TropicalFruitGirl26 Posted May 15, 2016 Share Posted May 15, 2016 Don't know how much discussion this will generate, but figured it was worth a shot. Below is a list of the longest running Stanley Cup droughts, along with notes showing when teams were even last in the Finals (if ever at all), and how many times they may have gotten to the Finals WITHOUT winning. Highlighted are the current final four teams, St. Louis, San Jose, Tampa Bay and Pittsburgh. Interesting to note that the two 'biggest underacheivers', as they were termed on another thread here, are on the cusp of possibly getting to the Finals, winning, and HAPPILY moving themselves to the BOTTOM of this list (where the Blackhawks and Kings are). Also interesting...some people are calling the Sharks-Blues Western series the "real SC Finals". Sorry, I gotta call 'horse$#!%' on that one..... Again, Sharks and Blues, while having good teams this year (oh wait, they've had them before too!), not only have long running Cup droughts, but they've NEVER WON IT...at all! While the two teams who are considered an 'afterthought' by some, Pitts, TB, have at least won a Cup, with Pittsburgh obviously being the most recent team of the four to do so. Not only that, but the Pens even still have players who were around when the team won last! So yea, I'd say calling the Western Finals the "Real SC Finals" is a bit short sighted.....especially when you have a not so distant winner still in it in the Pittsburgh Penguins, and the CURRENT defending Eastern Champion Lightning, who if they win their series with the Pens, will be back to back TWO time Eastern Champions. But anyways, a thread to talk about Cup droughts, Finals appearances with no Cups, or even teams with NO Cups or NO Finals appearances, and those that may be there soon enough....and those that may go another decade or so without ever getting there. Psssst....the Flyers lead the league in most Finals appearances without winning.......hehe...just sayin..... Can you argue they are the 'most futile' (even though they obviously have won Cups before...thought not for a loooong time), or can you argue that they have iced pretty good teams to even make it to the Finals that many times? These and other Cup drought related topics can be talked about here. Let's have it! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TropicalFruitGirl26 Posted May 15, 2016 Author Share Posted May 15, 2016 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
yave1964 Posted May 15, 2016 Share Posted May 15, 2016 Wow, I had no idea that only four teams in the entire league had a longer drought than the Flyers. Probably because of the half a dozen times of making it to the finals and bowing out. The Jet/Coyotes franchise 36 years of NEVER making the finals is wretched. But worse than that is the Blues who made it for each of their first three years under Scott Bowman and have never made it back since. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TropicalFruitGirl26 Posted May 15, 2016 Author Share Posted May 15, 2016 7 minutes ago, yave1964 said: Wow, I had no idea that only four teams in the entire league had a longer drought than the Flyers. Probably because of the half a dozen times of making it to the finals and bowing out. The Jet/Coyotes franchise 36 years of NEVER making the finals is wretched. But worse than that is the Blues who made it for each of their first three years under Scott Bowman and have never made it back since. Not only that, but if you want to talk 'wretched and growing', how about them Capitals, who had a very powerful team this year, are currently on a 40 season numb streak....and that was just extended this season when the Pens beat them. Also, the Vancouver Canucks. 45 seasons, had some good teams pretty recently, with no Cup....and now look to be on a downward spiral for the foreseeable future....meaning that Cup drought likely grows from 45 to over 50 pretty quickly! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
flyercanuck Posted May 15, 2016 Share Posted May 15, 2016 @TropicalFruitGirl26 I used to like you! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TropicalFruitGirl26 Posted May 15, 2016 Author Share Posted May 15, 2016 1 minute ago, flyercanuck said: @TropicalFruitGirl26 I used to like you! Gosh, darnit...did I wreck yet ANOTHER online relationship!!?? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ScottM Posted May 16, 2016 Share Posted May 16, 2016 If the Blues don't win the Cup this season, that will get them to 48 to tie the Leafs. For that reason alone, I want to see the Blues win it. I wanna see Toronto stay right there in their misery all by their lonesome. FWIW, Buffalo can keep them company at the top of the list too, as far as I'm concerned. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WordsOfWisdom Posted May 16, 2016 Share Posted May 16, 2016 1 hour ago, ScottM said: If the Blues don't win the Cup this season, that will get them to 48 to tie the Leafs. For that reason alone, I want to see the Blues win it. I wanna see Toronto stay right there in their misery all by their lonesome. Misery loves company. I need the Blues to win one more round for my bracket challenge. