The NHL’s Stanley Cup bubble was a 65-day, nasal-swabbing ordeal that the Tampa Bay Lightning will look back at more fondly than the Dallas Stars.
The Lightning, after all, got to exit Tuesday with that glittering silver trophy.
“Whether it was bubble life, you’re going to remember this moment the rest of your life, and how worth it it was to go through however many days it was, without your support staff, your family, your friends,” Lightning captain Steven Stamkos said.
“We’re going to miss being together every single second of every day. It doesn’t get any closer than what we were able to accomplish in this bubble. It was one of the toughest championships to win under the circumstances. We found a way.”
Indeed, if the Stanley Cup had a branded tag line, it would be: “Toughest trophy to win in sports.”
There were those this year that wondered if that would be true, whether ending the season prematurely, bringing 24 teams to an abruptly called playoff, to neutral site games with no fans, would mean the 2020 champion would require an asterisk.
“Not at all,” said Kris Versteeg, a Stanley Cup champion in 2010 and 2015 with the Chicago Blackhawks.
Versteeg pointed out the Stanley Cup was awarded in 2013 after a 48-game, lockout-shortened season. The same was true for the 1993-94 Stanley Cup.
“They played more of a season (in 2019-20) than the lockout season, they played 70 games,” Versteeg said. “At no point does this deserve an asterisk if the lockout doesn’t.”
The NHL didn’t move beyond a 70-game season until 1967-68. And it didn’t get to the point where a team needed to win 16 times in the playoffs — four best-of-seven series — until 1986-87.
Tampa Bay won 18 times in the post-season this year, a record, because their round-robin games count. Goalie Andrei Vasilevskiy won every one of those games, which should stand as a record for some time, at least until the NHL decides to expand the playoff format.
Had the Islanders won the Cup, they would have needed to win 19 times in the post-season, since they played through the best-of-five qualifying round.
“This to me is a well-deserved Cup,” Versteeg said. “What these guys are going through, they’re getting less rest than a regular year. Their body had to be battling. They were doing it under these (pandemic) circumstances, away from their families.”
Versteeg went the other way on the asterisk, in that maybe it deserves a badge of honour, because this one was harder to win than others. He wasn’t alone in that thinking.
“If there’s an asterisk, it’s because it’s full-measure plus,” said Vegas coach Pete DeBoer, whose team lost to Dallas in the Western Conference final. “Given the circumstances, I’d say asterisk in a positive fashion. It might have been the toughest Stanley Cup to win.”
The NHL became the first of the major North American sports leagues to complete its season, and earned accolades all around after more than 33,000 tests on players, team and league personnel produced not a single positive COVID-19 test in either host city, Toronto or Edmonton.
But as teams prepare to bid adieu to the bubble, few will actually miss it.
“I’ll miss Call of Duty,” Conn Smythe winner Victor Hedman said.
“My eight-year-old daughter is now 13, that’s how long it feels,” Tampa Bay assistant coach Jeff Halpern said.
“Not one bit,” said Dallas coach Rick Bowness, looking forward to home cooking. “I’ve already told my wife, don’t even expect to go to a restaurant for a while. You make the best of it, and that’s what we’ve done. We knew coming in. We were all prepared to be here nine or 10 weeks. But there won’t be one thing about bubble life I’m going to miss.”
Dallas winger Corey Perry simply laughed when asked what he might miss.
“We just hope everything in the world gets back to normal, and we can get fans back in the building and get back to our regular schedule,” he said. “That’s what we’re looking forward to.”
Perry, by the way, becomes the answer to a trivia question as the only player to score in a regular-season game (he did so in 2007 when the Ducks opened in London) and the Stanley Cup final in the month of September.
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As is his wont, Tampa coach Jon Cooper had the most cerebral approach. He took notes about bubble life, so he wouldn’t forget.
“To be honest, there’s been a lot of good,” he said. “It’s been an experience, and for the most part it’s been a really cool experience. When I look back, with some of the notes I’ve taken over time, it’ll be pretty cool to tell some of the stories.
“But probably the best part of this whole thing is going to be when we check out.”
