Most people in life are content with achieving one dream professionally speaking, but not Montreal Canadiens legendary goaltender Ken Dryden. Becoming a professional athlete is already quite a difficult dream to achieve, but for Montreal’s number 29, it wasn’t enough.
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On top of being one of the most dominant goaltenders of his era, Dryden became a lawyer and, later in life, a teacher, an author and a politician. No wonder he only spent eight seasons in the NHL, he needed time to live all his other lives.
Funnily enough, Dryden was drafted in 1964 by the Boston Bruins in the third round with the 14th pick (yes, rounds were much shorter in the original-six era). He was 16 years-old back then and as he refused to report to Boston, they traded him to the Canadiens for two players, Paul Reid and Guy Allen, neither of whom ever played in the NHL.
Meanwhile, Dryden joined the Canadiens in 1970-1971 playing six regular season games which he all won, posting a 1.65 goals-against average and a .957 save percentage. As a result, he became the team’s number one goaltender and led the Habs to the Stanley Cup keeping a .914 SP and a 3.01 GAA, leading him to his first and only Conn Smythe Trophy win. He also became the first goaltender to win the Cup before losing a single regular season game on top of winning hockey’s biggest prize before the Calder Trophy as the league’s top rookie.
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The following season, he was a fixture in the Canadiens’ net, playing 64 games and keeping a 39-8-15 record with a .930 SP and a 2.24 GAA. As a result, he won the Calder Trophy as the top rookie in the league and finished second in Hart Trophy voting. Montreal fell short of its own expectation that season, being eliminated from the playoffs after just six games. In 1973, he won a second Cup and the Vezina Trophy as the league’s top netminder.
Dryden would fail to guide the Canadiens to the Stanley Cup in 1975. They had failed to win the big prize in 1974, but that was the year they played without Dryden who sat out because of a contractual dispute and worked all year in the Law firm Osler, Hoskin and Harcourt as a legal clerk, which allowed him to complete the requirements of his law degree at McGill University.
Once the contractual dispute was settled, Dryden returned to action and while his numbers (.906 SP and 2.70 GAA) would have been great according to most standards, they were below his…