Each year, the National Hockey League hands out the Jack Adams Award to the head coach ‘adjudged to have contributed the most to his team’s success’. Hands down the greatest coach in the game, Scotty Bowman, has been awarded the Jack Adams just two times over his illustrious and legendary career.

Over 30 seasons as a head coach in the NHL, Bowman maintained a regular season winning percentage of .657 and a playoff winning percentage of .632. Scotty is not even closely contested in several career categories among NHL coaches. He is the all-time leader in games coached (2141), games won (1244), games lost (584), seasons coached (30) and Stanley Cups won (9). He was inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame in 1991.

Bowman began coaching in 1956 at the age of just 23. His hockey career was cut short at the junior level when he suffered a broken skull. In 1957, he led the Ottawa Junior Canadiens to the Memorial Cup where they lost to the Flin Flon Bombers in seven games. The following season, he took the Junior Canadiens to the Memorial Cup again, this time beating out the Regina Pats in six.

Scotty got his start in the NHL when the league expanded from six to twelve teams for the 1967-68 season. Bowman took the helm of the expansion St. Louis Blues and led them to the Stanley Cup finals in each of the team’s first three seasons. In his second and third season with the Blues, the team was tops in the West Division standings during the regular season.

From 1971-72 to 1978-79, a NHL coaching legend was truly born. As head coach of the Montreal Canadiens, Bowman won five Stanley Cups. Four of the Stanley Cups were won in consecutive seasons from 1976 to 1979. The team was regular season division champions six of the eight seasons.

Bowman’s least successful stint as a head coach came next with the Buffalo Sabres. Scotty was behind the Sabres bench from 1979-80 to 1986-87. The team did well but didn’t experience any great playoff success.

In 1991-92, Scotty took over behind the bench for the Pittsburgh Penguins. With Mario Lemieux in his prime, the team couldn’t help but win the Stanley Cup. Scotty coached one more season in Pittsburgh before heading to Detroit and his most earned success.

Bowman coached the Red Wings from 1993-94 to 2001-02. With Detroit, he won three Stanley Cups and lost in the Stanley Cup finals once. During that time, Detroit was tops in their division six times. The 1995-96 Red Wings didn’t win the Cup but their 62 regular season wins is a record that topped Bowman’s 1976-77 Montreal Canadiens that won 60.

So, why did the greatest head coach in NHL history only get recognized as the league’s best coach on two occasions? Is the Jack Adams Award the ultimate ‘participant’ prize? It could be said that the teams he coached often were so talented that they didn’t need a bench boss to tell them what to do. Thus, Bowman simply stood on the bench while greats like Guy Lafleur, Mario Lemieux and Steve Yzerman brought him the Cup.

The two seasons that Bowman won the Jack Adams were the two previous seasons mentioned above when his teams had record breaking regular season success. The 1976-77 Montreal Canadiens are considered to be the best team in the history of the NHL. The 1995-96 Red Wings won more games than the 1976-77 Canadiens, albeit while playing two more regular season games.

Every team that Bowman coached was talented. It took ultra-amazing feats by his teams for him to be recognized as a great coach when others have done it with teams that were slightly above mediocre. Bowman may have been ripped off, but I doubt he cares much. When people think of Scotty Bowman, I’m sure the nine Stanley Cups speak an incredible amount louder than the two Jack Adams Awards.