Anton Jože Gale

Anton Jože Gale
Date of birth	March 26, 1944
place of birth	Jesenice , Yugoslavia
date of death	March 25, 2018
Place of death	Ljubljana , Slovenia
size	178 cm
Weight	82 kg
position	goalkeeper
Catch hand	Left
Career stations
1961-1968	HK Olimpija Ljubljana
1968-1969	Syracuse Blazers Clinton Comets
1969-1973	HK Olimpija Ljubljana

Anton Jože Gale (born March 26, 1944 in Jesenice , Yugoslavia ; † March 25, 2018 in Ljubljana , Slovenia ) was a Yugoslav ice hockey goalkeeper who took part in three Olympic Winter Games and eight ice hockey world championships. He later worked as a goalkeeping coach.

Career

Anton Jože Gale, who was born in Jesenice, went to Ljubljana , the capital of the Yugoslav republic of Slovenia, at the age of 17 , where he joined the HK Olimpija Ljubljana , for which he played most of his career. After his good performance at the 1968 Winter Olympics , he was invited to the training camp of the New York Rangers , but got no contract there, but played the following season with the Syracuse Blazers in the Eastern Hockey League . To the playoffs he was committed by the Clinton Comets , with whom he won the league. He then returned to Olimpija Ljubljana and won the Yugoslav championship with them in 1972 . Thereupon was again invited to an NHL training camp, this time with the Chicago Blackhawks . But since he did not receive an NHL contract again, he returned to Ljubljana and played there until the end of his career in 1973. In 2007 he was accepted into the Slovenian Ice Hockey Hall of Fame .

International

Between 1961 and 1973 Gale was a total of 112 times in the goal of the Yugoslav national ice hockey team . He participated in the Olympic Winter Games in Innsbruck in 1964 and in Grenoble in 1968 , when he was named the best goalkeeper in the placement round and, with a catch rate of 92.2%, made a significant contribution to the Yugoslav selection's ninth place, the best result in its history. and in 1972 in Sapporo . With a total of 15 appearances at the Winter Olympics, he is the fourth most frequently used goalkeeper. Only Wladislaw Tretjak (19 games for the Soviet Union), Jim Marthinsen (17 games for Norway) and Dominik Hašek (16 games for Czechoslovakia and the Czech Republic) were on the ice more often. In addition, Gale also played in eight world championships (seven B world championships and one C world championship), including the C World Cup in 1961 and the B title fights in 1967 and 1973 . His career ended at the 1973 B-WM in Graz when a puck destroyed his mask in the game against the United States in the second period with a surprising score of 4: 1 (final score: 6: 6) and he suffered a serious eye injury had to be replaced.

Coaching

After his early retirement, Gale initially worked as a junior coach at his club HK Olimpija Ljubljana . When the Slovenian national team first took part in the C World Championship in 1993 after independence , Gale was their goalkeeping coach.

Achievements and Awards

• 1968 Best goalkeeper in the placement round at the Olympic Winter Games
• 1969 won the Eastern Hockey League with the Clinton Comets
• 1972 Yugoslav champion with the HK Olimpija Ljubljana

Web links

• Anton Jože Gale at eliteprospects.com (English)
• “Remebering Gale” at www.iihf.com, accessed March 28, 2018.