Height: 5-11
Weight: 180
Shoot: R
Born: 12 Jul 1946, Melrose MA
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Regular Season & Playoff Scoring Record (key)
| year | team | |||||||||||
| 1972-73 | New England | |||||||||||
| 1973-74 | New England | |||||||||||
| 1974-75 | New England | |||||||||||
| 1975-76 | New England | |||||||||||
| Edmonton | ||||||||||||
| Totals (2 teams) | ||||||||||||
| 1976-77 | Calgary | |||||||||||
| Totals: |
• Member, United States Olympic Team, 1968.
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Hurley Achieves Personal Parity • by Dick Dew • The Hockey Spectator • March 23, 1973
To Paul Hurley, happiness is ice time. And ice time is to Paul Hurley the indication that he has achieved personal parity with the National Hockey League. The odds were against Hurley when he joined with the New England Whalers. True, he was a Boston College product and a successful performer with the Boston Braves of the American Hockey League. But the Whalers were loaded with experienced NHL defensemen so Hurley knew he faced an uphill battle against a combined total of 19 years of NHL experience spread among Ted Green, Rick Ley, Brad Selwood and Jim Dorey. Thus it was no surprise that Hurley was riding the bench as an occasional performer and clearly the Whalers fifth defenseman when the World Hockey Association got underway. But Hurley, who had worked hard during New England's training camp, felt he deserved a shot. So he appealed his limited duty status to coach Jack Kelley, insisting he couldn't prove his worth without playing. Kelley responded by giving Hurley additional duty as point man on the faltering New England power play. Then, Paul got a better chance. He tells it this way: "We weren't going too good and we needed some muscle up front. For the most part, our forwards aren't hitters, a lot of them are too small, so I played three games at forward. I had kept myself in pretty good shape by working harder in practice and the games at forward helped me get my timing." The fact that Hurley was in pretty good shape and performed quite well up front despite his 195-pound bulk earned him something of a second chance. With the experiment over, Kelley began giving Paul added work on defense, working him in wherever possible. It recently reached the point where Hurley is averaging just about as much ice time as the more expensive types with their NHL backgrounds. And Hurley has made sure Kelley has no reason to regret the move. "Paul is more than our fifth defenseman," Kelley said. "He plays rough and that helps, particularly with us. We don't have many hitters among the forwards so our defense has got to do it." "All the defensemen hit but Paul rubs people out. He fits right in with the other guys and helping our scoring potential. He's got that big shot from the blue line. Maybe he doesn't do a lot of scoring himself but I'm sure that shot helps set up a lot of goals." "I think I've proved myself with regular turn," Hurley said. "Both to myself and to the club. My biggest problem was knowing that these other four guys had really been around. I felt I could play with them but I had to have the chance to prove it. And now that I've had that chance, I feel I've succeeded." |
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Excerpts from Zander Hollander's Guide to Pro Hockey, 1975-76 (by Reyn Davis)
Like Larry Pleau, he's a native of the New England area ... Tongue-in-cheek teammates have nicknamed him "The Shooter" ... Needed to go on a goal-scoring binge late in the 1974-75 season to maintain his seasonal average of three ... Hist first goal was an overtime winner in Winnipeg ... Has progressively become a better defenseman to the point where expensive veterans such as Jim Dorey and Ted Green were expendable ... Not at all mean ... A regular clothes horse ... Attended Boston College and was drafted by the NHL Bruins |
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