Conn Smythe - Smythe Forms The Maple Leafs

Smythe Forms The Maple Leafs

The Rangers went to the top of their division, while the St. Pats were doing poorly. J. P. Bickell, a part-owner of the St. Pats, contacted Smythe about taking over the team as coach, but Smythe turned him down. Smythe was more interested in owning the team or a share of the team, and told Bickell so. Not long after, the St. Pats were up for sale and Bickell offered Smythe a chance to become a part-owner. The club had a tentative agreement to be sold for $200,000 to a Philadelphia group, which would move the team. If Smythe could raise $160,000, Bickell would not sell his $40,000 share and the team would remain in Toronto. Smythe was successful, and on February 14, 1927, Smythe invested $10,000 and with the help of some partners bought the St. Pats, renaming them the Toronto Maple Leafs.

At first, Smythe's name was kept in the background. However, when the Leafs promoted a public share offering to raise capital, they announced that "one of the most prominent hockey coaches in Toronto" would be taking over management of the club. That prominent coach turned out to be Smythe. He succeeded Querrie as the team's governor, and installed himself as general manager. He installed Alex Romeril as coach. For the next season, Smythe changed the team's colours from green and white to their present blue and white, the same colours as those of his sand and gravel business trucks. Smythe also took over as coach, and for the next three years he served as team governor, general manager and coach.

In 1929, Smythe decided, in the midst of the Great Depression, that the Maple Leafs needed a new arena. The Arena Gardens seated 8,000 and the Maple Leafs were regularly filling it with 9,000 customers. Smythe knew it would take over a million dollars to construct and he got backing from Sun Life for half. The site was land from T. Eaton Co. on Carlton, a site Smythe selected because it was on the street car line. Smythe gave up the coaching position to concentrate on the arena project. The building started construction on June 1, 1931 and was ready on November 12, 1931, after five months. As part of a corporate reorganization, Maple Leaf Gardens Ltd. was founded that year to own both the team and the arena. To pay for the building construction, the construction workers were paid with Maple Leaf Gardens stock instead of 20% of their pay. Selke, who had union connections, and Smythe were successful in negotiating the payment method in exchange for using unionised workers.

In its first season in the new building, Smythe fired coach Art Duncan after five games and hired Dick Irvin to coach. Irvin promptly led the Maple Leafs to their first Stanley Cup as the Maple Leafs, and the franchise's third overall. While the Leafs would go to the finals every year except for 1934 and 1937 during Irvin's nine-year tenure, they were unable to win another Cup. By 1940, Smythe believed that Irvin had taken the Leafs as far as he could, and decided to replace him with former Leafs captain Hap Day. Smythe also knew that he would be away in the war and felt that Irvin would not be tough enough without Smythe to back him up. Soon afterward, Smythe engineered Irvin's hiring as coach of the moribund Montreal Canadiens. The once-proud franchise had just suffered a horrendous 10-win season, the worst in their history, leading to rumours that it might fold. Smythe suggested that the Canadiens' owners, the Canadian Arena Company, hire Irvin as coach, even though he knew it was giving the Leafs' most bitter rival an instant shot in the arm. However, the 1930s had seen several franchises fold outright or suspend operations never to return. Smythe feared the league wouldn't survive the loss of its oldest franchise, and decided to put the good of the league ahead of his rivalry with the Habs.