If you were scrolling through your audio feed
right now looking for something fascinating to
listen to, you might actually see a title for
this deep dive that looks something like the
deep dive. Unbreakable records and burning rinks
of the 1919 -20 NHL season. Right. And you'd
probably read a description packed with all these
SEO keywords about, you know, the chaotic high
scoring origins of the National Hockey League
or Joe Malone's unbreakable seven goal record.
Exactly. Or. The bizarre rules of the 1920 Stanley
Cup finals, including the forgotten rover position
and the Ottawa Senators championship run. And
you might just think, oh, that sounds like a
really fun bit of wild sports history. But reading
a summary doesn't really prepare you for the
actual ground level chaos of this specific year.
So welcome to the Deep Dive. We are so glad you
could join us today. Glad to be here and really
excited to unpack this one with you. I want you
to close your eyes for a second and just imagine
a professional sports league, like the absolute
highest level of competition in its field. Now,
imagine a team in this elite league has their
home stadium just burned to the ground, forcing
them to live completely out of suitcases. It's
wild. And imagine a player setting an all -time
scoring record. Right. But when asked about his
historic performance, all he can really remember
is how bitterly cold it was on the ice. Yeah.
Not the glory, just the frostbite. Right. Oh,
and the championship finals. They have to be
packed up and moved to an entirely different
city right in the middle of the series because
it's just, you know, a little too warm outside
and the ice is melting. It paints a picture of
a, I mean. Really, a disorganized pickup league,
not a professional operation. But the reality
is this was the National Hockey League. It was.
And we are looking specifically at the 19 -19
-20 NHL season today. We're relying on the really
comprehensive Wikipedia article detailing this
exact stretch of time. And our mission for this
deep dive is to basically cut through those dry
statistics. We want to explore how this single,
wildly unpredictable four -team season bridged
the gap between the chaotic origins of ice hockey.
and the polished, modern NHL we know today. Yeah,
because to really understand this, we have to
set the stage for you. The timeline is late 1919.
Right, so the world is just emerging from the
devastation of World War I. And the NHL itself
is barely out of its infancy. It's entering only
its third season in existence. Let's actually
start with the business side of things, because
looking at the league landscape back then is
staggering compared to today. Right now, in this
1919 season, there are only four teams in the
entire NHL. Just four. You have the Ottawa Senators,
the Montreal Canadiens, the Quebec Athletics,
and Toronto. Just four franchises carrying the
entire weight of this professional experiment.
Yeah. And the instability of those organizations
is really something to behold. Take Toronto,
for example. Oh, the Toronto situation is fascinating.
The source notes that in December 1919, the NHL
approved a name change for the Toronto franchise
to the Tecumsehs. Right. But then, just a matter
of days later, the franchise is transferred from
the Arena Company to a group of private investors.
And this new group immediately renames the club
the Toronto St. Patrick's. But what really stands
out to you about that transaction? It has to
be the price tag. The historical record shows
this group of investors paid the NHL for the
franchise, and the cost was exactly $5 ,000.
$5 ,000 for a professional hockey franchise.
I mean, to put that into perspective, today we
are talking about NHL team valuations in the
hundreds of millions. Yeah, with many crossing
the billion dollar mark now. Exactly. But the
business of hockey in 1919 relied entirely on
gate receipts. Right. There were no massive television
broadcasting rights. No global merchandising
empire. No corporate arena sponsors. You paid
the players based on how many people actually
walk through the turnstiles on a freezing Tuesday
night. It highlights just how informal and fledgling
the business side of the league was. And that
instability wasn't just limited to Toronto. No,
definitely not. The source mentions that Quebec
was finally icing a team for the 1919 -20 season
after actually sitting out the first two years
of the NHL. What was the holdup there? Well,
that goes back to a man named Percy Quinn. According
to our source, the NHL had previously canceled
the Quebec franchise because Quinn tried to use
it to resurrect a rival league. The NHRA. Exactly,
the National Hockey Association, which was essentially
the predecessor to the NHL. So when Quebec was
finally reinstated by agreement in December 1919,
it brought the league back up to that grand total
of four teams. But even with just four teams,
the logistics proved to be a total nightmare.
