Montreal Canadiens: Top 5 All Time Coaches Rankings – #2 Toe Blake
By Suki Gill
Montreal Canadiens great Joseph Hector “Toe” Blake was already a legend in Montreal before he ever got into coaching. As a member of the famed Punch Line, alongside Maurice “Rocket” Richard and Elmer Lach, he won three Stanley Cups, a Hart Trophy and a Lady Byng Trophy over 13 seasons as a player in the National Hockey League with the Canadiens from 1935 to 1948.
Blake didn’t just walk into an NHL coaching job after hanging up his skates, he rode the buses and paid his dues. He began his coaching career with the Houston Huskies, leading them to a championship in the United States Hockey League. He also spent time as player coach with the Buffalo Bisons of the American Hockey League before returning north of the border. After playing parts of two seasons with the Valleyfield Braves of the Quebec Senior Hockey League he would become their head coach for the start of the 1951-52 season and run the bench there for three seasons.
Blake would eventually be brought in by general manager Frank J. Selke to replace the great Dick Irvin as head coach of the Montreal Canadiens at the start of the 1955-56 season. Blake enjoyed immediate success behind the bench of the Habs, compiling a stellar 45-15-10 regular season record en route to capturing a Stanley Cup in his first season. It was just the beginning of an unbelievable run for Blake and his charges. With Blake at the wheel and legends Maurice Richard and Jean Beliveau leading the way on the ice, they would reach the top of the NHL mountain in each of his first five years at the helm. A true dynasty that featured several future Hall of Famers, including the likes of Boom Boom Geoffrion, Dickie Moore, Doug Harvey and Henri Richard, the Canadiens teams of the late 1950’s are thought of by many as one of the greatest teams ever assembled.
As the calendar turned to 1960, Blake and the Canadiens started to falter. Regular season success did not translate to the playoffs and they would be eliminated in the first round in each of the next four seasons. However, Blake was able to persevere and guide his team back to prominence as the Canadiens would add three more Cups to the trophy case over a four year period from 1964 to 1968.
Blake went out on top, walking away from his post in 1968 at the age of 56. He left the game with 500 career wins in 914 regular season games and 82 wins in 119 career playoff games. At the time of his retirement, his eight Stanley Cup wins were the most by any coach in the history of the National Hockey League. The record would stand until 2002 when it was broken by another legendary Canadiens coach, Scotty Bowman.
A Hall of Fame player who cemented his legacy as an even better coach, Toe Blake will forever have his own chapter in Montreal Canadiens history.