Five Overtimes, published in 2024 by McFarland, is the story of the 1950-51 NHL season. It takes the reader from the anticipation of opening night, throughout the quirky ups and downs of its 210-game regular season dominated by the Detroit Red Wings, and into the surprising Stanley Cup playoffs and the remarkable five-game final. Uniquely, every game of the championship series required a fourth period to determine a winner. Of course, there is also the tragic postscript: the bizarre disappearance and death of Toronto hero Bill Barilko four months later while on a fishing trip gone horribly wrong.
Every playoff game of both semifinal series and the exciting Cup final is closely scrutinized. As an added bonus, the weird controversy of what really happened to the puck that won the Cup for the Toronto Maple Leafs is examined in great detail.
Five Overtimes may be purchased here. Five Overtimes - McFarland
Excerpt from Five Overtimes
The Toronto Maple Leafs entered the 1951 Stanley Cup finals as the solid favorites to walk off with the trophy in the best-of-seven tussle. This was a fact, not just an opinion, widely shared by diehard or biased Leaf rooters.
Toronto had pretty much manhandled the Canadiens all season long, losing just twice to the Habs in their 14 regular-season meetings during the 1950-51 campaign. Before Game One, bookmakers listed the odds on a Toronto series triumph at 5:7, meaning that one had to wager $7 on Joe Primeau’s club to win $5. Some hockey writers figured that ratio was quite generous to the underdogs in the red, white and blue Montreal jerseys. A Canadian Press article that appeared in the Montreal Star without a byline on April 11—the same day the Cup finals began—said as much. It noted, “Montreal’s poor regular-season record against Toronto would seem to be grounds for wider odds, but the Canadiens rate respect for their good showing against the power-packed Detroit Red Wings.”
The Canadiens had also lost more games than they had won during the 70-game regular season. Only two teams in NHL history had overcome that stigma to win the Stanley Cup. They were the 1938 Chicago Black Hawks and the very recent 1949 Toronto Maple Leafs.
Even Dink Carroll, the sports editor of the Montreal Gazette, openly acknowledged that his beloved hometown NHL club would be hard-pressed to pull off another playoff upset and upend the vaunted powerhouse club from southern Ontario. Despite the Habs having shocked the Detroit Red Wings in their semifinal series, the 51-year-old Carroll thought the second-place Leafs would present an even more formidable obstacle for the Habs than the first-place club from Michigan had. Writing from Toronto on the day of Game One, Carroll admired the Leafs as a team and appreciated how talented and efficient they were throughout their 70-game schedule. Toronto’s .679 winning percentage was their best in club history. More than seven decades later, it still is.
Carroll was not alone in his praise. Boston coach Lynn Patrick had made the trip to Maple Leaf Gardens to see the opening two games of the championship series for his own amusement. Patrick had nothing but positive things to say about the team that had thumped his Bruins in the semifinals.
“Lynn hadn’t seen the Canadiens play in a few weeks, so he didn’t know how to rate them in this series” noted Carroll, “but he’d seen more than enough of the Leafs.”
“They [Toronto] were flying against us after the first two games,” the Bruin coach recalled with a slightly awestruck tone. “I never saw them look better than in the last game of the series where they beat us, 6-0. They looked like a perfect hockey machine that night.” Patrick then oddly added with a chuckle, “I’m glad it’s all over for us this year. Now I can stand in one of the runways at Maple Leaf Gardens, eat peanuts, and watch [Dick] Irvin and [Joe] Primeau sweat. I’ll bet Irvin is up pacing in the corral right now.”
Be that as it may, some Toronto-based hockey writers were expressing concerns that the Habs were being greatly underrated as a serious threat to the local NHL team they covered passionately each day. One such scribe was James (Red) Burnett of the Toronto Star. He cautiously informed his readers,
…A month ago, we’d have picked the Leafs in four straight games. However, this collection of Habs isn’t the same band of misfits that was flattened consistently by the Leafs all season. This is a fighting unit, a group that has caught fire. They’ve won or tied all the “must” games in a stretch drive that carried them from fifth spot to third place and then past the mighty Detroit Red Wings into the finals.
Every playoff game of both semifinal series and the exciting Cup final is closely scrutinized. As an added bonus, the weird controversy of what really happened to the puck that won the Cup for the Toronto Maple Leafs is examined in great detail.
Five Overtimes may be purchased here. Five Overtimes - McFarland
Excerpt from Five Overtimes
The Toronto Maple Leafs entered the 1951 Stanley Cup finals as the solid favorites to walk off with the trophy in the best-of-seven tussle. This was a fact, not just an opinion, widely shared by diehard or biased Leaf rooters.
Toronto had pretty much manhandled the Canadiens all season long, losing just twice to the Habs in their 14 regular-season meetings during the 1950-51 campaign. Before Game One, bookmakers listed the odds on a Toronto series triumph at 5:7, meaning that one had to wager $7 on Joe Primeau’s club to win $5. Some hockey writers figured that ratio was quite generous to the underdogs in the red, white and blue Montreal jerseys. A Canadian Press article that appeared in the Montreal Star without a byline on April 11—the same day the Cup finals began—said as much. It noted, “Montreal’s poor regular-season record against Toronto would seem to be grounds for wider odds, but the Canadiens rate respect for their good showing against the power-packed Detroit Red Wings.”
The Canadiens had also lost more games than they had won during the 70-game regular season. Only two teams in NHL history had overcome that stigma to win the Stanley Cup. They were the 1938 Chicago Black Hawks and the very recent 1949 Toronto Maple Leafs.
Even Dink Carroll, the sports editor of the Montreal Gazette, openly acknowledged that his beloved hometown NHL club would be hard-pressed to pull off another playoff upset and upend the vaunted powerhouse club from southern Ontario. Despite the Habs having shocked the Detroit Red Wings in their semifinal series, the 51-year-old Carroll thought the second-place Leafs would present an even more formidable obstacle for the Habs than the first-place club from Michigan had. Writing from Toronto on the day of Game One, Carroll admired the Leafs as a team and appreciated how talented and efficient they were throughout their 70-game schedule. Toronto’s .679 winning percentage was their best in club history. More than seven decades later, it still is.
Carroll was not alone in his praise. Boston coach Lynn Patrick had made the trip to Maple Leaf Gardens to see the opening two games of the championship series for his own amusement. Patrick had nothing but positive things to say about the team that had thumped his Bruins in the semifinals.
“Lynn hadn’t seen the Canadiens play in a few weeks, so he didn’t know how to rate them in this series” noted Carroll, “but he’d seen more than enough of the Leafs.”
“They [Toronto] were flying against us after the first two games,” the Bruin coach recalled with a slightly awestruck tone. “I never saw them look better than in the last game of the series where they beat us, 6-0. They looked like a perfect hockey machine that night.” Patrick then oddly added with a chuckle, “I’m glad it’s all over for us this year. Now I can stand in one of the runways at Maple Leaf Gardens, eat peanuts, and watch [Dick] Irvin and [Joe] Primeau sweat. I’ll bet Irvin is up pacing in the corral right now.”
Be that as it may, some Toronto-based hockey writers were expressing concerns that the Habs were being greatly underrated as a serious threat to the local NHL team they covered passionately each day. One such scribe was James (Red) Burnett of the Toronto Star. He cautiously informed his readers,
…A month ago, we’d have picked the Leafs in four straight games. However, this collection of Habs isn’t the same band of misfits that was flattened consistently by the Leafs all season. This is a fighting unit, a group that has caught fire. They’ve won or tied all the “must” games in a stretch drive that carried them from fifth spot to third place and then past the mighty Detroit Red Wings into the finals.
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