October 1972 - October 7, 1972 (Saturday)

October 7, 1972 (Saturday)

• The National Hockey League's two expansion teams, the New York Islanders and the Atlanta Flames, played against each other for their first game to open the 1972-73 NHL season. Playing at the Nassau Coliseum before 12,221 the Flames won 3–2. Morris Stefaniw and Ed Westfall scored the first goals for the Flames and Islanders, respectively. The Islanders, who played on at Uniondale, New York, on Long Island, would finish their first season as the NHL's worst team, with a record of 12–60–6, but would later win the Stanley Cup four years in a row (from 1981 to 1984). The Flames, named for the burning of Atlanta during the American Civil War, would move to Calgary in 1980 and win the Stanley Cup in 1989.