Gerald Michael "Gerry" Cheevers was born in St. Catharines, Ontario on December 7, 1940. He started his NHL goaltending career with two games in 1961-62 for the Toronto Maple Leafs before being claimed by the Boston Bruins, where he played from 1965-66 to 1971-72 and 1975-76 to 1979-80 and was on two Stanley Cup winning teams. He also played four seasons in between with the Cleveland Crusaders of the World Hockey Association.

Cheevers played 418 regular-season and 88 playoff games in the NHL and compiled a combined 2.85 goals-against average with 34 shutouts. His 283-136-74 record gives him a winning percentage of 67.6%, the second best of all time when he retired. He also amassed over 250 career penalty minutes. In 1985 he was elected into the Hockey Hall of Fame.

In 1971-72 he had an undefeated streak of 32 games. In 1969-70 he had 10 consecutive playoff wins.

Cheevers is also notable for being one of the innovators in the early days of painting goalie masks. His mask was decorated with stitches, each one supposedly designating where he either was or would have been cut on the face.

Cheevers also served as coach of the Bruins from 1980-81 to 1984-85, and went 204-126-46 in the regular season and 15-19 in the playoffs.

Ralph Slate. The Internet Hockey Database. http://www.hockeydb.com. April 26, 2002.
Doug Norris. "Gerry Cheevers (1961-1980)", The Goaltender Home Page. http://ucsu.colorado.edu/~norrisdt/bio/cheevers.html. April 26, 2002.
Joel Ferchoff. "Gerry Cheevers Profile", Joel's World of Goalies. http://www.geocities.com/Colosseum/Arena/7632/cheevers.html. April 26, 2002.