Reflecting on the life of Ken Dryden with stats, facts, opinions and personal memories. A very unique retrospective on one of the greatest, ever.

THE HOCKEY WORLD MOURNS THE PASSING OF KEN DRYDEN 

He came into the NHL in 1971 as an unheralded rookie. In fact, he played so few games (6 toward the end of the schedule, winning them all) that he still qualified as a rookie the following season.  Those exploits would have to wait.  First was a Stanley Cup and a Conn Smythe Trophy to win.  Such was the beginning of Ken Dryden's career in the show with the Montreal Canadiens. . 

We lost Mr. Dryden two days ago ( September 5, 2025) .  His passing has reverberated around the NHL, our great country, in fact messages and commentary has poured in from the entire hockey world. Thus was the legacy of one of the greatest goalies in hockey history and one of the greatest Canadians ever with his legacy off the ice almost as significant as his exploits on - which included six Stanley Cups; five Vezina Trophies; A Calder Trophy, a Conn Smythe Trophy and induction to the Hockey Hall of Fame in 1983.   What a career. 

Dryden was a draft pick of the Boston Bruins in 1964, a fact not a lot of people knew until the internet exploded in our lives and players' backgrounds were more easily researched.   In fact Sam Pollock who many regard as the greatest General Manager in NHL history, made his first ever transaction by acquiring the rights to Dryden on draft day that year.  Pollock had just replaced Frank Selke Sr, the man who hired him to work in the Habs organization in 1947. 

       Pollock was dealing with long-time hockey man and hockey royalty Lynn Patrick, part of the legendary Patrick clan who was the Bruins General Manager.  Trader Sam, as he would become known,  believed Patrick coveted a player Montreal had drafted named Guy Allen so he packaged Allen up with another Montreal pick,  Paul Reid and in return got the rights to the 2nd overall pick, a player named Alex Campbell and the 16 year old goalie the Bruins drafted, Ken Dryden.   ( yes in those days the minimum age to be drafted to the NHL was 16)

Normally I'd say at this point, and now you know the rest of the story.  Hardly.   

Dryden played Junior B in Etobicoke, Ontario where he was coached by Larry Regan, an Ottawa native who had a sixteen year pro hockey career including 280 games in the NHL where he played in three Stanley Cup finals with two teams, Boston and Toronto and in a nice little twist of irony, he was a Calder Trophy winner in the NHL with the Bruins, fifteen years before Dryden won his Calder Trophy with the Habs.  Next it was off to Cornell and Division 1 hockey. 

Dryden's college career at Cornell was nothing short of superlative.  Three seasons, two trips to the NCAA finals, one national win and an overall record of 76 wins 4 losses one tie....I mean....come on.....

After that it was a stint with our National team where he would face the Soviets and goaltender Vladislav Tretiak three years before the Summit Series.   Next came the AHL and the Montreal Voyageurs, the Canadiens farm team.  Dryden sported a record of 16-7-8 as he shared the net primarily with Wayne Thomas.  Those numbers combined with a three game slide by the Habs as they picked up a measly 1/6 points, plus an injury to starter Rogie Vachon meant a call up to the bigs for the 23 year old.   The third game of this mini slide was a home loss to Chicago. The next night they had to play on the road in Pittsburgh. The date was Sunday March 14, 1971.   Did coach Al MacNeil play a hunch?  Did Sam Pollock ask Coach MacNeil to play the rookie?  Whoever formally made the call, there's no doubt, Dryden's stellar performance making 35 saves and helping Montreal to a 5-1 victory sparked the call to use him again.  For the record, a rookie on the Penguins named John Stewart scored the first goal of his career and the first ever against Dryden in the NHL.  

The Habs had stopped the slump. They rolled into St. Louis, started Phil Myre who got lit up as Montreal lost 6-2 and with Vachon still on the DL the Habs gave Dryden the next start a home game against their arch rival Leafs.  This game I remember. We had to watch it on CBC French because it was on a Thursday with the late great René Lecavalier doing the play by play and Gilles Tremblay doing colour.    It's actually my first memory of Dryden.  He was excellent, making 25 saves, Montreal won 4-1. Frank Mahovlich was awesome and John Ferguson spent the whole game running everything in a blue and white sweater.   I thought to myself, hey, maybe this kid can back up Vachon in the playoffs.  Little did I know.  But first, came a bit of history.  

