Gordie Howe Trivia
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50 free Gordie Howe trivia questions with answers — sports quiz, new questions added Aug 2026.
This Gordie Howe trivia quiz covers Mr. Hockey from a farmhouse in Floral, Saskatchewan, to a final NHL season at 52 and one last professional shift at 69. The easy questions are ones any hockey fan can answer: the team he spent 25 seasons with, the number he wore, the nickname, what a Gordie Howe hat trick is and which player finally broke his scoring records. The harder end is for Red Wings historians and hockey obsessives: his linemates on the Production Line, the fractured skull of 1950, the four straight scoring titles, why he switched from number 17 to number 9, how many Hart Trophies he won, the WHA team he joined with his sons Mark and Marty, the night he scored his 1,000th professional goal, the salary dispute that helped spark the players' association, the game show he appeared on in 1967, and the bridge across the Detroit River that carries his name. Every answer was checked against encyclopaedia entries for Howe, his teams and his family before publishing, and the supporting sentence is stored with each question. If you enjoy this one, try our Hockey, Detroit Red Wings and Wayne Gretzky quizzes next.
30 of 50 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01What was Gordie Howe's famous nickname?
Mr. Hockey
Mr. Hockey. His wife Colleen, who ran the family business, registered the nickname as a trademark, along with her own, Mrs. Hockey.
Q 02In which 1986 teen comedy does a main character wear Gordie Howe's Red Wings jersey for most of the film?
Ferris Bueller's Day Off
Ferris Bueller's Day Off. Cameron wears it even though the film is set in Chicago, home of the rival Blackhawks, and Howe said he sent the filmmakers the jersey himself.
Q 03In which Canadian province was Gordie Howe born?
Saskatchewan
Saskatchewan. He was born in a farmhouse at Floral and grew up in Saskatoon, and at 15 he walked out of his first NHL training camp because he was homesick for the province.
Q 04Which exercise did doctors prescribe the teenage Gordie Howe, fearing a calcium deficiency had weakened his spine?
Chin-ups
Chin-ups. Together with the concrete he hauled on building sites beside his father, they gave him the sloping shoulders and powerful forearms of his playing days.
Q 05Which perk persuaded Howe to take sweater number 9 in 1947?
A lower Pullman berth on road trips
A lower Pullman berth on road trips. On the team's overnight trains the lower sweater numbers got the bottom bunks, so he gave up the 17 he wore as a rookie when 9 came free.
Q 06Which player passed Howe's 801 NHL goals in December 2022?
Alex Ovechkin
Alex Ovechkin. He tied and passed Howe in one night, scoring twice against Winnipeg, the second goal into an empty net.
Q 07Howe's record of 1,767 NHL games was finally passed in April 2021 by which player?
Patrick Marleau
Patrick Marleau. Howe still leads if his 419 games in the WHA, which the NHL does not recognise, are counted: 2,186 in the major leagues.
Q 08What three things make up a 'Gordie Howe hat trick'?
A goal, an assist and a fight
A goal, an assist and a fight. The NHL has never counted it as an official statistic, and the first one on record came years before Howe was born.
Q 09Who is credited with a record 18 'Gordie Howe hat tricks', as of 2025?
Rick Tocchet
Rick Tocchet. Howe himself had only two, both in the 1953-54 season, and few players dared to fight him after he battered the enforcer Lou Fontinato in 1959.
Q 10Which two linemates joined Howe on the famous 'Production Line'?
Sid Abel and Ted Lindsay
Sid Abel and Ted Lindsay. The name saluted the car factories of the team's home city as much as the goals: in 1949-50 the trio were the NHL's top three scorers.
Q 11Which Maple Leafs captain was Howe trying to check when he fractured his skull in 1950?
Ted Kennedy
Ted Kennedy. Howe crashed head first into the boards and needed emergency surgery to relieve pressure on his brain, yet he walked onto the ice weeks later when his team won the Cup.
Q 12Leading the NHL in points four seasons running won Howe which trophy?
Art Ross
Art Ross Trophy. He won the first by 20 points, a season after the head injury that nearly killed him, and went on to win six in all.
Q 13Opponents gave Howe which second nickname, for the weapon he favoured in the corners?
Mr. Elbows
Mr. Elbows. Told as a brawling rookie by coach Jack Adams to stop fighting everyone, Howe fought selectively and let his elbows do the policing.
