William Tulip Reay (August 21, 1918 – September 23, 2004) 
Played for Detroit Red Wings (1943, 1944), Montreal Canadiens (1945-1953)
Coached for: Toronto Maple Leafs (1957–1959), Chicago Black Hawks (1963–1977)
Regular season record: 542–385–175 (.571), Postseason record: 57–60 (.487), Career: 599–445–175
Five division titles (1969-70, 1969-1973, 1975-76), best record in NHL (1966-67), 12 Stanley Cup playoff appearances in 14 full seasons as coach
Win, lose, or draw, Billy Reay had a happy and long life in hockey. The Winnipeg native entered the leagues of hockey with the St. Boniface Seals in the Manitoba Junior Hockey League in 1936 when he was 18 years old. For nearly a decade, he would play in four different minor leagues (Albert Senior Hockey League, American Hockey Association, Quebec Senior Hockey League) and won a few championships. He became a major league NHL player for brief spurts with the Detroit Red Wings of two games in the 1943-44 and 1944-45 seasons (with the former season seeing him score two goals). He finally made it stick in the NHL with the Montreal Canadiens in 1945 and played there for eight seasons, which saw him do four 40-point seasons. He won the Stanley Cup in 1946 and 1953 before closing out his career with the Vancouver Canucks of the Western Hockey League. As a player, Reay had 105 goals and 162 assists in 479 games while playing in 63 playoff games.
Billy Reay was a player-coach as early as the 1950s with Victoria in the WHL and coached in the AHL in Rochester in 1956-57. He was hired to be the head coach of the Toronto Maple Leafs in 1957. In the then-six team league, they finished last place in Reay's only full season. In the summer of 1958, Punch Imlach got hired as an assistant general manager for a team that had a multiple man committee to oversee business. In November, he got himself named a fulltime GM and proceeded to fire Reay with a team that had won five of its first 20 games of the 1958-59 season. Reay made the best of it as a coach in the minor leagues with the Sault Ste. Marie Thunderbirds of the EPHL in 1960 and the Buffalo Bisons from 1961-1963. The Chicago Black Hawks saw what they liked from him and asked him to replace Rudy Pilous (who had won the Cup for Chicago in 1961 but apparently was fired by Tommy Ivan in a letter) as head coach in the summer of 1963.
As headlined by players such as Bobby Hull, Stan Mikita, and Glenn Hall, the 1963-64 Black Hawks narrowly finished in 2nd place to Montreal with 36 wins (and one less tie) but were upset by the 4th place Red Wings in seven games. The Black Hawks finished 4th the following year but got revenge in some small part by defeating the Red Wings in a seven-game semifinal victory to reach the Stanley Cup Final versus Montreal. Unfortunately, the home team that won all of its games benefitted Montreal, who won the decisive seventh game 4-0. In the final two seasons of the six-team era, the Black Hawks lost in the semifinal round each time, which included a 1966-67 season where they had more points than anyone (94, having won a club-record 41 games). The 1967-68 season, the first with 12 teams (and therefore eight playoff teams) saw them narrowly finish 4th. They made it to the Semifinals only to lose to Montreal. The 1968-69 team finished out of the playoffs (dead last, actually), the only time in a full season that Reay did not reach the playoffs with Chicago. The 1969-70 team began a torrid run for Reay as the Black Hawks won the first of four consecutive division titles (even when being moved from the East to the West in 1970), with the first season seeing them be the regular season champion for the second time ever (and last until the 1990-91 team). The Black Hawks flip-flopped runs to the Cup, making it in 1971 and 1973 (the latter without Hull) while losing in the semifinals in 1970 and 1972.
The home team won each of the first six games in 1971 (which included an overtime win by Chicago in Game 1 on rookie goaltender Ken Dryden*), and Chicago had a 2-0 lead at one point in Game 7 before Jacques Lemaire (on what was reported to be a 60-foot shot or 75 feet out) and Henri Richard evened the game in the second period that led to Richard's go-ahead winner 2:34 into the third period. The 1973 Final went six games as Scotty Bowman's first Cup win came with a team that beat Chicago 6-4 in Chicago. Chicago made the postseason three more times with Reay (with the 1975-76 squad winning the Smythe title) but never got past the Semifinal round. In December of 1976, with the team at 10-19-5, he was apparently fired by a note left under his door and replaced by former player Bill White. At the time, only Dick Irvin (691) had more wins than Reay and only Irvin (190) and Toe Blake (119) had more playoff games coached than Reay's 117. Reay never coached again and died in Wisconsin in 2004 at the age of 86. The Chicago Tribune called him "wasn’t one to polish apples or lick boots, either, and perhaps this is why he has been denied a place in hockey’s Hall of Fame."
Researching from the NHL Coaching Register, the following NHL coaches won 300 games but have never won the Stanley Cup (please note that all but six of these names started their career after 1980, as win totals have exploded with expansion):
Only three of those people have been inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame as a builder*: Quinn, Neilson, Francis, although the future is unwritten for Ruff (900 wins and counting) or DeBoer (are we kidding?) or even with Rod Brind'Amour (who could just make it as a player). Compare Reay to Quinn/Neilson/Francis (please note the season count is not all full as each were fired at one point) in regular season record and playoff record.
By no standard is Billy Reay lower than one, let all alone all three of those names. As such, his continued omission from the Hockey Hall of Fame is a mistake that should be rectified if the Blackhawks had the stones to actually mount a campaign for Reay, whose 516 victories is still the most in franchise history.
On behalf of the Unsung Hall of Fame, it is my privilege to welcome Billy Reay to the Hall.
N O T E S
*Yes, people like Bob Pulford and Sid Abel made it, as players.
*The late Ken Dryden won his first six regular season games and won himself the goaltender position for the whole playoffs, going 12-8 and winning the Conn Smythe Trophy for his postseason play.
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