1942 Maple Leafs leave plucky Oilers a hard act to follow

Article content

Their names are usually invoked only in playoff desperation. 

Article content

Yet the perfect mix of Hall of Famers and hard workers who were the 1942 Toronto Maple Leafs are in the news again.

While all Stanley Cup winners assure each other they’ll ‘walk together forever.’ this bunch — including Sweeney Schriner, Wally Stanowski, Bingo Kampman, Pete Langelle and the more-recognized Syl Apps, Turk Broda and coach Hap Day — stand a bit taller as the only team in pro sports to rally from an 0-3 hole in a championship best-of-seven series.

“They came out of the series the fighting-est bunch in the history of hockey,” Day said of his players at the team victory banquet at the Royal York Hotel. 

The latest club bidding to join them is also Canadian: The no-quit Edmonton Oilers.

Eighty-two years after Toronto stunned the Detroit Red Wings, as Postmedia’s Rob Tychkowski wrote Tuesday night in the Game 5 euphoria, Edmonton is halfway to the impossible. 

Article content

We apologize, but this video has failed to load.

Play Video

NHL teams have come back from deficits of 0-3 before — the 1975 New York Islanders over Pittsburgh, the 2010 Flyers against Boston and, the most recent, Los Angeles over San Jose a decade ago.

An Isles fan hung a homemade sign reading “Remember the ‘42 Leafs” through their ‘75 playoffs when nine times New York won elimination games, beating the Rangers in a best-of-three preliminary and almost erasing 0-3 against the Flyers before losing Game 7.   

But none of those Lazerus-like revivals were on the big stage with the Cup constantly in the house but getting packed up again. After Tuesday, the Oilers joined the 1945 Wings and 2012 New Jersey Devils as the only teams to force at least a Game 6 in the final — Friday in front of their increasingly confident and intimidating fan base at the Rogers Place. 

Article content

Article content

But as with the Oilers and ‘42 Leafs, every great comeback has to start in a grave. That’s where the Leafs were knee-pad deep in April of ‘42, losing 3-2 and 4-2 at home then 5-2 in Game 3 at the Detroit Olympia. The Wings were killing Toronto with an effective dump-and-chase style.   

“Detroit had us buffaloed,” Day told writer Stan Fischler years later, part of Eric Zweig’s excellent book, Maple Leafs, The Complete Oral History. Day and manager Conn Smythe resorted to some tactical and motivational magic. 

Day ruffled feathers before Game 4 with controversial lineup changes, including benching Gordie Drillon (who remains the last Leaf to win a scoring points title) and fellow forward Bucko McDonald, opting for healthy scratches Don Metz, Hank Goldup and inserted defenceman Bob Goldham, later a Hockey Night In Canada analyst. It remains in dispute whether Day and Smythe had heeded advice from Schriner to change tactics when they called the forward to their hotel breakfast table on the morning of Game 4.   

Article content

One of the team’s directors planted a story with Detroit reporters calling out the Leafs for gold-bricking, knowing it would add to Wings’ over confidence.  

In the dressing room before the game, Day is reputed to have read a letter from a teenaged girl, a Leafs fan getting mercilessly teased at school by Detroit supporters, but urging her team not to fold. Schriner is said to have leaped to his feet hearing her words and shouted at Day “tell that kid not to worry,” before getting an assist in the 4-3 season-saving win. 

Just like that, momentum shifted. In a as the Leafs began firing the puck right back out to elude Detroit forecheckers. Detroit manager Jack Adams took out post-game frustrations on referee Mel Harwood and was booted from the series, while two other Wings were fined.  

Article content

Someone at the Olympia made another huge mistake, jumping the gun on a large floral display to congratulate the pending Cup champions that was in full view of the Leafs arriving at the rink. The Wings had the lead twice in the final four games and couldn’t hold, as Toronto won back at home 9-3 and rode a 3-0 Broda shutout back in Detroit.

“I know they talked about taking my dad out (after Game 3),” Broda’s daughter, Barb Tushingham, told the Toronto Sun last year. “Conn said ‘no, I brought him in, he stays.’

“I remember dad saying ‘you have to (hang) in there and just play with heart. Dad didn’t have a goalie coach, didn’t wear a mask and, at the end of every year, had lost his toenails, a couple of teeth and had a black eye.”

His shutout set up Game 7 in front of what would be the largest crowd to watch a hockey game at the time — 16,218 at Maple Leaf Gardens. Radio legend Foster Hewitt’s excitement level also rose with each win and big Toronto goal. 

Article content

The Leafs hadn’t won a Cup since their inaugural season on Carlton Street 10 years earlier and, at a gloomy juncture of World War II with bad news on most battlefronts, their rally against the Wings lifted spirits in English Canada on either side of the Quebec border. Calls flooded the Gardens switchboard to wish the team luck or try and secure a ticket. 

“I couldn’t get a line out to my wife to save my husbandly neck,” Smythe’s assistant, Frank Selke, quipped to a reporter. 

Yet it was a nail-biter, the Leafs trailed 1-0 after two periods. Smythe, who was training his artillery regiment and unable to attend all the games, barged into the dressing room meaning to shake up his troops, but the laconic Schriner assured him the Leafs would prevail and tied the game himself against Detroit goalie Johnny Mowers. 

Article content

“A blind shot,” Schriner said after the game. “I didn’t know I’d scored until I heard the crowd shouting, then saw the (goal) light go on. It was the biggest light I ever saw in my life.” 

Langelle would get the eventual winner with Schriner adding another for insurance.

“I’ll never forget the last minute of the game, skating around with a two-goal lead and the knowledge Detroit couldn’t win it,” Apps told Fischler. 

Presented with the Cup, which was then cylindrical with the bowl on top and nicknamed ‘the elephant’s leg,’ captain Apps immediately called Smythe to hold it, telling him “you’ve waited long enough, come and get it.”

The time and technology of the era, a decade before Hockey Night in Canada televised the Leafs and Montreal Canadiens, means few visuals  survive of the ‘42 team. Langelle and teammates with sticks raised after his goal and the crowd reacting does rank as one of the great black-and -white sports photos of the era.  

Article content

Stanowski was the last survivor of the ‘42 team, lasting until age 96 in 2015. 

“There wasn’t very much money when I signed,” he said in an earlier interview with the Sun. “I made about $1,500 in Syracuse and about $3,000 with the Leafs (in 1939, with $30 deducted for his team sweater). But it didn’t make any difference, I just wanted to play.” 

The ‘Whirling Dervish’ was one of the few defenders to rush the puck in his day, but ran afoul of the strict Smythe for sleeping at home with his own wife at training camp. Stanowski craftily orchestrated a newspaper story critical of Smythe he knew would enrage the boss enough to trade him to the Rangers. 

The Wings shook off blowing the 0-3 lead to win the Cup a year later, beating the Leafs in six along the way. But there was no escaping their role of ignominy.

“Someone had to lose that series,” Detroit defenceman Jimmy Orlando said. “We just happened to be the unlucky ones.” 

Lhornby@postmedia.com 

X: @sunhornby 

Article content