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The final team standing in their way, the lone opponent left to be vanquished on their path to immortality is the Montreal Canadiens, who finished 18th in the regular season on points and was the last team to qualify for the Stanley Cup Playoffs but upset three higher-ranked teams - rallying from a 3-1 deficit to defeat Toronto in the First Round, sweeping Winnipeg in the Second and knocking off heavily-favored Vegas in six games in the Semifinal Round - to reach their first Cup Final in 28 years.
The Canadiens are an Original Six team with more Stanley Cups (23) and appearances in the Final (32) than any other National Hockey League franchise. They are considered hockey royalty.
But in this series, the Lightning are the experienced team that's been in this situation before and knows what it takes to win it all. And the Canadiens are the young, up-and-coming squad who suddenly finds themselves one more upset away from one of the most improbable Cup wins in recent memory.
Video: Steven Stamkos, Pat Maroon | SCF Media Day 6.27.21
Tampa Bay has used last year's memories as motivation to reach this point: finally getting over the hump in the Edmonton bubble to defeat the Dallas Stars in six games and lift the 2020 Stanley Cup, the heroes' welcome home when they brought the Cup back to Tampa and stepped off the plane at the Sheltair Jet Center to their families, the festivities inside AMALIE Arena re-creating their on-ice championship ceremony from the bubble, the boat parade up the Hillsborough River that's now become a staple of championship celebrations in the Bay Area, and the victory party inside Raymond James Stadium where Lightning captain Steven Stamkos proclaimed Tampa the greatest hockey town in the world while Nikita Kucherov was in the background hugging the Stanley Cup, moments after he had finished pouring a beer down the throat of Lightning owner Jeff Vinik.
"I think we just used that experience that we had last year in terms of fulfilling your ultimate dream of winning the Stanley Cup and realizing how amazing that feeling is and knowing how hard it was to accomplish that," Stamkos said during NHL media day Sunday at AMALIE Arena, one day before the Cup-opening game against the Canadiens. "That was kind of one of the first thoughts for a lot of the guys was when we had the Cup and we were with the Cup and spending time with the Cup was we can't wait to do this again because it's so amazing. That's kind of just been the mindset all season long. It's a lot easier said than done. We've put ourselves in a position to do that now. It's quite an accomplishment. But it isn't over yet. We want to go out there and finish the job. But I think that mindset was it was so special and so fun to do that with that group that immediately when you win it one of your first thoughts is let's do it again."
Victor Hedman is the reigning Conn Smythe Trophy winner after contributing 10 goals and 22 points while leading the effort from the blue line to shut down the Dallas attack in the Bolts' six-game victory over the Stars in 2020. He said what the Lightning experienced last season is something that's never left this team, those memories the main reason this current group is where it is today despite facing periods of adversity in their journey to get there.
After finishing with one of the best records in franchise history through the first two months of the regular season in 2021, the Lightning hit a wall in late March and early April, slumping to third place in the reconfigured Central Division by the end of the regular season. Tampa Bay defeated cross-state rival Florida in the First Round, winning two of three games on the road with the Panthers owning home-ice advantage as the higher seed and wrapping up the series in six games before dispatching Central champion Carolina in five games, taking all three games in Raleigh.
Video: Brayden Point, Anthony Cirelli | Media Day 6.27.21
The Lightning lost out on a bid to close out the New York Islanders in six games in the Semifinal Round, the Isles rallying from a two-goal deficit in Game 6 to win in overtime in the final game inside the Nassau Veterans Memorial Coliseum and force a winner-take-all Game 7 at AMALIE Arena on Friday.
The Bolts, haunted by their past playoff failures in similar situations and belief after exorcising those demons last season, played a nearly perfect game to defeat the Islanders 1-0 in Game 7 and become just the seventh defending champion in the last 30 years to advance to the Final.
