to qualify for the Stanley Cup playoffs during Luongo’s initial stint with the team. During the 2006 off-season, he was traded to the Canucks after failed contract negotiations with the Panthers.

In his first season in Vancouver, Luongo won 47 games, and was runner-up in voting for both the Hart Memorial Trophy (league MVP) and Vezina Trophy (best goaltender). Following his second year with the Canucks, he became the first NHL goaltender to serve as a team captain since Bill Durnan in the 1947–48 season. Luongo served in that capacity for two seasons before resigning from the position in September 2010. In the subsequent 2010–11 season, he helped the Canucks to Game 7 of the Stanley Cup Finals but lost to the Boston Bruins. During his eight-year tenure with Vancouver, Luongo became one of the team’s leaders in wins and shutouts. He returned to the Panthers during the 2013–14 season, where he spent the remainder of his career, qualifying for the playoffs with the Panthers only once during that time.

Internationally, Luongo has competed for Team Canada in numerous tournaments. As a junior, he won a silver medal at the 1999 World Junior Championships, while being named Best Goaltender in his second tournament appearance. Luongo won two gold medals at the 2003 and 2004 World Championships and a silver in the 2005 World Championships. He also won the 2004 World Cup championship and appeared in the 2006 Winter Olympics in Turin as a backup to Martin Brodeur in both instances. He succeeded Brodeur as Canada’s starting goaltender during the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver, winning a gold medal. On January 7, 2014, he was named to the 2014 Canadian Olympic hockey team, where he won his second Olympic gold medal in a largely backup role to Carey Price.

Luongo played in the butterfly style of goaltending, dropping to his knees with his skates pointing outwards and his pads meeting in the middle in order to cover the bottom portion of the net. Owing to the style of play, groin injuries are common for butterfly goalies. Luongo suffered one during the 2008–09 season and missed 24 games.

An athletic goaltender, Luongo was known for having quick reflexes, particularly with his glove. One of Luongo’s early goaltending coaches, François Allaire, remembered Luongo to have had the “best catching glove he’d ever seen in a kid” when he first came to his goaltending school in Sainte-Thérèse-de-Gaspé, Québec, at the age of 14. Allaire is known to be a strong proponent of the butterfly style. At 6 feet and 3 inches, Luongo was able to cover a lot of net with his size. Observers also noted the strong concentration, competitiveness and mental aspects of his game. On the other hand, his puck-handling skills have been described as a weakness.

His style began to be directed during his midget years with Allaire and Montreal-Bourassa goaltending coach Mario Baril. Luongo sent tapes of his play to Allaire during his rookie season in the QMJHL and his former goaltending coach advised him to be more aggressive and come out of the net more to cut off angles and challenge shooters. Later in his NHL career, the Canucks hired a new goaltending coach, Roland Melanson, prior to the 2010–11 season. Working with Melanson, Luongo began playing deeper in his crease against Allaire’s original advice, allowing him to maintain positioning for rebounds.

Vancouver Canucks head coach Alain Vigneault said that Luongo played best with more playing time over the length of the season. Throughout his career, he garnered lots of playing time, including four consecutive 70-game seasons from 2003–04 to 2007–08 between the Florida Panthers and Canucks. He was known to suffer from slow starts to the season, usually in the first month of October. In his first three Octobers with the Canucks, Luongo posted a combined 10–13–0 record and a .899 save percentage – numbers that are well below his career pace.

Luongo received the Mark Messier Leadership Award in his first season with the Canucks for the month of March 2007. Prior to his third season with Vancouver, he was named Markus Näslund’s successor as team captain and the first goaltender to be named a captain in 59 years. Teammate Mattias Öhlund, who served as alternate captain to Luongo for one season, described him as a vocal leader, while Luongo has also identified that quality in himself. General manager Mike Gillis described his commitment level as “unprecedented”, adding that “he’d be a great example for our younger guys”, at the time of the captaincy announcement. He served in that capacity for two seasons before relinquishing the captaincy prior to the 2010–11 season.

David Aebischer

David Aebischer is a Swiss former professional ice hockey goaltender who played in the National Hockey League with the Colorado Avalanche, Montreal Canadiens and the Phoenix Coyotes. He was a member of the 2001 Stanley Cup champion Avalanche team, becoming the first Swiss native to achieve the feat. Aebischer also played several seasons in his native Switzerland with HC Fribourg-Gottéron, HC Lugano and the Rapperswil-Jona Lakers of the National League (NL).

Aebischer is also known as a goalie coach for HC Fribourg-Gottéron.

Red Almas

Ralph Clayton Almas, better known as Red Almas, was a professional ice hockey goaltender. He played for a decade in three professional leagues.

Lorne Anderson

Lawrence Robert Anderson was a Canadian professional ice hockey player. Born in Renfrew, Ontario, he played with the New York Rangers. He gave up the fastest hat trick in NHL history, in 21 seconds, to Bill Mosienko on March 23, 1952. After that Anderson was never seen in an NHL rink again.

Hardy Astrom

Ray Hardy Åström is a retired Swedish professional ice hockey goaltender who played three seasons in the National Hockey League (NHL) for the New York Rangers and Colorado Rockies.

Due to his tendency for letting in shots taken from behind the blue line, Rockies head coach Don Cherry unceremoniously dubbed him “The Swedish Sieve”.

