For their 1974-75 hockey card sets, both Topps and O-Pee-Chee continued on with their newly formed tradition of producing playoff cards. The cards featured the results of each playoff series from the previous year.
Card number 214 featured the 1973-74 semi-final series between the Chicago Black Hawks and Boston Bruins. Boston won the series in six games to advance to the finals against the Philadelphia Flyers.
On the front of the card, Phil Esposito of the Bruins is positioned in his usual spot at the edge of his opponents crease. Playing goal for the Black Hawks is, of course, Phil’s brother Tony Esposito. The puck is forever frozen in time on the goal line, forcing the collector to imagine if the puck crosses or Tony somehow kicks it out.
That year, Chicago met the Los Angeles Kings in the quarter-finals and, with the help of two 1-0 shutouts with Esposito in net, the Black Hawks won the series four games to one. In Boston’s quarter-final series, the Bruins swept the Toronto Maple Leafs in four. As mentioned, the Bruins and Hawks met in the semis with Boston coming out with a 4-2 victory. In the finals, the Philadelphia Flyers captured their first Stanley Cup championship, taking four of six games from the Bruins.
Phil Esposito played all 16 playoff games for the Bruins in 1973-74. Tony Esposito played in ten of Chicago’s eleven games, being pulled for Mike Veisor in one and sitting on the bench as Veisor completed one full game.
During the regular season, Boston had the most goals scored in the National Hockey League with 349. Phil led the league with 68 while taking both the Art Ross Trophy and Hart Trophy. The Black Hawks tied the Flyers for the fewest goals against with 164. Tony had the league’s second lowest goals against average at 2.04. The lowest was Bernie Parent of Philadelphia with 1.89. The two were the only goalies to play 70 or more games with Parent playing 73 and Esposito playing 70.
The brothers met two other times in the Stanley Cup playoffs. In 1969-70, the Black Hawks and Bruins met in the semi-finals with Boston sweeping the series and eventually taking home the Stanley Cup. In 1974-75, the teams met again in the preliminary round with Chicago winning two games to one.
Phil played in the NHL from 1963-64 to 1980-81 with Chicago, Boston and the New York Rangers, appearing in 1,282 regular season games and scoring 717 goals. He also played 130 games in the playoffs and scored 61 goals. He was a major part of two Stanley Cup champions in Boston. Phil won the Art Ross Trophy five times and was inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame in 1984.
Tony played in the NHL from 1968-69 to 1983-84 with the Montreal Canadiens and Chicago. In 1968-69, he played his only games with the Canadiens, appearing in 13 regular season matches. However, after sharing the regular season goaltending duties with Rogie Vachon, Gump Worsley and Ernie Wakely, Tony didn’t dress for any games in the playoffs as the Canadiens captured the Stanley Cup with a sweep of the St. Louis Blues in the finals. Tony won the Vezina Trophy three times during his career and was inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame in 1988.