Why did he only coach 8 seasons?
With such a small sample size, and so few actually series', it doesn't mean as much to me as it apparently does to you.
Yet, he accomplished more.....
1. He was involved in an array of other things beyond hockey, including being a huge reason why the NHL was created in the first place. And I think managing teams was probably a greater passion for him given his legendary success at it. I think it's pretty remarkable that a man with no ice hockey playing experience was able to the things he did as a manager AND coach. General overview from Wiki:
Even though he had never played hockey, Mr. Gorman was a talented evaluator of talent.
Ted Dey, principal owner of the
Ottawa Senators of the
National Hockey Association, had trouble recruiting players for the 1916–17 season and hired Mr. Gorman to do the task. He did it so capably that he was hired as secretary-treasurer.
In November 1917, Gorman,
George Kennedy,
Sam Lichtenhein and Mike Quinn all played a part in suspending the NHA and forming the National Hockey League in an effort to rid themselves of Toronto NHA owner
Eddie Livingstone. Gorman became the manager and part-owner of the Senators at that time. He helped lead the team to
Stanley Cups in 1920, 1921, and 1923. He sold his interest in the Senators in 1925 to
Frank Ahearn and became manager-coach of the
New York Americans, introducing professional hockey to
New York City.
New York Americans visit to Tijuana, Mexico in April 1926. Gorman is second from left, front row.
He resigned from the Americans in 1929 to get involved in horse racing. He managed the
Agua Caliente Racetrack in Mexico from 1929 until 1932.
[2] In 1932, Gorman brought the horse
Phar Lap to Mexico where the horse won the $100,000 Agua Caliente Handicap before dying under mysterious circumstances in San Francisco. When the president of Agua Caliente sold the racetrack in 1932, Gorman was briefly out of sports.
Late in the 1932–33 season, he was hired as coach of the
Chicago Black Hawks and became general manager as well the following season, building a defensive squad around
Lionel Conacher and goalie
Charlie Gardiner. He took the team from last place in their division in 1932–33 to their first Stanley Cup victory in 1934—despite scoring the fewest goals of any NHL team. Ten days after the Cup victory, Gorman resigned after a dispute with the owner. He went to
Montreal as their manager-coach and helped the
Montreal Maroons to their final Cup in
1935, thus becoming the first (and only) coach to win consecutive Stanley Cups with different teams. Gorman coached the Maroons until the club folded in 1938. In 1940, he became general manager of the
Montreal Canadiens and lead them to Cup victories in
1944 and
1946. He is the only person to manage four different teams to championships: the Senators, Black Hawks, Maroons and Canadiens. No other General Manager in the history of the NHL,
Major League Baseball, the
National Football League, or the
National Basketball Association has won championships with four different teams.
Gorman was also a promoter. One of his flops was after he became manager-coach of the Montreal Maroons when he booked evangelist
Aimee Semple McPherson at the Montreal Forum. Few people came. "No one wanted to be saved," he explained.
[2] However, some of his better promotions came when he was the Montreal Canadiens general manager. He had
Duke Ellington and
Frank Sinatra perform at the Forum.
After retiring as general manager of the Canadiens in 1946, Gorman bought the
Ottawa Senators of the
Quebec Senior Hockey League, managing it to win the
Allan Cup in 1949. He took figure skater
Barbara Ann Scott on a continental tour after she won the figure skating gold medal at the
1948 Winter Olympics. Gorman revived professional wrestling in Montreal and promoted it in Ottawa, and introduced professional baseball to Ottawa in 1951 with the
Ottawa Giants of the
International League.
In 1937, he took over management of the
Connaught Park Racetrack, a horse race track in Aylmer QC, near Ottawa, of which he had been a part-owner since 1925. Gorman was managing the race track when he died of cancer at a hospital in Ottawa at the age of 74.
[3] He was the last living founder of the NHL. He has been inducted into the
Hockey Hall of Fame (1963), the Ottawa Sports Hall of Fame (1966), and the
Canadian Horse Racing Hall of Fame (1977)
2. Considering he only coached 8 years and had 2 of the worst franchises in the league at his disposal I'd say he did exceptionally well.
3. Jack Adams also coached forever, was barely above .500 in his regular season career and exactly .500 in the postseason. He only accomplished "more" if you look at raw numbers without context IMO.
