1958–59 NHL season

League business

The NHL and the Canadian Amateur Hockey Association (CAHA) negotiated a new professional-amateur agreement, since the previous deal had expired in 1955, and the groups had operated on a gentleman's agreement. CAHA secretary George Dudley announced that NHL would pay C$40,000 towards developing amateur players, and the agreement set rules for negotiation lists and reserve lists and an earlier deadline to decide which players might be moved from a junior team to a professional team. The CAHA agreed that amateurs aged 17 and older would use same rules as the professionals except for overtime.

Regular season

The Toronto Maple Leafs, last-place finishers the previous season, brought up Johnny Bower to share goaltending duties with Ed Chadwick and bolstered the defence by adding Carl Brewer and Allan Stanley to aid Tim Horton and Bobby Baun.

Ralph Backstrom and Jean Beliveau each had two goals apiece in a 9–1 Montreal win at the Montreal Forum on October 23. Rudy Pilous, coach of the Black Hawks, was displeased with his team's performance and fined his team $100 for the poor performance.

Beliveau had a hat trick November 29 as Montreal beat Detroit 6–2 at the Forum. Gordie Howe was injured in a collision with Doug Harvey near the end of the first period and was taken to hospital, returning for the third period. The next night, Montreal defeated the Red Wings 7–0 as Jacques Plante got his third shutout of the season.

On January 3, Harvey was back in the Canadiens' lineup and scored two goals in a 5–1 win over the New York Rangers at the Forum. In the last minute of play, Plante got two penalties, one of them a major that sparked the fight. Jimmy Bartlett had skated into Plante, and Plante retaliated by punching Bartlett, provoking a bench-clearing brawl. Referee Dalton McArthur gave Bartlett a double major, one for charging and one for fighting, and a misconduct penalty.

On February 1, the Rangers downed the Red Wings 5–4 at Madison Square Garden. Lou Fontinato became incensed when Gordie Howe struck Eddie Shack with his stick, and challenged the right wing. Howe broke Fontinato's nose in the fight. On February 5, the Rangers beat the Wings 5–0 on Worsley's shutout. Detroit coach Sid Abel, formerly Howe's centerman, fined 14 players $100 each for playing what he described as "the worst game of hockey he had seen in 20 years".

On February 15 at Madison Square Garden, Worsley had Montreal shut out with ten minutes remaining. Then the Canadiens scored 5 goals to win 5–1. Coach Phil Watson ordered every player except Worsley out on the ice for an after-game workout. Watson said Worsley hadn't played so badly. General manager Muzz Patrick said the workout was in lieu of fines.

With five games left in the season, the Rangers had a seven-point lead over Toronto. Then the Rangers went into a tailspin, and the Leafs got hot. The key game was played March 19 between Toronto and the Canadiens. Plante could not play due to a severe case of boils, and so the Canadiens used Claude Pronovost in goal. He let in five goals before coach Toe Blake replaced him in the third period with Claude Cyr; it was Cyr's first and last NHL game. Toronto won 6–3. The Canadiens brought up Charlie Hodge from the Montreal Royals and on March 22, he beat the Rangers 4–2. The Rangers still had a chance to make the playoffs if Detroit beat Toronto. The Leafs won 6–4 and ousted the Rangers from the playoffs.

The Montreal Canadiens again won the regular season standings; their players dominated the All-Star nominations (with six of a possible twelve, the same number as in 1956) and trophies as Jacques Plante won his fourth straight Vezina Trophy, Tom Johnson won the James Norris Memorial Trophy, ending teammate Doug Harvey's four-year monopoly, and Dickie Moore won the Art Ross Trophy, setting a new record for total points in a season: with a 41-goal, 55-assist campaign, Moore broke Howe's league record by a single point.

This season marked the final time until 1967 with an active player who had played for a team not in the Original Six. Former Brooklyn Americans player Ken Mosdell suited up for two postseason games for the Canadiens that year, and retired after Montreal won the Cup.

