Before their Stanley Cup run in 1970, the Boston Bruins lost another three Stanley Cup finals against the Canadiens since 1946.
It happened in five games in 1953, in five games in 1957 and in six games in 1958. After chasing the Cup for so long without any great luck, the Bruins missed the playoffs for eight straight years from 1960 until 1967. In 1968, the Blues made it to the Stanley Cup Final in their first ever NHL season but lost to Montreal, and did the same a year later; Boston still not managing to reach the final hurdle.
Then in 1970, a promising team beat the St. Louis Blues in just four games. In Game 1, John Bucyk powered the Bruins to a 6-1 win with a hat trick. In Game 2, the Bruins won 6-2. Back in Boston Garden for Game 3, the Blues opened the scoring but John McKenzie won the game for Boston in a 4-1 victory; McKenzie sadly passed away last June. In Game 4, the Blues put together their best effort in the series, but John Bucyk tied it up with less than seven minutes to go to force the overtime.
In that overtime, just 40 seconds in, Bobby Orr scored his first goal of that Stanley Cup Final to end the 31-year drought without the Cup for Boston. It was Orr’s ninth overall tally of the playoffs, but what timing for such an iconic Cup-clinching goal for the legendary number 4!
Just please don’t get beaten in the first round next year by the Montreal Canadiens… Okay, let’s pass! Did I ever mention that the Bruins got swept by the Habs in 1968 in the first round after they ended their longest ever drought without the playoffs? Let’s pass, again!
In 1972, the Bruins made their way back to the Stanley Cup Final and faced the New York Rangers. Bobby Orr, the Bruins hero from 1970, had just one goal in the playoffs; he scored four in the Cup Final, including a Cup-clinching goal in Game 6, where the Bruins won 3-0 in New York to hoist their fifth Stanley Cup.
Don’t worry, next year the Rangers beat the Bruins in the first round, not Montreal!