I have done a number of historical dynasty reports in the past, usually in baseball but some hockey, and I think it is high time I do another hockey one. This one will be a yearly replay of the history of the sport, beginning in 1909 and progressing - I hope- at least through to the end of the Original Six era and into 1967 expansion.
FHM11 will be used and I have the game set to use the FHM development engine. It sacrifices some historical realism but for me that is what I want, I like to see some surprise players emerge and things not go quite as they did in real life. It will be a 1909 start and I plan to progress fairly quickly until the birth of the NHL in the winter of 1917-18.
I will be acting as an overseer in that I will not control a team. My interference will be minimal but I plan on making some small adjustments, primarily to advance story lines. I have the draft turned off so we are using the NHL sponsorship rules until the mid-1960s and I may tinker a bit with where players get signed as juniors. For example Rocket Richard needs to be in Montreal and Gordie Howe should start in Detroit but if Mr. Hockey happens to end up with the Rangers - and collects a jacket as a signing bonus- I will allow that.
The background stories I interject, particularly with the NHA and PCHA, will be historical based but due to what may happen in FHM as I sim I will take some artistic license. I plan on looking at each season including the Olympics when they occur and the playable minor leagues when they appear, but the major focus will be on the NHL. I hope to, with the aid of daigle91's great
csv to html converter when the new version comes out, dive a little deeper into individual player's careers once I get some seasons in.
So here goes
The National Hockey League was originally planned to simply be a temporary measure, born out of necessity amidst legal wranglings arising from a dispute between owners of clubs in the NHL's predecessor -the National Hockey Association.
The NHA was founded in 1909 by Ambrose O'Brien and disappeared forever in 1917 when the league suspended operations in order to get rid of an unwanted owner, Eddie Livingstone. Plenty happened in its brief tenure, including introducing six-man hockey by removing the rover position in 1911. The NHA also dealt with competition for players with the Pacific Coast Hockey Association, the enlistment of many players for World War I and multiple disagreements between owners, nearly all of which involved Livingstone and his Toronto Shamrocks club.
While this replay will focus primarily on the NHL, it will begin with the first playable league in FHM11, the NHA.
1909-10
Much like the NHL being born due to a dispute amongst owners, the NHA got it's start in the same manner. In November 1909 the senior amateur league in Central Canada was the Eastern Canadian Amateur Hockey Association, which consisted of four teams in the Quebec Bulldogs, Ottawa Senators, Montreal Shamrocks and Montreal Wanderers. The Wanderers had just been purchased by P.J. Doran who owned the Jubilee Rink in Montreal and planned to move the Wanderers there. However, it was smaller than the Wanderers current rink - the Montreal Arena- which meant visiting teams would earn less on their games in the Wanderers new arena. The ACHA wanted to prevent the Wanderers from switching rinks so the existing ACHA owners, minus the Wanderers, looked to form a new league called the Canadian Hockey Association.
Meanwhile Ambrose O'Brien, founder of the Renfrew Creamery Kings team, was seeking admission to the new CHA so his club would be eligible to compete for the Stanley Cup. His bid to join was turned down, and he happened to run into the Wanderers owner, who had also been rejected by the CHA.
The pair decided to form their own league called the National Hockey Association with the Montreal Wanderers and three teams controlled by O'Brien in the Renfrew outfit as well as the Haileybury Comets and the Cobalt Silver Kings. The league would be rounded out with the addition of the Ottawa Senators along with two more Montreal teams, called the Canadiens and Shamrocks.
Those seven teams played a 12 game schedule before the Montreal Wanderers were declared champion with an 8-3-1 record. O'Brien's Creamery Kings also finished 8-3-1 but the Wanderers were awarded the title on a tiebreaker. The two clubs had split their two meetings during the season with Renfrew winning 6-2 in Montreal in January before the Wanderers returned the favour with a 5-4 win on the road in late February. The Wanderers, led by league scoring champion Jimmy Gardner, had the better goal differential at +22, compared to Renfrew's +11, and as a result the Montreal Wanderers were declared champions.
26-year-old Lester Patrick was named the league's Most Valuable Player. Patrick, who also played basketball while attending McGill University, was lured to Renfrew from a western team by O'Brien for an unheard of sum of $3,000. His brother Frank, a defenseman, had joined him and the duo enjoyed great success with Lester leading the Creamery Kings in scoring with 15 points. That total was two shy of Jimmy Gardner's league best 17 points for the Wanderers but Lester Patrick earned the nod over Gardner and Renfrew's Cyclone Taylor to be named MVP.
The top goaltender award went Ottawa's George Broughton, who led the league with a 2.96 goals against average.