Welcome in and thank you so much for joining
us for today's deep dive. We're really thrilled
to have you here. Yeah, glad you could make it.
We've got a great one today. We really do. Today
we are transporting you back in time to a very
specific, just an incredibly critical moment
in sports history. We're talking about the 1942
to 1943 National Hockey League season. A really
wild year. Oh, completely. And we are relying
on a massive, highly detailed... historical article
as our single source to kind of unpack all this
today. Right. To figure out how they even survive.
Exactly. That's the mission for this deep dive.
We want to uncover how a season defined by, you
know, a global war, unimaginable tragedy in the
boardroom and just sheer desperate survival,
how all of that accidentally birthed one of the
most legendary eras in all the sports. The original
six era. You guessed it. OK, let's unpack this,
because when you think of the original six, you
usually picture this, I don't know, this golden,
untouchable. Era of hockey. Pristine sweaters,
noble rivalries. Yeah, packed arenas, the whole
romanticized image. But looking at the historical
record, the foundation of that era was built
on pure, unadulterated crisis management. It
really was. What's fascinating here is that the
original six wasn't... It wasn't some grand marketing
strategy. Right. Or a carefully curated master
plan by the Lee owners to create this premium
product. It was a product of contraction, plain
and simple. Necessity. Yeah. Coming into the
42 -43 season, the NHL was reduced to just six
teams because the Brooklyn Americans were officially
dropped from the league. And the reason behind
this really highlights the domino effect of the
era, doesn't it? Oh, absolutely. Madison Square
Garden simply turned down a lease agreement with
the team's owner, Red Dutton. And without a building
to play in, Dutton was effectively locked out.
But, I mean, was it purely a logistical issue
with the arena? Or did the remaining owners see
a financial benefit to consolidating the talent
pool and the revenue into just six cities? Because
Dutton certainly didn't seem to think it was
just about a lease. He argued passionately that
the ongoing Second World War was going to weaken
all the teams across the board anyway. So why
single out the Americans for contraction? He
had a point. Dunn had a point about the war weakening
everyone. But the other owners countered with
a pretty harsh reality regarding manpower. Yeah,
the military draft. Right. They pointed out that
the sheer number of players, particularly Americans,
who are currently serving in the armed forces,
meant the Brooklyn franchise literally could
not operate. They just didn't have the bodies.
They wouldn't have the bodies to put on the ice.
So the league officially placed the Brooklyn
Americans on what they called reserve status.
Which is basically suspended animation, right?
Exactly. To break that down, reserve status essentially
meant putting the franchise on ice, pun intended.
The League promised Dutton they could return
after the war was over and the talent pool replenished.
Though as history tells us, they never actually
returned. Nope, never did. But that manpower
shortage, it wasn't just an excuse to push out
Brooklyn. It was affecting every single roster
in ways that are hard to comprehend today. Oh,
massively. I want to look at the New York Rangers
for a second because they felt the full devastating
impact of World War II during this specific season.
They went from being the first place team in
the league to the absolute worst. First to worst.
First to worst in a single year. If we connect
this to the bigger picture, the war was draining
the talent pool relentlessly. The Rangers lost
key personnel almost overnight. It's staggering.
We're talking about guys like Art Coulter, Alex
Shibaki, the Colville brothers, Bill Juzda. By
the time the dust settled, the Rangers were left
with just one player from their regular defensive
rotation. Just one. Just Ott Heller. Everyone
else had enlisted or been drafted. They were
desperately trying to plug holes in a sinking
ship, which led to trades like sending Babe Pratt
to Toronto just to get Hank Gold up and a player
named Dudley Red Garrett. And the story of Red
Garrett, it brings a really heavy perspective
to this whole discussion. We talk about wins
and losses and team standings, but the reality
outside the rink was literally life and death.
It really was. Dudley Red Garrett proved to be
an excellent replacement on the ice for New York.
But the somber reality of this era is that professional
hockey was entirely secondary to the global conflict.
Garrett played just 21 games for the Rangers
before he, too, was called into the armed forces.
