Not only did the Columbus Blue Jackets move into the #8 spot in the West last night with a 3-2 win over Anaheim, they also successfully defended their (unofficial) title of Stanley Cup Champions. Yes, that's right: if the Stanley Cup was up for contention during the regular season, the Blue Jackets would be the current holders of the Cup. Of course we all know that doesn't happen, but let's not stop that from having a little fun with the idea that the Cup could be up for grabs most nights during the season.
The idea is based off of something in international football (or as we call it, soccer), called the
Unofficial World Football Championship. The idea originated from a match between Scotland and England in 1967 that Scotland won; it was the first loss for England since winning the World Cup in 1966, and some Scottish fans joked that the win made them the new world champions of football. According to the actual calculation of the unofficial title, the world championship of football was originally decided in the first international football game in 1873 between England and Scotland, and every competitive match thereafter between the champion and another international team is a matchup for the "unofficial world title." The current UWFC titleholder is Argentina, who took the title from Sweden on February 6 and will defend again on June 7 against Colombia.
This idea was briefly referenced
in an article earlier this year by Harrison Mooney, who similarly joked that when Colorado bested Chicago in regulation 6-2 on March 6, if the Cup was up for challenge every game, the Avs would be the new "Stanley Cup Champions." However, Mooney made the assumption that Los Angeles Kings would have been the champions coming out of the 2012 playoffs, and via results from there forward, the Cup would have passed to the Avalanche. So, that got me to do some digging.
I already had an archive of all NHL games played, so doing this wasn't overly difficult - but I needed to decide when to say "this is when it starts." For me, I chose the end of the 1926 playoffs when the Montreal Maroons won the Cup. Why 1926? I could have chosen any prior year, anything prior to '26 would have meant the Cup was possibly won by a non-NHL team (say, Victoria in 1925). By going from '26 forward, all games are (as long as you make a couple of assumptions) played by NHL teams only, ensuring that the Cup stays within the NHL. So, to fit this I made two rules to guide the process:
1. Only regular-season and postseason games involving NHL teams count; preseason and exhibition games do not - even if the game pits two NHL teams against each other. This is because preseason games are difficult if not impossible to accurately find for older years, and because going down the path with exhibition games leads to a dead end because of a lack of information (see below).
2. If a game ends in a tie, the champion retains the title; if it ends in a result past regulation (whether OT or the shootout), the winner takes the title.
Based on those two rules, the first "defense of the unofficial Cup" took place on November 16, 1926 when the Maroons played in New York against the Rangers. The Rangers won 1-0, making them the new "unofficial Cup" champions. They defended the title on November 20 against the Toronto St. Pats, winning 5-1 to retain the title - but then lost to the Pittsburgh Pirates on November 25 by a score of 2-0, making the Pirates the new "unofficial Cup" champions.
Continue this forward, and eventually we get to the 2012-13 season ... where Los Angeles didn't come in as the unofficial champions. Calgary did, by virtue of a 5-2 win over Anaheim on April 7, 2012, marking the first time since 2009 that the unofficial title was
not carried into the playoffs. Calgary proceeded to lose to San Jose 4-1 on January 20, and the Sharks held the title through 6 successful defenses until falling to Nashville 2-1 on February 2. From there, it's gone to Minnesota (February 9), Vancouver (February 11), Dallas (February 15), Calgary (February 17), Phoenix (February 18), Edmonton (February 23), Chicago (February 25), Colorado (March 8), Edmonton (March 12), Detroit (March 15), Minnesota (March 20), Dallas (March 29), Los Angeles (March 31), Phoenix (April 2), Vancouver (April 8), Colorado (April 13), and finally to Columbus on April 15 ... and the Blue Jackets retain the title after last night's 3-2 OT win over Anaheim. (Oddly enough, Mooney was correct that the Avalanche did indeed become the unofficial Cup champions after that win over the Blackhawks - and his path and the actual path would have converged on February 25 when Chicago beat Edmonton 3-2.)
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But what if the Cup
did change hands in exhibition games? Where would it be right now? Great question - and unfortunately, I don't have an answer other than "somewhere with a national team." On January 6, 1983 the Philadelphia Flyers held the unofficial Cup championship going into a game with the USSR National Team, having won it back on December 30, 1982 from Calgary and retaining it through the next 3 games. That night, the Soviets beat the Flyers 5-1 - which would have made the USSR National Team the new unofficial Cup champions. From there, one would have to track all of the international games played from there forward, but it would almost certainly mean some national team would be holding the title of "unofficial Cup champions."
What if I exclude national teams? Then the Cup first went to a non-NHL team on January 6, 1986 when the Boston Bruins, fresh off a 4-0 win over Buffalo to take the unofficial title, dropped a 6-4 decision to Dynamo Moscow. Dynamo then took on Boston two nights later, winning that game 7-4 to complete a 4-game tour and return to the Soviet Union ... and carry the title of "unofficial Cup champions" with them. At that point, the title likely stayed in the USSR for years before bouncing around Europe; whether it would have returned to the NHL is uncertain, but I suspect the only chance might have been in the preseason exhibition games from 2007-2011 in Europe - and even then, there's no guarantee of it. Like above, it would require someone to have access to all of the games played in Europe (and especially Russia) from 1986 forward, and I've yet to see anything that's remotely close to complete to try and do that.
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What have the Blues done with this? They've had a pair of cracks at claiming the title this year, but failed both times. The first was February 5, when Nashville came to town; that was a 6-1 defeat. The other was February 28, when Chicago came to town; that was a 3-0 defeat. The last time the Blues could claim to be the unofficial Cup champions? The period of February 9 - February 14, 2012 when the Blues went on the road to New Jersey and took the title from the Devils in a 4-3 win, then came home and successfully defended twice (3-2 win over Colorado on the 11th, 3-0 win over San Jose on the 12th) before going to Columbus on the 14th and falling 2-1.
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Finally, a couple quirks in the defense of the unofficial Cup:
-- At the end of the 1975-76 season, the California Seals held the unofficial title but didn't make the playoffs; the franchise relocated to Cleveland for the 1976-77 season, meaning the Barons opened up the season as the title holders. They actually defended successfully twice before losing to Boston on October 10, 1976.
-- In the 1994-95 season, the New York Rangers came in as the unofficial (and actual) Cup champions; since there were no games between conferences, the unofficial Cup stayed in the East - and the New Jersey Devils swept the Detroit Red Wings in the Finals, making this the only season (to date) where one conference held the Cup for the entire season.
-- Most years, the unofficial Cup champion and the actual Cup champion are the same team at the end of the playoffs - but on occasion, it's not. In 1979, the Minnesota North Stars completed the season as the unofficial Cup champions but missed the playoffs; it would be the last time that happened until 2003-04, when Columbus beat Detroit in the regular season finale and then held the unofficial Cup championship through the lockout. The other two times in the post-lockout era this happened were 2008-09 (Florida beat Washington in the season finale) and 2012 (Calgary, mentioned above).
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So yes, Columbus is the current unofficial Cup Champions for the first time since March 23, 2012 when they snatched the title from Carolina 5-1 (and then promptly lost it 2 nights later in a 6-3 loss to Edmonton). Will they carry the title to the playoffs and beyond? Probably not - but don't let that stop Jackets fans from proclaiming they're #1 ... until they get beat again, and someone else can start making that claim.
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