"This group is super special, the way we came together," said Hedman, who paces all NHL defensemen this postseason for scoring. "The regular season was kind of up and down. It was a tough season playing against the same teams over and over again, but the closer we got to the playoffs, it felt like our game really came together. Then the playoffs started, and it was like we picked up where we left off last postseason. I think our game has gotten better and better. I think in the Finals, obviously you want to be at your best. We're super excited to be back and have another chance to win a Stanley Cup."
The Lightning went through the regular season too with a target on their backs as the defending champion. And they had to play it without Nikita Kucherov, who is the League's leading scorer this postseason and is attempting to become just the sixth player in the NHL's expansion era (since 1967-68) and first since Mario Lemieux in 1991 and 1992 to lead the playoffs in scoring in back-to-back years but had to sit out the regular season after offseason hip surgery.
"We tasted how it is to win a Stanley Cup, so we thought we had a great season without our best player," Lightning forward Ondrej Palat said. "I thought we did well. We just want to win again. We're just talking about it, how good of a feeling it is. I thought the season was good and we translated it into the playoffs. We're very hungry."
Video: Ondrej Palat, David Savard | SCF Media Day 6.27.21
Palat is one of seven players from the Lightning's 2015 Cup Final team that lost to the Chicago Blackhawks in six games along with Hedman, Stamkos, Kucherov, Alex Killorn, Tyler Johnson and Andrei Vasilevskiy. That team, much like the Montreal team that stands in the way of the Lightning this year, was an inexperienced group that wasn't expected to make it to the Cup Final and was just happy to be there in a lot of ways going up against a veteran Chicago group that would win its third Cup in six seasons after defeating the Bolts.
"Similar to Montreal, I don't think many people had us picked that year to the Cup Finals," Killorn said, recalling that 2015 Cup run. "I think we had a lot of young guys. Kuch might have been in his first or second season, but you know the group, you learn a lot through those moments. I think there's a lot of excitement when you first get to do it, but I think for us now, we've been in a lot of these series. We've lost. We've won in Eastern Conference Final Game 7s. And I think it's just going through that, you learn a ton, you learn how in series you've got to be even keel. You've got to realize that things aren't always going to go your way. This might happen. That might happen. In the end, it's a seven-game series, so you have to be able to withstand all of that, and I think the older you get, you might have more experience in those aspects."
That core seven, those holdovers from the 2015 team, have been through it all, the lows of Game 7 defeats in the 2016 and 2018 Eastern Conference Finals to Pittsburgh and Washington, respectively, teams that would go on to lift the Cup, missing the playoffs in 2017 when Stamkos was injured most of the season, the humiliating four-game sweep at the hands of the Columbus Blue Jackets following a regular season when they tied the NHL record for wins (62) and were the clear favorite to win it all.
And they were the pillars of the group that won it all last season, when they put those past playoff failures behind them, slaying the dragon that was the Blue Jackets in a First Round rematch, outwilling Columbus in a five-overtime Game 1 that remains one of the longest ever played in the NHL, bouncing the Boston Bruins and Islanders to get to the Cup Final then defeating the Stars to fulfill the promise of so many years prior coming up just short.
Video: Jon Cooper, Julien BriseBois | SCF Media Day 6.27.21
It's the confidence from that victory, but maybe more so the sting of those failures, that has gotten this group on the precipice of becoming one of the truly elite teams in NHL history, of achieving greatness.
Or, as Cooper has asked his team repeatedly throughout this season, "Do you want to be special?"
The Lightning have shown they do.
"Last year, It seemed like kind of a relief because we had been a couple times, a couple Eastern Conference Game 7s that we weren't able to get the job done," Killorn said. "And this year it seems like guys are just as hungry if not more hungry than we were last year.
"I know it's cliché to say when you win one you want to win another one, but it's really true."
The Link Lonk
June 28, 2021 at 06:45AM
https://www.nhl.com/lightning/news/fresh-memories-of-last-years-triumph-motivating-tampa-bay-lightning-to-repeat/c-325494230
Fresh memories of last year's triumph motivating Lightning to repeat - Official site of the Tampa Bay Lightning
https://news.google.com/search?q=fresh&hl=en-US&gl=US&ceid=US:en
