Pals, there’s been a certain animosity between Calgary and Edmonton for well over a century, dating back to the Canadian Pacific Railway opting for a more southern alignment in the early 1880s that put Calgary smack-dab in the middle of the busiest shipping operation in the country.

And while the enmities of 100 years prior had nothing to do with the Calgary Flames and the Edmonton Oilers, it just so happens that members of those two hockey clubs do not like each other. At all. There may be no better example of two teams hating each other than an incident that took place on Jan. 2, 1986 at the Olympic Saddledome.

At the time, things weren’t going great for the Flames. They had lost seven in a row, effectively burning off the momentum they had generated throughout November and early December. They were backsliding towards the .5o0 mark after a pretty solid start to the season and were a bit cranky about it.

By the latter stages of the second period, the Flames were down 4-1 to the Oilers. And so, things got a bit ugly.

Four fights broke out: Doug Risebrough fought Marty McSorley. Then Tim Hunter fought Dave Hunter. Jim Peplinski and Kevin McClelland fought, to the point where each player got two fighting majors. And then Paul Baxter fought McSorley. Risebrough had already been steered into the home penalty box when a linesman, trying to get things back in order, absent-mindedly chucked an McSorley’s discarded jersey into the Calgary penalty box.

Whoops.

Whether he was upset about the losing streak. Or the in-progress loss to the Oilers. Or the fight. Or just a combination of everything, Risebrough put McSorley’s jersey on the floor of the penalty box and walked over it with his skates, slicing and dicing it with his blades.

Here’s how the Calgary Herald’s Gyle Konotopetz described the aftermath a couple days later in the Jan. 4, 1986 edition of the newspaper, as Oilers head coach Glen Sather was upset about the incident:

Ultimately, Risebrough was never disciplined by the league for the incident. The Flames’ losing streak lasted for 11 games, when it was snapped by rookie netminder Mike Vernon, who the club had called up from the minors.

While the Oilers dominated the regular season series in 1985-86 – winning six of eight meetings – the Flames got a measure of revenge in the playoffs, eliminating the Oilers in the second round en route to their first appearance in the Stanley Cup Final.

And linesmen have been a little more careful about which penalty box they toss errant jerseys into.

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