Let’s start with the legend of the home intruder. Guy wielding a bat. A bat? You kidding me? Like a bat was a tougher foe than Rocket Richard, and Ezzie had handled the Canadian numerous times, hadn’t he? And if Ted Lindsay of the Red Wings hadn’t intimidated Ezzie – and he hadn’t – why fear a guy brandishing a bat?

So Ezzie – and for the record his name was Bill Ezinicki, though anyone who knew him, which was just about everyone in hockey and golf, the two greatest sports circles in existence, called him Ezzie – made his way downstairs and swiftly had things in order.

The police arrived to find the suspect, minus the bat and likely some teeth, wrapped up in a rug.

The necessary details were provided to the police, who escorted the suspect to medical treatment then booking, and within 24 hours the story had grown to folklore status. It was rumored that Ezzie had needed one punch to halt the guy. “No,” Ezzy said with a wry smile, “I hit him more than once.”

Which reminds Mike Menery of the time he was sitting in a hospital room, watching his dad’s chemo treatment. Behind a dividing curtain, a visitor was telling another patient about this pro who had given him a bunker lesson recently. The pro tossed balls at him, hit his club a few times, slapped him to pay attention. “Never had a lesson like it,” said the guy.

Menery’s dad pulled back the divider and said, “did you take a lesson with Ezzie?” and the man confirmed with a shake of his head.

Which is a segue into that story about Ezzie and the crushing body check put upon Edgar Laprade of the New York Rangers. Play was stopped and New York coach Frank Boucher later demanded Ezzie be suspended.

Conn Smythe, Toronto’s owner, replied to Boucher: “Take a look at the film and you might learn how a good body check is delivered.”

Punches, full-contact golf lessons, body checks. They are just slithers of his story, but the larger part and the true essence of the late and truly great Bill Ezinicki is this: He was the genuine article, authentically tough to the core as a champion hockey player, gracious and humble as a champion golfer.

“The best ‘people guy’ ever,” said Brian Lynch.

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It has been nearly 12 years since Ezinicki died at the age of 88 and what prompts these words of remembrance is simple. When playoff pucks start flying on those same days when golf also commands our participation, it produces a Venn diagram of happiness.

And when you are in the overlap of hockey and golf, thoughts always drift toward Ezinicki, of whom legendary Boston Bruin teammate Milt Schmidt once said: “He took his golf seriously, more seriously, as a matter of fact, than hockey.”

Pure serendipity how Ezinicki’s hockey career brought him to Boston for two seasons and thus opened up brilliant opportunities to merge into a vibrant golf scene. Having been a main cog to three straight Stanley Cup champions in Toronto, Ezinicki in the fall of 1950 was late to pre-season camp.

“Would you rather be playing hockey or the golf course?” asked Smythe. Ezinicki paused, then answered, “I guess I’d rather be on the golf course.”

Smythe dealt him to Boston where linemates were Schmidt and Woody Dumart, but each of his seasons ended with first-round playoff losses. After one more year in the NHL (1954-55 with the Rangers) Ezinicki was just 32. Prime time for golf and oh, how he roared onto the local pro scene.

Ezzie, who in 1947 had lost in the finals of the Canadian Amateur to the heralded Frank Stranahan, won the NEPGA Championship in ’56 and ’58. In 1960 he won State Opens in Massachusetts, Rhode Island, New Hampshire, and Maine. Nine times he qualified for the U.S. Open and on seven occasions Ezinicki played in the PGA Championship. He wintered in Florida with Gene Sarazen, played a lot of golf with 1946 U.S. Amateur champion Ted Bishop, and counted six-time PGA Tour winner Paul Harney – the greatest golfer to come out of New England – as a great friend.

Harney, like so many others, heard of Ezzie the hockey player and shook his head. “I could never get over that. He was a real gentleman on the course,” said Harney, who passed in 2011.

The summer after his first year in the NHL, Bill Ezinicki qualified for the first of nine U.S. Opens. His talents also earned him a parade of pro wins inside New England including four different State Opens in 1960.

Timing is everything and Ezinicki always felt blessed to have had the head professional opportunities come his way. With the chance to work at The International in Bolton, Mass., in 1974, though, Ezzie hit it out of the park. It’s just part of Ezzie folklore, however, that he almost didn’t get the chance.

Spike Boda, part of legenary NEPGA family, was leaving the International and had the assignment to pick his successor. “That was Ezzie,” said Mike Menery.

But for five weeks, Boda’s calls never got to Ezinicki because he was either on the golf course playing – his No. 1 love – or giving lessons – his No. 2 love. “It took forever for Spike to get a message to Bill – show up at the International for a pro-am, get $100 appearance money, then have a chance for more money in the tournament.”

That did the trick. It got Ezinicki to The International – then owned by ITT which used it for corporate enjoyment and pre-approved guest play. “Only there was no tournament,” laughed Menery. “Spike tricked Bill to get him there, just to tell him that he was now the head pro.”

Years later, Ezinicki reflected fondly on Spike Boda’s sly move. “When I came here for the first time, I looked around and said to myself, ‘Thank God I got traded to Massachusetts.’ ”

Menery, who is married to Spike Boda’s daughter, Lynn, maintained a rich golf lineage from Andover CC to Old Marsh CC in Palm Gardens, Fla., where he is the GM.

Lynch, now the GM at Wellesley CC in Wellesley, Mass., had an incredibly colorful run at The International, much of it owed to Ezinicki.

Each of them cherishes the memory of the guy who was hockey tough but golf gentle. “Unless you’re talking lessons,” laughed Menery. “When you took lessons from Ezzie, your hands would bleed. You would go for a 40-minute lesson but be there for four hours. He was a full contact golf coach.”

It wasn’t long into Ezzie’s tenure at the International that CEO Harold Geneen realized his new head pro was a fantastic player and brilliant teacher, but not much of a bookkeeper or office manager. Another pro joined the staff but more help was needed. So, Ezinicki looked at twins Brian and Kevin Lynch, who had caddied for a few years, and told them they were now running the bag room.

“It was the greatest golf tutelage you could have received, working for Ezzie,” said Brian Lynch who remembers a rainy day when no golf was going to be played. Ezinicki told the twins to go through every member’s bag and polish the persimmon woods.

“Next day, members got to the tee, reached in their bag and thought they had new drivers,” laughed Brian. “Ezzie pointed to me and my brother and said, ‘They cleaned them.’

“We could never understand how such a tenacious hockey player was the sweetest, most gentle guy you could ever meet.”

When in 2012 Ezinicki was in failing health and had to move from his home across from The International, Lynch was helping in whatever way he could. One day in the home’s kitchen, Lynch saw hundreds of pieces of fan mail just sitting there.

“Imagine having hundreds of pieces of fan mail? He was the most humble guy; he just didn’t want a big fuss made out of him,” said Lynch, who slowly went through some of the mail and came across one piece that struck a chord with him.

It was from a man in Toronto, a hand-written note from a longtime Maple Leafs fan explaining how for years he had admired Ezinicki. “I followed you as a kid,” wrote the man and his request was for Ezinicki to autograph a picture that he had enclosed.

“You have to know that Ezzie had the greatest penmanship. It was (Arnold) Palmer-like,” said Lynch. “So I took the photo and traced Ezzie’s perfect penmanship and signed the photo and mailed it to him.”

Consider it signing off as a tribute to a mentor and a hero. “He was revered,” said Lynch.