Through the Looking Glass: Magic on ice
They tooted horns, rang bells and blew sirens. On a warm April night in 1963, nearly 11,000 playoff-crazed hockey fans shoe-horned into the spanking new Baltimore Civic Center to watch their beloved Clippers win their first postseason game.
The crowd cheered every shot by the Clippers’ high-scoring center, Dave Creighton, and every save by goalie Marcel Pelletier. They whooped when the public address announcer asked that a doctor go to the dressing room of the Hershey Bears, the Clippers’ opponent in the American Hockey League Calder Cup quarterfinals.
Baltimore won the game, 5-3, but lost the best-of-three series to Hershey. The Clippers would play 14 more years in the AHL but no team captured the city’s heart like the first one. Noel Price. Jean Ratelle. Duane Rupp. Who can forget?
Baltimore Sun file photo by Paul Hutchins
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