Saturday March 20, 1971 was Bobby Orr's 23rd birthday and he celebrated by scoring once, assisting two more, helping his Bruins beat the Philadelphia Flyers 5-3.  Elsewhere that night the Habs were hosting the Buffalo Sabres whose two goalies were Joe Daley and Dave Dryden, Ken's brother!  Brother's had never faced each other in an NHL game as goalies and to give Punch Imlach, GM and coach of the Sabres credit, he floated the idea of starting Dave, hoping Al MacNeil would follow suit and start Ken, no such luck. Punch held true and started the senior Dryden but with no Ken he pulled him the first whistle and put in Joe Daley.  Fate intervened about half way through the second period when a shot from Eddie Shack hurt Rogie Vachon enough that he had to leave the game.  In came Ken, Punch immediately pulled Daley, put in Dave and history was made. 

The brothers each let in two goals, Montreal won the game 5-2 and the brothers shook hands in one of the NHL's most iconic photos.   Ken and Dave faced each other eight times, six in the regular season and two in the playoffs with Ken only losing one time to his brother.  The rest of Ken's career has been well documented.  I'd like to finish by adding some opinions and personal reflections. 

1970-71

Dryden's coming out party.  He made the saves when needed but wow, he got lit up large in several of those playoff games.  In twenty games he allowed 61 goals ( Montreal allowed 63, two were empty net) but when it mattered most, he got it done, which frankly was a precursor to the Summit Series.  He's absolutely revered for his play in the 1971 playoffs and yet is hammered for his play in '72. 

The Summit Series 

None of the three goalies who played in the series, played well overall.  Tretiak started well but was overwhelmed and not good at all at home in Moscow.  Tony Esposito had great wins in games 2 and 7 but would have loved to have goals back in the tie in Winnipeg and the blown loss in game five.   Dryden ( and the whole team ) laid an egg in game one and were equally bad in game four.  Dryden rebounded by being one of the stars in game six and of course was the winning goalie in game eight.

    He later would go 1-1 against the Soviets in the 1979 Challenge Cup and of course was in the 3-3 tie against the Red Army on New Years Eve.  So his overall record while a member of the NHL against the Soviets was 3-3-2 which includes that game one loss in 1972 where no other goalie in hockey history would have got the win for Canada in that game.  They didn't even dress six D.   The narrative that Dryden was terrible against the Russians is horribly misstated.   In fact his stellar play in game six of the Summit Series is. hardly ever mentioned!  Additionally he takes a ton of heat for allowing the last two goals in the famed NYE game.  He had faced seven shots in forty minutes.  The zamboni didn't even really need to clean Montreal's side of the ice, the game was so one-sided.  But, give the Red Army credit, they took advantage of their few opportunities on six shots in the third and scored twice.  In fact Dryden had to make a late great save to secure the tie but again, he gets hammered because of the few shots and the blown lead.  

1973-74

Dryden got into a contract dispute with GM Sam Pollock.  As I understand it, Ken was making 60,000 and wanted a new deal after his fantastic 1972-73 season.  Pollock said play it out, we'll take care of you.  Ken said no, Sam said no, so Ken sat out.  Because he was still under contract to Montreal he could not play goal in any other league or with any other team.  So while he pursued his legal work he played defense for a mens league team in Toronto called Vulcan Packaging.  He wore number 3.  I remember watching highlights of his play.  He looked terrible.  At the conclusion of that hockey season, a season in which Montreal's goals against went from 180-240, Dryden and Pollock got together and hammered out a new deal.  

