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Tommy Ivan, 88, Executive For Two Hockey Champions

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June 27, 1999, Section 1, Page 31Buy Reprints
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Thomas (Tommy) Ivan, the diminutive and dapper coach and general manager who helped turn around two franchises in the National Hockey League's six-team era, died yesterday at the age of 88.

Ivan, who had been suffering from a kidney ailment, died at Lake Forest Hospital in suburban Chicago.

Although Thomas Nathaniel Ivan never played in the N.H.L. during a hockey career that lasted more than 60 years, he made it into the sport's Hall of Fame because of his success coaching the Detroit Red Wings and running the front office of the Chicago Blackhawks. He was a Blackhawks vice president at the time of his death.

Although only 5 feet 5 inches, he exuded strength. His effusive nature was enhanced by his good looks and his 1930's-chic style -- his white hair combed back, his suit adorned with a contrasting breast-pocket handkerchief.

Ivan said that he realized his future lay with his brain, and not with his brawn, in the 1930's -- after he was high-sticked in the face during a game in Brantford, Ontario, when he was a 26-year-old minor leaguer.

After several years of coaching amateur and minor league hockey, he joined the Red Wings as their head coach in 1947. That began an association with the N.H.L. that would last more than 50 years.

Ivan quickly broadened the Red Wings' farm system, which he also ran. Under his direction Detroit, which had not captured the Stanley Cup since 1937, brought up rookies like Gordie Howe, Ted Lindsay and goalie Terry Sawchuk, who went on to legendary careers.

In Ivan's seven seasons, the Red Wings finished first six times and won the Stanley Cup three times.

Stan Fischler, the author of more than 70 books on hockey, yesterday recalled Ivan's formula for success with young players:

''Tommy used to say that you should make them practice hard early in the morning. 'If you get them up early enough,' he explained, 'they'll go to bed early enough.' ''

But despite his success with the Red Wings, Ivan wanted to run his own show, and he knew that would not happen with Jack Adams entrenched as Detroit's general manager. But the Red Wings and the Blackhawks were both owned by the Norris family. And in 1956, at the height of his success with the Red Wings, Ivan left for Chicago.

The Blackhawks were a woebegone franchise that had not won the Stanley Cup in 20 years and were supposedly saddled with the Muldoon Curse: Pete Muldoon, their first coach back in 1927, had put a hex on them after he was fired.

But Ivan had the keen eye for talent he had demonstrated in Detroit, and soon players named Bobby Hull and Glenn Hall and Stan Mikita were starring in cavernous Chicago Stadium. Ivan gave up coaching to focus on his duties as general manager, and he oversaw a Stanley Cup championship in 1961. The Blackhawks reached the cup finals four more times in the next 12 seasons.

But while savoring the Blackhawks' success, Ivan also made his biggest blunder. He put together a package of players that included Phil Esposito, Ken Hodge and Fred Stanfield and shipped them to the Boston Bruins for Gilles Marotte, Pit Martin and a minor league goalie named Jack Norris.

Esposito then helped spearhead a Bruins resurgence that led them to dominate the N.H.L. But Ivan soon returned the Blackhawks to prominence in the league.

In 1974 he was elected to the Hall of Fame. In 1977 he gave up his role as general manager, remaining as a Blackhawks vice president.

He is survived by four children, eight grandchildren and four great-grandchildren.

A version of this article appears in print on  , Section 1, Page 31 of the National edition with the headline: Tommy Ivan, 88, Executive For Two Hockey Champions. Order Reprints | Today’s Paper | Subscribe

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