1948 - 49 NHL season The 1948 - 49 NHL season was the 32nd season of the National Hockey League . Six teams each played 60 games . Regular season . Don Gallinger , hopeful he could win an appeal of his suspension in the gambing scandal , finally admitted to gambling and was expelled from the NHL for life in September . On October 8 , 1948 , the New York Rangers were due to start their season against the Montreal Canadiens , when the team suffered bad misfortune . Buddy O ' Connor , Frank Eddolls , Edgar Laprade , Bill Moe , and Tony Leswick were travelling in their car from Montreal to Saranac Lake , when their car was struck by a truck near Rouse ' s Point , New York . O ' Connor suffered several broken ribs , Eddolls suffered a severed tendon in his knee , Laprade suffered a broken nose , Moe had a cut in the head requiring several stitches and Leswick only escaped with a few bruises . The Rangers were affected so easily , they only scored 133 goals and finished last . A league record of ten major penalties was set November 25 , 1948 when 11 , 000 fans at the Montreal Forum witnessed a donnybrook . It started when the Habs ' Ken Mosdell elbowed Maple Leaf Gus Mortson . Mortson retaliated by knocking Elliot de Grey down with his stick . Montreal ' s Maurice Richard then sprang onto Mortson ' s back and they fought , and then all hands joined in . Mortson , Richard , Toronto ' s Howie Meeker and Mosdell were banished with majors . Play had scarcely began when Ken Reardon ( Frenchtown ) and Joe Klukay ( TO ) began fencing and Bill Barilko went at Reardon , while Klukay got into it with Billy Reay , and in another fight , Hal Laycoe got into it with Garth Boesch . In the game itself , Turk Broda quietly picked up his first shutout of the year as the Leafs got the Canadiens 2 - 0 . A sad note was the death of former Pittsburgh Pirates defenceman Tex White , who was found dead in his bed at his home in Port Colborne , Ontario on December 12 . He was only 48 years old . Both Detroit and Montreal lost key players to injury this year . Montreal lost Elmer Lach with a fractured jaw when he collided with Toronto defenceman Bob Goldham , and Butch Bouchard injured a knee . Detroit lost Gordie Howe , who underwent knee surgery . Bill Durnan got hot in the second half of the season and recorded four consecutive shutouts , going 309 minutes and 21 seconds without giving up a goal . In all , Durnan had 10 shutouts and won his fifth Vezina Trophy in six years . Scoring leaders . " Note : GP = Games played , G = Goals , A = Assists , PTS = Points , PIM = Penalties in minutes " Stanley Cup playoffs . Semifinals . Detroit Red Wings vs . Montreal Canadiens " Detroit wins best - of - seven series 4 games to 3 " Toronto Maple Leafs vs . Boston Bruins " Toronto wins best - of - seven series 4 games to 1 " Stanley Cup Finals . Toronto Maple Leafs vs . Detroit Red Wings " Toronto wins best - of - seven series 4 games to 0 " Regular Season Attendance . Total : 2 , 409 , 765 Debuts . The following is a list of players of note who played their first NHL game in 1948 - 49 ( listed with their first team , asterisk ( * ) marks debut in playoffs ) : Last games . The following is a list of players of note that played their last game in the NHL in 1948 - 49 ( listed with their last team ) :