1978-79

This was Dryden's final season in the NHL.  The narrative is that at 31 years of age, he had done it all and it was time to move on to other life challenges.  That's not what I think happened.  Montreal beat Boston in the SF in one of if not the greatest non-Cup final series of all time.   Montreal won that series thanks to an overtime victory in game seven, despite Dryden being terrible.  In the final after a terrible open game loss ( 4-1) it was announced Dryden would not be the starter for Montreal in game two.  Bunny Larocque would get the net.  In warm-up, as I watched intently, ( I was at the game)  Doug Risebrough caught Larocque in the finger with a shot and broke it.  Out went Bunny. In came Ken.   The game started with the Rangers quickly going up 2-0.  It looked like a disaster was brewing but the vaunted Habs rallied, won the game going away 6-2 and took the series in five games.   In my opinion, Dryden knew the writing was on the wall.  His save % had dropped, his GAA had increased and other key players were moving on notably captain Yvan Cournoyer, Jacques Lemaire and head coach Scotty Bowman.  They were all joined by Dryden. Just my opinion, but I think he made the decision to call it a day because he knew he had nothing left.  BTW the last player to score on Dryden was Carol Vadnais in game five in Montreal on May 21, 1979.  I was at the game. It was the night before my 20th birthday.  What a way to leave my teens.   

Post NHL career 

What more can you say?  Celebrated author, politician, Senator, advocate, Officer of the Order of Canada; voted one of the top 100 players of all time; Order of Hockey in Canada; President of the Toronto Maple Leafs; on and on and on.  Again, no words. Superlative.  A level of excellence in his post-playing career that might be the most significant of any athlete in history.   

My personal recollections

I only met Ken Dryden for the first time in 2007 at the 35th anniversary of the Summit Series.  I had already attended and worked about a half dozen of their reunion functions, primarily golf tournaments but a few other events as well.   He was cordial, not overly friendly but that's okay.  I was just an emcee doing a job.  I will say that because of his attendance I recanted the story on stage of his first game against his brother and he was beaming as I nailed every stat from that game including a great fight late in the second between Peter Mahovlich who was also in the crowd and Reggie Fleming.   After dinner Dryden sought me out and thanked me for sharing the story and we had our first real formal chat, which was great!     

As the years rolled by I continued to do some Team Canada 72 events. Gord Stellick was also brought in to emcee for a few years so I did not get all of the gigs but after a few years away I was brought back and I was very grateful to Ficel Marketing who were the marketing side of the Team Canada 72 alumni at the time, for using me as often as they did.   

The picture I have here with Ken and Serge on stage with me was taken in Winnipeg during a 2016 tour for Team Canada 72 as they retraced their steps from '72 making appearances in Montreal, Toronto, Winnipeg and Vancouver.  I hosted the Toronto and Winnipeg legs.   Anywhere from 6-8 players joined us on the tour and it was during the pre and post of these events that I had more time to talk to Dryden.   Those conversations I cherish the most as I remember him today.   We talked about the Forum, I told him I got engaged on center ice, he couldn't believe it lol.   We talked about Flower, the Big Three, Scotty, and of course, 72...Lots and lots of talk about 72.  Every one of those conversations, his answers or thoughts were so cerebral, so thought out, no stock answers or comments.  It sure was fun.  

During the time of that tour and during the years I was continuing to work their alumni events, I was working a contract on Rogers radio in Ottawa (2013-2017)  hosting a Saturday show and Ken guested on phone interviews a few times.  Those were awesome as well.   However it was our last time together three years ago that I will always be eternally grateful.   The 50th anniversary of the Summit Series.   

Brendan Shanahan deserves a ton of credit for the night.  On behalf of the Leafs, he hosted as many members of the alumni that could attend an exhibition game in Toronto between the Leafs and the Habs.  The perfect backdrop.  Only problem was this was a very scaled down reunion and there was no official duty for yours truly.  I was so disappointed but I had to get there, I had to be with the guys one final time.  Pat Stapleton had passed away suddenly and he had taken over the role of running their alumni.  With his passing the job fell on Serge Savard and Ken Dryden.  I asked for permission to attend, as their guest. ( I want to add here that Yvan and Evelyn Cournoyer played a huge role behind the scenes to ensure I could attend, as did Ron Ellis. You may think this should have been just a rubber stamp, let Liam come but they had private events with family, everybody knew this would be the last reunion. To be allowed to attend everything with them was magical)     Both Serge and Ken gave me the green light and I was with the boys for two nights and a day which fell right on September 28th, a true 50th anniversary.   I thanked Ken very much that night.  It was the last time I saw him and now we've lost a few more of those incredible men, including number 29.  

  What a legacy.  From your incredible amateur days, your marvelous NHL play, and your outstanding post hockey life and family life, you sir, will always be a benchmark of greatness on and off the ice.   Rest in peace, Ken. I thank you for your friendship.  May God bless your memory.