Montreal Canadiens: Three Single Season Records That Will Never Be Broken

Most Penalty Minutes

You could make an argument that no one will ever score more than 60 goals for the Canadiens, or that there is no way they will ever lose more than 16 games in overtime like they did in 2011-12. Of course, it is quite unlikely they will ever have more than 23 ties like they did in 1962-63 but the rules of the game could change in the future, you never know.

One thing that is incredibly unlikely to ever see in the NHL again is the same number of penalty minutes players used to put up. Back in the day, line brawls, players leaving the bench to jump somebody and stick swinging incidents were commonplace.

These days? Players almost never fight and there really is no such thing as a “goon” anymore in the NHL. While that does speed up the game and take away some of the unnecessary violence, it does change things,

Without looking it up, it is hard to even guess who was the leader in penalty minutes on the Habs last season. Turns out, it was Michael Pezzetta, who played just 51 games and had 81 penalty minutes. He also lead the team in fighting majors with five. That’s a fight every ten games.

Chris Nilan used to fight ten players per game. Okay, not quite. But he must have come close on a few nights. In 1984-85, the Habs tough guy, who also played on a shutdown line with Bob Gainey and Guy Carbonneau, had 385 penalty minutes.

I guess when you aren’t afraid to cheapshot the other team’s goaltender 200 feet away from where a play was blown dead, the PIMs will add up.

The only current Montreal Canadiens player with more CAREER penalty minutes on the Habs is Brendan Gallagher with 397. Nilan pretty near had that in one season. We are never going to see that happen again.

Most Shutouts

Shutouts? Did the most recent version of the Montreal Canadiens have any of those? Apparently so. Jake Allen had a pair and Sam Montembeault had one as well. That’s three in an 82 game season, which is well short of the Canadiens single-season record.

That record, is an incredible 22 shutouts by George Hainsworth in 1928-29. There are a few reasons that this record has been able to stand for nearly 100 years and will likely stick around for 100 more, if not forever.

First of all, it was back before teams were allowed to use a fairly common practice now that is known as “the forward pass.” Teams would suddenly be allowed to pass the puck ahead to a teammate immediately after Hainsworth piled up 22 shutouts in just 44 games.

The Boston Bruins were the only team in the league to score more than two goals per game in that 1928-29 season, so Hainsworth earning a shutout every other game does have a bit of an asterisk attached. It is impressive, as no one else ever had more than 15 in NHL history, so no one has come close to matching Hainsworth’s impressive shutout record.

And no one else ever will. Martin Brodeur is the only goalie to get over halfway to 22 shutouts since the 2005-06 lockout, and no one on the Canadiens has ever come close.

Least Losses In A Single Season

Speaking of unbreakable records, there is none more impressive than the greatness of the Canadiens 1970’s dynasty. Specifically, the 1976-77 team has gone down in the record books as the greatest team in NHL history.

And why not? They were carried by a terrific offence headed by Guy Lafleur and Steve Shutt, a trio of incredible defenders in Larry Robinson, Guy Lapointe and Serge Savard as well as star goaltender Ken Dryden. Add in Scotty Bowman behind the bench, sprinkle in a couple of more Hall of Fame players like Jacques Lemaire, Yvan Cournoyer and Bob Gainey, and you have the best team ever assembled.

The numbers prove it, especially the fact that they lost just eight games all season. That is a full 80 game schedule as well. The team went 60-8-12, meaning they were 1.5 times more likely to tie a game than lose is, and 7.5 times more likely to win that lose on any given night.

Just eight losses in a full season is something that we will never see again. The 2021-22 Canadiens lost eight games in most eight game stretches last season, forget the full schedule.

The Tampa Bay Lightning are known as the closest thing we have seen to a dynasty in recent years and they lost seven playoff games the last time they won the Stanley Cup in 2021. Those Lightning had an incredible regular season in 2018-19, perhaps the best we have seen since the Canadiens most recent dynasty, and they lost 16 games.

Losing just eight games in a full season is unfathomable. That’s the same number of games the Toronto Maple Leafs lose in just two playoff series every two years. It’s unimaginable a team could go a full season losing just eight times.

It will surely never happen again.

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