The Bruins have won six Stanley Cups, tied for the fourth-most in NHL history. Call it greed, but that number could easily be higher.
For an organization as storied as the B’s, heartbreak is embedded in their history. The championship in 2011 ended nearly four decades of pain, but even since then, they’ve had to endure a pair of devastating Stanley Cup defeats. The franchise has been littered with close calls and dominant teams that have come up short.
Under normal circumstances, the Stanley Cup Final would be starting around now, and the B’s could have been playing in it with a chance to avenge last year’s Game 7 heartbreak. In that spirit, we’ve decided to take a look — team by team — at the best Boston teams in history that didn’t win a championship. The series begins with the Bruins.
5. 1978-79
This Bruins team personified what Boston fans expected from their hockey team, a tough and fearless group, but it had a ton of talent, too. The B’s boasted eight 20-goal scorers, led by 38 from Rick Middleton and 35 from Peter McNab, and the goaltending duo of Gerry Cheavers and Giles Gilbert helped lift them to the Adams Division title. It had been seven years since the Bruins lifted the Stanley Cup, but Don Cherry’s deep and talented squad, which amassed 100 points and the second seed in the Wales Conference, looked primed to finally dethrone the nemesis Montreal Canadiens, who had three consecutive Stanley Cups and five in the decade.
The B’s swept the Pittsburgh Penguins to earn a date with the top-seeded Habs in the semifinals, where it looked like they would break their skid of 13 straight playoff series losses to the rivals up north. Boston led Game 7 in Montreal by a goal late when it was whistled for an infamous too many men on the ice penalty. The Canadiens tied it on the power play, then won it in overtime before winning the Stanley Cup, producing heartbreak for the Bruins, the end of Cherry’s coaching stint in Boston, and one of the great what-ifs in franchise history.
4. 1977-78
This was probably Cherry’s best team in his five seasons as the Bruins’ coach. The offense was dominant, with a record that still stands for the most 20-goal scorers in a season with 11, and another with 16 goals. Terry O’Reilly and 37-year-old Jean Ratelle led the way with 90 and 84 points, respectively, while McNab’s 41 goals led the team as it went on to a 51-18-11 record, 113 points and another Adams Division crown.
But like so many versions of the B’s in the 1970s, their blend of skill and grit wasn’t quite enough to topple the Canadiens, who went an absurd 59-10-11 for an NHL-best 129 points. The B’s, led by defenseman Brad Park, breezed through the first two rounds of the playoffs, sweeping the Chicago Blackhawks and eliminating the Philadelphia Flyers in five games to advance to the Stanley Cup Final. But again they met the Habs, who won it in six games.
3. 2013-14
Fresh off their heartbreak of losing the 2013 Stanley Cup Final in devastating fashion the year prior, the B’s returned with a vengeance and still with much of the same core that won them the Stanley Cup in 2011, and then-general manager Peter Chiarelli gave them a fresh coat. He traded Tyler Seguin to the Dallas Stars for Loui Eriksson and three other players before adding veteran forward Jarome Iginla in free agency, a move that paid major dividends. Iginla and Patrice Bergeron each potted 30 goals, the new parts fit nicely together and the B’s had one of their best regular seasons in franchise history, going 54-19-9 for 117 points and the Presidents’ Trophy.
This group may have peaked too early, though. After ousting the Detroit Red Wings in five games in the first round, the B’s finally ran into some trouble against the Canadiens — who else? — and fell to their rival in seven games, an abrupt ending to a promising season. It also sent the B’s into somewhat of a tailspin as they missed the playoffs for two straight seasons that included the firing of Chiarelli.
2. 1929-30
Way back when the Bruins and the NHL were in relative infancy, the B’s put together what should still be considered the most dominant single season in league history. A season after winning their first Stanley Cup, the Bruins went 38-5-1 — the regular season was 44 games then — for 77 points. Their point percentage of 87.5 still stands as the best in NHL history.
Cooney Weiland and Dit Clapper scored 43 and 41 goals, respectively, to lead the NHL and a B’s offense that led the league with 179 goals in 44 games, and goaltender Tiny Thompson played all 44 games to win the Vezina Trophy. The B’s were the clear favorite to win the Stanley Cup, but after ousting the Montreal Maroons in the semifinals, they lost in a two-game Stanley Cup Final series to the Canadiens, the first time they lost consecutive games all season.
1. 1970-71
Nearly 50 years later, the 1971 Bruins still rank among the most shocking shortcomings in Boston sports history. The B’s won the Cup in 1970 and should have repeated. They dominated the regular season by going 57-14-7 for 121 points and the East Division title. They scored 399 goals for an absurd 5.12 goals per game led by a quartet of 100-point scorers. Phil Esposito scored 76 goals and had 152 points and Bobby Orr had 139 points. They were unstoppable.
Until the first round of the playoffs. The top-seeded Bruins matched up with the Canadiens and ultimately a red-hot goaltender in Ken Dryden, who cooled the B’s and helped the Habs pull off one of the greatest upsets in NHL history, culminating in the Canadiens eliminating the B’s with a 4-2 Game 7 victory at Boston Garden.
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May 28, 2020 at 05:00PM
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Ranking the best Bruins teams that failed to win Stanley Cup - Boston Herald
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