Presidents' Trophy—Something New for the Trophy Case

In 1985, the National Hockey League’s Board of Governors came up with a new award for regular-season excellence. Beginning in 1985-86, the League would award a new Presidents’ Trophy to the team that finished atop of the regular-season standings.

The Oilers had already finished first overall in 1983-84, and they went on to win the Cup the same year.  The team was looking for a repeat performance the following year, but this time they would hope to be honoured by both the President's and Stanley Cup trophies.

As the defending two-time Cup champs, the Oilers were favoured to be the NHL’s top regular-season club. The team scored 426 goals that season, and had 10 players in the NHL All-Star Game. Wayne Gretzky broke his own records with 215 points and 163 assist that season, and Paul Coffey set a new record for defencemen by scoring 48 times. Three of the top four men in the NHL scoring race were Oilers (Gretzky at one, Coffey at three and Kurri at four). By the end of the season, the Oilers finished nine points clear of the Philadelphia Flyers for the first overall, and 30 points ahead of the second-place team in the Campbell Conference, the Calgary Flames.

The team earned just as many points as it did in 1983-84, but this time the NHL awarded them the first-ever Presidents’ Trophy.

In the 1986 playoffs, the Calgary Flames upset the Oilers in the second round, and the Presidents’ Trophy became nothing more than a hollow victory. For Oilers fans, the failure of 1986 offered little or no consolation that the team took the first President's Trophy.

That 1986 season set the mood that continues to surround the Presidents’ Trophy. Although, the first-place team in the NHL gets the prestige of a major award and nearly $400,000 US in prize money, a Stanley Cup is what matters, and first place means nothing unless its in the playoffs.

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