John Scott

TigerBlog hopes you had a chance to read yesterday's guest entry from Tad La Fountain. 

If not, HERE it is.

His piece was really good. It was also really long. TB originally thought about making it a two-part entry, but he decided to let it all go on one day.

Hopefully you liked it.

The average length of a TigerBlog entry is about 750 words. The piece Tad wrote was twice that. 

TB, though, will never give up on the idea that people will read lengthy pieces as long as they're compelling and well done. Tad's piece is both of those.

As for TB, he's passed the 60,000-word mark on the women's history book. That's coming soon enough, so yes, he's hoping that people still have the patience for something long.

In other news, TigerBlog listened to an amazing podcast over the weekend. Here it is:

This is an outstanding podcast. It's the story of former NHL player John Scott, who was a fringe player - and mostly an enforcer - who suddenly at the end of his career found himself through an incredible series of events in the all-star game.

TigerBlog sort of remembered the story. The podcast will tug at a bunch of your emotions, mostly making you smile and, perhaps, a bit misty.

TB wanted to share the podcast with you today. The only problem is that the story of a 6-8 former hockey player who never scored more than three goals in a season in college or the NHL has nothing to do with Princeton Athletics.

He also used his non-segue segue last week, and he's only good for maybe one or two of those a year. That meant the challenge was now to find something that links John Scott and Princeton.

Ah, the challenge.

The first was that perhaps he played against Princeton while he was at Michigan Tech. That would be the easiest.

Well, the Princeton-Michigan Tech series history lasts all of two games, and they long predate the early 2000s, when Scott was in college (as an engineering major, no less). In fact, the series predates when Michigan Tech was called Michigan Tech.

The first meeting between the two was a 3-3 tie on Jan. 4, 1930, when the school was called the Michigan College of Mining. That game was in Princeton, one day short of seven years after Hobey Baker Rink opened.

The only other meeting was in Detroit on Dec. 30, 1969. That one was a 5-2 Michigan Tech win.

Michigan Tech, by the way, is located in Houghton. How long a ride is that from Detroit? How about just short of nine hours.

So that was a dead end.

When TB heard the John Scott story, it did remind him of the career of Princeton alum George Parros, who played for eight years in the NHL. Like Scott, Parros became known as an enforcer.

Parros actually had much better numbers, in college and the NHL. 

Scott, at Michigan Tech, scored seven goals and added 12 assists. Parros had 20 goals and 32 assists for his Princeton career.

In the NHL, Scott played 286 games, with five goals, six assists and 544 penalty minutes. 

In his NHL career, Parros played 474 games, with 18 goals, 18 assists and 1,092 penalty minutes. 

Scott averaged 1.9 penalty minutes per game. Parros averaged 2.3 per game.

Parros also won the Stanley Cup with the Anaheim Ducks in 2007. Scott had the all-star game experience that was covered in the podcast.

There is one big connection between Parros and Scott. 

When TB did a search, he found four videos that showcased fights between the two of them.

TB does not like to see fighting in hockey. It detracts from the beauty of the game. In fact, TB is not going to link to the videos he found here at all.

What TB really wonders is what it would be like for Parros and Scott to get together now and talk about their experiences in the NHL and especially what they remember from their fights.

In fact, maybe he'll try to track them down and find out. Hmmm. He wonders what he'd learn from such conversations.