Wow. And tragically, he gave his life in service
during the war. It completely recontextualizes
what these teams were dealing with. It really
does. They weren't just losing star players to
free agency or injuries. They were sending their
teammates off to a global theater of war. And
some of them. Never came back. It makes you realize
that these front offices were barely holding
their organizations together. I mean, to survive
this massive enlistment drain, the NHL actually
had to make a special, unprecedented agreement
with the Canadian Amateur Hockey Association,
the CAHA. Like the junior leagues. Yeah. Yeah.
The agreement allowed junior age players to become
professionals early whenever they wanted, specifically
so these young guys could make a living under
wartime conditions. But how did that actually
play out on the ice? You have to picture. the
physical reality of this. Because the NHL was
so desperate for bodies, you suddenly had 16
and 17 -year -old boys. Kids. Literal kids who
should have been worrying about high school exams
stepping onto the ice to play against fully grown,
heartened professional athletes. That's terrifying.
It was. These veterans were men fighting for
their livelihoods in an incredibly brutal era
of the sport. The league fully expected clubs
to rely heavily on these kids. Did they have
any rules in place for that? A few. They set
some ground rules, like requiring NHL teams to
contact the junior club first and continuing
to pay the CHA for developing the players. But
it was purely a survival tactic. They needed
warm bodies in skates, even if those bodies belonged
to teenagers. The logistics of just keeping the
league functioning under wartime restrictions
led to some wild rule changes, too. Oh, the overtime
thing. Yes. Think about how... Integral overtime
is to the drama of regular season hockey today
for you as a fan. It's often the most exciting
part of the game. But partway through this very
season, regular season overtime was completely
abolished. Banned entirely. And I know they didn't
do it for player safety. So what was the actual
catalyst for banning extra time? This raises
an important question about how infrastructure
dictates sports. The ban had absolutely nothing
to do with player fatigue or safety. It was strictly
dictated by wartime travel restrictions and the
rigid schedules of the locomotive trains. The
trains? Yeah. Teams relied entirely on the rail
system to get from city to city. And during the
war, troop movements and military supplies took
absolute priority. So the passenger trains were
getting bumped. Exactly. They were operating
on incredibly strict, unforgiving timetables.
If a hockey game went into overtime... The visiting
team risked missing their train out of town.
They'd just be stranded. Right. So the last regular
season overtime game, played for decades, happened
on November 10th, with the Rangers beating Chicago
5 -3. By November 21st, 1942, the league officially
banned it. Banning a massive component of the
sport simply so players wouldn't get stranded
at the station is wild. And that rule stuck around.
For a very long time. Regular season overtime
would not return to the NHL until the 1983 -1984
season. Decades later. Over 40 years later. An
entire generation of hockey forever altered because
of train schedules in 1942. But as challenging
as the on -ice logistics and the train schedules
were, the league was about to face a completely
sudden catastrophic crisis at the executive level.
We need to look at January 25, 1943. Right. The
NHL held a lead meeting that day. It was supposed
to be routine administrative housekeeping. Just
normal stuff. Yeah. The primary agenda was just
confirming the playoff dates, setting them to
start on March 20th, and agreeing that all series
would be best of seven. The morning session went
off without a hitch. But the afternoon session.
The afternoon session took a very dark turn.
Frank Calder, the longtime president of the NHL,
had just finished a tense conversation with Red
Dutton. The Brooklyn owner. Right. Officially
informing him about that reserve status for the
Brooklyn Americans we discussed earlier. Shortly
after that exchange, Hapday, the coach of the
Toronto Maple Leafs, noticed Calder was in visible
physical distress. Two lead governors rushed
over to help him, but Calder, being the old school
executive he was, tried to brush it off. He assured
them he was fine. But then his face contracted
in pain. He took a few faltering steps and he
suddenly cried out. And this is a direct quote
from the source. My God, there is something wrong.