Which brings us to the Montreal Canadiens. This
is such a crazy story. In April 1919, so during
the offseason, their home arena, the Jubilee
Rink, burned down, just completely destroyed
by fire. How does a professional team even function
without a home rink? Well, it creates an immediate
and severe logistical crisis because of the fire.
Montreal was forced to play entirely on the road
for the first part of the season. Just think
about the physical toll of that. You're traveling
by train in 1919. Living out of hotels. Playing
in front of hostile crowds every single night
without the comfort or routine of home ice. They
were essentially nomads until their new building,
the Mount Royal Arena, was finally completed
in January 1920. And when they finally got into
that new building, they made absolutely sure
the opening night was one for the history books.
Let's pivot to the on ice action because this
is where the records really start shattering.
January 10th, 1920, Montreal opens the brand
new Mount Royal Arena against the Toronto St.
Patrick's. And New Zealand decides to celebrate
the new barn by scoring six goals himself. Yeah,
Montreal drubs Toronto with a final score of
14 to 7. And that scoreline isn't just a quirky
historical footnote. That combined total of 21
goals in a single game remains an NHL record
to this very day. Over a century later. Right.
In over a century of hockey since that night,
with all the advancements in equipment, training,
and offensive strategy, no two teams have ever
combined to score more goals in an NHL game.
That is staggering. But that wasn't even the
most mind -blowing individual performance of
the month. Not even close. Fast forward just
a few weeks to January 31st, 1920. We have Joe
Malone of the Quebec Athletics. In one single
game, Joe Malone scores seven goals. Seven. And
the source notes an eighth goal was actually
disallowed on an offside call. Which, as of the
2020 update in our source material, still stands
as the NHL record for the most goals. scored
by a player in one game. It is widely considered
one of the truly unbreakable records in professional
sports. You would assume a guy who scores seven
goals in a professional hockey game would talk
about how perfectly his stick felt or how he
was just reading the goaltender flawlessly. Right,
but when quoted later about his historic performance,
Joe Malone simply said, The thing I recall most
vividly is that it was bitterly cold. It's just
a brilliant detail. It strips away the mythology
of the era. It really does. It reminds you that
they were playing in conditions we would consider
entirely unacceptable for professional athletes
today. They weren't in climate -controlled mega
arenas. They were in freezing, drafty buildings,
likely trying to keep their extremities from
going numb while playing a violently physical
game. But there is a massive statistical paradox
when it comes to Joe Malone and those Quebec
Athletics. Oh, the team performance? Yeah. If
Malone is putting up seven goals in a single
night, and the source notes he led the entire
league with 39 goals that season, how does his
team perform overall? Well, you'd naturally assume
a team with that kind of offensive juggernaut
would be a powerhouse. I mean, Malone even almost
tied his own seven -goal record later that season,
scoring six goals in a game against Ottawa on
March 10. Wow. But despite having the most lethal
score in the sport, the Quebec Athletics were
dreadful. The source shows they went 2 -10 in
the first half of the season, and 2 -10 in the
second half, they finished dead last. How is
it possible to have a player scoring nearly 40
goals and still lose almost every game you play?
The answer is hidden in their defensive statistics.
While Malone was filling the net at one end of
the ice, the team was completely bleeding goals
at the other. They surrendered an NHL record
7 .18 goals against per game. So you're stepping
onto the ice mathematically guaranteed to give
up at least seven goals. Precisely. Their main
goaltender, Frank Brophy, played 21 games and
gave up 148 goals. That's a 7 .1 goals against
average. It is a fascinating contradiction. You
have the league's greatest scorer operating within
the league's... absolute worst defensive structure.