Final standings

Playoffs

Playoff bracket

The top four teams in the league qualified for the playoffs. In the semifinals, the first-place team played the third-place team, while the second-place team faced the fourth-place team, with the winners advancing to the Stanley Cup Finals. In both rounds, teams competed in a best-of-seven series (scores in the bracket indicate the number of games won in each best-of-seven series).

| RD1-seed1=1 | RD1-team1=Montreal | RD1-score1=4 | RD1-seed2=3 | RD1-team2=Chicago | RD1-score2=2 | RD1-seed3=2 | RD1-team3=Boston | RD1-score3=3 | RD1-seed4=4 | RD1-team4=Toronto | RD1-score4=4 | RD2-seed1=1 | RD2-team1=Montreal | RD2-score1=4 | RD2-seed2=4 | RD2-team2=Toronto | RD2-score2=1

Semifinals

(1) Montreal Canadiens vs. (3) Chicago Black Hawks

Following game six, Ottawa Journal sports editor Bill Westwick quoted league president Clarence Campbell as accusing the referee Red Storey of "freezing" in the final minutes of the near-riotous game. Storey subsequently resigned as a referee. Campbell stated that Westwick took the words out of context, accused him of "breaking confidence" in the article. Westwick's fellow newsmen defended his article and did not question its veracity.

|1-1-1 =Tod Sloan (1) – pp – 16:34 |1-1-2 =10:46 – Claude Provost (1) |1-2-1 =No scoring |1-2-2 =04:05 – Henri Richard (1) 19:23 – pp – Marcel Bonin (1) |1-3-1 =Tod Sloan (2) – 03:26 |1-3-2 =02:04 – Marcel Bonin (2) |goalie1-1 =Glenn Hall |goalie1-2 =Jacques Plante

|2-1-1 =Eric Nesterenko (1) – sh – 14:35 |2-1-2 =05:56 – Marcel Bonin (3) 12:01 – pp – Bernie Geoffrion (1) 12:48 – Dickie Moore (1) |2-2-1 =No scoring |2-2-2 =08:29 – pp – Jean Beliveau (1) 17:06 – pp – Marcel Bonin (4) |2-3-1 =No scoring |2-3-2 =No scoring |goalie2-1 =Glenn Hall |goalie2-2 =Jacques Plante

|3-1-1 =11:17 – Al Arbour (1) 13:15 – Lorne Ferguson (1) |3-1-2 =No scoring |3-2-1 =16:44 – Ed Litzenberger (1) |3-2-2 =Marcel Bonin (5) – 06:30 |3-3-1 =19:54 – en – Glen Skov (1) |3-3-2 =Henri Richard (2) – 08:48 |goalie3-1 =Glenn Hall |goalie3-2 =Jacques Plante

|4-1-1 =18:08 – Bobby Hull (1) |4-1-2 =Marcel Bonin (6) – pp – 04:33 |4-2-1 =No scoring |4-2-2 =No scoring |4-3-1 =13:26 – Lorne Ferguson (2) 19:49 – en – Glen Skov (2) |4-3-2 =No scoring |goalie4-1 =Glenn Hall |goalie4-2 =Jacques Plante

|5-1-1 =No scoring |5-1-2 =01:34 – Andre Pronovost (1) 10:48 – pp – Marcel Bonin (7) 14:35 – Claude Provost (2) 16:38 – pp – Bernie Geoffrion (2) |5-2-1 =Tod Sloan (3) – pp – 03:00 |5-2-2 =No scoring |5-3-1 =Eric Nesterenko (2) – 05:11 |5-3-2 =No scoring |goalie5-1 =Glenn Hall |goalie5-2 =Jacques Plante

|6-1-1 =13:05 – pp – Ted Lindsay (2) |6-1-2 =Doug Harvey (1) – 02:20 |6-2-1 =05:52 – Ed Litzenberger (2) |6-2-2 =Dickie Moore (2) – pp – 09:09 Claude Provost (3) – sh – 10:22 |6-3-1 =03:24 – pp – Ed Litzenberger (3) 14:32 – Ted Lindsay (2) |6-3-2 =Dickie Moore (3) – 13:18 Claude Provost (4) – 18:32 |goalie6-1 =Glenn Hall |goalie6-2 =Jacques Plante

