We’re not sure if they used a boot heel for a puck, what they did for nets, boards and benches or whether the men watching doffed their top hats and shouted “hip, hip hooray” for a goal. No sepia-toned pictures survived, not even a pencil sketch. But when nine skaters of the home side Granite Curling Club met nine equals from the neighbouring Caledonians on Feb. 16, 1888, it was the Big Bang for the Centre Of The Hockey Universe. The first organized hockey game in Toronto, involving proper sticks, two set teams, coded rules, an indoor venue and most notably, newspaper verification, was a 4-1 win for the Granites. If there was a post-game traffic jam on Church St., it...
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