Four-time Stanley Cup champion winger Marcel Bonin passed away Sunday, according to an announcement from the Canadiens. He was 93.
Montreal was where Bonin was born and where he played his best hockey, but it wasn’t where his NHL career started. Acquired by the Red Wings in 1952 from the Quebec Aces of the Quebec Senior Hockey League, where he was briefly teammates with all-time great Jean Béliveau, Bonin made his NHL debut at age 20 that season.
He posted four goals and 13 points in 37 games during his rookie campaign with Detroit in 1952-53, splitting the year between the NHL and the Wings’ AHL affiliate at the time, the St. Louis Flyers. After spending nearly all of 1953-54 in lower-level leagues, he returned to Detroit full-time for 1954-55. Bonin was an impact piece, finishing sixth on the team in scoring with 36 points in 69 games and adding a pair of assists in 11 playoff games as he won his first of four Original Six championships.
That summer, Bonin was part of the blockbuster deal that sent Terry Sawchuk, the reigning Vezina Trophy winner and future Hall-of-Famer, to the Bruins. He spent one year in Boston, recording nine goals and nine assists for 18 points in 67 games on a Bruins offense that limped to a league-worst 2.10 goals per game.
Bonin returned to lower-tier hockey with his old stomping grounds in Quebec the following year before being claimed by his hometown Canadiens in the Inter-League Draft preceding the 1957-58 campaign. Reunited with Beliveau, then a perennial MVP candidate, and names like Henri Richard, Maurice Richard, and Bernie Geoffrion, Bonin resurfaced as a high-end complementary piece.
Bonin won Stanley Cups with Montreal in his first three seasons back in the league, recording 133 points in 182 games between the 1957-58 and 1959-60 campaigns. In year four, he recorded a career-high 35 assists and 51 points in 65 games. He was off to a good start in 1961-62, notching 21 points in 33 games, before sustaining a career-ending back injury in a game against the Red Wings in February.
He recorded 11 goals and 22 points in 34 games across four trips to the postseason with the Habs. All but one of those goals came in the 1959 playoffs, where he led the league with 10 goals in 11 games en route to Montreal’s fourth of five straight titles.
All of us at Pro Hockey Rumors offer our deepest condolences to the Bonin family and his loved ones.
Good player, epic name. RIP.