From there, a truly harrowing sequence of events
unfolds. Calder was taken to his hotel room where
a doctor confirmed he had suffered a massive
heart attack. A massive one. A specialist had
to intervene and convince him. despite Calder's
stubborn protests, to check into St. Michael's
Hospital in Toronto. And while he was recovering
there at St. Michael's, he suffered his second
heart attack. Yet he somehow fights through that
second one. After a week, he actually feels well
enough to travel, so he takes a train back to
Montreal and checks into Montreal General Hospital.
By February 4th, he's sitting in his hospital
bed. He's surrounded by his family. He eats a
light breakfast. And what is he doing? Working.
He is literally reviewing the league's financial
books from his hospital pillows. The sheer stubborn
dedication to the job right up to the very end
is remarkable. While looking over those league
ledgers, he slipped back onto his pillows and
passed away from a third fatal heart attack at
the age of 65. Unbelievable. The league was suddenly
completely leaderless during the most precarious,
fragile season in its history. And the irony
of what happens next is almost hard to believe.
The NHL urgently needed a new president to guide
them through this wartime chaos and keep the
league from folding entirely. Who did they choose
to step in on an interim basis? Red Dutton. Red
Dutton. The very same ousted owner who had just
lost his Brooklyn franchise. The very man Frank
Calder had been speaking to right before his
first heart attack. Dutton goes from a frustrated,
locked -out owner who believed the league couldn't
survive the war to the interim president tasked
with ensuring it did exactly that. It is a profound
twist of fate. But it's a sobering reminder of
the human element behind the business of sports.
Despite losing their foundational leader and
despite operating in the long shadow of a global
war, the league had to press forward. The games
had to go on. The business couldn't stop. The
games had to be played. And the product on the
ice was surprisingly fierce. Here's where it
gets really interesting. You'd think a depleted
grieving league would produce sloppy, forgettable
hockey. But the intensity was off the charts.
The Detroit Red Wings emerged as the absolute
powerhouse of the regular season. They really
did. They finished in first place with 61 points.
But the stat that really jumps out is their plus
45 goal differential. For those listening who
might not obsess over hockey analytics, how dominant
is a plus 45 in this specific era? It's a staggering
number when you consider the context. A plus
45 goal differential simply means Detroit scored
45 more goals than they allowed over the course
of the year. Right. But remember, this was only
a 50 -game season. Averaging almost a full goal
better than your opponent every single night
in a six -team league where you play the same
rosters over and over again is total dominance.
They were just crushing people. And a huge part
of that dominance came down to their man in the
net. Johnny Mowers was phenomenal. He secured
six shutouts in those 50 games, winning the Vizina
Trophy for allowing the fewest goals in the league.
When your goaltender is a brick wall, it allows
your defense to play more aggressively, which
fuels the offense. But it wasn't just precision
passing and great goaltending. It was also incredibly
violent. Oh, very. This era was notoriously tough,
and there's a specific incident that perfectly
illustrates the raw emotions spilling over on
the ice. It was a massive stick -swinging brawl
between Jimmy Orlando, a hardened veteran for
Detroit, and a rookie for Toronto named Gay Stewart.
A nasty fight. And apparently the rookie absolutely
dismantled the veteran. Orlando came out of it
badly cut in the face and... bleeding profusely.
The league had to step in and suspend both players
to maintain some semblance of order. But what's
notable about Gay Stewart isn't just that he
won a bloody, visceral fight against an established
enforcer. Right. He was actually good. Stewart
was a legitimate offensive weapon. He went on
to win the Calder Memorial Trophy as the best
first year player in the NHL. He represented
a new breed of player coming into the league,
highly skilled, but tough enough to survive.
