1973 WHA playoffs

The 1973 WHA playoffs was the postseason tournament of the World Hockey Association's 1972–73 season. The tournament concluded with the Eastern Division champion New England Whalers defeating the Western Division champion Winnipeg Jets in five games for the first Avco Cup championship. They lost just three playoff games total in their Avco Cup run, which included a perfect 9–0 record at home. The peak attendance for a playoff game that year was Game 4 of the Avco Cup Final when 13,697 people attended at Boston Garden. Norm Beaudin of the Winnipeg Jets led all teams in goals (13) and points scored (28).

The top four teams in each division made the playoffs.

1. New England Whalers, Eastern Division champions – 94 points
2. Cleveland Crusaders – 89 points
3. Philadelphia Blazers – 76 points
4. Ontario Nationals – 74 points

1. Winnipeg Jets, Western Division champions – 90 points
2. Houston Aeros – 82 points
3. Los Angeles Sharks – 80 points
4. Minnesota Fighting Saints – 79 points

At the end of the season, the WHA had a problem involving the fourth and final team to make the postseason in the Western Division. The Alberta Oilers and Minnesota Fighting Saints finished the season with the same record of 38–37–3 after Alberta beat Minnesota on March 30 by a score of 5–3 for their fourth victory in eight contests. The league had done a directive on March 21 that would do away with having a playoff game to settle ties, instead favoring tiebreakers for those with more wins over the other team while also stating that in the event of each team being even, the next tiebreaker would be victories within the Western Division, which favored the Oilers (21 wins) over Minnesota (17 wins). However, Minnesota challenged the rule and got the backing of the WHA owners on their side to instead go with a one-game playoff to settle ties here, with Alberta owner Bill Hunter calling the Saints organization "the No. 1 award for bushers."^[1][2] The league Board of Governors, meeting quickly to decide, elected to move on a one-game playoff while allowing the Oilers to have a choice of site, and due to prior booking in Edmonton, the team elected to pick Calgary to host the one-game playoff. Mel Pearson scored the first goal seventeen minutes into the game for the Fighting Saints.^[3][4][5]

New England had gone 5-3 against the Nationals in the regular season.^[6]

Owing to a dispute with the city of Ottawa, the Nationals elected to play their playoff games at Maple Leaf Gardens rather than their regular season home of the Ottawa Civic Centre. The equipment for the team was placed in Maple Leaf Gardens on the eve of Game 1.^[7] The team called themselves the "Ontario Nationals" for the playoffs and never played in Ottawa again, as they were sold to interests that had them play in Toronto as the Toronto Toros. Brit Selby and Mike Byers each scored game-winning goals in overtime to win games for the Whalers, with the latter being the first to end a postseason series with an overtime goal that saw the Whalers send the Nationals home.^[8]

The Crusaders finished as the second-best team in the East with a 43–32–3 record and led the league in goals allowed with just 239 to go with a 4th best offense with 287 goals. The Philadelphia Blazers squeaked into the postseason as the 3rd team with a record of 38–40–0 to go with the third best offense with 288 goals scored and a 10th ranked defense with 305 allowed. Cleveland had gone 6–4 against Philadelphia in the regular season. ^[9] In the first game, Ron Buchanan became the first WHA player to score a playoff overtime goal that gave Cleveland a 3–2 victory.^[10] It wound up also being the last WHA game played by Bernie Parent, who elected to leave the team in a contract dispute where the team had apparently dipped into the escrow account meant to play Parent's salary that essentially saw his contract voided. In Game 2, Cleveland held Philadelphia scoreless for the first 56 minutes in a 7–1 win while Gary Jarrett became the first WHA player to accomplish a playoff hat-trick (six further players joined him in the postseason).^[11][12] 27 total penalties were called in Game 3 (twenty combined in the first two periods), but Philadelphia went 0-for-10 on power-play chances while Cleveland scored the first goal of the game on a shot that was rebounded off the foot of Don Burgess on the very first shot Cleveland did with 13 minutes remaining in the first period and did not trail from there for a 3–1 win. A four-goal second period in Game 4 helped the Crusaders to a 6–2 victory to finish the sweep.^[13][14] The Blazers moved to Vancouver in the offseason. ^[15][16]

The Winnipeg Jets marched in as the best team in the Western Division with a 43–31–4 record that excelled at defense, holding teams to 249 goals allowed (2nd of 12 teams) with a passable 5th-ranked offense. The Minnesota Fighting Saints, having survived the tiebreaker and marching in with a 38–37–3 record that had a weak offense (250 goals, 11th of 12 teams) and a middling defense (6th). Winnipeg had gone 4–3–1 against Minnesota in the regular season.^[17] In Game 1, player-coach Bobby Hull scored two goals after scoring just one goal in five contests against Minnesota in the regular season to give Winnipeg a 3–1 victory. In Game 2, the teams were tied midway into the second period before a power play opportunity was completed by Wally Boyer to give the Jets a 3-2 lead they would never let go of, as they added two further goals to go up 2–0 in the series.^[18][19][20] Now back in Minnesota for Game 3, the Fighting Saints struck back with a four-goal first period on their way to a 6–4 victory.^[21]

