HERB GARDINER’S EXPLOITS IN 1926-27 EARNED HIM THE HART TROPHY, AWARDED TO THE MOST VALUABLE PLAYER.

A surveyor by trade, Herb Gardiner was also one of hockey’s greats of his time. Born in Winnipeg in 1891, he was a dominant amateur defenseman for many years before turning pro with the Calgary Tigers of the West Coast Hockey League at the age of 29.

The transition was a successful one and Gardiner continued his stellar play, recognized as one of the top rearguards in the circuit. The Tigers travelled east in 1924 to challenge for the Stanley Cup but lost to the Canadiens, who invited Gardiner to their training camp in the fall of 1926 when the PCHL ceased operations.

He accepted and spent the next three years in the NHL, closing out his career as a member of the Canadiens. The 5-foot-10, 190-pound blue-liner was one of the bigger men in the game and among the strongest. Playing in an era that featured a far more brutal form of play than is accepted today, Gardiner was in his element when the going got rough.

As he had done in the past, the 35-year-old Gardiner quickly established himself as one of the NHL’s most skilled and consistent blue-liners. His smooth play and sound work in his own end was complemented by defense partner Sylvio Mantha’s playmaking and utterly fearless approach to the game, making the duo one of the top defensive pairings in the game.

The grizzled NHL newcomer had an immediate impact on both his rebuilding team and the league as a whole with his performance in 1926-27 and was awarded the Hart Trophy, presented annually since 1924 to the player judged the most valuable to his team.

One of only four players to appear in every game in his first two years with Montreal, Gardiner was loaned to Chicago prior to the beginning of the 1928-29 campaign. He appeared in a handful of games that season, spending the bulk of his time behind the Blackhawks bench.

Recalled by the Canadiens towards the end of the season, Gardiner played his last NHL games with the Habs before being sold to the Bruins, who handed him the reins to their Philadelphia farm club.

Gardiner remained in Philadelphia and ran the bench for the city’s AHL and Eastern Hockey League teams until 1947.

Inducted to the Hockey Hall of Fame in 1958, Herb Gardiner died in 1972 at the age of 80.