Sweet redemption.
Injured Lightning captain Steve Stamkos hoisted the Stanley Cup on Monday night after cheering on his Tampa Bay teammates in a 2-0 victory over the Dallas Stars, to take the NHL final in six games.
The smiles on the Lightning players’ faces as they celebrated said it all: The journey was worth it, leaving family and friends for more that two months was worth it — even as the coronavirus pandemic seemed to stop the world — and the embarrassment of 2019’s early playoff exit was truly buried in the past.
The Cup presentation by commissioner Gary Bettman — who didn’t have to suffer a torrent of boos from fans like every other year — was different. Before handing it to the players, they posed for a team photo behind it while Bettman spoke.
“This will go down as one of the hardest runs of all time,” said Bettman. “It is my honour to present the Cup to Steven Stamkos.”
His teammates cheered, and fireworks went off behind them. Stamkos — dressed in full gear — grabbed the Cup and handed it to defenceman Victor Hedman to start the player parade around the ice.
Hedman, who took over as leader with Stamkos sidelined for all but a brief but exhilarating appearance in Game 3, was named winner of the Conn Smythe trophy as most valuable player in the playoffs. Hedman scored 10 times in the post-season, third most by a defenceman in league history.
“It’s a dream come true,” said Hedman. “It’s the best thing I’ve experienced in my hockey career. What we accomplished inside the bubble is unbelievable. We were determined to finish the job when we had the opportunity.”
Brayden Point, who scored 14 goals, and Blake Coleman, a key trade deadline acquisition, scored for Tampa while goalie Andrei Vasilevskiy got his 18th win — another post-season record made possible by the expanded format. Nikita Kucherov led all scorers.
“The beauty of our team was everybody chipping in,” said Point. “We got contributions from everyone at different times. That’s what makes this win so special.”
Stamkos, who scored in his only playoff appearance, joins some legendary names among captains who missed the final game (and more) but joined their teammates for the celebration. The likes of Montreal’s Yvon Cournoyer (1977, 1979) and Jean Beliveau (1968) were on the ice for the presentation, but injured for the clincher. His goal could go down alongside the likes of Bobby Baun’s OT winner on a broken foot that helped the Maple Leafs win the Cup in 1964.
But it was an usual playoffs from the beginning, delayed until the summer, with piped-in sound meant to mimic the crowds that were understandably absent, and with games being played more than a calendar year after the training camps for both finalists had started.
The Lightning entered the COVID-free bubble in Toronto on July 26, weighed down by questions about the health of their captain and disappointments from playoffs past.
They’ll exit the bubble in Edmonton more than two months later as champions.
It was a satisfied group that would parade the Cup around the ice at Edmonton’s Rogers Place, even if there were relatively few family and friends on site. And why not celebrate? They had slayed the dragon that was the Columbus Blue Jackets, their nemesis from the 2019 playoffs, then took down the Boston Bruins and New York Islanders to earn a berth in the final for the third time.
This hardened core of battle-scarred veterans, for whom so much was expected when they made the Cup final in 2015 against Chicago, never lost two in a row in the playoffs.
“You learn how hard it is to get to this point,” said Lightning GM Julien BriseBois. “It’s hard to win one playoff game, let alone win four playoff games. And you have to do that four times to win the Cup.
“Everyone says it’s the hardest trophy to win in sports, and that doesn’t do it justice. It’s incredibly hard. You need a lot of things to go your way. You need a lot of good players, you need resiliency, you need breaks.”
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With the trophy presentation, the NHL became the first major North American sports league to complete its season during the pandemic, after a four-month pause that started in March.
With the rest of the regular season scratched, the league inviting 24 of the 31 teams to expanded playoffs in Edmonton and Toronto. The NHL administered 33,174 COVID-19 tests to club personnel, including players, starting Aug. 1 with no positive results.
“There won’t be one thing about bubble life I’m going to miss,” said Dallas coach Rick Bowness.
It’s estimated it cost the league and member teams $75 million (U.S.) to finish the year and meet contractual obligations to television rightsholders and sponsors.
Ultimately, injuries caught up with Dallas. While Tampa was without Stamkos, for all but the first period of Game 3, the Stars were gutted throughout their lineup the deeper they went into the playoffs.
They were without No. 1 goalie Ben Bishop for most of they playoffs, and though Anton Khudobin played well in his absence, there was a negative effect as the series wore on. Dallas had gone with a two-goalie system all year, but were reluctant to rest Khudobin with untried Jake Oettinger as his backup.
Dallas also lost forwards Radek Faksa (injured in the Western final), Blake Comeau (lost in Game 2 of the Cup final) and Roope Hintz (hurt in Game 4). Basically the third line was wiped out. They were replaced by the likes of Joel Kiviranta, Justin Dowling and Nick Caamano.
The seeds of the Tampa Bay Lightning’s second Stanley Cup triumph were planted in April of 2019. They were heavy favourites that year, runaway Presidents’ Trophy winners as the regular season champions. And they were unceremoniously ousted from the first round by Columbus in four straight games.
As if that wasn’t hard enough to swallow, they were reminded of their epic failure with each visit to another city, reporters asking how they were handling that particular humiliation. They owned it, though. Not proudly, necessarily. But they didn’t back down from addressing their failures, and got better this year because of it.
Each of the players who returned was just a little hardier this year, a little tougher, a little more tenacious.
“We used to be team that it wasn’t good enough to beat you 3-0, we had to beat you 9-0,” said Cooper. “If you play that way in the playoffs, bad things can happen. Being humbled can help right a ship. I truly believe last year’s experience — we’re seeing the fruits of that awful setback.
“You need to have an attitude adjustment. Guys have to buy in. When guys understand it’s what you keep out of your net and not how much you put in the other net, good things will happen.”
