When you think of the word ‘Hull’, either the city on the other side of the river from Ottawa comes to mind or the high scoring family of NHL hockey players. Since no one really cares much about Hull, Quebec, the word is pretty much synonymous with the hockey family.

As far as family members playing in the National Hockey League, the Sutter’s, Stastny’s and Howe’s have had more. Potentially, the Staal’s will too. None have put up the combined numbers that the Hull’s have.

All-Time Top Ten NHL Family Point Scoring:

3,215 Bobby, Dennis and Brett Hull

2,981 Brandon, Brent, Brett, Brian, Darryl, Duane, Rich and Ron Sutter

2,861 Brent and Wayne Gretzky

2,630 Gordie, Mark, Marty and Vic Howe

2,449 Anton, Marian, Paul, Peter and Yan Stastny

2,011 Henry and Maurice Richard

1,911 Gilbert and Marcel Dionne

1,893 Joby, Mark and Mitch Messier

1,876 Frank and Peter Mahovlich

1,822 Pierre and Sylvain Turgeon

Bobby Hull played in the NHL from 1957-58 to 1971-72 then again for one more season in 1979-80. From 1972-73 to 1978-79, he was the face of the World Hockey Association, playing for the Winnipeg Jets.

Up until his departure to the WHA, Hull played solely with the Chicago Black Hawks. With Chicago, Bobby won the Art Ross Trophy as the league’s leading scorer on three occasions. For two consecutive seasons, 1964-65 and 1965-66, Hull was selected as the winner of the Hart Memorial Trophy as the NHL’s most valuable player.

For a short period of time, Hull held the record for most goals in a NHL regular season when he scored 58 in 1968-69. Two years later, Phil Esposito of the Boston Bruins would smash that mark with 76. Bobby got his revenge, scoring 77 with the Winnipeg Jets of the WHA in 1974-75 to hold the record for most goals in a ‘major league’ hockey season. Of course, Wayne Gretzky would soon enough come along and destroy that record.

Bobby returned to the NHL for the 1979-80 season as the remaining four WHA teams were swallowed up. He began the season with the Jets and played in 18 games. He was shipped to the Hartford Whalers where he played in nine games with Gordie Howe. He was inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame three years later. Hull ended his career with 610 regular season goals in the NHL and an additional 303 in the WHA.

Dennis Hull’s career somewhat paralleled that of his older brother. Both were products of the St. Catherines Teepees / Black Hawks of the OHA. Both played the bulk of their NHL careers with the Chicago Black Hawks. Dennis and Bobby played together from 1964-65 until Bobby left for the WHA. Free from his brother’s shadow, it was the year that Bobby began his career in Winnipeg that Dennis had his career year in Chicago, scoring 39 goals and adding 51 assists for 90 points.

Dennis played with Chicago until the end of the 1976-77 season. He joined the Detroit Red Wings for the 1977-78 season and helped the team to one of its just two playoff berths during the ‘Dead Wings’ era. Dennis retired after that season with 303 goals, ironically the same total that brother Bobby scored in the WHA.

Brett Hull played in the NHL from 1986-87 to the beginning of the 2005-06 season. Brett started his career with the Calgary Flames but appeared in just 57 games over two seasons. Following a trade to the St. Louis Blues during the 1987-88 season, Hull’s career took off like a rocket.

Brett Hull’s 86 goals in 1990-91 represent the third best single season total of all time. The two higher counts above him both belong to Wayne Gretzky with 92 in 1981-82 and 87 in 1983-84. It’s often overlooked that Brett was just six goals away from Gretzky’s ‘untouchable’ record and he missed two games that season.

The 86 goal performance that year earned him his only Hart Memorial Trophy as the league’s MVP. The 86 goals couldn’t pave the way to an Art Ross Trophy, though, as he was still 32 points behind Gretzky, then of the Los Angeles Kings. Brett joined his father in the Hockey Hall of Fame in 2009 after a 1,269 regular season game career with Calgary, St. Louis, the Dallas Stars, Detroit Red Wings and Phoenix Coyotes.