Blueshirts Briefs: Small center provides big playoff push

Welcome back to Blueshirts Briefs, a series profiling those who had a short shift with the New York Rangers.

Every week until play resumes, Blue Line Station will feature a player, coach, or general manager who had a brief stint with the New York Rangers. We’ll look at what each contributed to the Blueshirts and why his stay on Broadway was short.

Bobby Sheehan

Position: Center

Hometown: Weymouth, MA

How the Rangers got him: Signed as a free agent, Oct. 1, 1978

Rangers stats: 4 goals, 3 assists, 7 points, 8 penalty minutes in 15 playoff games

Back checking

Bobby Sheehan played 310 NHL regular-season games over eight seasons for six different teams. Not one of them was the New York Rangers. The 5-foot-7, 155-pound center did, however, skate in 15 postseason matches for the Blueshirts in 1978-79 — and, boy, did he ever make an impact. More on that in a bit.

Sheehan’s NHL career started with the Montreal Canadiens in 1969-70. He played 45 games over two seasons, notching eight goals and six assists for 14 points. In 1971, the Habs would win the Stanley Cup. However, Sheehan was barely a factor, skating in just six matches and registering no points and a minus-4 rating.

After that season, Montreal traded Sheehan to the California Golden Seals for cash. The move paid off for Sheehan and the Seals, as the diminutive center enjoyed the most productive of his eight years in the NHL, finishing second on the team in scoring with 46 points (including 20 goals and 26 assists).

Sheehan spent the next four seasons in the World Hockey Association after being selected by the New England Whalers in the league’s General Players Draft in 1972. The Whalers traded him the following August to the New York Raiders, who were coached by former Rangers’ center Camille Henry.

Like Sheehan, Henry was himself a diminutive NHLer, listed at 5-foot-9, 152 pounds. And like Sheehan, Henry’s size didn’t preclude him from a productive pro career. In 637 regular season matches for the Rangers, Henry potted 256 goals and assisted on 222 others for 478 points; he also won the Calder and Lady Byng trophies during his time on Broadway.

Sheehan had his best pro season with the Raiders in 1972-73, finishing second on the team in scoring with 88 points (including 35 goals and 53 helpers, as well as a team-best 18 power-play tallies).

The following season, the Raiders struggled to compete against the established Rangers and expansion New York Islanders and wound up relocating to Cherry Hill, NJ, and becoming the New Jersey Knights. Both Henry and Sheehan were gone by season’s end.

Sheehan spent the next four seasons, respectively, with the WHA’s Edmonton Oilers, Chicago Blackhawks, Detroit Red Wings, and the WHA’s Indianapolis Racers.

In October 1978, the New York Rangers came calling.

With the Rangers

The 30-year-old from Boston’s south shore region spent the 1978-79 regular season with the Rangers’ American Hockey League affiliate, the New Haven Nighthawks.

But after the Rangers dropped Game One of their Quarterfinals series against the Philadelphia Flyers, head coach Fred Shero called up Sheehan. Wanting to add speed to the lineup, Shero had Sheehan center a line with Ron Duguay and Pat Hickey. And the diminutive pivot didn’t disappoint, scoring his first NHL playoff goal in Game Four (as the Rangers won in five).

Next, in the Semifinals against the first-place New York Islanders, Sheehan tallied in each of the first three games to help the Rangers stun their Long Island rivals in six. The upset left Islanders defenseman Denis Potvin slumped against the boards with his head slouched to the side, his face painted in disbelief.

Sheehan recorded an assist in the Stanley Cup Finals, where the Rangers fell in five to the dynastic Montreal Canadiens (who claimed their fourth straight Cup that spring).

Why he left the Rangers

After the season, he was traded to the Colorado Rockies for pedestrian defenseman Dennis Owchar and center Larry Skinner, neither of whom skated a single shift for the Blueshirts. Sheehan spent two seasons with the Rockies, signed with the Los Angeles Kings in the 1981 offseason, but played just four games.

Ironically, his last NHL game was on Dec. 2, 1981, at the Great Western Forum against the Rangers. Sheehan recorded two shots in New York’s 4-3 win.  Sheehan retired as the last and most successful of five New York Rangers who never appeared in a regular season game for the team, but did play in the Stanley Cup Playoffs.