Punch Imlach : biography
George "Punch" Imlach (March 15, 1918 – December 1, 1987), was an NHL coach and general manager. He is a member of the Hockey Hall of Fame.
Coaching record
Team | Year | Regular season | Post season | ||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
G | W | L | T | OTL | Pts | Finish | Result | ||
TOR | 1958–59 | 50 | 22 | 20 | 8 | – | (65) | 4th in NHL | Lost in Stanley Cup Finals |
TOR | 1959–60 | 70 | 35 | 26 | 9 | – | 79 | 2nd in NHL | Lost in Stanley Cup Finals |
TOR | 1960–61 | 70 | 39 | 19 | 12 | – | 90 | 2nd in NHL | Lost in first round |
TOR | 1961–62 | 70 | 37 | 22 | 11 | – | 85 | 2nd in NHL | Won Stanley Cup |
TOR | 1962–63 | 70 | 35 | 23 | 12 | – | 82 | 1st in NHL | Won Stanley Cup |
TOR | 1963–64 | 70 | 33 | 25 | 12 | – | 78 | 3rd in NHL | Won Stanley Cup |
TOR | 1964–65 | 70 | 30 | 26 | 14 | – | 74 | 4th in NHL | Lost in first round |
TOR | 1965–66 | 70 | 34 | 25 | 11 | – | 79 | 3rd in NHL | Lost in first round |
TOR | 1966–67 | 70 | 32 | 27 | 11 | – | 75 | 3rd in NHL | Won Stanley Cup |
TOR | 1967–68 | 74 | 33 | 31 | 10 | – | 76 | 5th in East | Did not qualify |
TOR | 1968–69 | 76 | 35 | 26 | 15 | – | 85 | 4th in East | Lost in first round |
BUF | 1970–71 | 78 | 24 | 39 | 15 | – | 63 | 5th in East | Did not qualify |
BUF | 1971–72 | 41 | 8 | 23 | 10 | – | (51) | 6th in East | (resigned) |
TOR | 1979–80 | 10 | 5 | 5 | 0 | – | (75) | 4th in Adams | Lost in first round |
Building the Sabres
After being fired by the Leafs, it was expected that Imlach would join the NHL’s new Vancouver franchise. Imlach, Joe Crozier, and Foster Hewitt had become partners in the Vancouver Canucks of the Western Hockey League and were in line to become owners of the Vancouver NHL team. But they didn’t have the financial resources to buy the team, which went to Medical Investment Corporation (Medicor). Medicor bought the WHL Canucks for $2.8 million, with Imlach making a reported gain of more than $250,000. He was offered a job with the NHL Canucks, but instead accepted an offer from the NHL’s other expansion team, the Buffalo Sabres, as their first coach and general manager in 1970.
In the team’s first draft, it was a foregone conclusion that the first selection would be junior phenom Gilbert Perreault. The first pick would go to the team that won the spin of a roulette wheel. Imlach opted to take numbers 11–20 on the wheel, since 11 was his favorite number. When league president Clarence Campbell spun the wheel, he initially thought the pointer landed on 1. However, while Campbell was congratulating the Vancouver delegation, Imlach asked Campbell to check again. As it turned out, the pointer was actually on 11. Imlach promptly selected Perreault, who would go on to play 17 years with the Sabres and still holds every major offensive record in Sabres history. (Perreault, incidentally, would himself be assigned the number 11 for his entire career in Buffalo, a number that has since been retired by the Sabres organization.)