(2) Boston Bruins vs. (4) Toronto Maple Leafs

|1-1-1 =No scoring |1-1-2 =07:50 – Jerry Toppazzini (1) |1-2-1 =Gerry Ehman (1) – 06:07 |1-2-2 =10:53 – Leo Labine (1) 11:53 – Vic Stasiuk (1) 18:45 – sh – Larry Leach (1) |1-3-1 =No scoring |1-3-2 =06:18 – Don McKenney (1) |goalie1-1 =Johnny Bower |goalie1-2 =Harry Lumley

|2-1-1 =Dick Duff (1) – 15:45 |2-1-2 =10:00 – Fleming MacKell (1) 12:14 – pp – Fleming MacKell (2) |2-2-1 =Ron Stewart (1) – 08:09 |2-2-2 =No scoring |2-3-1 =No scoring |2-3-2 =15:59 – Jean-Guy Gendron (1) 19:15 – en – Leo Labine (2) |goalie2-1 =Johnny Bower |goalie2-2 =Harry Lumley

|3-1-1 =16:21 – Bob Pulford (1) |3-1-2 =Vic Stasiuk (2) – pp – 02:43 |3-2-1 =No scoring |3-2-2 =Vic Stasiuk (3) – 17:34 |3-3-1 =17:08 – Gerry Ehman (2) |3-3-2 =No scoring |3-4-1 =05:02 – Gerry Ehman (3) |3-4-2 =No scoring |goalie3-1 =Johnny Bower |goalie3-2 =Harry Lumley

|4-1-1 =06:58 – pp – Gerry Ehman (4) |4-1-2 =No scoring |4-2-1 =No scoring |4-2-2 =No scoring |4-3-1 =02:46 – Brian Cullen (1) |4-3-2 =Jerry Toppazzini (2) – 02:02 Bronco Horvath (1) – 07:20 |4-4-1 =11:21 – pp – Frank Mahovlich (1) |4-4-2 =No scoring |goalie4-1 =Johnny Bower |goalie4-2 =Harry Lumley

|5-1-1 =Bert Olmstead (1) – pp – 09:26 |5-1-2 =No scoring |5-2-1 =Dick Duff (2) – 06:37 |5-2-2 =No scoring |5-3-1 =Frank Mahovlich (2) – 00:19 Bob Pulford (2) – sh – 09:02 |5-3-2 =11:25 – Jerry Toppazzini (3) |goalie5-1 =Johnny Bower |goalie5-2 =Harry Lumley

|6-1-1 =15:13 – pp – Bert Olmstead (2) |6-1-2 =Jerry Toppazzini (4) – pp – 07:28 Don McKenney (2) – 09:34 |6-2-1 =03:50 – Frank Mahovlich (3) |6-2-2 =Johnny Bucyk (1) – 09:57 Johnny Bucyk (2) – 17:19 |6-3-1 =02:55 – Gerry Ehman (5) 07:37 – sh – Frank Mahovlich (4) |6-3-2 =Bronco Horvath (2) – 12:56 |goalie6-1 =Johnny Bower |goalie6-2 =Harry Lumley

|7-1-1 =Larry Regan (1) – pp – 05:33 |7-1-2 =01:11 – pp – Vic Stasiuk (4) |7-2-1 =No scoring |7-2-2 =14:33 – Leo Boivin (1) |7-3-1 =Bob Pulford (3) – 08:36 Gerry Ehman (6) – 17:27 |7-3-2 =No scoring |goalie7-1 =Johnny Bower |goalie7-2 =Harry Lumley

As of , this is the last time the Maple Leafs defeated the Bruins in a playoff series.

Stanley Cup Finals

Main article: 1959 Stanley Cup Finals

|1-1-1 =Dick Duff (3) – sh – 04:53 Billy Harris (1) – 06:24 |1-1-2 =00:36 – Henri Richard (3) 15:41 – Ralph Backstrom (1) |1-2-1 =Ron Stewart (2) – 18:26 |1-2-2 =16:28 – Andre Pronovost (2) |1-3-1 =No scoring |1-3-2 =11:59 – Marcel Bonin (8) 15:02 – pp – Dickie Moore (4) |goalie1-1 =Johnny Bower |goalie1-2 =Jacques Plante

|2-1-1 =No scoring |2-1-2 =05:12 – pp – Tom Johnson (1) |2-2-1 =Ron Stewart (3) – 11:41 |2-2-2 =No scoring |2-3-1 =No scoring |2-3-2 =05:02 – Claude Provost (5) 18:33 – Claude Provost (6) |goalie2-1 =Johnny Bower |goalie2-2 =Jacques Plante

|3-1-1 =16:29 – Billy Harris (2) |3-1-2 =Marcel Bonin (9) – pp – 17:31 |3-2-1 =17:11 – Bert Olmstead (3) |3-2-2 =No scoring |3-3-1 =No scoring |3-3-2 =Dickie Moore (5) – 01:30 |3-4-1 =10:06 – Dick Duff (4) |3-4-2 =No scoring |goalie3-1 =Johnny Bower |goalie3-2 =Jacques Plante

