Cournoyer reflects on 50th anniversary of 1973 Cup title with Canadiens

Yvan Cournoyer listened to the statistics being read to him, that he ranks second or third behind fellow legends Maurice Richard and Jean Beliveau in a handful of Stanley Cup Playoff offensive categories for the Montreal Canadiens.

"Stop, please. This sounds like I was good," Cournoyer said with a laugh.

The "Roadrunner," as the speedy Hockey Hall of Fame forward was nicknamed in his prime, was reflecting on the 50th anniversary of the Canadiens' 1973 Stanley Cup championship, a six-game series clinched against the Chicago Black Hawks at Chicago Stadium on May 10.

Cournoyer's 25 points (15 goals, 10 assists) in 17 playoff games against the Buffalo Sabres, Philadelphia Flyers and finally the Black Hawks are third in Canadiens postseason history behind Frank Mahovlich's 27 (14 goals, 13 assists) in 1970-71 and Guy Lafleur's 26 (nine goals, 17 assists) in 1976-77.

Early 1970s Canadiens alternate captain Yvan Cournoyer and coach Scotty Bowman. Together they won five Stanley Cup championships between 1973-79. Graphic Artists/Hockey Hall of Fame

His 15 goals stand as the modern-day Canadiens playoff record, trailing the 17 scored by Newsy Lalonde in early-era 1919.

Cournoyer's 1973 production also was an NHL career postseason high for points and shooting percentage, a success rate of 30.61 percent on 49 shots.

"With the sticks we had then?" he joked of the heavy, inflexible lumber he gripped.

Cournoyer's 12 points (six goals, six assists) in a Stanley Cup Final are tied for first in NHL history. Wayne Gretzky had 11 points (three goals, eight assists) against the Boston Bruins in the 1988 Final, excluding his two assists from the suspended Game 4 on May 24 because of a power failure at Boston Garden.

The Roadrunner, now 79, won the 1973 Conn Smythe Trophy voted as the most valuable player of the postseason. He edged Dennis Hull, the Black Hawks' leading scorer with 24 points (nine goals, 15 assists) in 16 games.

Black Hawks' Dennis Hull (left) and Stan Mikita, who respectively had seven and eight points against the Canadiens in the 1973 Stanley Cup Final. Frank Prazak/Hockey Hall of Fame

Cournoyer pocketed $1,500 for the Conn Smythe, also winning a car when voted playoff MVP by Sport magazine. He and Hull were teammates for Canada the previous September for the historic 1972 Summit Series against a Soviet Union all-star team, so the Canadiens star knew his Black Hawks friend and rival well enough to give him the needle.

"If I hadn't won the Smythe, I'm sure Dennis would have because he had a very good playoffs," Cournoyer said. "I went to New York that spring to accept my car and the next fall, before a preseason game in Chicago, I pulled Dennis aside and told him, 'Your car is running very nicely.' I'm quite sure he's used that in his after-dinner speeches over the years."

The Bruins had won the Stanley Cup twice in the past three seasons but were bounced in five games by the New York Rangers in a 1973 Quarterfinal, the Rangers then falling to the Black Hawks in a five-game Semifinal to send Chicago to the Final.

The Stanley Cup champion 1972-73 Montreal Canadiens. Eleven members of the team would be elected to the Hall of Fame. Macdonald Stewart/Hockey Hall of Fame

The Canadiens needed six games to eliminate the Sabres in a Quarterfinal, then defeated the Flyers, 4-2 winners against the Minnesota North Stars, in five games.

The Final pitted coach Scotty Bowman's East Division champion Canadiens (120 points; 52-10-16) against Billy Reay's West Division champion Black Hawks (93 points; 42-27-9). It was the 15th time the teams had met in the playoffs, the Canadiens 5-0 in the Stanley Cup Final with their 1973 victory.

Montreal goalie Ken Dryden had been awarded the Vezina Trophy, his first of five wins of the then statistics-based prize (33-7-13, 2.26 goals-against average. 926 save percentage, six shutouts) in the 1970s. The Canadiens scored 329 regular-season goals, one behind the NHL-leading Bruins that dwarfed the 284 scored by the Black Hawks.

But the Final wouldn't be the blowout that some suggested it might be. Indeed, it was all over the map for a confounding six games, Montreal outscoring Chicago 33-23 by the end of it.

The 1972-73 Chicago Black Hawks, who fell in six games to the Montreal Canadiens in the Stanley Cup Final. Goalie Tony Esposito and forward Stan Mikita, side by side at the far right of the front row, would be elected to the Hall of Fame. Le Studio du Hockey/Hockey Hall of Fame

The Canadiens opened at home with dominating 8-3 and 4-1 wins. If they were swaggering as they headed to Chicago, they were knocked down a peg with a 7-4 loss in Game 3. Dryden then blanked the Black Hawks 4-0 in Game 4, outdueling Tony Esposito to send the series back to Montreal for what many expected would be the Canadiens' home-ice coronation.

"It was crazy," Cournoyer recalled of Game 5, a ridiculous 8-7 Chicago victory. "We were as stunned as anybody. We had no idea that was going to happen. It's like we were bowling, the score was so high."

The game featured the most goals scored by two teams in a Stanley Cup Final game, having eclipsed by two the 13 scored in the Detroit Red Wings' 9-4 win against the Toronto Maple Leafs on April 7, 1936.