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WordsOfWisdom Posted May 16, 2016 Share Posted May 16, 2016 8 hours ago, TropicalFruitGirl26 said: Don't know how much discussion this will generate, but figured it was worth a shot. Below is a list of the longest running Stanley Cup droughts, along with notes showing when teams were even last in the Finals (if ever at all), and how many times they may have gotten to the Finals WITHOUT winning. So you're up for more Leafs chat? Awesome. Two generations of people living on this planet have never seen the NHL's richest franchise (Leafs) in the Stanley Cup final. To put that in perspective, the Yankees have won something like 12 World Series in the past 50 years. Imagine the Lakers or Celtics never making an NBA final in your lifetime. (Impossible.) Imagine the Yankees, Red Sox, Giants, and Dodgers never making a World Series. (Impossible.) Imagine the Cowboys, Patriots, Packers, (my football is rusty) never making a SuperBowl. (Impossible.) The Leafs are rich beyond rich. They have like 25% of the NHL's overall wealth. Chances are, the NHL doesn't survive without the Leafs, since they pay the revenue sharing money for all of the league's floundering teams. They play in front of a hockey market that is 10x larger than the New York Rangers market. Their ticket revenue is higher than all four of the current remaining teams combined. One Leafs playoff game would generate more money than the entire series will between the Blues and Sharks or Penguins and Lightning. (Have I laid it on thick enough yet?) While it's an interesting running joke that the Leafs have a 50-year Stanley Cup drought, one could say that the NHL has suffered overall as a "big four" North American sport because of it. A strong Leafs team could make the NHL the 3rd largest behind football and baseball. The fact that the game's #1 franchise has been a complete dog pile has stunted the growth of the league and probably cut long term revenues in half. In other sports, people don't watch baseball when the Yankees are losing 100+ games per season. Fan interest across the league goes down when marquee teams flounder. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WordsOfWisdom Posted May 16, 2016 Share Posted May 16, 2016 Given the current state of the Leafs (rock bottom), their drought will extend beyond 50 years no problem. I'd say 55 years is still a safe bet. Here's why: It will take the Leafs at least 5 years from today to get good again (if they manage things properly). I'm talking "final four" good, not 8th place good. Even if that happens, their odds of getting to the final are 50% or less... because the team never shows up in the conference finals. They stink the joint up every time. Even if they fluke their way to a Cup final, there would be a feeling that the team has already far exceeded expectations and whatever happens happens. The players will just be happy to be there. Any Leafs player that even plays in a Stanley Cup final wearing the blue and white is going to get a statue outside the arena and have their jersey number retired, win or lose. It's hard to win the Cup when you've already won in the minds of everyone just by being there. Is 50 years the longest drought in NHL history? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TropicalFruitGirl26 Posted May 16, 2016 Author Share Posted May 16, 2016 9 hours ago, WordsOfWisdom said: Given the current state of the Leafs (rock bottom), their drought will extend beyond 50 years no problem. I'd say 55 years is still a safe bet. Here's why: It will take the Leafs at least 5 years from today to get good again (if they manage things properly). I'm talking "final four" good, not 8th place good. Even if that happens, their odds of getting to the final are 50% or less... because the team never shows up in the conference finals. They stink the joint up every time. Even if they fluke their way to a Cup final, there would be a feeling that the team has already far exceeded expectations and whatever happens happens. The players will just be happy to be there. Any Leafs player that even plays in a Stanley Cup final wearing the blue and white is going to get a statue outside the arena and have their jersey number retired, win or lose. It's hard to win the Cup when you've already won in the minds of everyone just by being there. Is 50 years the longest drought in NHL history? Without doing a big lookup on all the teams, if I am not mistaken, the Rangers hold the all time longest drought at 54 seasons. They won right around the time I started noticing and following the NHL. I remember them being the first Stanley Cup champion I was ever really aware of. At the time, I didn't realize the significance of "The Messiah", that long Cupless streak, about "guarantees", or that Finals would be heartbreaking ones for a young Martin Brodeur and his Devils team...and for Pavel Bure and his Vancouver Canucks. Of course, the Devils would go on to win a few Cups since then, rectifying that hearbreak, and keeping them at a respectable position on this Drought list....whilst the Vancouver Canucks? Not so much.... As for your Leafs, excellent analogy with the MLB! As much as I dislike teams like the Yankees, Red Sox, and Dodgers, yes, it IS good for baseball that those teams do well because they help drive interest in the overall product....whether as fan favorites or villains. Same with the Leafs in the NHL. While I would certainly choose the Bolts over the Leafs at any given time, I do understand that having a competitive, and more importantly a WINNING team in Toronto, would have the effect of driving interest in the sport overall. After all, even Leaf haters can get into that right? To use a pro wrestling analogy (I am quite novice at it, but my husband and his family are big time wrestling fans, and some of it just sorta permeates my way...lol), it is better to have a big positive reaction, or a big negative reaction (Toronto can be that big fan favorite, or that big Heel that EVERYONE wants to see beat up), rather than NO reaction at all. And right now, with the Leafs leading the pack in the Drought Race, their biggest reaction from fans and detractors alike (aside from the usual Leaf jokes ) is.....indifference. Not good for the overall NHL product. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