Montreal definitely took advantage of that non
-existent Quebec defense. Just to toss in one
more absurd scoreline from our source, on March
3, Montreal beat Quebec by a massive margin of
16 -3. 16 -3? Yeah, and that stands as the record
for the most goals scored by one team in a single
game. The overarching theme of this season really
is chaos. The defensive strategies, the goaltending
equipment, the rule enforcement, everything was
still evolving in real time. Which leads us perfectly
into some of the bizarre roster quirks from that
season. Oh, I have to share this detail from
January 24. Ottawa is playing Toronto, and Ottawa's
goalie, Clint Benedict, gets penalized. Now today,
if a goalie gets a penalty, a skater goes to
the penalty box to serve it, and the goalie stays
in the net to protect the team. Right. But how
did it work in 1920? The rules were far less
forgiving. Clint Benedict actually had to leave
the crease and serve his own penalty. So for
two minutes, Ottawa forward Jack Dara had to
play in goal. A forward, strapping on the heavy
goaltender pads right in the middle of a professional
game. And the best part is that Dara didn't surrender
any goals during those two minutes. He pitched
a perfect two -minute shutout. That's incredible.
All of these elements, the massive scores, the
forwards playing in goal, the burning rinks,
they paint a picture of a sport that is incredibly
raw, yet intensely vibrant. And people were flocking
to witness it. The source points out that with
World War I now over, players had returned home
and fans were coming out in much larger numbers.
The public was hungry for entertainment after
years of global hardship. We have hard numbers
to back up that cultural shift, too. On February
21st, 1920... record crowd of 8 ,500 fans packed
into the arena gardens in Toronto to watch the
St. Patrick's play the Ottawa Senators. Gathering
8 ,500 people into an indoor arena in 1920 is
a massive achievement. It really is. It proves
that despite the logistical hurdles, the moving
franchises, the changing team names, the game
of hockey was rapidly capturing the public's
imagination. It was validating the sport as a
major cultural and economic event. With crowds
of 8 ,500 people buying tickets, you would assume
the league owners would want a massive, drawn
-out playoff format to maximize their gate receipts.
You would think so. So how did they actually
decide a champion? They utilized a format you
almost never see in major modern sports leagues,
a split schedule. The regular season was divided
into a distinct first half and a second half.
And the Ottawa Senators completely dominated.
They went 9 -3 in the first half. They went 10
-2 in the second half. Because Ottawa won both
halves of this split season, the NHL didn't even
bother holding a league playoff. Ottawa was automatically
crowned the NHL champion. But being the NHL champion
in 1920 didn't mean you automatically were on
the Stanley Cup. Right. Who did Ottawa have to
play to claim the ultimate prize? Ottawa had
to face the champion of a rival league, the Pacific
Coast Hockey Association, or the PCHA. And their
champion was the Seattle Metropolitans. So the
Stanley Cup final. was this showdown between
the NHL champion from the East and the PCHH champion
from the West. But before the puck even drops,
they run into a logistical problem regarding
their uniforms. The source notes that the Seattle
Metropolitans wore green, red, and white uniforms.
The Ottawa Senators wore black, red, and white.
Someone looked at the ice and realized they looked
way too similar. So Ottawa agreed to wear white
sweaters for the series just so the players could
tell each other apart. But a uniform clash is
a minor inconvenience compared to the actual
rules of the game. The source mentions games
two and four were played under PCHA rules. What
did that actually change on the ice? It introduced
a completely extra position. Under NHL rules,
they played the standard six -man setup we see
today. But the PCHA rules forced the seventh
man onto the ice, the rover. The rover. Yeah.
This was a player who didn't have a fixed zone
like a left winger or a right defenseman. They
simply roamed the ice wherever the play demanded.
So in a best of five championship series, games
one, three, and five are played under normal
NHL rules. But in games two and four, there is
suddenly an extra guy flying around the ice.