The eight second-period goals scored -- five by Chicago -- set the NHL record for one period in any playoff round, equaled by the Vancouver Canucks and Rangers in the third period of Game 5 in the 1994 Final.

Canadiens' Ken Dryden, the puck in front of his mask, captain Henri Richard in the background, and Black Hawks' Tony Esposito in action at the Montreal Forum. The goalies were teammates for the 1972 Summit Series, opponents in the 1973 Stanley Cup Final. Frank Prazak/Hockey Hall of Fame

Dryden and Esposito, Summit Series teammates and future Hall of Famers, were as airtight as a screen door. Chicago scored eight times on 29 shots, Dryden's save percentage a beer-league .724, and Montreal scoring seven times on 31 shots, Esposito at .774.

"Black Hawks stay alive in goalies' nightmare," the Montreal Star headlined its game story the next day.

"Stupid," Cournoyer was quoted postgame.

"Close. Awful," added Canadiens forward Pete Mahovlich.

"Once a game starts wide open, it's difficult to kind of change it," Dryden told reporters. "You let a goal in, you don't feel too badly. You think you can get two back."

Chicago Tribune of May 11, 1973, reports on the Montreal Canadiens' Stanley Cup championship win against the Chicago Black Hawks. Newspapers.com

Said Chicago defenseman Pat Stapleton: "The Canadiens came out flying but then it all sort of fell apart and we just kept hanging in, hoping to get the last goal. That's all you can do."

Said Esposito: "Tonight, I was tired. That's all. The guys pulled me through."

Only two minor penalties were called by referee Bruce Hood, one per side, each resulting in power-play goals. The scoring was nicely spread out, Chicago's Stan Mikita and Jim Pappin and Montreal's Claude Larose with two goals apiece.

The game was a better see-saw than you'd find in a children's playground. Five times Chicago clawed back when a goal down, finally going up 7-5 by the end of the second period. The Canadiens pulled within one twice in the third, Montreal captain Henri Richard scoring the game's 15th and final goal at 11:43.

Montreal Gazette of May 11, 1973 reports on the Montreal Canadiens' Stanley Cup championship win against the Chicago Black Hawks. Newspapers.com

The sixth and deciding game at Chicago Stadium was almost as much fun. The Canadiens rallied from a 2-0 first-period deficit to jump ahead 3-2 and 4-3, Cournoyer breaking a 4-4 tie with the Cup-clincher at 8:13 of the third and Marc Tardif adding the insurance goal at 12:42, spoiling Pit Martin's hat trick for the Black Hawks.

The championship was the NHL-record 11th for Henri Richard and Cournoyer's sixth; the latter would win four more consecutively 1976-79 as Canadiens captain, succeeding Richard.

If Cournoyer is proud of his Conn Smythe 50 years later, the Stanley Cup is at a different level altogether.

"You're not thinking about your own statistics when you play," he said. "You just want to win, and you do everything you can to make that happen. I wasn't looking to win the Conn Smythe, I wanted to win the Stanley Cup. For me, it was always all about the team. Maybe that's why I was voted captain when Henri retired in 1975."

Cournoyer scored an NHL career-high 47 goals in 1971-72, then 40 in each of the following two seasons.

"I don't mind that I never scored 50," he said. "The bottom line is to win. That's the way I always thought. Personal recognition will come if you win. I've always been a teammate. You don't win the Stanley Cup by yourself. You need everybody working together."

His NHL career spanned two Canadiens dynasties, from the mid-1960s through the end of the 1970s.

Chicago Tribune of May 11, 1973 reports on the Montreal Canadiens' Stanley Cup championship win against the Chicago Black Hawks; Henri Richard with 11 Stanley Cup miniatures, representing the record number he won as a player, all with the Canadiens. Newspapers.com; Bob Fisher, Montreal Canadiens

"People ask me to reflect on the 10 Stanley Cups that I won, and I say I most remember losing in 1967, when we were upset by Toronto because we underestimated them," Cournoyer said. "Henri broke in with his brother, Maurice, in 1956, and played with Jean Beliveau, Doug Harvey, Dickie Moore, Bernie Geoffrion, Jacques Plante. I call them the old guys.

"I won five Stanley Cups (from 1965-71) with Jean and Henri and others, then five with the new guys. I was very fortunate to be in the middle of that. Guy Lafleur was coming (in 1971). I had Jacques Lemaire and Steve Shutt with me up front, the 'Big Three' on defense -- Larry Robinson, Serge Savard, Guy Lapointe, Ken in goal. All of them Hall of Famers. The old guys showed me how to win and I tried to carry that forward."

Now age 79, a half-century after the 1973 championship, No. 18 of 24 for the Canadiens, Cournoyer considers the organization that has been his hockey family since he joined the Junior Canadiens at age 18 in 1961-62.

"Time flies when you're so busy meeting people, doing promotions, being an ambassador for the Canadiens," he said.

"Has it really been 50 years?"

With that, the Roadrunner laughed.

"You'll have to speak up. I have a hard time hearing now."

Top photo: Members of the 1973 Stanley Cup Montreal Canadiens celebrate on City Hall steps following the team's victory parade. From left: Jacques Laperriere, Ken Dryden, team co-owner Edward Bronfman, Guy Lafleur, Serge Savard, trainer Eddy Palchak and an unidentified stickboy, coach Scotty Bowman, athletic therapist Bob Williams, Michel Plasse, captain Henri Richard (wearing a cowboy hat) and two reporters. City of Montreal Archives