The Chicago Blackhawks ninth straight win pushed coach Joel Quenneville over Al Arbour for the second most wins in hockey history with 783 earlier on Thursday. The defending Stanley Cup champions go for ten in a row tonight in Toronto.
Legendary coach Scotty Bowman owns the top spot with 1,244 wins. Bowman is currently the senior adviser of hockey operations while his son Stan is the team’s general manager.
The Blackhawks defeated the Montreal Canadiens 2-1 at the Bell Centre. Captain Jonathan Toews put the team on the board first with his seventeenth goal in the first period. Goalie Corey Crawford kept them in the game with numerous saves, including three in a row from Tomas Fleischmann in the second period.
The defending Stanley Cup champions have not lost in 2016.
Quenneville also signed a three-year extension with Chicago on Tuesday. Over eight seasons, he has won three Stanley Cups with the Blackhawks. The team barely missed the Stanley Cup final in 2014 when the Los Angeles Kings beat them in overtime in Game 7.
“He’s had some great players, sure, and every coach needs that,” explained Bowman. “But I think a lot has to do with continuity. His core players have played for him for a while and know what he expects. And he hasn’t changed assistant coaches all the time. They know what he expects of them too.”
He added: “He knows how to make adjustments. Chicago, for example, recently had back-to-back games with Pittsburgh. In the away game, even though he wanted (Jonathan) Toews to face Sidney Crosby, it’s hard when you don’t have the final line change. So, he had (Artem) Anisimov against him. The next night at home, he had Toews go against him.
“Since there are no ties anymore, guys have chances to get more wins, either in overtime or the shootout. It’s a small factor but it plays into it.”
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