The literal bloodbaths of the 1940s. Speaking
of new talent, we have to talk about what was
brewing up in Montreal. Yes. The Canadians finished
fourth in the standings, barely squeaking into
the playoffs by a single point. But their coach,
Dick Riven, was quietly assembling the pieces
of an absolute juggernaut. He put together the
very first iteration of what hockey historians
know as the punchline. Legendary. That was Elmer
Latch, Toe Blake, and Joe Benoit. The cultural
and historical impact of the punchline cannot
be overstated. They would go on to terrorize
the league for years. And you could see the chemistry
forming immediately. Joe Benoit had a phenomenal
year, scoring in even 30 goals. Wow. To put that
in perspective for Montreal fans, he became the
first Canadian to hit the 30 -goal plateau since
the legendary Howie Morens did it way back in
the 1929 -30 season. The pieces for a dynasty
were falling into place. But wait, Montreal also
debuted another rookie that year, didn't they?
Someone who ended up having a rather, let's say,
complicated start. Yes, and this is one of the
great ironies of hockey history. During this
42 -43 season, Montreal debuted a young, fiery
player who showed flashes of brilliance but ended
up suffering a broken leg. A bad break. The Canadiens
manager at the time, Tommy Gorman, actually went
on the record expressing deep concern that this
young player was simply too brittle to ever make
it in the grinding, physical world of the NHL.
That brittle rookie was Maurice Richard. Maurice
Rocket. The one and only. The idea that the Rocket,
arguably the most fearsome, relentless, and iconic
goal scorer in the history of the sport, a guy
who basically defines hockey toughness was almost
written off as too fragile, is hilarious in hindsight.
It really highlights how unpredictable player
development was, especially when you factor in
the sheer physical toll of the game back then.
And Richard wasn't the only notable youth movement.
Right. Over in Boskin, the Bruins debuted a player
named Beb Guidolin. who made history by becoming
the youngest rookie to ever play in the NHL.
Because the older veterans were overseas, the
door was blown wide open for these teenagers
to step in and plant the seeds for the next generation.
But let's look at the structure of the league
itself, because having only six teams didn't
just open doors for rookies. It fundamentally
changed the psychology of the sport. Why did
this specific contraction forge such intense
legendary rivalries? It comes down to human nature.
Familiarity breeds contempt. Sure does. Because
the lead was reduced to just six teams, the schedule
was incredibly condensed. You were playing the
exact same five opponents up to ten times a single
season. Ten times. You weren't just playing a
team. You were playing the guy who cross -checked
you in the teeth two weeks ago, and you knew
you'd see him again next Tuesday. No escaping
it. There was no hiding. That constant repetitive
physical friction birthed the fierce, genuine
blood feud rivalries that fans eventually romanticized
as the hallmark of the original six. And that
familiar hatred really boiled over when the regular
season ended and the playoffs began. Because
the league was now just six teams, the old quarterfinal
round was completely eliminated. How did the
new bracket work? The Stanley Cup playoffs were
reduced to just a four -team best -of -seven
bracket. The first -place team played the third
-place team, and the second -place team faced
the fourth -place team. Nice and simple. It was
a streamlined, high -stakes sprint to the Cup.
And this format actually stayed in place all
the way through the 1966 -67 season. Let's look
at the first matchup. The first place... Detroit
Red Wings against the third place Toronto Maple
Leafs. Detroit ultimately won the series 4 -2,
but calling it a hard -fought series feels like
an understatement. Look at game two of that series
in Detroit. Toronto won the game 3 -2, but it
took them four overtime periods to do it. Four
overtimes? Jack McLean finally scored the winner
in the fourth OT. You have to imagine the physical
state of those players. These rosters were already
stretched incredibly thin by the military draft.
They didn't have four lines they could roll to
keep guys fresh. You had the same handful of
exhausted men playing essentially two and a half
full hockey games in a single night. With dull
skates. The skates are dull, the ice is chewed
up, the lactic acid buildup in their legs must
have been agonizing. The sheer stamina required
just to stay upright, let alone compete at a
championship level, is unimaginable today. Despite
Toronto's unbelievable resilience in that marathon
game, Detroit's overall depth and the absolute
brick wall that was Johnny Moore's were just
too much to overcome. Detroit eventually closed
out the series by winning game six in overtime
on a goal by Joe Karvath. And the other side
of the bracket. Meanwhile, in the other semifinal,
the second -place Boston Bruins took on the fourth
-place Montreal Canadiens. Boston handled Montreal
pretty decisively, winning the series four games
to one. But there is a staggering statistic buried
in this matchup, isn't there? Yes, and it is
a piece of trivia that perfectly illustrates
how the balance of power shifts in sports. When
Boston eliminated Montreal in Game 5 of this
1943 series, it marked the absolute end of an
era for Boston. It would be the last time the
Boston Bruins would defeat the Montreal Canadiens
in a postseason series until 1988. 1988, that
is a 45 -year playoff curse against their biggest,
most hated rivals. Incredible to think about.
