All around sports fandom, there’s a growing interest in athletic aesthetics. With throwback uniforms, City Editions, and alternate helmets picking up fire emojis across social media, the once-frivolous detail of sports team uniforms has become big business. While this may be new ground for casual fans, the diehard partisans of the National Hockey League have long taken a particular interest in hockey sweaters. (Real fans would never call them “jerseys.”) Maybe a long-sleeved garment has more real estate to get excited about. If you’re thinking of starting a collection, begin with some of these—the most popular uniforms in NHL history.
Montréal Canadiens
Call it le tricolore, le blue-blanc-et-rouge, or even la sainte-flannelle: literally “the holy sweater.” The red sweater with broad blue stripes and an interlocking “CH” is symbolic not only of le club du hockey, the Montréal Canadiens, but of Canadian culture. As an old joke goes, Canada loves hockey so much that they put it on their money. They did. But it’s no joke. The $5 bill featured a quotation from “The Sweater,” a short story about the tensions between French and English Canada as represented by a hapless Québecois boy who mistakenly receives the uniform of the hated anglophones’ Toronto Maple Leafs. The Canadiens themselves, however, were not oppressed. They donned their holy sweaters and brought the Stanley Cup back to Montréal, a city with a major role in hockey’s history, 24 times.
Québec Nordiques
From 1979 to 1995, the Canadiens weren’t the only NHL game in la belle province. 150 miles downriver in Québec City, the Nordiques hit the ice in the powder blue and fleur-de-lis emblems of the provincial flag, along with an abstract geometric logo that could only come from the ’70s: an igloo and a hockey stick that formed a lowercase “n.” Some observers think it looks more like an elephant than an igloo. With their relocation to Denver and transformation into the Colorado Avalanche, this one is out of circulation, but it remains popular among hockey’s nostalgic contingent.
Chicago Blackhawks
With appearances in Wayne’s World, National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation, and The Dilemma, the Chicago Blackhawks and their elaborately chain-stitched crest have a permanent place in popular culture. The red, white, and black of the Hawks have been an enduring classic, from the organization’s dark ages to its Cup-winning renaissance and back.
Detroit Red Wings
But if we’re talking about sweaters immortalized on screen, who can forget Cameron donning the Winged Wheel in Ferris Bueller’s Day Off? Even in a love letter to Chicago, John Hughes paid tribute to his Michigan roots with an appearance of the Detroit Red Wings’ simple sweater. Whether on the Russian Five or a civilian, a Wings sweater screams “Motor City” worldwide.
Toronto Maple Leafs
Whether it’s the classic 31-point leaf or the modernist 11-point leaf, whether the socks have two stripes or nine, no list of the most popular NHL uniforms in history is complete without the stark blue and white of English Canada’s team, Toronto’s beloved Maple Leafs. There have been a lot of crazy uniforms over the NHL’s century-plus span. There were the angled jade-and-eggplant stripes of Disney’s Mighty Ducks of Anaheim, the crestless orange and yellow “Flying Vs” the Vancouver Canucks donned in the ‘80s, or the sea foam green and banana yellow of the long-forgotten Oakland Seals. However, there’s simply no replacement for the simple, austere sweaters that will always scream “Canada” and “hockey.”
