NEW YORK — Dickie Moore, a Hockey Hall of Famer who played on six Stanley Cup championship teams with the Montreal Canadiens and won two straight NHL scoring titles, died Saturday in Montreal. He was 84.
Réjean Houle, a former Canadiens wing and a community-relations official for the team, said the cause was prostate cancer.
As a forward for the Canadiens from 1951 to 1963, Mr. Moore was an outstanding puck handler and passer with a hard shot and was adept at faking out goalies in front of the net. Although smallish, he had no problem mixing it up with the league’s roughnecks.
Mr. Moore played at left wing on one of hockey’s most brilliant lines, skating with Maurice Richard, the Rocket, at right wing and Richard’s younger brother Henri at center.
Mr. Moore set what was then an NHL single-season record for points with 96 in 1958-59, capturing his second consecutive Art Ross Trophy as the league’s scoring leader.
He played on teams that won the Stanley Cup in 1953 and every year from 1956 to 1960. In addition to the line with Mr. Moore and the two Richards, the Canadiens of the 1950s featured Jean Béliveau at center, Bernie Geoffrion and Bert Olmstead at wing, Jacques Plante in goal, and Doug Harvey and Tom Johnson on defense. All were Hall of Famers, with Mr. Moore inducted in 1974.
Mr. Moore was 5 feet 10 inches and 165 pounds or so, but as he told CJAD-AM of Montreal in 2013, “size didn’t count as far as I was concerned.’’
Maurice Richard marveled at Mr. Moore’s toughness.
“I once saw him play as a junior in Quebec against Béliveau,’’ Richard recalled in “The Flying Frenchmen: Hockey’s Greatest Dynasty’’ (1971), written with Stan Fischler. “Just about the whole Quebec team went after Dickie, but he wasn’t afraid in the least. He fought everybody on the ice, and after that, the Canadiens knew he would make it big in the NHL.’’
Richard Winston Moore was born Jan. 6, 1931, in Montreal, one of nine children. As a youngster, he played hockey on an outdoor rink, but when he was 7, he sustained a severe break of his right leg when he was hit by a car while riding his bicycle. Through his long hockey career, the muscle in that leg never developed properly.
Mr. Moore joined the Canadiens’ system in 1947, playing junior hockey in Montreal. He made his NHL debut in the 1951-52 season and finished third in balloting for the Calder Trophy as rookie of the year.
He became a regular in 1954. He led the NHL in goals, with 36, in the 1957-58 season, adding 48 assists for his league-leading point total of 84, although he skated for much of the season’s second half with a cast on a broken left wrist.
He had 41 goals with a league-leading 55 assists the following season, and his 96 points broke the NHL single-season record of 95, set by the Red Wings’ Gordie Howe in 1953 (marks that have been eclipsed many times since).
Mr. Moore retired for the first time after the 1962-63 season. He returned to the NHL two seasons later with the Toronto Maple Leafs, retired again and then concluded his career in 1967-68 with the newly founded St. Louis Blues as the league expanded to 12 teams, from the Original Six. Mr. Moore finished with a flourish, scoring seven goals and getting seven assists in 18 playoff games in the Blues’ run to the Stanley Cup finals, where they were swept in four games by the Canadiens.
In his 14 seasons, Mr. Moore scored 261 goals and had 347 assists, and he played in six All-Star Games.
He leaves his wife, Joan; a daughter, Lianne; a son, John; and several grandchildren.