NHL

The National Hockey League was founded in 1917 as the successor to the National Hockey Association (NHA) which was founded in 1909, and began play in 1910 with seven teams in Ontario and Quebec, and was one of the first major ice hockey professional leagues. In the 1920s, the National Hockey League undertook a rapid expansion, adding the Montreal Maroons and the Boston Bruins in 192, as being the first American team to join the league. The first NHL All-Star Game was held in 1934 to benefit Ace Bailey, whose career was ended by an aggressive hit from Eddie Shore.

The NHL was reduced to six teams: the Boston Bruins, the Chicago Black Hawks, the Detroit Red Wings, the Montreal Canadiens, the New York Rangers, and the Toronto Maple Leafs, a line-up, often referred to as the “Original Six“, in the 1942–43 season which would remain constant for the next 25 years. In the 1967–68 season, the league increased in size to 12 teams with the inclusion of the Los Angeles Kings, Minnesota North Stars, Philadelphia Flyers, Pittsburgh Penguins, California Seals, and St. Louis Blues.

The Montreal Amateur Athletic Association (AAA), champions of the Amateur Hockey Association of Canada for 1893, was the first recipient of the Stanley Cup. Inscribed on the Dominion Hockey Challenge Cup, the trophy was first awarded to Canada’s amateur ice hockey clubs who won the trophy as the result of challenge games and league play. Then, there were 25 teams that won the cup. The Montreal Canadiens have won the Stanley Cup 24 times and made the Finals an additional eleven times.  There were two years when the Stanley Cup was not awarded: 1919, because of the Spanish flu pandemic, and 2005, because of the NHL lockout. As a result, the trophy has been won 106 times altogether since 1914 and even at the end of the 2022 season.