Ice hockey in the desert?
Leave it to a Canadian rink rat to come up with that idea.
Coming from a country where fervor for the sport borders on religious devotion, it was a no-brainer for Saskatoon, Sas-katchewan, transplant Maurice "Morie" Sugarman to start a hockey team when he moved to Tucson.
Sugarman, who became a naturalized citizen while serving in the U.S. Army during World War II, was known around town as "Mr. Hockey" during his 30 years on the Old Pueblo skating scene.
"You know people who live, eat and breathe something they are passionate about? That's how he felt about hockey, and that's what he taught the kids," said Maureen Lostutter, who first met Sugarman at the rink as a teen, when she took her little sister skating.
They renewed the acquaintance years later, when Lostutter signed up her sons to play in the league Sugarman started.
People are also reading…
Sugarman, a father of three, was still coaching in his mid-70s when he was diagnosed with leukemia, said his daughter, Linda McKinley. Five years later, plagued by dizzy spells after quadruple-bypass surgery, Mr. Hockey hung up his skates for good. Sugarman died March 8 at 89.
Sugarman, who moved to Tucson in 1946 for his wife's health, first organized a men's hockey team here in the early 1960s, after the opening of Iceland Skating Rink, once at 5915 E. Speedway.
"It was a really informal setting," said his son, Kenny Sugarman, who played on the team with his dad. "We'd get together and get up enough money to rent the rink for an hour."
In the early years, equipment was hard to come by, and Kenny Sugarman remembers players wrapped magazines around their legs in lieu of shin guards. Later, they upgraded to guards worn by baseball catchers before eventually getting proper equipment.
Morie Sugarman scrounged for gear where he could find it. He even had friends in Canada send their used equipment.
"He'd keep repairing the old equipment," Kenny Sugarman said. "We were making do with what we had."
In the mid-1960s, the ice rink shut down for a few years, but the lapse didn't diminish Sugarman's reputation among Southwest hockey aficionados.
Bill Dunn Sr. came to Tucson from Albuquerque in 1968 to reopen the rink. He was involved with a hockey program in New Mexico, and a few people there told Dunn to look up Sugarman when he arrived in Tucson.
"I didn't have to look Morie up," Dunn said. "He met us at the ice rink the first day we were here."
That same year, Sugarman founded the Tucson Amateur Ice Hockey Association for children and teens. He started with 10 kids and built the program to more than 100 players in less than four years.
In the beginning, Sugarman's daughter said, "He didn't have enough boys to make a hockey team, so I skated with them in my figure-skating skates."
Bill Dunn Jr. grew up at the rink with Sugarman as a coach and supporter.
"Back when we started, there was kind of a ragtag bunch of kids, and we didn't have any equipment or anything," Dunn Jr. said. "We were wearing mismatched socks, whatever he could get his hands on. Morie would go to any length to find us equipment so we could play hockey. He wanted all the kids to play hockey."
Sugarman was still an avid hockey player, too.
"He was kind of a Gordie Howe-type," said Dunn Jr. "He was a really nice, quiet, easy-going guy, but if you were out there playing hockey with him and you started banging him around a little bit, you were probably the one who was going to get the worst of it.
"I think of that ice rink, and I can't help but think about Morie skating out there," Dunn Jr. said.
Aaron Lostutter, 17, remembers going to the rink when he was 3 to watch his brother, who was a year older, play hockey.
Sugarman talked his mother into putting skates on the 3-year-old. Sugarman taught the younger child to skate by sending him out on the ice with a metal chair to lean on until he found his balance.
"He knew it would take some time, so he started slow with me. I love the sport now," said Lostutter, who has been playing hockey ever since.
"He was a very, very good coach," Kenny Sugarman said. "He had the patience of a saint to teach these little kids how to skate from scratch."
And Sugarman eventually solved the equipment shortage.
"He owned tons of hockey equipment," said Aaron Lostutter. "He dished it out like it was pizza. I think when he stopped, he had three storage units full of hockey equipment. He wanted hockey to thrive in Tucson."
Life Stories
This feature chronicles the lives of recently deceased Tucsonans. Some were well-known across the community. Others had an impact on a smaller sphere of friends, family and acquaintances. Many of these people led interesting — and sometimes extraordinary — lives with little or no fanfare. Now you'll hear their stories.
"Life Stories" will be kept online at go.azstarnet.com/lifestories