Q 21Which discovery in 1969 soured Howe on his club's management?
He was only the team's third-highest-paid player
He was only the team's third-highest-paid player. Owner Bruce Norris gave him a large raise but blamed Howe's wife Colleen, who acted as his agent, for the demand.
Q 22Which chronic problem forced Howe's first retirement after the 1970-71 season?
A wrist injury
A wrist injury. Arthritis in his left wrist sent him to a front-office desk, and two years later he had surgery on it so that he could come back and play alongside his sons.
Q 23In a 1992 episode of The Simpsons, Bart sends which character a photo of Gordie Howe, posing as her admirer?
Q 14At which position did Mark Howe, a left winger beside his father in the WHA, later reach the Hockey Hall of Fame?
Defence
Defence. Mark was the WHA's rookie of the year as a winger in 1974 and filled in on the blue line there, then moved back for good in the NHL and entered the Hall in 2011.
Q 15As an NHL rookie, Howe kept what as proof for the future that he had really played in the league?
A scrapbook
A scrapbook. He scored in his first game yet doubted he would last in the league; he went on to play 26 NHL seasons.
Q 16Which baseball Hall of Famer, a Tigers great of Howe's own era, helped carry his casket in 2016?
Al Kaline
Al Kaline. The casket was borne into a public visitation that ran from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m., hours chosen in honour of the number 9 Howe wore.
Q 17In 1968-69 Howe was one of the first three 100-point scorers in NHL history; which Boston centre got there first?
Phil Esposito
Phil Esposito. He got there four weeks before Howe, who scored his 100th point on the season's last day, the eve of his 41st birthday.
Q 18Which Montreal right winger, also wearing 9, was Howe's great rival in the 1950s?
Maurice Richard
Maurice Richard. Howe fell one goal short of Richard's record 50 in 1952-53, then took his career goals record a decade later, in 1963.
Q 19Which Chicago rival, later his teammate, described Howe as 'strong as a bull and tougher than a night in jail'?
Bobby Hull
Bobby Hull. He also said he enjoyed every high-sticking minute of their duels, and the two ended up as teammates in 1979-80, the last season for both.
Q 20Howe's only 100-point NHL season followed which league change?
Doubling to twelve teams
Doubling to twelve teams. Expansion in 1967 brought more scoring chances, and Howe, at 40 and on a line with Alex Delvecchio and Frank Mahovlich, scored 44 goals and 103 points.
Edna Krabappel
Edna Krabappel. Bart invents a suitor called Woodrow to prank his lonely teacher, then, seeing how hard she has fallen, lets her down gently with a goodbye letter.
Q 24Which WHA team did Howe join in 1973 to play alongside his sons?
Houston Aeros
Houston Aeros. The club ignored the age limit to draft his two teenage sons, then invited their 45-year-old father as well, in a deal his wife Colleen put together.
Q 25After the 1950 head injury left Howe with a facial tic, teammates gave him which nickname?
Blinky
Blinky. The slight tic was the lasting trace of the fractured skull that nearly killed him, and he went on to play for 30 more years.
Q 26What happened to the WHA's MVP trophy a year after Howe won it at 46?
Renamed after him
Renamed after him. The Gary L. Davidson Trophy became the Gordie Howe Trophy after he came out of a two-year retirement to score 100 points in his first WHA season.
Q 27After chasing a purse snatcher and returning the bag in 1973, Howe asked for what in return?
That they come to his games
That they come to his games. He chased the thief for several blocks until the purse was dropped, and at 45 he was doing all he could to sell hockey in his new team's city.
Q 28After a severe stroke in 2014, Howe's family took him to which country for an experimental stem cell treatment?
Mexico
Mexico. The spinal injections were not yet allowed in the United States, so he joined a clinical trial at a clinic in Tijuana; his family said the only other choice was Russia.
Q 29Which first did Howe claim while playing alongside his sons?
First grandfather to play pro hockey
First grandfather to play pro hockey. His son and teammate Mark became a father while the two were still on the ice together, and Gordie kept playing until he was 52.
Q 30Whose injury did Howe avenge by felling Robbie Ftorek with his stick?
His son Marty's
His son Marty's. Howe was around 50 and playing in the WHA; Ftorek, who had broken a bone in Marty's face, went down hurt, and Howe's only punishment was a five-minute penalty.