Today in hockey history, the Hall of Fame announced three new classes, a new professional hockey league in North America is formed, one of the players who played in that league extends his NHL record, a coach deservingly wins an award, two Stanley Cups are won in overtime, and a goalie with a very impressive record.
The Hockey Hall of Fame announced three new classes on this day:
1965 – Marty Barry, Clint Benedict, Arthur Farrel, Red Horner, Syd Howe, Jack Marshall, Bill Mosienko, Blair Russel, Ernie Russell, and Fred Scanlan; and builders Foster Hewitt and Tommy Lockhart.
1969 – Red Kelly, Sid Abel, Roy Worters, Bryan Hextall, and builder Bruce Norris.
1970 – Bill Gadsby, Tom Johnson, and Cecil “Babe” Dye.
1971 – The World Hockey Association (WHA) was founded as an attempt to compete with the NHL. It operated from 1972-79 before being absorbed the NHL (four teams, at least), although it wasn’t because the quality of play was less than its older brother’s; the WHA teams actually won more games in exhibitions between the two leagues. Additionally, the WHA sparked the careers of legends such as Wayne Gretzky and Mark Messier (who played for the NHL-absorbed Oilers), and inspired other business effects and policies that you can read for yourself if you’re interested.
1987 –Wayne Gretzky won the Hart Trophy for the eighth consecutive season, essentially making him the most valuable player for an eight-year period. Talk about domination. Surprisingly, his eight-straight Hart Trophies is only tied for the NHL record for most consecutive wins of one specific award; Bobby Orr won the Norris Trophy in all eight years from 1967-75. Although, the second-longest streak for the Hart is three wins by, yep, Bobby Orr (1969-72). Gretzky won one more Hart in 1989.
1987 – Detroit’s Jacques Demers was awarded the Jack Adams Award (coach of the year) for giving the Red Wings a 38-point turnaround from the previous year; their record for the 1985-86 season was a paltry 17-57-6 (40 points)!!! Not only did he improve their record to 34-36-10, not only did they make the playoffs, not only did they win their first series since 1978, but they made it to the conference finals. If that’s not accredited to the coach’s success that I don’t know what can be.
1996 – Patrick Roy had a 63-save shutout as the Avalanche beat the Panthers 1-0 in triple overtime in Game 4 of the Finals to win the first Stanley Cup in Colorado history. I guess Roy, who won the Conn Smythe, really didn’t want to travel anymore.
2000 – Jason Arnott scored at 8:20 of double overtime to lead the Devils to a 2-1 victory over the Stars in Game 6 of the Finals and the franchise’s second Stanley Cup championship (and as many in five years). Scott Stevens was awarded the Conn Smythe Trophy.
2002 – Detroit’s Dominik Hasek got the shutout in the Red Wings 3-0 win over the Hurricanes in Game 4 of the Finals to become the first player to record a shutout in each of the four rounds. Those shutouts helped the team win the Cup that year.
Source: Hockey Hall of Fame
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