In September of 1990, the Montreal Canadiens and Minnesota North Stars travelled to the USSR as part of their training camp for the 90-91 season. It was a long way to go for a training camp, but there’s a lot of NHL fans over there, and in particular, Montreal Canadiens fans, and this was a once in a lifetime chance for folks there to see these players in living colour.
Minnesota won only one of four games, but Montreal beat Leningrad SKA 5-3, Dynamo Riga 4-2, and Moscow Central Army 4-1, and lost 4-1 to Dynamo Moscow.
In semi-related news, years later, in 2000, I was walking the back streets of St. Petersburg and came across a restaurant called ‘The Montreal Canadiens Club’. Imagine my surprise!
I went in and there was a dance floor with a giant mural of the Montreal skyline, and also a souvenir booth selling Habs pucks and pins and such. And the waitresses wore team jerseys. Eventually this place closed down because it was really expensive, way too many rubles for the average Russian citizen. But they managed to bring the entire Legends of Hockey team there for a big night and there were pictures of Frank Mahovlich, Bobby Hull, Guy Lafleur, and other NHL stars getting tipsy and eyeballing the waitresses.
A few weeks after discovering this place I brought my friends there for dinner and it was great fun. I drank too much vodka, and went well beyond my budget, but I needed to do this. After all, how often does one get to eat at a Montreal Canadiens restaurant in St. Petersburg, Russia?