But in the spring of 1943, Boston was riding
high. They advanced to the Stanley Cup Finals
to face the first -place Detroit Red Wings. But
if fans were expecting a grueling, quadruple
-overtime epic like the semifinals, they were
deeply disappointed. The finals were a complete
mismatch. Detroit swept the Bruins four out.
Detroit systematically dismantled Boston. The
physical toll of the war -shortened rosters and
the grinding season finally caught up to the
Bruins. They just ran out of gas. They did. Boston
managed to score a total of five goals in the
first two games of Detroit, but when the series
shifted to Boston for games three and four, the
Bruins' offense completely evaporated. They had
nothing left in the tank. And Mowers was waiting
for them. Detroit's goaltender, Johnny Mowers,
proved exactly why he was the league's MVP in
net. He shut out the exhausted Bruins in game
three with a 4 -0 win and then drove the final
nail in the coffin, shutting them out again in
the deciding game four with a 2 -0 victory. Back
-to -back shutouts in the Stanley Cup finals
to clinch the championship. That is the definition
of a clutch performance. Detroit was simply on
another level. But before we completely close
the book on the on -ice action, we should definitely
acknowledge a couple of the standout statistical
stars from the regular season who didn't necessarily
get to hoist the cup, right? Absolutely. The
individual talent was still blindingly bright.
The scoring title went to Chicago's Doug Bentley,
who put up an incredibly impressive 73 points,
33 goals, and 40 assists in just 50 games. Great
numbers. And the Hart Trophy, given to the league's
most valuable player, went to Boston center Bill
Cowley, who racked up 72 points in 48 games before
running out of gas in the finals. Even in a contracted
war -torn league, the high -end offensive talent
was still putting on a show for the fans who
needed the distraction. So what does this all
mean? We've covered a franchise collapsing over
a lease dispute, teenagers playing against hardened
men, a tragic death in a hospital bed, wartime
train schedules altering the rulebook, and a
dominant championship sweep. How do we pull all
of these chaotic threads together? If we synthesize
everything we've discussed. The 1942 -43 NHL
season wasn't just another year of hockey. It
was a crucible. A crucible. The world was consumed
by a devastating war. The league lost its visionary
president under shocking circumstances. And the
talent pool was severely depleted by the military
draft. They were forced into a lean six -team
survival mode just to keep the lights on. Yeah.
But in doing so, they inadvertently created a
pressure cooker. The constraints of the time
forged a fiercely competitive, intimate, and
violent league that would capture the imagination
of fans for the next quarter century. They built
the most stable, celebrated, and romanticized
era in the sports history out of pure desperation.
It really makes you stop and think about how
history is shaped by circumstance. I want to
leave you, the listener, with a final thought
to mull over today as you go about your week.
We revere the original Sixth Era as this foundational,
almost mythical golden age of modern hockey fandom.
We buy the vintage jerseys and celebrate the
history. We certainly do. But if World War II
hadn't forced Madison Square Garden to deny Red
Dutton his lease, and if the global military
draft hadn't forced the league to consolidate
its talent into just six cities to survive, would
the original six era have ever existed at all?
It's a great question. Would those legendary
rivalries have ever formed without the repetitive,
grueling schedules? Or is the NHL's most celebrated,
romanticized golden age purely an accidental
byproduct of a global catastrophe? Thank you
so much for joining us on this deep dive. We
hope you enjoyed it, and we encourage you to
keep exploring the history hidden in your own
sources.