The one call Joe Bowen still hasn’t made for the Maple Leafs

Ask Joe Bowen what his favourite moment behind the microphone has been these past 44 years has been, you’ll get the same answer:

“It hasn’t happened yet.”

Meaning the dramatic goal call that clinches the Maple Leafs a Stanley Cup or counting down the final seconds to what would be the NHL team’s first title since 1967.

Well, they’d better hurry up. If they don’t do it this June, then Bowen — who is set to be celebrated by the club in this retirement season on Tuesday night before the Leafs play Chicago — will finish his career 0-for-44.

“If not this year, it wouldn’t be as upsetting to me as people might think,” Bowen told the Toronto Sun. “I’ve just had too much fun doing this job along the way.”

But Bowen has allowed himself to daydream of such a celebration after what would be 3,800 games on radio and TV. He has the parade route all planned in his head, though not in the manner over-confident fans have done for decades.

Bay Street? Bowen is thinking much bigger.

“It would start in Timmins (near the birthplace of the great Tim Horton in Cochrane) and join Highway 11,” he said. “Pass through Sudbury (where Bowen and several former Leafs stars such as George Armstrong and Eddie Shack are from), right down Yonge, the longest street in the world, until the front tires of the lead car dip in Lake Ontario.

“They’re so many Leafs fans who’d come out to see it. Of course, It might take a few days, but I’d like to ride along the whole way.”

Bowen will rest his larynx on Tuesday night to be part of a centre ice ceremony at Scotiabank Arena with his family (four sons and three grandchildren). Youngest son David, breaking into broadcasting with the OHL Sudbury Wolves, will handle play-by-play with Joe’s regular colour commentator, Jim Ralph.

There will be special guests, clips of his favourite calls during timeouts and his signature “Holy Mackinaw” T-shirts on sale with some proceeds to charities such as Hockey Helps the Homeless. Bowen has used his platform to assist such causes as leukemia research after one of his boys was diagnosed in childhood, through bottle return drives.

Tuesday morning, Bowen was invited into the dressing room to receive an engraved ‘golden’ microphone from the players and a commemorative sweater. He earlier received a custom-designed goalie mask from equipment man Bobby Hastings with an image of him at the mic.

Bowen ran through the history of ‘Holy Mackinaw’ this week on City TV’s Breakfast Television.

“My dad was a goalie and I was, too. We were huge Leaf fans and I was told I was being walked around the living room by my dad, as a baby, fussing when Bill Barilko scored (to win the 1951 Cup in overtime against Montreal). We’d watch Johnny Bower, who was my favourite and dad would blurt out ‘Holy Mackinaw! What a save by Johnny!’

“My dad passed away when I was 14, so I never got to ask him why he used it. I never did in junior hockey (in Sudbury) or three years in the American Hockey League (Halifax). But many years into my time with the Leafs, Felix Potvin made a great save at Chicago Stadium and for some reason, out of the recesses of my mind I yelled ‘Holy Mackinaw!’

“I probably wouldn’t have used it again, but I looked over and Bill Watters (his analyst in the 1980s and ‘90s) had fallen off his chair, laughing. I thought if I got a rise like that out of Wilbur, maybe I’ll use it again.”

With Bowen’s time in the best seat in the house down to half a season, he’s at peace with his decision to retire this past summer.

“I’m 74 and I know myself I’m not as good,” he told BT. “I feel it and I’d rather go out on my terms than having someone tap me on the shoulder and say ‘I think that’s enough.’

“The whole dynamic of what we do has changed (no travel, with he and Ralph working road games from a studio monitor). I think it’s time. I always wanted to do a little more travelling and spend more time with my family.”

Bowen, winner of the Hockey Hall of Fame’s Foster Hewitt Award (and who worked more seasons in Toronto than the play-by-play pioneer) was voted a member of the Leaf Alumni of players, coaches and executives, and will now emcee their many events.

Yes, he has felt the pain of that 58-year Cup drought, longest in the National Hockey League. No fan has has been closer to the good, the bad and the ugly than Bowen.

“Leafs Nation is huge, but it’s a lot like your own family. You yell at them, you get upset with them, you admonish them. But you never stop loving them,” he said.

lhornby@postmedia.com

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