When the Toronto Maple Leafs blew a 3-1 series lead and lost to the Montreal Canadiens Monday night, they did the New York Rangers a favor. No longer are the Rangers the sole owners of the longest Stanley Cup drought in NHL history. They are now tied by the Maple Leafs who have now gone 53 seasons without winning a Stanley Cup.
Not only that, but the Maple Leafs have taken the Rangers’ place in the record books for the most years without a Stanley Cup. Due to the 2004-05 lockout, it means the Maple Leafs have gone 54 years without a Cup, surpassing the 53 years of futility for the Blueshirts.
The Maple Leafs have a chance to take the Rangers out of the record books completely if they don’t win a Stanley Cup next season. Fingers crossed.
The Rangers’ drought
The Rangers held the record that the Maple Leafs tied by not winning a Stanley Cup from 1941 to 1993. Those 53 years of futility included three trips to the Final in 1950, 1972 and 1979.
The Blueshirts finally ended that streak when, with Mike Keenan behind the bench and led by Mark Messier, Mike Richter and Brian Leetch, they beat Vancouver and won the Stanley Cup in 1994. That win ended the chants of “1940” that haunted the Rangers for years.
In all honesty, the Rangers should have won the Cup in 1950 over the Red Wings, dropping the series in seven games. The rub was that they had to play five of the seven games in Detroit and their two “home” games were played in Toronto. That’s when the Rangers had to vacate Madison Square Garden because of the circus.
The Rangers also had some fabulous Herb Brooks coached teams in the early 1980s but were annually eliminated by the Islanders’ dynasty.
The Maple Leafs’ drought
The last time the Maple Leafs won the Stanley Cup was in 1966-67. It ended a stretch that saw Toronto win four Stanley Cups in six years and no one thought it would be over half a century and counting before they would win again.
What’s frightening about Toronto is that they haven’t even made it to the Stanley Cup Final since then, getting as far as the Conference Finals only four times.
The legend in Toronto was that a hex had been placed on the Maple Leafs after their 1967 win. A player named Larry Hillman wanted a $5,000 raise to $20,000, but was offered $19,500 by G.M, Punch Imlach. Hillman held out for 24 days until he agreed to Imlach’s offer, but was then fined $100 per day ($2,400) for holding out. When he left Toronto a year later, Hillman proclaimed that the Leafs would never win another Cup until he was repaid with interest. In 2017, Leafs’ President Brendan Shanahan repaid Hillman including interest, but it appears the Hillman Hex was not for the reason for the drought.
Some hope for the Leafs
Even if the Leafs get sole possession of the record for futility, there are a couple of teams nipping at their heels. The Buffalo Sabres and the Vancouver Canucks have never won a Cup since their inaugural 1970-71 season so their droughts are at 50 years and counting.
Ranger fans should be pleased that they are on the brink of getting rid of one of the records a team doesn’t want to hold. And if anyone was curious, their current Stanley Cup drought of 26 years is currently the 11th longest in the NHL