Best single-season team?

[BM67]

6 of the 7 starting goalies in the NHL in 41-42 missed 2 or more seasons due to military service. Only two of them didn't win a starters job after returning to the NHL.

 

[04' hockey]

1976-77 Canadiens. Not even close.

Sure the 60 win mark was eventually eclipsed by the 95-96 Red Wings, but the 76-77 Canadiens lost EIGHT games in an 80 game schedule. I doubt that'll ever be matched.

AGREE......playing in front of Dryden were Robinson, Savard, Lapointe and an underrated Nyrop - 8 losses
AND, the whole friggin' team could FLY.....
I suggest any decent College team could have played well in front of those guys and lost, what, maybe 12 games that year

 

[Hardyvan123]

AGREE......playing in front of Dryden were Robinson, Savard, Lapointe and an underrated Nyrop - 8 losses
AND, the whole friggin' team could FLY.....
I suggest any decent College team could have played well in front of those guys and lost, what, maybe 12 games that year

Okay I know that you are being sarcastic in the last part but does quality of opposition come into play at all in evaluating "the best team of all time"

http://www.hockey-reference.com/leagues/NHL_1977.html

Go through some of thsoe teams and their respective situations in that year and tell me that the league overall was as competitve as say 97 to pick a year out of my head.

Talent in the NHL overall still had to compete with the WHA, at least for some players, and the increase in the quality of player from the US College ranks and Europe wouldn't really start for another couple of years.

 

[BubbaBoot]

Montreal 76-77...a sick team

Shutt - Lemaire - Lafleur
Lambert - Mahovolich - Courneyer
Gainey - Riseborough - Houle
Wilson - Jarvis - Tremblay
Roberts
(I'm a little hazy on the 3rd and 4th lines, someone correct me)

Robinson - Lapointe
Savard - Nyrop
Bouchard - Charttraw
Van Boxmeer

Dryden
Larouque

 

[hislop]

1977 habs

 

[hislop]

Okay I know that you are being sarcastic in the last part but does quality of opposition come into play at all in evaluating "the best team of all time"

http://www.hockey-reference.com/leagues/NHL_1977.html

Go through some of thsoe teams and their respective situations in that year and tell me that the league overall was as competitve as say 97 to pick a year out of my head.

Talent in the NHL overall still had to compete with the WHA, at least for some players, and the increase in the quality of player from the US College ranks and Europe wouldn't really start for another couple of years.

Yeah, and the soviets won world titles against college kids and washed-up former pros (or, in the later years, against hastily-assembled NA squads filled with marginal NHLers). Somehow, methinks you're the type of guy who would formulate plenty of excuses for the russians, but none for the canadiens of the late 1970s. Truth is, Montreal had an excellent record against the other elite teams in the NHL of the time, swept aside a very, very good (and very, very tough) bruins team in the finals, and was simply dominant all season long in what was, whatever you may care to think, still the toughest pro hockey league in the world.

 

[BubbaBoot]

Yeah, and the soviets won world titles against college kids and washed-up former pros (or, in the later years, against hastily-assembled NA squads filled with marginal NHLers). Somehow, methinks you're the type of guy who would formulate plenty of excuses for the russians, but none for the canadiens of the late 1970s. Truth is, Montreal had an excellent record against the other elite teams in the NHL of the time, swept aside a very, very good (and very, very tough) bruins team in the finals, and was simply dominant all season long in what was, whatever you may care to think, still the toughest pro hockey league in the world.

Us old timers still remember 1971 like it was yesterday. Ken Dryden stood on his head and stopped the only team of the era that rivaled the Candiens best rosters.

Frank Mahovolich - Beliveau - Cournoyer (jeezus he could fly)
Lemaire - Pete Mahovolich - Larose / (Houle?)
Ferguson (one tough SOB0 - Henri Rchard - Roberto / (Tardiff?)

Tremblay - Laperriere
Lapointe - Harper
Bouchard

Dryden

v

Cashman - Esposito - Hodge
Bucyk - Stanfield - McKenzie
Walton / Marcotte - Sanderson - Westfall
Carleton / Bailey - Walton - Leach

Orr - Dallas Smith
Awrey - Green
Ricky Smith

Cheevers
Johnston

Those games of that era were epics.....lotta bad blood and drama....