Mike Scully, a Simpsons writer, producer and former showrunner, grew up in West Springfield, Massachusetts, where he became familiar with the Eastern States Coliseum and the staff and players who played for the American Hockey League’s Springfield Kings.
Perhaps as an 11-year-old rink rat he became too close. When any of the players or staff gave him game-used pucks or equipment, he recalled being chased by a hockey stick-brandishing Eddie Shore, who demanded that it be returned, lest it affect the team’s bottom line.
But there, at the home of the Springfield Kings, Los Angeles’ early AHL affiliate, Scully caught the earliest stages of so many memorable careers, having seen Butch Goring and Billy Smith before they became NHL stars, and recalled one memorable fight-filled night that resulted in the arrest of Pete Demers, Los Angeles’ long time Head Athletic Trainer.
In this Kings Weekly story stitched together so well by Jack Wilson, Scully and Demers relived the details of one of the more memorable donnybrooks in Western Massachusetts hockey history, while Scully also shares the backgrounds and inspiration behind the jokes and storylines of Lisa on Ice, one of the most revered episodes of the longest running scripted series in prime time television history. In bonus footage, viewers are also treated to a glimpse of The Simpsons’ writers room on the FOX lot in Los Angeles.
Related: Looking back at Lisa on Ice
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