|4-1-1 =No scoring |4-1-2 =No scoring |4-2-1 =No scoring |4-2-2 =No scoring |4-3-1 =03:45 – Billy Harris (3) 18:36 – Frank Mahovlich (5) |4-3-2 =Ab McDonald (1) – 09:54 Ralph Backstrom (2) – 13:01 Bernie Geoffrion (3) – 15:56 |goalie4-1 =Johnny Bower |goalie4-2 =Jacques Plante

|5-1-1 =No scoring |5-1-2 =04:13 – pp – Ralph Backstrom (3) 13:42 – Bernie Geoffrion (4) 16:26 – Tom Johnson (2) |5-2-1 =Bob Pulford (4) – pp – 04:27 |5-2-2 =09:55 – Marcel Bonin (10) 19:25 – pp – Bernie Geoffrion (5) |5-3-1 =Frank Mahovlich (6) – 12:07 Bert Olmstead (4) – 16:19 |5-3-2 =No scoring |goalie5-1 =Johnny Bower |goalie5-2 =Jacques Plante

Awards

All-Star teams

Player statistics

Scoring leaders

Note: GP = Games played, G = Goals, A = Assists, Pts = Points, PIM = Penalties in minutes

Leading goaltenders

Note: GP = Games played; Min = Minutes played; GA = Goals against; GAA = Goals against average; W = Wins; L = Losses; T = Ties; SO = Shutouts

Coaches

• Boston Bruins: Milt Schmidt
• Chicago Black Hawks: Rudy Pilous
• Detroit Red Wings: Sid Abel
• Montreal Canadiens: Toe Blake
• New York Rangers: Phil Watson
• Toronto Maple Leafs: Punch Imlach

Debuts

The following is a list of players of note who played their first NHL game in 1958–59 (listed with their first team, asterisk(*) marks debut in playoffs):

• Stan Mikita, Chicago Black Hawks
• John McKenzie, Chicago Black Hawks
• Bill Hicke*, Montreal Canadiens
• Eddie Shack, New York Rangers

Last games

The following is a list of players of note that played their last game in the NHL in 1958–59 (listed with their last team):

• Earl Reibel, Boston Bruins
• Real Chevrefils, Boston Bruins
• Danny Lewicki, Chicago Black Hawks
• Gus Mortson, Detroit Red Wings
• Kenny Mosdell, Montreal Canadiens (Last active from the New York Americans/ Brooklyn Americans and last player from the pre-Original Six era.)
• Wally Hergesheimer, New York Rangers

Broadcasting

Hockey Night in Canada on CBC Television televised Saturday night regular season games and selected Stanley Cup playoff games. Games were not broadcast in their entirety until the 1968–69 season, and were typically joined in progress, while the radio version of HNIC aired games in their entirety.

In the U.S., this was the third season of a four-year deal with CBS to televise Saturday afternoon regular season games. This season, CBS aired games from October to March.

References

• {{Citation|last=Coleman|first=Charles L.|year=1976
• {{cite book |title=Years of glory, 1942–1967: the National Hockey League's official book of the six-team era
• {{cite book|title=Total Hockey |editor=Diamond, Dan |publisher=Total Sports |year=2000 |isbn=1-892129-85-X
• {{cite book |editor-last=Dryden |editor-first=Steve |title=Century of hockey |publisher=McClelland & Stewart Ltd.
• {{Citation|last1=Duplacey |first1=James|year=2008
• {{cite book |last1=Fischler |first1=Stan |last2=Fischler |first2=Shirley
• {{Citation|last=McFarlane|first=Brian|year=1969|title=50 Years Of Hockey

;Notes

References

1. Sullivan, Jack. (May 21, 1958). "Allan Cup Champions To Defend World Ice Crown". Brandon Daily Sun.
2. (January 3, 1959). "Pro-Amateur Agreement Reached". Winnipeg Free Press.
3. (April 7, 1959). "Campbell Says". [[Ottawa Journal]].
4. Lake, Stuart. (August 30, 1973). "After 47 years, Bill Westwick writes his final 30". [[Ottawa Citizen]].
5. MacCabe, Eddie. (June 21, 1990). "Bill Westwick: Good reporter, good man, good friend". [[Ottawa Citizen]].