1966 Stanley Cup Finals


The 1966 Stanley Cup Finals was the championship series of the National Hockey League's 1965–66 season, and the culmination of the 1966 Stanley Cup playoffs. It was contested by the Detroit Red Wings and the defending champion Montreal Canadiens. The Canadiens won the best-of-seven series, four games to two, to win the Stanley Cup for the seventh time in eleven years.

Paths to the Finals

Montreal defeated the Toronto Maple Leafs 4–0 to advance to the finals, and Detroit defeated the Chicago Black Hawks 4–2.

Game summaries

With this series, Toe Blake had coached the Canadiens to seven Cups in eleven years. Henri Richard, a member of all seven championship teams, would score the series winner in game six in overtime. Two minutes into the extra period, Richard broke in on Red Wing goalie Roger Crozier, lost his footing on the newly resurfaced ice as he cut across the goalmouth, and sprawled into Crozier. The puck went in, and even though Crozier and the Wings protested that Richard had pushed the puck in with his hand, the goal stood. His brilliant play in goal, even in defeat, earned Crozier the Conn Smythe Trophy as the most valuable player in the playoffs.
Roger Crozier wins Conn Smythe Trophy.

Montreal Canadiens 1966 Stanley Cup champions

Stanley Cup engravings

In 1966, NBC became the first television network in the United States to air a national broadcast of a Stanley Cup Playoff game. The network provided coverage of four Sunday afternoon playoff games during the postseason. On April 10 and April 17, NBC aired semifinal games between the Chicago Black Hawks and the Detroit Red Wings. On April 24 and May 1, NBC aired Games 1 and 4 of the Stanley Cup Finals between the Montreal Canadiens and the Detroit Red Wings. Win Elliot served as the play-by-play man while Bill Mazer served as the color commentator for the games.
NBC's coverage of the 1966 Stanley Cup Finals marked the first time that hockey games were broadcast on network television in color. The CBC would follow suit the following year. NBC's Stanley Cup coverage preempted a sports anthology series called NBC Sports in Action, hosted by Jim Simpson and Bill Cullen, who were between-periods co-hosts for the Stanley Cup broadcasts.