In Game 4, a tight affair saw Bill Sutherland send the game into overtime with 45 seconds remaining in regulation for Winnipeg. In overtime, a Norm Beaudin shot resulted in a save by Mike Curran and a faceoff. On the faceoff, when trying to switch sides of the net to defend in the net, Curran had the butt end of his stick get stuck in the netting to where Beaudin had a perfect net to shoot in the game-winning goal for Winnipeg.^[22] A five-goal second period in Game 5 bolstered the Jets to an 8–5 victory in Game 5.^[23]

Los Angeles had gone 6–3–1 against Houston in the regular season.^[24]

New England went 5–3 in the regular season against Cleveland. Amidst sweltering heat that reportedly was at 85 degrees in the Boston Garden in front of 6,101 fans, the Whalers took Game 1 with a goal by Tim Sheehy in the last 25 seconds.^[25][26] New England beat Cleveland in five games.^[27]

Winnipeg went 6–2 against Houston in the regular season.^[28] Winnipeg dominated Houston for the entire series, where they never trailed at any point in the series.^[29]

The first Avco Cup matched the Western Division champion Winnipeg Jets, as coached by player-coach Bobby Hull versus the Eastern Division champion New England Whalers, ascoached by Jack Kelley; in the regular season, the Whalers went 5–1 versus the Jets and were tabbed as slight favorites. 6,526 fans saw the first ever Avco Cup game at Boston Garden.^[30] Due to a conflict in dates, the Whalers hosted Game 1 while Winnipeg hosted Game 2 and Game 3 before the Whalers hosted Game 4 and Game 5.^[31] New England scored four goals in the opening period of Game 1 despite being outshot 14–7; Norm Beaudin scored the first Avco Cup Final goal at 10:02 in the first period for Winnipeg, but Rick Ley tied it for New England with a power play goal two minutes later as the first of the Whaler barrage. Tom Webster scored two goals in the game while Tommy Williams provided three assists in the resulting 7–2 victory. In Game 2, Winnipeg had two-goal leads in the first and second periods, but the Whalers shut them out in the third period while scoring five unanswered goals to win 7–4.^[32] 7,200 saw Game 3 in Winnipeg go into a tight finish, as a 3–0 Winnipeg lead was snapped by Rick Ley with just five minutes to go into the second period before goals by Ted Green and Tim Sheehy in the third period tied the game. But 37 seconds after the Sheehy goal, with 1:04 remaining in the game, Hull gave the Jets the go-ahead lead with his goal as the Jets held on to win Game 3.^[33]

Winnipeg had a lead in three of the five games, but the Whalers came back twice to go along with a powerful scoring attack that saw fourteen different players score a goal for the team in the series. Game 4 (with 13,967 attending fans) saw Winnipeg take an early lead on Bobby Hull's goal in the first period, but the Whalers scored two goals in the second period to take the lead before adding two more in the third period, with Mike Byers having two goals for the night.^[34] In Game 5 to 11,186 fans, New England took an early lead with Tom Webster scoring a goal 21 seconds into the game. Four minutes later, Larry Pleau scored a shorthanded goal to give them a 2–0 lead. The two teams then traded goals as the Whalers led 5–2 after one period. Winnipeg clawed back in the second period to narrow it to a 6–4 deficit, and Bob Woytowich got it to 6–5 with 15:01 remaining. But Larry Pleau responded for the Whalers with a goal just 45 seconds later at 5:44 that ended up being the series-winning goal to make it 7–5. He added another goal over a minute later to give New England an insurmountable 8–5 lead along with making him the first player to achieve a hat trick in the Avco Cup Final. The two teams traded goals for the remaining minutes.^[35] The victory for the Whalers was particularly satisfying for Whalers captain Ted Green, who had played for the NHL Boston Bruins at the Boston Garden the previous year when they won the Stanley Cup. Differing sources stated that Green and his teammates skated around with the Eastern Division championship trophy or a trophy acquired at a store, as the Avco World Trophy was not completed at the time. ^[36]

New England won nine consecutive home playoff games. Howard Baldwin issued a challenge to the 1973 Stanley Cup champion for a one-game playoff on neutral ice to claim the Cup, but the league never responded.^{[37][38][39][40]}

These were the top ten skaters based on points.^[41]

These were the top five goaltenders in terms of minutes.^[42]

1972–73 New England Whalers

WHA playoffs