The History of the Adams Division

I've followed the NHL in some form for 30 years, but I'm still learning about the league I enjoy watching. A long time ago, I did learn about the old divisions: Adams, Patrick, Norris, and Smythe. These divisions predated the geographical ones that we've known for the last 30 years, and the rivalries were immensely intense during that period. This will be the first of four stories focusing on those classic divisions, and I'll start geographically, even though the names had nothing to do with location. First off, the Adams Division.

In 1967, the NHL doubled in size from six teams to 12, but that started the league's growth. In 1970, the Vancouver Canucks and the Buffalo Sabres debuted, and two years later, the New York Islanders and the Atlanta Flames joined the league. The 1974-75 season saw the debut of two more teams: the Kansas City Scouts and the Washington Capitals, bringing the league's total to 18 teams. At the time, the league was divided into two divisions: East and West. In 1974, however, the continued expansion led to the league realigning their divisions, splitting the two large divisions into four smaller ones.

The divisions were given their aforementioned names, and regarding the Adams Division, it was named after Charles Francis Adams, the founder of the Boston Bruins. Speaking of the Bruins, they were the one of the four founding members of the newly formed Adams Division, along with the Buffalo Sabres, the Toronto Maple Leafs, and the California Golden Seals. Technically, the four teams remained together in the division until 1979, as during that stretch, the fading Golden Seals moved to Cleveland and became the Barons, and after two years and fading even more, they folded and merged with the Minnesota North Stars, who took the Seals/Barons' place in the Adams Division.

The Buffalo Sabres were the first winners of the Adams Division in 1974-75, a season that saw them reach the Stanley Cup Final, but lose to the Philadelphia Flyers. The Bruins would win the division for the next four seasons, with 1977 and 1978 seeing them defeated in the Cup Final. The 1979-80 season saw the Adams Division add a fifth team in the form of the Quebec Nordiques, one of the four teams who joined the league via the WHA-NHL merger. In addition, it was beginning with that season that the league sent 16 teams to the Stanley Cup Playoffs, though the teams were ranked 1-16 based on point total and regardless of division. During that year, only the Nords missed out from the Adams, but during the following year (1980-81), the entire Adams Division qualified for the playoffs, with the North Stars reaching the Cup Final that year, but were victims of the Islanders dynasty.

In 1981, the North Stars and Maple Leafs swapped places with the Hartford Whalers (another WHA transplant) and the Montréal Canadiens, giving us the most familiar and longest tenured version of the Adams Division. Despite the non-geographical name, all of the division's teams were located in the northeastern portion of North America, and with the swap, the Adams was the division that featured the Battle of Quebec, which became the league's first provincial rivalry when the Nordiques joined the NHL two years prior.

In addition, this was the first of 12 straight seasons that featured the epic format that saw the top four divisions qualify for the playoffs, with the first two rounds being divisional. During that year, the Canadiens won the Adams in the regular season; the first time that neither the Bruins nor the Sabres finished first in the division. However, it would be the Nordiques who would emerge as the playoff division champions, as they defeated the Habs in the Adams Semifinals (five games), and ousted the Bruins in the Adams Final (seven games). The Bruins would finish first for the next two seasons, but while the 1983 playoffs saw them represent the Adams in the Final Four, they would be ousted by the eventual playoff champions, the Canadiens, in the 1984 Adams Semifinals.

It would be 12 years before the Adams Division finally won a Stanley Cup. After losing the Adams Final to the rival Nordiques, the Canadiens finished second behind the Nords in the Adams, but would defeat the Bruins and Whalers to represent the division in the Final Four. The Habs defeated the Rangers in the Wales Final, and went on to defeat the Calgary Flames in five games to capture the Stanley Cup. The following season (1986-87) saw the Whalers win the division for the first and only time (in fact, it was the team's only division title in Hartford), but they were upset by a Nordiques team who finished eight points under .500. We sure did own the Whalers.

The Adams would be represented in the Cup Final for three straight seasons after that one: 1988 (Bruins), 1989 (Canadiens), and 1990 (Bruins again), but they suffered the same fate. They lost to an Alberta franchise. Those five teams (Bruins, Canadiens, Nordiques, Whalers, and Sabres) served as the Adams Division for 12 straight seasons until the expansion Ottawa Senators joined the league and became the division's sixth franchise. This occurred in the 1992-93 season, and it saw the Bruins finish first in the division, but they were upset by the Sabres in the Adams Semifinals. The Canadiens emerged as the playoff champions, and that year saw them win the Stanley Cup again, this time in five games over the Los Angeles Kings.

The 1992-93 season served as the final year featuring those division and conference names, as they went back to geographical names beginning with the 1993-94 season. The Adams Division was renamed the Northeast Division, and those same six teams remained together, though the Pittsburgh Penguins would actually be placed in the Northeast Division as a transplant from the old Patrick Division. Two former Adams Division clubs would relocate; the Quebec Nordiques moved to Denver and became the Colorado Avalanche, and the Hartford Whalers moved to Raleigh and became the Carolina Hurricanes, who remained in the Northeast Division until the divisions were realigned in 1998.

The Bruins won the Adams Division nine times during its existence. The Canadiens won it five times, while the Sabres only won it three times, including the first year in 1974-75. The Whalers and Nordiques only won the Adams once each. Regarding the 12 seasons under the divisional playoff format, ten of the twelve occurrences saw either the Bruins or Canadiens as the playoff Adams Division Champions. 1982 and 1985 were the only exceptions, and both times, it was the Nordiques winning the division during the playoffs.

The current eight-team Atlantic Division serves as a descendant of sorts to the Adams Division, with the Bruins, Sabres, Canadiens, and Senators serving as half of the Atlantic. The first three teams have been in the same division together since 1981, while the Senators were only in the Adams during the division's final year, though all four teams have co-existed in the same division together (in some form) since 1992. The Adams Division was quite iconic, with the most known iteration consisting of two Original Six teams, two WHA transplants, and a post-1967 franchise. The rivalries were quite heated; the Quebecois teams went at it five times in the playoffs, the Whalers and Sabres had their moments, and none of the teams liked the Bruins. The Adams Division was quite legendary and iconic during the NHL's heyday in the 1980s.