The Great Expansion - The Ultimate Risk that Changed the NHL Forever

Join them on this ultimate hockey road trip through Europe in the locker rooms, on the ice and in the streets. Sit behind Jaromir Jagr's mother in Kladno. Admire the Alps with Joe Thornton and Rick Nash. Walk through a pine forest to Peter Forsberg's childhood rink. Debate with Russian police at the Dynamo arena to meet Alexander Ovechkin before he became an NHL star.

And experience all the adventures of dozens of NHLers like Danny Briere, Martin St. Louis, Alexei Kovalev, Ilya Kovalchuk, Alexei Yashin, Mike Knuble, Henrik Lundqvist, Zdeno Chara, Daniel Alfredsson, Saku Koivu, Miroslav Satan, Martin Brodeur, Sergei Fedorov and Dominic Hasek.

Technically it was a minor league, but for hockey fans west of the Mississippi, the Western Hockey League provided major-league entertainment for over 25 years.

The WHL was a determined and ambitious professional league, with some 22 teams based in major American and Canadian cities. Known as the Pacific Coast Hockey League prior to 1952, the WHL aspired to establish itself as North America's second major league, a western counterpart to the early eastern Canada-based National Hockey League. But it never quite managed to make the jump to the majors.

Ice Warriors is a play-by-play history of the Western Hockey League, recalling the league's beginnings as the Pacific Coast League, how it came to rival the NHL and what led to its disbanding in 1974. By interviewing former players, coaches and fans, and examining statistical records, Jon C. Stott captures the WHL's glory days and pays tribute to a time when hockey was played with heart.

Eddie Shore was the Babe Ruth and Ty Cobb of hockey, a brilliant player with an unmatched temper. Emerging from the Canadian prairie to become a member of the Boston Bruins in 1926, the man from Saskatchewan invaded every circuit in the NHL like a runaway locomotive on a downgrade. Hostile fans turned out in droves with a wish to see him killed, but in Boston he could do no wrong.

During his twenty-year professional career, the controversial Shore personified "that old time hockey" like no other, playing the game with complete disregard for his own safety. Shore was one of the most penalized men in the NHL, and also a perennial member of its All Star Team. A dedicated athlete, Shore won the Hart Trophy for the league’s most valuable player four times — a record for a defenseman not since matched — and led Boston to two Stanley Cups in 1929 and 1939. In 1933, Shore was the instigator of hockey’s most infamous event, the tragic "Ace Bailey Incident," and during his subsequent sixteen-game suspension the fans chanted, "We want Shore!" After retiring from the NHL in 1940, Shore’s passion for the game remained undiminished, and as owner and tyrant of the AHL Springfield Indians, he won championship after championship.

This is an action-packed and full-throated celebration of the "mighty Eddie Shore" — and also of the sport of hockey as it was gloriously played in a bygone age.

During the 1980s, the geography of minor-league professional hockey changed radically, moving from its roots in the Canadian Maritime provinces, New England and the Midwestern states into the American south. In addition to cities like Dallas, Charlotte, Norfolk and Oklahoma City, which had long traditions of minor-league hockey, unlikely places such as Biloxi, Baton Rouge, Little Rock and Augusta hosted teams. Over an 18-year period, minor-league hockey was played in 72 different southern cities, and at one point there were more minor-league teams in Texas than in all of Canada, making Texas the place where many players learned their hockey skills.

Hockey Night in Dixie examines this phenomenon with an historical overview of the period, including interviews with people involved in the founding and early years of each of the 13 leagues. There are also in-depth portraits of four teams, one from each of the four lower minor leagues that played during the 2005-06 season. These portraits feature interviews with owners, coaches, players, officials, fans and reporters.

Amply illustrated with photographs, Hockey Night in Dixie paints a vivid picture of this extraordinary development in minor-league sports.

Few have been given the opportunity to be on both sides of the hockey rink—managing the Leafs and the Rangers and then regaling his legion of TV and radio fans with the colourful insider knowledge he's amassed—about blockbuster trades, NHL stars, and the talent that got away. But Gord Stellick has. In an almost forty-year career, he's one of the best known hockey personalities around. And Stellicktricity captures the man, his career as the ultimate hockey insider, and insights and anecdotes on the game he loves so much.

Not only is the book crammed with details on hockey greats like Gretzky, Orr, Sakic, and Crosby, his NHL bosses (like Harold Ballard and Punch Imlach), but it also contains an inimitable look at Stellick's colleagues in the media. Destined to become a favourite of hockey fans everywhere, Stellicktricity not only covers every corner of the game of hockey but offers the author's unique view of other sports across North America.

• Stellick is ubiquitous as a host, colour commentator, and analyst on hockey broadcasts and shows of all kinds in TV and radio
• The book is loaded with Leafs content and brimming with anecdotes about legendary players, hockey management, and NHL characters (like Bob Goodenow and Wendel Clark)