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1970 Stanley Cup Finals
1970 Stanley Cup Finals
	Bobby Orr of the Bruins airborne after scoring the Cup-winning goal in overtime of game four; behind him is Noel Picard of the Blues
	* indicates periods of overtime
Location(s)	St. Louis: St. Louis Arena (1, 2); Boston: Boston Garden (3, 4)
Coaches	St. Louis: Scotty Bowman; Boston: Harry Sinden
Captains	St. Louis: Al Arbour; Boston: Vacant
Dates	May 3–10, 1970
MVP	Bobby Orr (Bruins)
Series-winning goal	Bobby Orr (0:40, OT, G4)
Hall of Famers	Blues:; Al Arbour (1996, builder); Glenn Hall (1975); Jacques Plante (1978); Bruins:; Johnny Bucyk (1981); Gerry Cheevers (1985); Phil Esposito (1984); Bobby Orr (1979); Coaches:; Scotty Bowman (1991); Harry Sinden (1983)

The 1970 Stanley Cup Finals was the championship series of the National Hockey League's (NHL) 1969–70 season, and the culmination of the 1970 Stanley Cup playoffs. It was a contest between the Boston Bruins and the St. Louis Blues, who appeared in their third consecutive finals series. The Bruins were making their first appearance in the Stanley Cup Finals since 1958.

The Bruins swept the Blues to win their first Stanley Cup title since 1941. Bobby Orr scored the Cup-winning goal on Mother's Day against St. Louis' veteran Hall of Fame goalie Glenn Hall, with an assist from close friend and teammate "The Turk" Derek Sanderson, at forty seconds of overtime. The subsequent image of Orr flying through the air, his arms stretched out in victory — (he had been tripped by Blues' defenseman Noel Picard immediately after scoring the goal) — is considered the most famous and recognized hockey image of all time. With the win, the Bruins became the first American team to win the Stanley Cup since the Chicago Black Hawks in 1961. The Blues, who had gone to the Finals their first three years in the league, would eventually lose each of the three series in four-game sweeps. St. Louis would not appear in a Stanley Cup Finals again until 2019, where they also faced (and defeated) the Bruins in seven games, ending the second-longest Finals drought in league history.

Paths to the Finals

Boston defeated the New York Rangers 4–2 and the Chicago Black Hawks 4–0 to advance to the Finals.

St. Louis defeated the Minnesota North Stars 4–2 and the Pittsburgh Penguins 4–2.

This was the seventh meeting between teams from Boston and St. Louis for a major professional sports championship. This previously happened in two World Series (1946, 1967), and four NBA Finals (1957, 1958, 1960, 1961).^[1]

Game summaries

The Boston Bruins tied for first in the East Division with the Chicago Black Hawks with 99 points. The Bruins lost the tiebreaker of wins with 40 to Chicago's 45. The St. Louis Blues finished first in the West Division with 86 points. This was the first playoff meeting between these two teams. In this year's regular-season series, there were three wins for Boston, one for St. Louis and two ties.

At 3:57 of the second period of game one, a hard shot from Fred Stanfield was deflected and struck Jacques Plante in the forehead of his face mask, splitting the mask in half and injuring Plante.^[2] Plante was finished for the series. Doctors later said if he hadn't been wearing the mask, he surely would have been killed. Ernie Wakely took over in goal but only held off the Bruins for a few minutes before becoming a rather easy mark for Bruins sharpshooters.

May 3	Boston Bruins		6–1	St. Louis Blues	St. Louis Arena	Recap
Johnny Bucyk (6) - 19:45		First period		No scoring
Johnny Bucyk (7) - 5:16		Second period		1:52 - Jimmy Roberts (2)
Wayne Carleton (2) - 4:59 Johnny Bucyk (8) - 5:31 Derek Sanderson (3) - sh - 17:20 Phil Esposito (12) - 18:58		Third period		No scoring
Gerry Cheevers 28 saves / 29 shots		Goalie stats		Ernie Wakely 16 saves / 21 shots Jacques Plante 13 saves / 14 shots

May 5	Boston Bruins		6–2	St. Louis Blues	St. Louis Arena	Recap
Fred Stanfield (4) - pp - 8:10 Ed Westfall (2) - 13:38 Ed Westfall (3) - sh - 19:15		First period		No scoring
Derek Sanderson (4) - pp - 9:37		Second period		17:26 - pp - Terry Gray (2)
Derek Sanderson (5) - 00:58 Johnny Bucyk (9) - 15:00		Third period		4:15 - pp - Frank St. Marseille (5)
Gerry Cheevers 17 saves / 19 shots		Goalie stats		Ernie Wakely 29 saves / 35 shots

