The 1979 Stanley Cup Final
Ten years of waiting, one unforgettable run, and a rivalry that still burns.
The 1979 Stanley Cup Final stands as the most electric moment in the early history of the St. Louis Blues, a 1967 expansion franchise that had endured a decade of heartbreak before finally breaking through to the NHL's ultimate stage. Facing the perennially dominant Montreal Canadiens, the Blues became the first expansion team of their era to reach the Cup Final, and the city of St. Louis erupted in a way it had never seen before.
Though the series ended in a 4-1 defeat to Montreal, the 1979 run redefined what the Blues meant to their community. It transformed the franchise from a struggling afterthought into a team with a legitimate claim to the sport's highest honour, and it cemented the Montreal rivalry as the emotional spine of Blues identity for generations to come.
Quick Facts
- Opponent
- Montreal Canadiens
- Series result
- Lost 4–1
- Significance
- First playoff appearance in franchise history (1967 expansion team)
- Captain
- Doug Smail
- Franchise founded
- 1967 (NHL expansion)
- Rivalry context
- One of the most storied rivalries in NHL history
Lore & Background
For a full decade after the Blues joined the NHL in 1967, the franchise existed in a state of quiet disappointment. They were the expansion team from the city of the Blues song, the team with the passionate but perpetually unfulfilled fanbase. When the 1978-79 season carried them into the playoffs for the first time and then straight to the Stanley Cup Final, the emotional release in St. Louis was almost violent in its intensity. The Krecki Arena (later the Savoy Centre) overflowed with fans who had waited ten years to see their team matter on the sport's biggest stage.
The series itself was a masterclass in the gulf between a team discovering its ceiling and a team that had been polishing it for decades. Montreal, with their dynasty pedigree and depth of talent, controlled the series largely on their terms. Yet the Blues competed with a ferocity that made every shift a small war, and the one game they won in the series became a touchstone for Blues fans who still reference it as proof that the gap was never as wide as the scoreboard suggested.
The 1979 Final also locked in the Montreal rivalry in a way that no other opponent could. The Blues had always been the underdog, the expansion team, the team from the middle of the map. But in 1979 they stood on the same ice as the Canadiens in the Cup Final, and that single image—Blues jerseys against the red and white of Montreal in the biggest series of the year—became the defining visual of the rivalry. Every subsequent meeting carried the ghost of that 1979 run, the near-miss that the franchise could never quite forget.
Reader's Guide
The Blues of 1979 were not the polished, system-driven teams that would come later. They were raw, physical, and deeply emotional—a roster built more on grit and local loyalty than on draft-room sophistication. What made this group distinct was the sheer improbability of their presence: a 1967 expansion franchise, a decade into its life, finally standing in the Stanley Cup Final. The turning point of the season was the regular-season push that vaulted them into the playoffs for the first time, a run that felt less like a strategy and more like a collective refusal to accept another year of irrelevance.
The pivotal moment of the series came in the one game the Blues won, a contest where the team played with a reckless, almost desperate energy that made the Canadiens look mortal for the first time in the series. That single victory became the emotional anchor for the franchise for years—proof that the gap was closable, that the Blues belonged on that ice.
By the time the final whistle of Game 5 ended the series, the identity of the Blues had shifted permanently. They were no longer the expansion afterthought. They were a team that had been to the Final, that had competed with Montreal at the highest level, and that carried a rivalry etched into its bones. The 1979 run became the baseline against which every future season was measured.
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