B21 Posted May 16, 2016 Share Posted May 16, 2016 18 hours ago, yave1964 said: Wow, I had no idea that only four teams in the entire league had a longer drought than the Flyers. Probably because of the half a dozen times of making it to the finals and bowing out. The Jet/Coyotes franchise 36 years of NEVER making the finals is wretched. But worse than that is the Blues who made it for each of their first three years under Scott Bowman and have never made it back since. Not to pile on the Blues but in those seasons the six expansion teams were all lumped in the same division and the playoff format at the time was intra-division until the SCF. The Blues didn't have to play an Original 6 team until the SCF...in which they were 0-12. That's right - swept all three times. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
yave1964 Posted May 16, 2016 Share Posted May 16, 2016 1 hour ago, B21 said: Not to pile on the Blues but in those seasons the six expansion teams were all lumped in the same division and the playoff format at the time was intra-division until the SCF. The Blues didn't have to play an Original 6 team until the SCF...in which they were 0-12. That's right - swept all three times. Still, I consider it some of the best coaching that Bowman ever did. YES they were in a division with the other weak sisters but he built a team of old venerable future HOFers Jaques Plante and Glen Hall in net, the glasses wearing Al Arbour who wound up second to Scotty in almost every coaching category was recalled from the minors where Toronto had banished him after a few cup wins,, an absolute TON of former Habs way past their prime appeared, the final hurrah for the tragic Doug Harvey on the back end, the versataille Jimmy Roberts, Noel Picard and Jean Guy Talbot also represented the Habs on the blueline which also included the nasty Plager brothers. They defended well, better than any other team and made the occasional trip into enemy territory, the teams only superstar Red Berenson leading the occasional charge along with gritty Ab McDonald, Dickie Moore and the ageless Camille 'The Eel" Henry who weighed maybe 150 pounds soaking wet. Lots and lots of guys who were trapped in the minors under the original six days got their first chance late in life, 30 year old rookies like Frank St. Marseille and Larry Keenan may have been stars if they had hit the league earlier but had been buried because of lack of jobs. Hell, Bill Mcreary was a 34 year old rookie, a solid two way forward who could score but never landed a job before. Bowman took these rejects, washed up vets such as Hall, Plante, Moore, Talbot Harvey, Camille Henry, and Arbour and stuck in the minors guys like Picard, Berenson, St. Marseille and Keenan and the occasional young prospect such as Terry Crisp and Gary Sabourin and made a team that could compete night in and night out. They had zero chance of winning a cup against the loaded Canadiens and the Big Bad Bobby Orr led Bruins, but they were the best of the new teams and IMHO Bowman did his finest job of finding the right mix of talent off the scrap heap. Someday someone will write a book about these guys, I hope, they deserve mention. They were the Island of misfit toys and for three years in a row they played their hearts out for a kid coach, a lot of the players were older than Bowman was at the time even. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sarsippius Posted May 16, 2016 Share Posted May 16, 2016 3 hours ago, TropicalFruitGirl26 said: Without doing a big lookup on all the teams, if I am not mistaken, the Rangers hold the all time longest drought at 54 seasons. We used to chant "1940" at the Spectrum, now my Rag-hating buddy likes to say "1994 and 54 more!" Sadly my Flyboys have no leg to stand in that bruhaha anymore.....41 years, 54 years, it's all a ridiculous amount of time. As far as those 6 Final appearances since 1975, they were fun but that bridesmaid thing gets old......were they failures? I dunno, '76 Habs '80 Isles '85 and '87 Oilers were the last real dynasties in the NHL. No excuses though, and I have always felt they should have beaten the Isles. '97 Detroit was a team whose time had clearly come but that will always be an embarrassing sweep, they choked like Murray said although he probably shouldn't have said it a press conference. 2010? Lucky to be there, still stung as bad as all the rest though. I guess what I'm saying is having the most Final appearances since expansion is worthless, it's mind boggling to have lost 6 in a row. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FD19372 Posted May 16, 2016 Share Posted May 16, 2016 What?! Buffalo has a beach? