Larry Robinson Larry Clark Robinson, born June 2, 1951 in Winchester, Ontario, Canada, was a star player and a coach in the National Hockey League. Larry "Big Bird" Robinson played junior hockey with the Kitchener Rangers then turned professional, spending 1971 to 1973 with the Nova Scotia Voyageurs of the American Hockey League before making it to the National Hockey League with the Montreal Canadiens.
At 6'4" and 225 pounds, Larry Robinson was a big and strong defenceman yet highly mobile. He played 17 seasons for the Montreal Canadiens and another three seasons for the Los Angeles Kings, until his retirement after the 1992 season. Twice he won the James Norris Memorial Trophy as the league's most outstanding defenceman and won the Conn Smythe Trophy as the most valuable player of the 1978 playoffs. Robinson was a dominant player whose talent and leadership helped lead the Canadiens to six Stanley Cups.
Larry Robinson was a member of Team Canada in the 1976, 1981 and 1984 Canada Cup tournaments and was an international All-Star team selection in the 1981 World Championships. During his career, he played in ten of the league's All-Star games and ended his 20-year career having scored 208 goals, 750 assists and 958 regular-season points as well as 144 points in 227 playoff games, a remarkable achievement for a defenceman.
Following his retirement, Robinson was appointed assistant coach with the New Jersey Devils in 1993 then made head coach of the Los Angeles Kings in 1995, the same year he was inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame. He left the Los Angeles team at the end of the 1998-99 season, and signed on as assistant coach with the New Jersey Devils once again. Named interim head coach of the New Jersey Devils on March 23, 2000, Robinson guided his team to the Stanley Cup. He stayed as head coach, guiding them back to the stanley cup finals the following year, but lost to the Colorado Avalanche in seven games. He was fired in the 2001-02 season, but returned as an assistant coach just before the 2002-03 season.
When Pat Burns suffered a recurrence of cancer, Robinson was once again named to be the Devils' head coach on Thursday, July 14, 2005. Robinson's short return behind the Devils bench would come to an end on December 19, 2005 however, when he resigned citing stress and other health problems
Larry Robinson was raised on an Ontario farm and as a boy he grew up with a love of horses. While living in the rural area of St. Lazare outside of Montreal, Robinson became a co-founder with former teammate Steve Shutt and local veternarian Dr. Gilbert Hallé of the Montreal Polo Club at Sainte-Marthe, Quebec.
