1977–78 NHL season

The 1977 NHL Amateur Draft was held on June 14, at the Mount Royal Hotel in Montreal, Quebec.

The League threatened further sanctions, and despite playing more than one game with their "unreadable" sweaters, Ballard's Maple Leafs finally complied in earnest by making the letters white on the blue road jerseys.

)[1] Officials began wearing their surnames on the back of their sweaters instead of being identified by numbers, as they were previously.

On December 11, 1977, the Philadelphia Flyers' Tom Bladon became the first defenceman in NHL history to score eight points in one game.

In the other groupings, the higher-placed team won each round, and the second-place Boston Bruins advanced to the finals against the first-place Canadiens.

In the finals, the Canadiens defeated the Bruins in six games to win their third consecutive Stanley Cup.

The Colorado Rockies made their one and only playoff appearance in the preliminary round against the Philadelphia Flyers, and were swept in two games.

The Chicago Black Hawks were swept in the other Original Six matchup of the playoffs, losing to Boston in the quarterfinals.

The twelve teams that qualified for the playoffs are ranked 1–12 based on regular season points.

It was the Rockies' only playoff appearance in their first eight seasons before moving to New Jersey in 1982 (including two years in Kansas City and six in Denver).

This was the first playoff series between these two teams; they would not meet again in Stanley Cup play until 2004, after the Flames had relocated to Calgary.

This was the third straight semifinal meeting following Philadelphia's win in five games in 1976 and Boston's four-game sweep last season.

This was a rematch of last year's Stanley Cup Finals, in which Montreal won in a four-game sweep.

GP = Games Played, G = Goals, A = Assists, Pts = Points, PIM = Penalties In Minutes Source: NHL.

[5] Note: GP = Games played; Min = Minutes played; GA = Goals against; GAA = Goals against average; W = Wins; L = Losses; T = Ties; SO = Shutouts The following is a list of players of note who played their first NHL game in 1977–78 (listed with their first team, asterisk(*) marks debut in playoffs): Nedomansky began his major professional career in the World Hockey Association.