May 7	St. Louis Blues		1–4	Boston Bruins	Boston Garden	Recap
Frank St. Marseille (6) - pp - 5:32		First period		13:23 - pp - Johnny Bucyk (10) 18:23 - John McKenzie (5)
No scoring		Second period		No scoring
No scoring		Third period		3:26 - Wayne Cashman (4) 14:26 - Wayne Cashman (5)
Glenn Hall 20 saves / 21 shots		Goalie stats		Gerry Cheevers 42 saves / 46 shots

May 10	St. Louis Blues		3–4	OT	Boston Bruins	Boston Garden	Recap
Red Berenson (7) - 19:17		First period			5:28 - Rick Smith (1)
Gary Sabourin (5) - 3:22		Second period			14:22 - Phil Esposito (13)
Larry Keenan (7) - pp - 00:19		Third period			13:28 - Johnny Bucyk (11)
No scoring		First overtime period			00:40 - Bobby Orr (9)
Glenn Hall 28 saves / 32 shots		Goalie stats			Gerry Cheevers 28 saves / 31 shots

Boston won series 4–0

Quotes

Bobby Orr… behind the net to Sanderson to ORR! BOBBY ORR!… scores and the Boston Bruins have won the Stanley Cup!
— Dan Kelly calling Orr's Stanley Cup winning goal

"The Flight"

The most commonly seen video clip of Bobby Orr's famous overtime goal ("The Flight") in game four is the American version broadcast on CBS as called by Dan Kelly. This archival clip can be considered a rarity, since surviving kinescopes or videotapes of the telecasts of hockey games from this era usually emanate from CBC's coverage. According to Dick Irvin Jr.'s book My 26 Stanley Cups (Irvin was in the CBC booth with Danny Gallivan during the 1970 Stanley Cup Finals), he was always curious why even the CBC typically uses the CBS replay of the Bobby Orr goal (with Dan Kelly's commentary) instead of Gallivan's call. The explanation that Irvin received was that the CBC's master tape of the game (along with others) was thrown away in order to clear shelf space at the network.^[3]

The New England Sports Network has played the CBS video of the goal but has used the original WBZ-FM radio call with Fred Cusick and Johnny Peirson.^[4]

Stanley Cup engraving

The 1970 Stanley Cup was presented to Bruins alternate captain Johnny Bucyk by NHL President Clarence Campbell following the Bruins 4–3 overtime win over the Blues in game four.

The following Bruins players and staff had their names engraved on the Stanley Cup

1969–70 Boston Bruins

Players

Centres

7 Phil Esposito (A)
16 Derek Sanderson
17 Fred Stanfield
22 Jim Lorentz
22 Ivan Boldirev (spare/did not play)

Wingers

Defencemen

4 Bobby Orr
6 Edward Ted Green (injured/did not play)
10 Rick Smith
20 Dallas Smith
24 Bill Speer
25 Gary Doak
26 Don Awrey

Goaltenders

30 Gerry Cheevers
1 Eddie Johnston
31 John Adams (spare/did not play)

Coaching and administrative staff

Weston Adams Sr. (Chairman/owner), Weston Adams, Jr. (President/owner)
Charles Mulcahy Jr. (Vice President – General Council), Ed Powers (Vice President – Treasurer), Shelby Davis (Vice President)
Harry Sinden (Head Coach), Milt Schmidt (General Manager)
Tom Johnson (Asst. General Manager), Dan Canney (Trainer)
John Forristall (Asst. Trainer)

Stanley Cup engravings

Tom Johnson's name was engraved T. Johnson TR by mistake. Johnson was actually the assistant manager, not the trainer. The mistake was not corrected on the Replica Stanley Cup created in 1992–93.
Ted Green received a head injury in a pre-season game. He missed the entire season, but his name was still engraved on the Stanley Cup. John Adams (goal) and Ivan Boldirev (forward) had their names engraved on the Cup before they played their first NHL game. Boldirev played his first NHL game for Boston during 1970–71 season, Adams played his first NHL game for Boston during the 1972–73 season. Dan Schock played in the minors but was called up to play one playoff game, earning a spot on the Stanley Cup. Ron Murphy played only 20 regular-season games and had officially retired in March, but his name was engraved on the Cup.
Boston Bruins did not have an official Captain – John Bucyk, Phil Esposito, Ed Westfall were Alternate Captains. Bucyk was presented with the Cup because he was the most senior letter-wearer (a scenario that would repeat in 1972).
After Boston included 3 players who did not play for the team that season, the NHL only allowed players who dressed in the playoffs to be included on the Stanley Cup.
The NHL feared that the Original Stanley Cup bowl was becoming too brittle. So a new Presentation Stanley Cup was made and first awarded in 1970. It was identical to the original bowl. The Original bowl was retired and put on permanent display at the Hockey Hall Fame.

References

Diamond, Dan, ed. (2000). Total Stanley Cup. NHL.
Podnieks, Andrew; Hockey Hall of Fame (2004). Lord Stanley's Cup. Triumph Books. ISBN 978-1-55168-261-7.