Muskegon Mohawks

International Hockey League (1965-1984)

Tombstone

Born: Re-branded from Muskegon Zephyrs
Re-Branded: 1984 (Muskegon Lumberjacks)

First Game: October 29, 1965 (L 5-4 @ Toledo Blades)
Last Game: April 8, 1984 (L 7-4 @ Milwaukee Admirals)

Turner Cup Champions: 1968

Arena

L.C. Walker Sports Arena (5,061)

Marketing

Team Colors: Royal Blue, White & Scarlet

Ownership

Owners:

1965-1973: Jerry DeLise
1973-1980: Dr. Richard Harris, John Snider, Dr. Lawrence Lauretti, et al.
1980-1984: John Snider, et al.

Sold (1984): $1.00 (John Snider et al. to Larry Gordon)¹

Our Favorite Stuff

Muskegon Mohawks
Logo T-Shirt

The Mohawks patrolled Muskegon’s L.C. Walker Arena ice sheet for 19 seasons between 1965 and 1984. At their peak, they hoisted the IHL’s Turner Cup in 1968 on the back of NHL All-Star refugee Carl Brewer. At their nadir in 1984, the team sold for a single dollar to veteran hockey exec Larry Gordon, who changed the team’s name to the Muskegon Lumberjacks.

This Mohawks design is available in several colors and in sizes Small through 6XL today at Vintage Ice Hockey!

When you make a purchase through an affiliate link like this one, Fun While It Lasted earns a commission at no additional cost to you. Thanks for your support!

Background

Muskegon’s International Hockey League club played under the Zephyrs moniker for five seasons (1960-1965), before team founder Jerry Delise re-branded the club as the Muskegon Mohawks prior to the 1965-66 season.

1968: Carl Brewer & Turner Cup Championship

In 1967-68 the Mohawks signed the iconoclastic 29-year old NHL refugee Carl Brewer. Brewer was perhaps one of the greatest defensemen of the 1960’s and he was certainly the most gifted player to ever suit up for the Mohawks. As a young man, Brewer anchored the defense for three straight Stanley Cup champion teams for the Toronto Maple Leafs from 1962 to 1964 and earned three NHL All-Star selections. But his remarkable career was punctuated by disputes with authority and serial retirements during his prime years. Among other complaints with NHL life, Brewer loathed air travel.

In the winter of 1967-68, Brewer’s wanderings brought him to Muskegon as a player-coach. The Brewer-led Mohawks roared through the 7-club IHL, easily winning the regular season with a 43-17-12 record. Muskegon was equally dominant in the playoffs. The swept the Columbus Checkers in four games in the semis and swiftly dispatched the Dayton Gems 4 games to 1 in the Turner Cup finals. The final victory came at home in Game 5 before an L.C. Walker Arena crowd of 4,709 on Saturday, April 13, 1968. Brewer scored a goal in his final Muskegon appearance. Bryan McLay netted a pair in the 6-2 triumph.

According to a 1970 Sports Illustrated profile, Brewer relished the long bus rides through the icy Midwest, which allowed him time to read. Following the season, the Detroit Red Wings offered a contract to return to the NHL. In typical fashion, Brewer spurned the offer to go play & coach in Finland…which he travelled to by boat. The 1968 Turner Cup would be the only championship for Muskegon during the Mohawks era.

Glory Days

Between 1967 and 1976, the Mohawks posted nine consecutive winning seasons, highlighted by the 1968 Turner Cup championship season. While Brewer drifted through for only one winter, the iron men of the Mohawks throughout the Golden Era of the 1960’s and early 70’s were player-coach Moose Lallo and right winter Bryan McLay.

Both men arrived in Muskegon along with the Zephyrs in the fall of 1960. Lallo was on the tail end of a 20-year playing career, and served double-duty as the team’s Head Coach. He led the Zephyrs to a Turner Cup championship in their second season in 1961-62. Lallo retired as a player in 1965 and continued as Head Coach and General Manager until the late 1970’s. McLay played thirteen seasons with the Zephyrs and Mohawks from 1960 to 1973, scoring exactly 500 goals in 932 games. Like Lallo, McLay stayed with the Mohawks in the front office after his retirement. Also like Lallo, he never played a minute in the NHL.

Like any great minor league team of that era, the Mohawks also had a classic tough guy named Lynn Margarit. Margarit played eight seasons for the Mohawks. During the final season of his career in the winter of 1975-76, Margarit became the all-time penalty minutes leader in the IHL with 2,156. The enforcer had a particularly fierce rivalry with the players (and fans) of the Toledo franchise. In 1968, a 20-year old Toledo fan filed assault and battery charges against Margarit, claiming the big defenseman bludgeoned and kicked him with his skates in the stands of the Toledo Sports Arena. In 1975, the Toledo Goaldiggers’ Ken Wright attacked Margarit in a game at Toledo, beating him so badly he had to be removed from the ice on a stretcher and hospitalized.

Sold For A Buck

The Mohawks fell on hard times after 1976. They never again had a winning season under the Mohawks name. Lallo resigned his Head Coach and General Manager post in March 1978, ending eighteen years with the organization. McLay replaced him, but quit himself less than a year later when the ‘Hawks got off to an historically bad start, going 3-32-3 to start the 1978-79 season.

The Mohawks’ struggles worsened as the 1980’s dawned. The city threatened the Mohawks with eviction over back rent in December 1981 and the team nearly folded in August 1982. The Mohawks hung in for two more losing winters, bottoming out in 1983-84 with a 19-58-5 record, the second worst performance in the IHL’s 24-year history in Muskegon.

Longtime pro hockey exec Larry Gordon purchased the Mohawks in June 1984 for the reported price of $1.² Gordon was a former World Hockey Association executive and the ex-General Manager of the Edmonton Oilers. Gordon re-branded the club, dropping the ‘Mohawks’ moniker in favor of the ‘Lumberjacks’ for the 1984-85 campaign. Over the next two years, Gordon assembled the pieces that would make the Lumberjacks the dominant IHL club of the late 1980’s.

The Zephyrs/Mohawks/Lumberjacks franchise moved to Cleveland and went out of business along with the rest of the IHL in the spring of 2001.

Muskegon Mohawks Shop

OUR FAVORITE STUFF

Muskegon Mohawks
Ceramic mug

Available now from our friends at Vintage Ice Hockey, this fully-insulated porcelain mug is ideal for your morning brew.

Ceramic | Capacity: 11 fl oz
Dishwasher safe
Lead and Cadmium free
Imported; processed and printed in the U.S.A.