The Montreal Canadiens have entered the quietest time on the calendar. While there is little to look forward to in the month of August, we decided to take a look back at some of the greatest managers in franchise history. We wrap up our site countdown of the five best general managers in Canadiens history with number one, Sam Pollock.
The Montreal Canadiens have won the most Stanley Cup titles in the history of the National Hockey League, though they have not won it since 1993. There have been periods of famine and other eras of domination.
None of the Canadiens eras have been more dominant, and more accustomed to winning Stanley Cups than the years when Sam Pollock was the general manager of the team.
Pollock was hired in 1964 to take over from Frank J. Selke who had done a fine job of winning and left an impressive team headlined by Jean Beliveau, Yvan Cournoyer and Henri Richard. Pollock always had a long-term mindset and sometimes traded popular players, but after their best years were behind them and he often got a great return.
He was instrumental in helping the league set up the large expansion that happened in 1967 and turned the six team circuit into a 12 team league. Pollock often added draft picks that were deemed as valuable as known commodities and had the patience to wait for that pick to turn in to an NHL player.
The Canadiens won four Stanley Cups in five years after Pollock arrived, so he clearly had a lot to work with when he first showed up in Montreal. A lot of the players involved in those championships were already in Montreal, or property of the Canadiens before Pollock was the team’s general manager.
However, he did set the table for an extended period of winning, and also built the best team that ever stepped onto NHL ice.
A big part of that was the much heralded acquisition of Guy Lafleur, who was drafted first overall in 1971. The Canadiens traded their 1970 first round pick and Ernie Hicke to the California Golden Seals for their first pick in 1971, which turned out to be first overall, as Pollock suspected it would.
He even traded Ralph Backstrom to the Los Angeles Kings midway through the 1970-71 season because they were just behind the Golden Seals in the standings, and Backstrom’s 27 points in 33 games with the Kings helped elevate them to second worst.
The Canadiens used that pick to select Lafleur, and Pollock would also select Larry Robinson in the second round of that draft. A year later he drafted Steve Shutt in the first round and Bunny Larocque in the second. A year after that it was Bob Gainey, then Doug Risebrough and Mario Tremblay in 1974.
He also drafted Guy Lapointe to round out the Big Three, and one of his first moves, trading Guy Allen and Paul Reid to the Boston Bruins for Ken Dryden.
With Dryden in goal, Lapointe, Robinson and Serge Savard on the blue line, and Lafleur leading the charge up front with Shutt, the Canadiens became unstoppable.
Pollock stepped aside following the 1977-78 season, a year in which the Canadiens won their third consecutive Stanley Cup. It was Pollock’s 9th Stanley Cup with the Canadiens in just 14 seasons.
That unprecedented run of winning is why Pollock is the greatest general manager in the history of the Montreal Canadiens.
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