The history of the National Hockey League begins with the end of its predecessor league, the National Hockey Association (NHA), in 1917. After unsuccessfully attempting to resolve disputes with Eddie Livingstone, owner of the Toronto Blueshirts, executives of the three other NHA franchises suspended the NHA, and formed the National Hockey League (NHL), replacing the Livingstone team with a temporary team in Toronto, the Arenas. The NHL's first quarter-century saw the league compete against two rival major leagues—the Pacific Coast Hockey Association and Western Canada Hockey League—for players and the Stanley Cup. The NHL first expanded into the United States in 1924 with the founding of the Boston Bruins, and by 1926 consisted of ten teams in Ontario, Quebec, the Great Lakes region, and the Northeastern United States. At the same time, the NHL assumed the status of a major league and in 1947 completed a deal with the Stanley Cup trustees to effectively reserve the Cup competition to its teams. The NHL's media presence spread across Canada aided by Foster Hewitt's radio broadcasts, which were heard coast-to-coast starting in 1933.
The Great Depression and World War II reduced the league to six teams, later known as the "Original Six", by 1942. Maurice Richard became the first player to score 50 goals in a season in 1944–45, and ten years later, Richard was suspended for assaulting a linesman, leading to the Richard Riot. Gordie Howe made his debut in 1946, and retired 35 seasons later as the NHL's all-time leader in goals and points. Willie O'Ree was the first player of Black descent when he suited up for the Bruins in 1958. In 1959, Jacques Plante became the first goaltender to regularly use a mask for protection.
The Original Six era ended in 1967 when the NHL doubled in size by adding six new expansion teams. The six existing teams were formed into the newly created East Division, while the expansion teams were formed into the West Division. The NHL continued to expand, adding another six teams, to total 18 by 1974. This continued expansion was partially brought about by the NHL's attempts to compete with the World Hockey Association, which operated from 1972 until 1979 and sought to compete with the NHL for markets and players. Bobby Hull was the most famous player to defect to the rival league, signing a $2.75 million contract with the Winnipeg Jets. The NHL became involved in international play in the mid-1970s, starting with the Summit Series in 1972 which pitted the top Canadian players of the NHL against the top players in the Soviet Union, which was won by Canada with four wins, three losses, and a tie. Eventually, Soviet-Bloc players streamed into the NHL with the fall of the Iron Curtain in 1989.
When the WHA ceased operations in 1979, the NHL absorbed four of the league's teams, which brought the NHL to 21 teams, a figure that remained constant until the San Jose Sharks were added as an expansion franchise in 1991. Since then, the league has grown from 22 teams in 1992 to 32 today as the NHL spread its footprint across the United States. The league has withstood major labour conflicts in 1994–95 and 2004–05, the latter of which saw the entire 2004–05 NHL season canceled, the first time in North American history that a league has canceled an entire season in a labour dispute. Wayne Gretzky passed Gordie Howe as the NHL's all-time leading scorer in 1994 when he scored his 802nd career goal. Mario Lemieux overcame non-Hodgkin lymphoma to finish his NHL career with over 1,700 points and two Stanley Cup championships. Increased use of defence-focused systems helped cause scoring to fall in the late 1990s, leading some to argue that the NHL's talent pool had been diluted by 1990s expansion. In 1998, the NHL began awarding teams a single point for losing in overtime, hoping to reduce the number of tie games; after the 2004–05 lockout, it eliminated the tie altogether, introducing the shootout to ensure that each game has a winner.
Background and founding
The first attempts to regulate competitive ice hockey matches came in the late 1880s. Before then, teams competed in tournaments and infrequent challenge contests that prevailed in the Canadian sports world at the time. In 1887, four clubs from Montreal formed the Amateur Hockey Association of Canada (AHAC) and developed a structured schedule. In 1892, Lord Stanley donated the Stanley Cup to be symbolic of the Canadian championship and appointed Philip Dansken Ross and Sheriff John Sweetland as its trustees. It was awarded to the AHAC champion Montreal Hockey Club and thereafter awarded to the league champions, or to any pre-approved team that won it in a challenge. In 1904, the International Hockey League (IHL), based around Lake Michigan, was created as the first fully professional league, which lasted for two seasons. In recruiting players, the IHL caused an "Athletic War" that drained amateur clubs of top players, most noticeably in the Ontario Hockey Association (OHA). In the 1905–06 season, the Eastern Canada Amateur Hockey Association (ECAHA) was formed, which mixed paid and amateur players in its rosters, which led to the demise of the IHL. Bidding wars for players led many ECAHA teams to lose money, and it eventually folded on November 25, 1909. As a result of the dissolution of the ECAHA, two leagues were formed—the Canadian Hockey Association (CHA) and the National Hockey Association (NHA). Since the NHA's owners were notable, wealthy businessmen, the CHA did not complete a season, as the NHA easily recruited the top players, and interest in the CHA teams faded. By 1914, the rival Pacific Coast Hockey Association (PCHA) league was launched and the NHA champion would play off each season against the PCHA champion for the Stanley Cup, ending the challenge era.