Imagine the mental agility required from these
athletes to completely alter their defensive
and offensive strategies from one night to the
next. It speaks volumes about their raw athletic
intelligence. They couldn't rely on heavily structured
modern coaching systems or video analysis. They
had to figure out how to adapt. to fundamental
rule changes on the fly in the middle of a championship
series. And speaking of figuring things out on
the fly, remember at the beginning of this deep
dive when I asked you to imagine the championship
finals being relocated because it was too warm
outside? The ultimate weather interference. This
five -game series was scheduled to be played
entirely in Ottawa, but unseasonably warm weather
hit the city. Because they didn't have the modern
climate -controlled systems we take for granted,
The warm weather literally melted the ice. It
became completely unplayable. It is incredible
to consider the highest prize in the sport being
derailed by a warm spring breeze. So they pack
up the entire Stanley Cup final and move the
final two games to the Arena Gardens in Toronto,
where the artificial ice was still intact. How
does this series conclude once they get to Toronto?
Ottawa ultimately wins the series, three games
to two. They capped it off with an explosive
6 -1 win in Game 5. And it was Jack Darrah, the
forward, who had to serve as an emergency goalie
earlier in the season, who scored three goals
in the third period to seal the victory for Ottawa.
A legendary performance to clinch the title.
But wait, what did the actual trophy presentation
look like? Because the source outlines a very
strange oddity regarding the hardware for this
19 - Well, nothing was straightforward in 1920.
The NHL champion was supposed to be awarded the
O 'Brien Cup, which was a trophy carried over
from the old NHA days. But the O 'Brien Cup wasn't
actually awarded in 1920. Why not? Because the
owner of the Montreal Canadiens, a man named
George Kennedy, had won it back in 1917. And
he simply kept it. He just hoarded the league
championship trophy in his own possession for
years. Essentially, yes. It remained under his
control. That's hilarious. It wasn't until Kennedy
died in 1921 that the NHL finally made arrangements
to reclaim the trophy from his estate. Wow. When
they reinstated it as the official award for
the league playoff champions, they retroactively
engraved Ottawa's 1920 championship win on it.
So Ottawa won the title, but didn't even get
their name on the league trophy until the following
year because a rival owner refused to give it
back. That is just the perfect cherry on top
of this beautifully chaotic season. So bringing
this all back to you listening right now, why
does a single sports season from over a century
ago matter? It matters because it is a stark
reminder that the polished multi -billion dollar
entertainment products we consume today with
their flawless ice surfaces, digital video reviews
and perfectly structured playoff brackets. They
didn't just appear out of thin air. They were
built on a precarious foundation of trial, error,
burning buildings, missing trophies and rule
bending chaos. It really makes you appreciate.
The deep, unpredictable history baked into every
single modern game you watch. It really does.
And I want to leave you with a final thought
to mull over. Let's hear it. Consider the fragile
financial foundation of everything we just discussed.
A group of investors bought the Toronto franchise
for $5 ,000. Right. If those specific local businessmen
or the handful of other owners in Montreal and
Ottawa had decided the investment was too risky,
or if that rink fire had bankrupted the Canadians
entirely. Does professional hockey even survive
the decade? That's a great point. We treat the
NHL today as an inevitable global superpower.
But in 1920, its existence hinged entirely on
a few stubborn guys in eastern Canada willing
to lose money on a game played on melting ice.
Yeah. If those early chaotic investments had
failed, would ice hockey have remained a niche
regional hobby rather than the international
phenomenon it is today? Furthermore, if the highest
levels of modern professional sports were still
entirely at the mercy of natural weather patterns,
how would it fundamentally change the way athletes
train, play, and win today? That is a fascinating
question to think about the next time you are
watching a game in a perfectly 65 -degree arena.
Thank you so much for joining us on this deep
dive into the 1919 -20 NHL season. We appreciate
you being here, and we'll catch you next time.
Thanks for listening. Take care.