Most Goals/Points by a Player against 1 Team, 1 Season?

[The Panther]

My post in a concurrent thread showed that Wayne Gretzky, in 1981-82, scored 13 goals against Los Angeles in one regular season (and another 5 in the playoffs, making 18 in one full season). He had 22 points against Los Angeles in the regular season (and 34 with the playoffs added!). This got me thinking: What is the most goals / assists / points by 1 player against 1 team in one season? (I'm thinking regular season, but adding in playoffs might be interesting as well.) A quick Google search turned up nothing.

I figured Gretzky in 1981-82 might be the modern-day record for a player's regular season goals against one team... until I saw what Gretzky did to the Winnipeg Jets in 1983-84: in 8 games, he scored 16 goals and 27 points. (It seems he scored 23 points against both Winnipeg and L.A. in 1984-85.) So, Gretzky's best was this 27 against Winnipeg, I thought. But then, in 1985-86, he scored 9 goals and 19 assists for 28 points against Winnipeg!! The same season, he had 20 assists against Calgary. (He also had 25 points against Vancouver in 1986-87.)

So, so far, we have Gretzky with 16 goals against one team in 1983-84, and 20 assists and 28 points against one team in 1985-86. (Those are just the ones I looked at; I didn't check in great detail, but those appear to be his best with Edmonton against one team.)

I would assume the post-expansion answer to my question is Wayne (Mario and Brett Hull did not match, since 1987 anyway) -- though I wouldn't rule out Espo in '71; and wouldn't Orr, Esposito, Lafleur, etc. have played the same team more times than teams would later do in the 80s/90s?

It's certainly conceivable, or maybe likely, that top scorers in the 50s/60s scored more than Gretzky or Lemieux could against any one team, given that they had more games against each team? For example, in 1944-45 (the '50 in 50' season), Maurice Richard played Boston 10 times. And by 1960, Montreal played Detroit 14 times in the regular season, so certainly top goal-scorers from the late 40s through the mid-60s might have beaten Gretzky.

Has anyone beaten the Gretzky numbers I found (if mine are indeed his best; I'm not 100% sure)? I am sure that someone has in history, but it's not easy to access those numbers...

 

[The Panther]

Brett Hull, by the way, scored 13 goals against Toronto in 1990-91, which I *think* is the most by anybody against one team since the mid-1980s...

 

[Pominville Knows]

 

[The Panther]

Yeah, but my point is, I'm sure the answer (for goals, at least) is not Gretzky. If teams were playing one another 14 times a year from the late 40s through mid-60s (more or less), there's go to be someone who scored more than 16 goals against one team in a season.

 

[blogofmike]

I believe Joe Malone scored 22 goals in 10 games against Ottawa in 1918

 

[Big Phil]

Yeah, but my point is, I'm sure the answer (for goals, at least) is not Gretzky. If teams were playing one another 14 times a year from the late 40s through mid-60s (more or less), there's go to be someone who scored more than 16 goals against one team in a season.

Hard to say. In the original 6 no one scored over one goal per game over the season except for Richard who had 50-in-50. But in 1945 they played 50 games, not 70. Geoffrion was the only other 50 goal man up until 1961, until Hull came along. Even then he peaked at 58. By then teams were playing each other 14 times a year. This means Hull averaged 11.6 goals against each team. He may have very well scored over 16 goals against one team.

As for points, I doubt you will find someone who posted more than 28 that Gretzky did against the Jets. The most goals he ever scored on a goalie in his career was Richard Brodeur. So perhaps if you look back to 1982 or so he had some gaudy numbers against Vancouver. But the thing with Gretzky, adjusted or not he always blows away the rest of the field in NHL history when it comes to offense. Even if Howe has a season where he scored 30 points against a team, he would have played them 14 times. Gretzky played his divisional teams much less than that in the 1980s.

The best I've seen Mario do was 21 points against the Devils in 8 games in 1993.

 

[SidGenoMario]

He's not the answer to the question but in 2009-10 Crosby torched the Isles for 17 points in 6 games.

 

[reckoning]

According to the Hockey Summary Project boxscores http://hsp.flyershistory.com/, Joe Malone scored 24 goals against Ottawa in 17-18. I highly doubt anyone has ever topped that.

Since 87-88 the highest number of goals against a team in one season that I could find on Hockey-Reference belongs to Joe Mullen, who scored 14 goals against L.A. in 88-89. http://www.hockey-reference.com/players/m/mullejo01/splits/1989/

As far as the years preceeding that, it's hard to verify without combing through the individual boxscores. I doubt anyone would've topped Gretzky's 16, but if there was a weak team in the same division as a good goalscorer, anything's possible.

I went through the boxscores for some of the more famous goalscoring seasons in the Original 6 era, and the highest I could find was Bernie Geoffrion getting 16 goals against the Rangers in 60-61.

It's unfortunate the summaries for 43-44 aren't easily available. Boston scored 72 goals against the depleted Rangers team that year, and I wonder how many Cain and Cowley had.

 

[The Panther]

Thanks, Reckoning! Good stuff.

Joe Malone isn't a surprise, but I never would have guessed Joey Mullen scored more against one team than Brett Hull against Toronto in '90-'91.

So, post-1920s, we've got Geoffrion and Gretzky with 16 goals against one team.

 

[steve141]

Not the most, but Richard scored 21 points against Chicago in 53-54. This was also the season that included Olmstead's eight point game against Chicago.

 

[steve141]

Hull had 25 points against Boston in 65-66.