The National Hockey League came into existence with the suspension of the NHA in 1917. After unsuccessfully resolving disputes with Eddie Livingstone, owner of the Toronto Blueshirts, executives of the three other NHA franchises—the Montreal Canadiens, Montreal Wanderers and Ottawa Senators—suspended the NHA, and formed the NHL, replacing Livingstone's team with a temporary team in Toronto, the Arenas. While new, the NHL was a continuation of the NHA. The NHL adopted the NHA's constitution, its rules, playing with six men to a side rather than the then-traditional seven and the NHA's split-season schedule. The owners originally intended the NHL to only operate for one season. However, the NHA was suspended permanently in 1918 and ceased to be an organisation in 1920. In 1921, the NHA championship trophy O'Brien Cup was adopted as the championship trophy of the NHL.
Timeline
1917–1942: Early years
Early years
One of the NHL's first superstars was the prolific goal-scorer Joe Malone, who scored 44 goals in 20 games in the NHL's first season, of which five were netted on the NHL's opening night. He also set the record for the most goals in a game that season, with seven. Six games into the season, the Montreal Wanderers were forced to permanently withdraw from the league, as a fire left them without an arena. In the 1918–19 season, the Montreal Canadiens faced the Seattle Metropolitans of the PCHA for the Stanley Cup amid the Spanish influenza pandemic. The series was called off after five games when numerous players became ill; one, Joe Hall of the Canadiens, died a few weeks later.
During the early 1920s, the NHL faced competition for players from two other major leagues: the PCHA and the Western Canada Hockey League (WCHL). As a result, ice hockey players were among the best paid athletes in North America. By the mid-1920s, the NHL emerged as the sole major league in North America; the PCHA and WCHL merged in 1924, only to disband two years later. The Victoria Cougars are the last non-NHL team to win the Stanley Cup, having defeated the Canadiens in 1925, and lost to the Montreal Maroons in 1926, respectively. The NHL continued to expand, adding the Maroons and its first American team, the Boston Bruins in 1924, getting up to 10 teams by 1926. Defence dominated the NHL, and in the 1928–29 season, Canadiens goaltender George Hainsworth set what remains a league record with 22 shutouts in 44 games. In response, the NHL began to allow forward passing in the offensive zone, which caused the offense to increase by approximately 2.5 times; to stem the tide, the NHL introduced the offside rule, which prevents offensive players from entering the opponent's zone before the puck crosses the "blue line".
Livingstone continued to press claims in court throughout the 1920s, going as far as the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council in London, England. In early 1927, the Toronto franchise was sold to Conn Smythe, who renamed it to the Maple Leafs, and successfully promised to win the Stanley Cup in five years. He built the Maple Leaf Gardens, which included radio broadcaster Foster Hewitt's famous broadcast booth, affectionately referred to as a "gondola". On December 13, 1933, Eddie Shore charged Ace Bailey causing a severe skull fracture, following what Shore thought was a check from Bailey, but was actually made by King Clancy. Despite the grim prognosis (newspapers printed his obituary), Bailey survived, but did not play another game. The Maple Leafs hosted the Ace Bailey All-Star Benefit Game, which raised over $20,000 for Bailey and his family.
Great Depression
While Conn Smythe was able to successfully build a new arena, numerous other teams experienced financial difficulties. With the folding of the Philadelphia Quakers (originally the Pittsburgh Pirates) and the St. Louis Eagles (originally the Ottawa Senators), the NHL was reduced to eight teams starting in the 1935–36 season. The Montreal Canadiens narrowly escaped a move to Cleveland, Ohio, before a syndicate of Montreal businessmen bought the team. Montreal's financial troubles forced them to sell popular player Howie Morenz. When Morenz scored against the Canadiens on the last day of the 1935 season, Montreal fans voiced their opinion, giving him a standing ovation. Morenz was eventually re-acquired by Montreal, and on January 28, 1937, Morenz's skate became caught in the ice during a play. He suffered a broken leg in four places, and died on March 8 of a coronary embolism; 50,000 people filed past Morenz's casket at centre ice of the Montreal Forum to pay their last respects. A benefit game held in November 1937 raised $20,000 for Morenz's family as the NHL All-Stars defeated the Montreal Canadiens 6–5.
In the mid-1930s, Chicago Black Hawks owner and staunch American nationalist Frederic McLaughlin commanded his general manager to compile a team of only American players; at the time, Taffy Abel was the only American-born player who was a regular player in the league. With eight out of 14 players Americans, the Black Hawks won only 14 of 48 games. In the playoffs, however, the Hawks upset the Canadiens, New York Americans, and the Maple Leafs to become the only team in NHL history to win the Stanley Cup despite a losing regular-season record. In the 1942 Stanley Cup Final, the heavily favoured Toronto Maple Leafs were facing an upset, having fallen 3–0 in the seven-game series to the fifth-place Detroit Red Wings. Toronto rebounded, and won the next four games to capture the Stanley Cup, becoming the first of four teams in the NHL to come back from a 3–0 series deficit and the only team to accomplish that in the Stanley Cup Final.