Height: 5-8
Weight: 175
Shoot: R
Born: 16 Oct 1945, Sydney NS
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Regular Season & Playoff Scoring Record (key)
| year | team | |||||||||||
| 1972-73 | New York | |||||||||||
| 1973-74 | New York-Jersey | |||||||||||
| 1974-75 | San Diego | |||||||||||
| 1975-76 | San Diego | |||||||||||
| 1976-77 | San Diego | |||||||||||
| 1977-78 | Edmonton | |||||||||||
| Totals: |
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Excerpts from Pro Hockey, WHA 1976-77 (by Dan Proudfoot)
Every San Diego Mariner knows trouble, but nobody knows it as well as Norm Ferguson. As team captain from the start, from New York to Cherry Hill, N.J., to San Diego, Ferguson has had the terrible chore of listening to teammates' complaints about various inscrutable managements. That would be bad enough. But Ferguson, who once was an outstanding National Hockey League rookie with seemingly a brilliant future in front of him, has had personal misfortunes of his own. He broke his leg in three places. He's suffered various painful injuries over the years. But, still, he finished the 1975-76 campaign with 37 goals and 37 assists, extremely respectable totals, and stood 10th among WHA scorers at his right wing position. Ferguson is only 31 --- it's just his experience that makes him feel like an old man. |
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WHA — The Change Fergy Needed • by Mark Ruskie • New York Raiders 1972-73 Hockey Program
For right wing Norm Ferguson of the Raiders, the World Hockey Association came along just in time. "I needed a change," admits the four-year NHL vet. "I wanted a challenge and I didn't mind starting at the beginning to get it. I wanted to make a fresh start." A 34-goal scorer his rookie year with the California Golden Seals, Ferguson tailed off to 11,14 and 14 goals the last three seasons after setting an NHL goal-scoring record for rookies. Ferguson's wanting to get away from it all had nothing to do with his old team, however. Instead, it was a matter of self-pride in the job he was doing. "There was no friction there," he says. "I liked it there but I wasn't satisfied with myself. I wasn't producing the way I should." When he first heard about the WHA the 5-8, 26-year-old native of Sydney, Nova Scotia, immediately started thinking. "I made up my mind to go," he says. "I first started talking with the New York owners in January and February. One game here with New York, they introduced themselves to me and we started talking. We didn't discuss money until the end of the year because we were involved in a playoff fight." Ferguson never got the chance to compare the Raider offer with the one from the Seals because none of none was forthcoming from his old club. "I had told general manager Garry Young I was talking to them, and when I finally made up my mind to go, I called Garry back. He said 'good luck' and that was the end of that." Ferguson won't be at a loss for ex-teammates in the new league because former Seal teammates Bobby Sheehan, Gary Kurt and Brian Perry are also wearing the Raider blue and orange. Ferguson had only one second thought about moving to the new league. "I didn't want to be the first one to sign," he says. "I wanted to make sure others were going to join because I didn't want to be the only guy to do it." Ferguson feels he has security in his Raiders contract. "The money is all guaranteed. I have to get it," says the man who scored more goals in one National Hockey League season than any other World Hockey Association player except Bobby Hull. There are some who felt Ferguson should have been the NHL's Rookie of the Year when he and Danny Grant both scored 34 goals to tie the record first set by Nels Stewart and since broken by Rick Martin of the Buffalo Sabres. Grant won the award even though he had played 22 regular season games plus a number of playoff games the year before. Ferguson, an authentic rookie who had never played in the league before, was second in that balloting, but won the Sporting News rookie honors. "Fergy deserves more credit," said Norm's former coach at Oakland and with the Cleveland Barons of the AHL, Fred Glover. "He played with four different line combinations and at two different positions." It was Glover's recommendation that first interested the Seals in Ferguson, who scored 42 goals his final year with Cleveland. "When I was first asked if he could score goals in the NHL, I said he was definitely an NHL player," said Glover. "He proved he could score in the AHL." "It wasn't how much but how. He gets no cheap goals and works for everyone. It isn't the goaltender who makes a bad play on Fergy. He makes the good one. He's inordinately strong for a little guy and likes to one hand the stick and fight off a man with the other like a Howe or a Richard." The trade that brought Norm to Oakland was a steal in that the Seals gave up only Alain Caron, Wally Boyer and the pro-rights to Lyle Bradley. In return, they got a 34-goal scorer, Stan Fuller, Michel Jacques, and Francois Lacombe. Ironically, Caron, Boyer, Ferguson and Lacombe will all be wearing WHA uniforms this season. Ferguson credits Glover for a good deal of his development. "He taught me to score and how to make a goalie work. He told me to keep practicing a move until it becomes automatic in a game." Ferguson is still looking forward to playing in Madison Square Garden, where he always had good success as a Seal against the Rangers. One of his early goals as a Seal came at the garden on a penalty shot against Ed Giacomin. If Fergy can come up with the kind of rookie season he had in the NHL in the WHA this season, the Raiders should really be in business in the Eastern Division as they challenge the New England Whalers, Cleveland Crusaders and the Philadelphia Blazers for the top spot. |
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