Hot Line in Hall of Fame spotlight

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This article was published 19/10/2016 (3575 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

It was before they played four seasons together, combining for 1,377 points. Before they led the Winnipeg Jets to two World Hockey Association championships, winning the Avco Cup in their second season in 1976 and again in their last year in 1978.

In fact, before they even played their first game together, Anders Hedberg, Ulf Nilsson and Bobby Hull knew they had something special.

The trio, who would go on to be one of the most recognizable professional hockey lines Winnipeg has produced, known around the hockey world as the Hot Line, knew they were destined for greatness the first time they stepped on the ice together at St. James Civic Centre for training camp in 1974.

“We had been told that, yeah, (management was) planning on playing us with Bobby, but we obviously didn’t know it would work and we didn’t know if it was really true, either,” recalled Hedberg, 65, who, along with Nilsson, 66, took questions prior to the Jets’ game against the Toronto Maple Leafs Wednesday night at the MTS Centre.

The trio (Hull was absent) was later honoured as the first inductees into the team’s newly formed Hall of Fame.

Nilsson and Hedberg took part in a ceremonial puck-drop in honour of their achievements, and, before the game got underway, a video montage of the Hot Line was shown on the arena’s Jumbotron.

“It makes me feel really good,” said Nilsson.

Looking back, the pair’s introduction to North American hockey was a shaky one.

With Hedberg and Nilsson coming from Sweden to play for the Jets, they knew little about their new teammate, including where Hull would fit on the line. A left-handed shot, Hedberg had grown up playing left wing or centre, but Nilsson, who was a natural centre, left him with just one comfortable option.

That is, until Hull showed up.

“Kid, get over on the right side,” was how Hedberg remembered the interaction with Hull. “And it worked.”

Hedberg added: “It was just a magic, magic practice where the antennas were up and it worked. It just fit… I don’t think we missed one line rush, and I’m very emotional because that was very, very special. We knew that evening it will work.”

For the next four years, Hull, Nilsson and Hedberg would help shape the way not only Winnipeg viewed the game, but the rest of the world, too.

Hull was a natural scorer, and with Nilsson and Hedberg ahead of their time, valuing puck possession over the now outdated dump-and-chase model, together they took the WHA by storm.

In each season, all three recorded at least 100 points — except for Hull in the 1976-77 season, where he was limited to just 34 games (he still scored 53 points) — and brought hockey glory to Winnipeg by winning two Avco Cups.

Though Wednesday was set up to be a perfect night — and some great days ahead, as both will be in attendance for the Heritage Classic events this weekend, however, neither of which will play — one obvious thing was still missing: Bobby Hull.

Hull, plagued by a checkered past, including allegations of domestic abuse in two prior marriages and an interview with a Russian journalist where he appeared to show sympathy for Nazi Germany, opted not to be in attendance.

“I spoke to Bobby and he’s upset some things are being brought up from the past,” said Nilsson. “I’m disappointed he’s not here.”

“Sad,” added Hedberg. “But he is old enough to make those decisions and it will not destroy our evening or Winnipeg’s evening. We’re celebrating hockey and that can be done without whoever, even Bobby Hull.”

jeff.hamilton@freepress.mb.ca Twitter: @jeffkhamilton