Pride on the Mount : More Than a Game

Mount Saint Charles Academy is the Los Alamos of hockey.

A small school in a small town in a famously small state, it has for decades been a virtual secret laboratory for creating hockey players, winning regional championships for twenty-seven straight years, and sending player after player to the NHL.

But no parent or reporter had ever been allowed to a practice or in the locker room, until veteran sportswriter John Gillooly was given total access for one year.

The result is a year in sports unlike any other. The story of Mount Saint Charles is in many waysthe story of one man, the coach, Normand "Bill" Belisle, now in his seventies.

Gillooly watched the practices, rode the bus, hung out in the locker room after defeats and triumphs.

He spoke with the parents and the former players now competing for the Stanley Cup.

He talked hockey for hours with kids who have dreamed all their life of playing for Belisle.

Gillooly found a coach who made cuts in thirty minutes--who even cut his own son after only a day.

His practices were notoriously hard, so hard that many excellent players were too timid to try out.

Bobby Orr, a scout, might show up at a game, but wouldn't want to bother Belisle, and would hang furtively in the shadows.

It was a team where future NHLers would linger for three years on junior varsity.

Here for the first time is the inside story of this legendary hockey coach, a must-read for every player and fan.