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FD19372 Posted May 16, 2016 Share Posted May 16, 2016 1 hour ago, sarsippius said: We used to chant "1940" at the Spectrum, now my Rag-hating buddy likes to say "1994 and 54 more!" Sadly my Flyboys have no leg to stand in that bruhaha anymore.....41 years, 54 years, it's all a ridiculous amount of time. As far as those 6 Final appearances since 1975, they were fun but that bridesmaid thing gets old......were they failures? I dunno, '76 Habs '80 Isles '85 and '87 Oilers were the last real dynasties in the NHL. No excuses though, and I have always felt they should have beaten the Isles. '97 Detroit was a team whose time had clearly come but that will always be an embarrassing sweep, they choked like Murray said although he probably shouldn't have said it a press conference. 2010? Lucky to be there, still stung as bad as all the rest though. I guess what I'm saying is having the most Final appearances since expansion is worthless, it's mind boggling to have lost 6 in a row. We lost to 3 of the greatest dynasties of all time, the Habs, Oilers and Islanders. Those teams were NOT failures in any way. I can't even reflect and be that irritated with losing to the Blackhawks, although I was with the goalie of our team, in 2010. The only one that upset me was the way we lost in 1997. One line team or not, we should have never been swept. Lost probably, but not swept. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WordsOfWisdom Posted May 16, 2016 Share Posted May 16, 2016 7 hours ago, TropicalFruitGirl26 said: Without doing a big lookup on all the teams, if I am not mistaken, the Rangers hold the all time longest drought at 54 seasons. They won right around the time I started noticing and following the NHL. I remember them being the first Stanley Cup champion I was ever really aware of. That was around the time I started following the NHL too (a couple years prior but close enough). I can remember my friend (also a Leafs fan) going on about how "we have to hope New Jersey wins because the Rangers are a stacked team", etc... I'm like "uhhh... they still have to get past Vancouver". In his mind, it was a forgone conclusion that the Leafs were going to smash the Canucks. On paper, I think the Leafs were better, and they held an edge in the standings if I recall correctly, but I knew that was a stacked Vancouver team. Naturally, the Canucks made short work of the Leafs and that was it. I doubt the Leafs could have beaten the Rangers that year anyway, but it probably would have been one of the greatest Stanley Cup finals in NHL history had those two teams met. Not to take anything away from Vancouver, but Toronto vs New York is two original six teams going at it. It would have been the highest rated Cup final in the past 25 years. In any event... 7 hours ago, TropicalFruitGirl26 said: As for your Leafs, excellent analogy with the MLB! As much as I dislike teams like the Yankees, Red Sox, and Dodgers, yes, it IS good for baseball that those teams do well because they help drive interest in the overall product....whether as fan favorites or villains. Same with the Leafs in the NHL. Why thank ya. The Leafs could be the NHL's greatest "heel" team. Everyone outside Toronto would despise them. A lot of people still do, even though they've done nothing but help the other 29 teams in the league by giving them free points. Just imagine the reaction they could provoke if they won 60 games in a season and went on a Stanley Cup tear of 3 Cups in 5 years or something to that effect. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sarsippius Posted May 17, 2016 Share Posted May 17, 2016 5 hours ago, FD19372 said: We lost to 3 of the greatest dynasties of all time, the Habs, Oilers and Islanders. Those teams were NOT failures in any way. Agreed there was no shame in those losses, in fact that '87 Flyers team will always be my favorite for the way they gutted it out in those playoffs. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
OccamsRazor Posted May 17, 2016 Share Posted May 17, 2016 I don't know what is worse never getting to a Cup.... ....or losing 6 times in the finals???? I'll say losing in the finals 6 times. Unreal. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
radoran Posted May 17, 2016 Share Posted May 17, 2016 19 hours ago, FD19372 said: What?! Buffalo has a beach? There's a big Lake there. One might even say a Great Lake. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WordsOfWisdom Posted May 17, 2016 Share Posted May 17, 2016 15 hours ago, sarsippius said: We lost to 3 of the greatest dynasties of all time, the Habs, Oilers and Islanders. Oh how times change... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
WordsOfWisdom Posted May 17, 2016 Share Posted May 17, 2016 1 hour ago, radoran said: There's a big Lake there. One might even say a Great Lake. It's grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrreat! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FD19372 Posted May 17, 2016 Share Posted May 17, 2016 8 hours ago, OccamsRazor said: I don't know what is worse never getting to a Cup.... ....or losing 6 times in the finals???? I'll say losing in the finals 6 times. Unreal. Never getting there means you have NO chance at winning the Cup. I'd rather at least GET to the finals. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FD19372 Posted May 17, 2016 Share Posted May 17, 2016 2 hours ago, radoran said: There's a big Lake there. One might even say a Great Lake. Yes. I've heard about their world-class halibut. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
flyercanuck Posted May 18, 2016 Share Posted May 18, 2016 20 hours ago, radoran said: There's a big Lake there. One might even say a Great Lake. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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