Like many netminders of the pre-expansion era, Marcel Paille had the great misfortune of trying to break into the NHL during what many consider to be the Golden Age of Goaltending. Those were the days of the Original Six, when each team carried only one goalkeeper and five of the incumbents, Johnny Bower, Glenn Hall, Jacques Plante, Terry Sawchuk and Gump Worsley were eventually inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame.
Joseph Marcel Rejean Paille was born on December 8, 1932 in Shawinigan Falls, Quebec, the same small Canadian town that produced the legendary Jacques Plante. He began his junior hockey career at the age of 17 with the Quebec Citadelles of the QJHL in 1949. When his junior career ended he moved to the Mantane Red Rockets (LSLHL) and then the North Bay Trappers (NOHA). It was while he was with North Bay that he was scouted and later signed by the Chicoutimi Sagueneens (QHL) where he earned Rookie of the Year honors in 1956.
Paille was selected by the Rangers from Chicoutimi in the 1956 Inter-League Draft and sent to the Cleveland Barons of the AHL. Marcel played very well that season posting a 34-25-3 record with seven shutouts and a 3.20 GAA. He also earned a spot on the league’s second All Star team and led the Barons to the Calder Cup championship that spring. At that point, the Rangers considered Marcel to be their “goalie of the future” and moved him to their Providence Reds farm club while trading the rights to 32-year old Johnny Bower to the Barons.
Paille made his NHL debut on the night of November 2, 1957 shutting out the Bruins 5-0 in Boston. He played a total of 33 games for the Blueshirts that year, posting an 11-15-7 record with a 3.09 GAA while sharing the Rangers netminding duties with Gump Worsley.
While with the Rangers that season, Marcel experimented with an odd looking white fiberglass mask that has become very familiar to hockey historians over the years. The mask was manufactured by the Brunswick-Balke Collender Company in Toronto and featured a wide Plexiglass eye shield. The contraption was heavy however, and offered little ventilation. Perspiration from Marcel’s forehead ran down into his eyes and the Plexiglass shield became foggy. The experiment ended after a single practice but Marcel donned a more traditional mask while with Providence in the early 1970’s.
Over the next seven seasons Marcel bounced between the Rangers and their various farm clubs in Providence, Springfield, Buffalo, Baltimore and Vancouver, being recalled when Worsley was injured or needed a rest. Paille made a place for himself in AHL history when he joined the Springfield Indians in 1959 and backstopped the team to three consecutive Calder Cup titles. Paille’s 47 victories in 1960-61 set an AHL record and he won the Harry “Hap” Holmes Award in 1961 and 1962 for leading the league in goals-against average. Overall Paille went 107-54-8 with 12 shutouts in 169 games with Springfield.
Then in 1964-65 as Emile Francis was growing tired of Jacques Plante’s diva-like behavior, Marcel was brought up to New York and played in 39 games, posting a 10-21-7 record with a 3.58 GAA.
Former Ranger Dick Duff got to know Marcel during his time in New York and remembered him fondly.
Dick Duff: “I had a lot of fun with Marcel Paille in the short time I was with the Rangers. We lived in the same place on Eighth Avenue and 45th St in an apartment building. It was four blocks from the old Madison Square Garden. So one night I said ‘Marcel where are you going?’
He said ‘I’m going to have a beer’.
I said ‘What kind of beer do you drink?’
He said ‘I like Schaefer beer.’
I said ‘Why Schaefer?
‘Because it’s the one beer to have when you’re having more than one.”
Emile Francis: “Paille was a standup goalkeeper. He played his angles very well and gave up very few rebounds. Because of being a standup goalkeeper and playing his angles everything went off into the corner. That was the difference between the old goalkeepers and these young guys now. They go down the way they do and the rebound comes straight out. But if you were a standup goalkeeper playing your angles you’d steer everything off into the corner.
He was a very calm guy with a lot of poise. He never got excited.
We were playing against the Chicago Blackhawks and Paille had a pompadour haircut Bobby Hull came down outside blue line and he took a slap shot and the puck split his hair! I damn near passed out on the bench. I could see the puck go right through his hair. If it hit him it would’ve killed him.”
Paille played well considering the team that he had in front of him, but the Rangers were in a rebuilding mode and he was traded to Providence that spring as part of the deal that brought Ed Giacomin to the Rangers. Overall in parts of seven seasons with the Rangers, Marcel saw action in 107 games, going 32-52-22 with two shutouts and a 3.42 GAA. Marcel then spent the next seven seasons in Providence where he became a fan favorite both on and off the ice.
Providence native Michael Venticinque grew up watching Marcel tending goal for the Reds.
Michael Venticinque: “He was quite a goaltender. I was invited to a hockey game one night and I was just fixated on Marcel. I was fascinated by the way he would stand up, come out, cut down on the angles, and occasionally go down…. but then he was right back up on his feet again. He had an excellent glove hand, he would’ve made a great first baseman. Believe it or not, I used to go to the games just to watch ‘him’ play. He was quick and agile and great on the angles.
He was a great skater too. I used to love going down by the goal judges booth just to watch his foot work. He was very good one-on-one. I saw him take out two guys on a breakaway, he made the save and took them both out of the play.
At the time he didn’t wear a mask and I remember he got hit in the face and they took him on the bench and stitched him up and he was back on the ice within 10 minutes. It was amazing!”
In 1972, at the age of 40, Marcel signed with the Philadelphia Blazers of the WHA who had acquired his rights from the Chicago Cougars. The Blazers doubled the salary that the Reds were paying him, but it was not a good experience for Marcel. He was backing up Bernie Parent, which meant he didn’t play that often, sometimes going more than a month between starts. And there were also times, on the road, that he didn’t even get a chance to practice. His coach, Phil Watson, treated him with distain and when he was given a chance to play, of course he was rusty. He finished the season with a 2-8-0 record with a 4.81 GAA. Then after the season when Marcel tried to hook up with another club, he found that Watson had blackballed him, telling everyone that his reflexes were gone and that he was washed up.
Michael Venticinque: “Marcel was a very soft spoken man, very shy and he kept to himself but he was highly respected. The fans loved him here. He was loved by everybody. I think in all the time I’ve been interested in hockey I never heard anyone say anything bad about him. In fact when he jumped from the American Hockey League to the World Hockey Association everyone was disappointed but I can understand why he was going because he figured he was going to make more money. But that short stay with the WHA didn’t help him any. He tried to come back to Providence but by then the Reds were tied in with the Rangers and they had an abundance of goaltenders. So he hooked up with his old friend Larry Wilson who was coaching the Richmond Robbins at the time and Larry took him on and he played one more season and then he retired in 1974.”
Marcel played for 15 seasons in the American Hockey League and set many records that still stand today including Most Games Played by a Goaltender (765), Most Minutes Played (45,300), Most Calder Cup games (87), Most Playoff Minutes Played (5,368), Most Calder Cup Games Won (49) and Longest Playoff Shutout Streak (207:27). He also placed second in career victories (349) behind Johnny Bower (359). He also posted 36 career AHL shutouts placing him fifth on the all-time list.
Marcel was inducted into the Springfield Hockey Hall of Fame in 1997. He passed away in 2002 and was inducted posthumously into the American Hockey League Hall of Fame in 2010.
Emile Francis: “He was a good goalkeeper. Hey when there are only six teams and you make it to the NHL you must be pretty good. And the American Hockey League was no different, all the teams in professional hockey carried only one goalkeeper. When I played in the American League it was the same thing they only had eight teams and out on the West Coast they only had eight teams so that was all you had. There weren’t that many places a goalkeeper could play.”
