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The New York Rangers had only had a franchise for two seasons and the Montreal Maroons for twice that when the two faced off for the Stanley Cup in 1928. The series was extremely close, with the opponents taking turns winning, despite the Rangers having lost their goalie to an eye injury. Game 5 took place on April 14, and when it ended, the New Yorkers became the first U.S.-based NHL team and the second American squad to win the championship.

For the 1927-28 season, both the Maroons and Rangers finished second in their divisions then beat the first-place finishers during semifinals (held March 31 and April 3). Two years earlier, Lester Patrick had led the Victoria Cougars of the Western Hockey League (WHL) when they lost the 1926 Stanley Cup Final to the brand new Maroons. Now, Patrick coached the Rangers in their first appearance in the Final. They were hoping to become the second American-based team to capture the Cup. The first had been the Seattle Metropolitans (of the PCHA) in 1917. Patrick played for them the season between that and 1919, when the Mets returned to the Final (which was cancelled due to the flu).

Thanks to the circus booking up Madison Square Garden, the 1928 finals were held exclusively at Montreal Forum. The Maroons led the series by defeating the Rangers 2-0 in both Game 1 and Game 3. However, each time, New York answered with victories in the even-numbered games. Game 2 caused a major shift in personnel when Rangers goalie Lorne Chabot was sent to Royal Victoria Hospital with any eye injury. Even with 44-year-old Patrick in net, the Rangers held on through overtime until their center Frank Boucher scored the game-winner.

The deciding game featured a crowd of 11,000-12,000, including Chabot watching from the bench with a “black shade over his eye.” Joe Miller replaced him in net. The New York Americans had placed Miller on waivers, so any NHL team could play him. By the time he was brought into the Final, he’d already returned home to Ottawa and hadn’t skated in four weeks. Still, he played brilliantly. Despite Montreal outshooting New York by almost 3-1, as the New York Daily News put it, “The stumbling block in their way, however, was Joe Miller, whose display in the Rangers’ net stamped him as the hero of the series.”

Not only was Miller coming back from his summer break suddenly, but he was also injured in the line of duty. Towards the beginning of Game 5, Murray Murdoch “rushed in to bat the puck to the corner. His stick clipped Miller over the eye.” Miller collapsed, and the referee rushed over to revive him. With a severe cut to the lid of his right eye, he was helped to the locker room to be patched up and take “the allotted ten-minute rest to apply ice to keep the swelling down.” When he “returned to the twine,” the crowd gave him a “big ovation.” Miller gave “one of the most remarkable bits of defensive work ever seen in this home of the ice game” with a “badly swollen face.”

As the Montreal Gazette bemoaned, “The delay gave the Rangers a chance to gather themselves together and Maroons had been taken off that first whirlwind charge.” That’s when “clever, crafty … slim, frail, pale-faced, the elusive Ranger centre found the highest pinnacle in the playoffs.” Frank Boucher had finished third in the scoring race (with 35 points) and had already pulled out an overtime win in Game 2. For his final feat, he scored both of the Rangers’ goals and in a similar manner when he “broke following sustained Montreal attacks and took the Maroon defense unawares.”

Boucher scored the first goal late in the first period, at 17:05. The Brooklyn Times Union summarized the play, “[H]e skated through the entire Montreal defense, drew Benedict out, and banged the puck into the net.” As the third period wound down, Boucher raced Dunc Munro (defenseman and captain for the Maroons) to the puck. When Boucher got there first, “with a deft twist, [he] was around the forward-rushing Munro,” and at 15:15 he slid the puck by the unprotected Clint Benedict. Still, Boucher and Benedict had grown up together in Ottawa and praised each other at the celebration following the game.

The Maroons did not give up but pushed hard until the end. They only managed to get one shot by Miller though. Under three minutes after Boucher’s second goal, Merlyn Phillips “got a pass from Siebert and shot past Miller.” The New York Daily News pointed out, “[T]he Maroons were not disgraced. They gave a game display and went down fighting. They were trying at all times, but were not favored by lady luck.”

Part of that ill luck came earlier in the third period when the score was still 1-0. Referee Mike Rodden blew a whistle on Phillips for being offside just as his teammate Russell Oatman scored. Not only were the Maroons deprived of the goal, but apparently, Rodden let go a similar situation in Game 4 that led to a Rangers’ goal. The fans were so enraged, claimed the Daily News, that they “rose as one and showered the ice with everything at hand, including hats, pennies, paper, fruit and finally a chair.” The Montreal Gazette went even further, describing how the crowd “vented their ill-feeling against the arbiter by heaving everything that they could pry loose. The ice was littered as it has never been covered before. The cleaners were called out and the game held up seven minutes. The cleaners had no sooner made the surface playable when a spectator hurled a chair from a box seat, narrowly missing those in front of the promenade.”

With the score remaining at 2-1, the Rangers made history books as the first U.S.-based NHL team to take home the Stanley Cup. They would win again in 1933 and 1940 before a long 54-year drought. Meanwhile, the Maroons won their second and final championship in 1935 before being suspended in 1938. They were the last NHL team that was not among the Original Six to claim victory until after the 1967 expansion.

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