The Panther
Registered User
Looking at Minnesota's record in 1980-81, it's strange to see (under coach Glen Sonmor) that they were a solid defensive team, and mediocre offensively. Anyway, before the end of the year they called up Dino Ciccarelli, who really delivered with 18 goals in his first 32 NHL games, and then 14 (!) as a rookie in the playoffs. The North Stars, with great playoff runs also by Steve Payne and Bobby Smith, eliminated Boston, Buffalo, and Calgary to make it all the way to the Finals. They lost in five to the mighty Islanders (they managed one win at home, already down 3 to nothing in games), but it was a big season for them and expectations must have been sky-high for 1981-82.
Luckily, the North Stars were in the Norris division where the competition wasn't too tough. They did have quite a strong season in 1981-82, and now with Ciccarelli and Neal Broten on board became more of balanced offense/defense team. They could score. Five players had a point-per-game, including Bobby Smith's career year of 114 points. Craig Hartsburg was a stud on defense (4th in Norris votes). Meloche and Beaupre were in net, and (esp. Meloche) their stats look good. But then the team crashed in round one against Chicago, losing three games to one. I'm not sure why, exactly. The stats show that the scorers scored and the goaltending wasn't bad, but they lost in four (okay, I now see both teams scored 14 goals in the series, but Minny routed Chicago 7-1 in game three, otherwise losing by more modest scores).
Anyway, big things were probably expected for 1982-83, and they had another great season at 96 points, but this was only 2nd in the Norris behind Chicago's big year. I see that Sonmor was relieved of coaching duties midway through the year with a strong 22-12-9 record. Was this related to his drinking episodes? (So I've heard, anyway.) The team had a 36-17-15 record in early March, and must have been toe-to-toe with Chicago, but then went 4-7-1 to finish the regular season. They beat Toronto in the playoffs, but then lost again to their nemesis, Chicago, four games to one.
In summer 1983, the North Stars had the 1st overall pick, and famously chose Brian Lawton (Yzerman and Lafontaine were available). In retrospect, was this a franchise tipping point...?
1983-84, under new coach Bill Mahoney, they dipped to 88 points, but this was good enough for 1st in the weak Norris. The scoring stats and team offence were much more modest this season. Bobby Smith was traded to Montreal early in the season for Keith Acton and Mark Napier. Meloche and Beaupre still in net, but the numbers aren't so good this time. This time, however, the North Stars take down their rival, Chicago -- which must have been sweet --, and then eliminate St.Louis in a relatively tight, 7-game series. Steve Payne scored in overtime of game 7, which put Minny back in the Conference Series. However, they faced Edmonton, and lost in four straight.
The North Stars at this point still had a solid young core, with Broten, Bellows, Ciccarelli, McCarthy, Payne, Acton, Hartsburg, and Dirk Graham all aged 25 or younger.
1984-85, everything went wrong as Sonmor came back mid-season as coach. Brian Bellows led the club with a measly 62 points, as injuries and slumps hit Payne, Ciccarelli, and Hartsburg. Amazingly, this still put them in the playoffs (Norris) where they actually beat out St.Louis, but then lost again to Chicago.
In 1985-86, Lorne Henning became coach and they had a brief comeback to form with an 85-point season (despite a disastrous 6-12-6 start), with Neal Broten having his biggest-ever year (105 points) and Ciccarelli looking good again, too. This is the season Scott Bjugstad had his one and only impressive NHL season with 43 goals, never otherwise scoring more than 11. They easily made the playoffs but were bounced in the first round by St.Louis.
Then the real rot set in. In 1986-87 they briefly had a winning record as late as February 1st, 1987... but then went 7-17-3 to close out the year, missing the playoffs for the first time since 1979. Ciccarelli had 52 goals, but pretty much everybody else disappointed.
They fired Henning and brought in 'Miracle-on-Ice' coach Herb Brooks. The result was a disaster. In 1987-88, the North Stars were dead-last in offence, and second-worst in defence. Unbelievably, they needed only to play better than .325 hockey to beat out Toronto for a Norris playoff spot... and they couldn't do it. In early December, they were a respectable 11-13-4, and would have been comfortably in a playoff spot. Then they went 8-35-9 the rest of the way....! This period's losses included 10-4 to Edmonton, 5-0 to Quebec, 5-0 and 8-1 to Hartford, and 9-1 to St.Louis. Gretzky managed 7 goals and 13 points in three games against them...
Not surprisingly, that was the end of Herb Brooks in Minny, but the upside was they got to draft Modano 1st overall in summer '88.
Anyway, all of this (esp. prior to 1986-87) is stuff I don't remember first-hand, but had to read about online. But I do that Minny had an exciting, promising team that were viewed as up-and-comers circa 1981 to 1984. they seemed to run into a wall in 1983-84, and never really recovered. Was it the Bobby Smith trade? Hartsburg's and Payne's sudden declines? Too radical of a coaching change by bringing in Henning? It's sort of strange to me that with their young and talented line-up they reached such a sad state by 1987 or so, when other teams similarly built in the early-80s (like Edmonton, Philly) were flying still flying high.
What happened?
