I learned to love the NHL by watching Soviet teams' holiday tours of North America, looking up the meaning of teams' names in an English-Russian dictionary and drawling the logos on the back of my math notebook.
Whalers, Penguins and Oilers logos/unis were mind-blowing...
Whalers, Penguins and Oilers logos/unis were mind-blowing...
Soviet teams' visual identities were bland, stern and had little variety. Their uniforms were whatever could be cheaply made by local manufacturers. Their logos would feature a star, a hammer, maybe a gear or something, and the name would be along the lines of "Excavator Builder"
N. Americans think that "Red Army" was a cool name, but nobody called them that. Back home, they were CSKA, a stupid acronym. They wore a star on the chest. So did SKA Leningrad. They competes against a Chemist, a Tractor, a Metallurgist, a Lokomotiv and the Uritsky Sports Club.
Khimik's yellow jerseys were nice, and the Soviet Wings was an energetic name, but most teams were indistinguishable from each other. All Dynamos wore blue and a D on their chest. There were 3 or more of them. There were three different Torpedoes, all in blue and red.
To me, seeing the Oilers in blue and orange, the Whalers in vivid green, the Pens' yellow sleeves was like trying ice cream for the first time. And all those logos, obviously unique to each club, not mass-produced for all the Dynamos in the land...
Anyway, Slava is maudlin...
Anyway, Slava is maudlin...
Vancouver and Quebec were mysteries because nobody could make out what was depicted on their logos or what their names meant.
Quebec's logo was the subject of many arguments: is it a lady's shoe? An elephant butt?
Quebec's logo was the subject of many arguments: is it a lady's shoe? An elephant butt?
