Greatness Confirmed

The goal cage, then as now, is 4 feet high. If Dryden played a 3-foot-high net, he essentially conceded the top corners—because few shooters ever aimed there. He believes the predilection for the low shot may well have stemmed from the mid-'60s, when Stan Mikita and Hull were pioneering the curved stick and 100-mph slapshot. "A lot of goalies then didn't wear masks, or the masks were very primitive," says Dryden. "So day after day in practice there were tantrums and things like that by goalies if someone shot high. Their outrage was quite legitimate. Injuries from high shots back then would have been very, very serious. So with their coaches and goalies all yelling at them, players didn't practice shooting high. Slowly goalies' crouches got lower and lower as they tried to cover the bottom corners. That left the top corners more and more exposed." Which Gretzky has exploited.

The game begins, and seven minutes into the first period Gretzky sets up Kurri for a power-play goal that ties the score 1-1. "Everything developed so quickly," says Dryden, impressed with Gretzky's pass. "The puck didn't stay on his stick. Once you beat someone, if you move the puck quickly you don't allow him back in the play. He stays beaten."

Later, Gretzky tries the opposite tactic, skating down the wing and waiting, waiting, waiting for someone to break free. "He has an enormous sense of patience," says Dryden. "Everybody has a moment of panic, but Gretzky's comes so much later than other players'. When he comes down the ice, there's a point when the defenseman thinks: He's going to commit himself one way or the other now. When that moment passes and Gretzky still hasn't committed, the whole rhythm of the game is upset. The defenseman is unprepared for what might come next. It's not an anticlimax. It's beyond the climax. And suddenly a player becomes open who wasn't open a moment before."

Dryden is enjoying the game. It's fast and crisp, with good action at both ends. "I remember when I played against Esposito and the puck went out of the corner, I always assumed it was going onto Espo's stick, and that it would then be coming my way," he says. "With Gretzky, a goalie just has to assume that when Wayne passes the puck out from behind the net, it's going onto a stick and there will then be a shot. You can't commit yourself to Gretzky the way you could to other great goal scorers because when you can move the puck as well as he can, well, there's no reason to shoot very often. Which, of course, works to his advantage."

By the third period the Islanders lead 4-2. Butch Goring, who has been covering Gretzky, has done a good job. By bumping Gretzky off stride, tugging at his arm discreetly, Goring has thrown him off his game. Several times Islander checkers have sent Gretzky sprawling. "I don't think he's going to get hurt often," says Dryden. "He's never really committed to any one direction, which makes him a hard person to injure. His body is always moving in a number of ways. In Orr, you sensed more power, more commitment. Gretzky will just sort of collapse in the direction you hit him."

There's a faint smile on Dryden's face. "He's a much better skater than I thought he was," he says. "He's just not a pretty skater. I never realized he was so quick." Gretzky is chasing one of the Islander defenders, who's trying to move the puck. "He's always pressing, but when you think of someone who's relentless, there's usually something very heavy-handed about it. Gretzky's almost spritelike." The puck is now along the boards, and Gretzky is circling in center ice, away from the play. "There's almost a will-of-the-wisp quality to the way he skates. He's very light. There's such a sense of freedom about him. There don't seem to be any constraints."

A light snow is falling in Edmonton on the night of Dec. 1. Gretzky has had one or more goals or assists every game this season, and tonight his two assists will pull him within one game of the consecutive-game scoring record of 28 held by Montreal's Guy Lafleur. Four nights later he will break Lafleur's mark. The streak will finally end at 30 against Los Angeles on Dec. 9.

Gretzky has picked up this season where he left off in 1981-82: He's running away with the league scoring championship. As of Dec. 18, he was averaging 2.51 points a game and was tied for second in the NHL in goals with 26. He had more goals (34) at the same point last year but fewer assists (48 to 57). Gretzky says teams have taken the front of the net away from him again, so he has moved back behind it, from where he's content to pass to teammates. "A lot of my game depends on how the other team is playing me," he says.

Tonight the Oilers' opponents are the Flyers, who this season have changed their style from a bullying team to a skating one. The game will start at 7:35, and three minutes before it begins, as one of the national anthems is being sung, Bobby Hull arrives. He's out of breath from climbing the arena stairs, but he's grinning, his broad, scarred face bursting with energy. He's also sweating. "I thought we were going to be a minute late, and Wayne would have a couple of goals already," he says, beaming. A friend, Bill Urzada, has met Hull, who lives in Demorestville, Ont., at the Edmonton airport and driven him to the Coliseum. Both raise registered polled Herefords.

Hull, the first man to score more than 50 goals in a season, may be the player most responsible for hockey as we know it today. As great as Howe was, as great as Orr, Esposito and Beliveau were, they didn't have Hull's charisma. His style of play exactly matched his personality—open, dramatic, uncompromising and utterly joyful. People paid to see him play, and they departed feeling they had shared something pretty good. "A lot of times those Chicago fans left the rink as tired as we were," recalls Hull. "When it's a great game, you can't believe it when it's over, and you can't wait for the next game to start.