The 1936-37 season was, to quote Charles Dickens: "the best of times and the worst of times" depending on where you were and where your loyalties lay.
One need look no further than the city of Montreal to see this dichotomy. One club, the Nationals, built on their dominating performance of the prior season to again easily win the Canadian Division with a (slightly) powerful performance that saw them go 33-7-8 and rampage through the revamped playoff format, sweeping their old friends from Toronto and winning the newly best-of-seven Cup Finals in a four-games-to-one romp over the Boston Bees. Across the hall (so to speak since they shared a home arena), the Montreal Valiants' fortunes improved on the ice as they rose to third over their dismal Detroit Olympians, posting an 18-23-7 mark. They brought back old favorite Harvey McLeod and though he was a mere shadow of the dominant force he had been, he fit right back in with his old mates Willie LeBlanc and Rene Mailloux while promising young winger Doug Lynch also joined the fold and things were looking up for the Vals. That was until early February of '37. McLeod had suffered a badly broken leg in a game with the Dukes the month before and then unexpectedly died in the hospital. The cause of death was listed as a heart attack. The death of the NAHC's all-time leader in goals scored and a legend in the city of Montreal stunned the hockey community. In his honor, an unnamed donor offered a trophy, the Harvey McLeod Trophy, to be awarded to the best first-year player in the league each year.
The big story of the 1935 offseason was the move by Toronto Dukes coach Jack Barrell to the Detroit Olympians. Barrell's Dukes had won two straight Challenge Cups. But his relationship with Toronto General Manager Charles Tattler was a contentious one and the lure of working with his close friend John Connolly Jr, who moved the Quebec Champlains to Detroit that same summer, made the move seem almost predestined. Tattler took the reins as coach, promising there would be no drop-off in the quality of play in Toronto (he was wrong, at least in the short-term) and predicted failure for the Olympians (admittedly, Barrell went from the penthouse to the basement with this move and improving the Detroit club was to be a monumental task).
The Montreal Nationals, watching the drama unfold in Toronto, were likely licking their chops. After being defeated in both the regular season and more importantly, in the Challenge Cup Finals, the Nationals had already had more than enough of the Toronto Dukes. In 1935-36, they vowed that they would be the ones to set the pace in the Canadian Division - and they went out and did it. Of course it helped that the Ottawa Athletics went belly-up: the NAHC held a dispersal draft for the Athletics' players and the Nationals ended up benefiting indirectly. A solid youngster by the name of Larry Dees went from Ottawa to Boston. The Bees, recognizing the young center's obvious talents, traded (for financial reasons, of course) center Ralph Speyer to the Nationals. Speyer immediately clicked with linemates Roger McIlwaine and Hank Lawrence and the trio formed one of the league's best lines. Speyer (23g, 21a), McIlwaine (16g, 26a) and Lawrence (18g, 20a) all placed among the league leaders in scoring and were collectively dubbed the "Pride of the Nationals" which was quickly shortened by the media to the "Pride Line."