Mike Milbury Pays Homage To Infamous Shoe Incident At Bruins-Rangers Game

It’s been 44 years since ex-Bruins defenseman Mike Milbury headlined one of the all-time wild brawls in Boston sports history — and it didn’t come against a rival opponent or enemy alike.

Instead, Milbury, who spent all of his 12-year NHL career with the Bruins, went toe-to-toe (or in this case shoe) with a fan following a 4-3 regular-season win over the Rangers. The year was 1979 and after a rowdy New York crowd at Madison Square Garden did its part in trying to involve itself in several ways throughout the battle, tensions escalated to new heights, prompting Milbury to storm out of Boston’s locker room and into the stands.

A postgame brawl between the Bruins and Rangers ensued and several New Yorkers nearby attempted to get in on the action. One fan grabbed a stick and even delivered a blow to fellow ex-Bruin Stan Jonathan from the other side of the glass boards. Milbury joined in as several Boston teammates went after the fan, but the brawl cemented itself as one-of-a-kind when Milbury removed one of the fans’ own shoes, used it against him before he tossed it on the ice — hoping it’d leave him to take the walk of shame back home with only one shoe to his name.

Now, over four decades since the incident went down, Milbury returned to TD Garden and was introduced before Saturday night’s Bruins-Rangers game. The now-71-year-old even waived one of his own shoes in the air, paying tribute to the unforgettable moment.

“I walked up the stairs and I got to where Peter McNab was, and I was trying to help him,” Milbury recalled during “The Tradition” in 2021. “He already had the guy in a very compromising position with his feet up in the air. So I grabbed at his leg and I took his cheap little penny loafer off and hit him on the thigh and for that, I got six games and a lifetime of shame.”

Milbury ranks second all-time in penalty minutes (1,552) in franchise history and called it a career in 1987.

Even 44 years since the mayhem, no Bruins brawl has come close in terms of insanity, and it’s likely Milbury will maintain that for future years to come.