Åström was the first European goaltender to start an NHL game, when he played for the Rangers against the Montreal Canadiens on February 25, 1978. Åström played brilliantly in the Rangers’ 6-3 win, which also stopped Montreal’s 28-game unbeaten streak.

Murray Bannerman

Murray Bannerman is a Canadian former ice hockey goaltender. He spent the majority of his career with the Chicago Blackhawks, though also briefly played for the Vancouver Canucks, who selected him in the 1977 NHL amateur draft.

Hank Bassen

Henry “Hank, Red” Bassen was a Canadian ice hockey goaltender. Bassen served as a back-up goaltender in the National Hockey League for the Chicago Black Hawks, Detroit Red Wings and Pittsburgh Penguins. He was the father of Bob Bassen, who played 765 regular-season games in the NHL.

Garry Bauman

Garry Glenwood Bauman was a professional ice hockey goaltender in the National Hockey League during the 1960s. He played 35 games over three seasons with the Montreal Canadiens and Minnesota North Stars.

Bauman and Montreal teammate Charlie Hodge shared goaltending duties in the 1967 NHL All-Star game, combining to record the first shutout in the history of the showcase event. It was one of only three games Bauman played with Montreal before being selected by the North Stars in the 1967 NHL Expansion Draft. He played parts of two seasons with the Stars, and then returned to Alberta to play for Calgary in the senior league.

Jim Bedard

James Arthur Bédard is a Canadian retired ice hockey goaltender. He is also known as the longtime goaltending coach for the Detroit Red Wings of the National Hockey League (NHL).

Originally drafted in 1976 by the Washington Capitals, Bédard played for parts of two seasons with the Capitals. After playing two seasons in the minor leagues, Bédard signed to play in the Finnish SM-liiga, After two seasons with TPS Turku he played in Finland for 12 seasons more, mostly in lower divisions, before finally retiring in 1994.

After his playing career, he served as the goaltending coach with the Detroit Red Wings for 19 seasons. He had won three Stanley Cups with Detroit in 1998, 2002 and 2008. On May 9, 2016, it was reported that Bédard’s contract with the team would not be renewed.

Bédard is also known as the goalie coach for the Detroit Red Wings Alumni Association (being active in its efforts to raise money for children’s charities in Metro Detroit), OHL’s Windsor Spitfires, and Dallas Stars AHL team based in Austin called the Texas Stars.

Gordie Bell

Gordon John Edward “Tinkle” Bell was a Canadian professional ice hockey goaltender.

In the 1945–46 season he made 8 appearances for the Toronto Maple Leafs. He would not play another NHL game for 10 more years when he suited up for the New York Rangers in 2 playoff games.

Bell played several seasons in the minor league American Hockey League. He began his pro career in 1942–3 with the Buffalo Bisons of the AHL. After a two-season absence from pro hockey, he split the 1944–5 season between Toronto and the Providence Reds. He died in Belleville, Ontario on November 3, 1980.

His brother Joe Bell also played in the NHL.

Thomas Greiss

Thomas Greiss is a German professional ice hockey player known as a goaltender for the Detroit Red Wings. Selected 94th overall in the third round of the 2004 NHL Entry Draft by the San Jose Sharks, he has also played for the Phoenix Coyotes, Pittsburgh Penguins, and the New York Islanders during his NHL career.

Glenn Hall

Glenn Henry Hall is a Canadian former professional ice hockey goaltender. During his National Hockey League career with the Detroit Red Wings, Chicago Black Hawks, and St. Louis Blues, Hall seldom missed a game and was a consistent performer, winning the Vezina Trophy, which at the time was awarded to the goaltender on the team allowing the fewest goals against (a distinction that now results in being awarded the William M. Jennings Trophy), three times, being voted the First Team All-Star goaltender seven times, and winning the Calder Memorial Trophy as best rookie. Nicknamed “Mr. Goalie”, he was the first goaltender to develop and make effective use of the butterfly style of goalkeeping. In 2017 Hall was named one of the 100 Greatest NHL Players in history. He is the grandfather of Grant Stevenson.

Ed Giacomin

Edward “Ed” Giacomin is a retired professional ice hockey goaltender who played for the New York Rangers and Detroit Red Wings in the National Hockey League, as well as for the Providence Reds of the American Hockey League.

Bernie Parent

Bernard Marcel Parent is a Canadian former professional ice hockey goaltender who played 13 National Hockey League (NHL) seasons with the Philadelphia Flyers, Boston Bruins, and Toronto Maple Leafs, and also spent one season in the World Hockey Association (WHA) with the Philadelphia Blazers. Parent is widely acknowledged as one of the greatest goaltenders of all time. During the 1973–74 and 1974–75 seasons, in what many consider the finest consecutive seasons ever by a goaltender, the Flyers won two Stanley Cups and Parent won the Vezina Trophy and Conn Smythe Trophy both seasons.

In that two-year run of dominance, Parent posted 30 shutouts in regular and post season play combined. A 1984 inductee into the Hockey Hall of Fame, Parent was rated number 63 on The Hockey News’ list of The Top 100 NHL Players of All-Time in 1998. Parent remains an iconic fan favorite in Philadelphia decades after his retirement. In 2017 Parent was named one of the ‘100 Greatest NHL Players’ in history.