Reed Larson: Red Wings defenseman plays with his childhood heroes as a member of the 1978 All-Star team

I HAVE A PICTURE OF THE 1978 ALL-Star Team that I keep in my bedroom at home. It's the only hockey picture I have up in my home, but I keep it out because of all the guys that were on the team. Those players, I don't see them often, but those guy--Darryl Sittler, Larry Robinson, Guy Lafleur, and the others--they were all really good to me.

I was 20 years old, playing in what was really my first full season in the NHL with the Detroit Red Wings. And there I was, sitting in the dressing room with those guys in Buffalo. Lanny McDonald was there. Terry O'Reilly, Brad Park. Darryl Sittler.

There were guys like Marcel Dionne, Gilbert Perreault, Borje Salming. You had a funny lineup. You had the entire French Connection Line of Perreault, Rene Robert and Rick Martin. You had the entire great Canadiens line of Jacques Lemaire, Steve Shutt and Guy Lafleur. And there were a lot of other Canadien players like Yvon Cournoyer, Serge Savard, Robinson and Ken Dryden.

These were guys I used to watch on TV, and now I'm getting dressed with them. It's a weird feeling, but they were very nice to me. I didn't say a whole lot. I kind of sat in the dressing room and watched. I just sat in the corner and watched everybody.

That whole year was a wild ride. The Red Wings, the year before, had finished dead last in the league. But in 1977-78, We got on the right track. We doubled the win total from the year before. We came on and ended up finishing second behind Montreal in the Norris Division and ended up beating Atlanta in the first round Of the playoffs. Then we went to Montreal and won the first game.

That might have been the only game they lost in the playoffs that year. I ended up playing 10 seasons in Detroit, and unfortunately, we weren't usually that successful. This was really the best it got. Growing up, playing for some very good coaches on the bantam, high school and college levels, when I got to the pros, I went to an organization that took three team pictures a year.

We're changing coaches, GMs and players like you're changing your socks. You just can't do it: One obvious thing to remember if you ever coach or run a team: You put a team together, and then you fry to make improvements with the least amount of player changes you can. The very good teams, the Canadiens, Oilers and Islanders, the teams that were winning three and four Stanley Cups in a five-year, six-year period, you're lucky if there were two new players a year.

But my rookie year, I had 19 goals and 60 points. You had no idea you'd do that well, especially that quickly. You just did the best you could and the whole year, you're on a high. Just to come to the rink to practice with the guys was exciting. We had a bunch of young guys like myself on the team, like Paul Woods and Dale McCourt Vaclav Nedomansky was a great international play.

He came over from the WHA. Jim Rutherford and Ron Low were the goalies. Perry Miller was a defenseman for us. Dennis Hextall was one of the veteran leaders. He and Nick Libett and Bill Lochead and Dennis Hull and Dan Maloney were the leaders. Terry Harper, too.

I was lucky enough to be selected for the All-Star Game--the game I'll never forget. In the locker room, you don't go up to anyone and introduce yourself and say, 'Hi, I'm Reed Larson.' You shook hands and said hi, but nobody officially introduced themselves.

I can remember vividly Guy Lafleur, Gilbert Perreault, and Rick Martin chain smoking cigarettes. I was kind of shocked at that. These guys skated like the wing. I'm sure they burned their lungs out all the time anyway. These guys from skating every day, I'm sure they were cleaning out their lungs anyway. But I remember sitting there saying, "Wow, these guys smoke a lot.'

It was a pretty serious game. A lot of the All-Star Games I played in after and I see nowadays, there's no checking, and guys just kind of displaying their skills and a lot of scoring. I like that, but the 1978 All-Star Game was old-time, grudge, competitive hockey. The attitude was, guys weren't trying to kill each other, but it was a high-tempo game. It was a rough game. It was like a playoff game almost. Larry Robinson and Clark Gillies did some running at each other, hitting each other. It was no friendly hockey match. It wasn't dirty, but it was a very hard-fought game. I've played in a lot of legends games through the years and when some of these guys lace them up, they play to win. I'm just amazed at the killer instinct of guys who played during that era. I feel very fortunate to have played in the league during that time.

The Campbell Conference got up on us, 2-0 early in the first period. Bill Barber and Denis Potvin scored. Darryl Sittler scored for us in the second period, and then Rick Martin scored real late to fie it. There might have been less than two minutes left when he scored.

That sent the game into overtime. The hometown crowd went home happy after Gilbert Perreault scored. That was a great game. Three-to-two? Could you imagine the All-Stars playing a 3-2 game today? It was a great game.