Epic. Just simply epic.
That’s the only way to describe what we have witnessed in two games of this year’s Stanley Cup final.
Intense. Fast. Physical. Strategic.
It is a series that seems to have everything, every storyline that a championship series should have. It has all of that because it has the two best, the two healthiest teams in the post-season tournament. So here we are in the first week of June, with 30 teams already planning for the future and the Vegas Golden Knights and Carolina Hurricanes fighting for the title.
And with most of the league’s hockey operations groups in Buffalo at the combine, prepping for the draft, those teams on the outside watching just like us (like the Winnipeg Jets), have to be asking the same question: “How close are we to playing in the Stanley Cup final?”
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When it comes to comparing a team like the Jets with these two teams, what is it that these teams, hardened by a journey through three rounds of playoffs, have that Winnipeg doesn’t?
Is it goaltending? Nope. Connor Hellebuyck can match anything Vegas’s Carter Hart or Carolina’s Frederik Andersen have.
Star power? Nope. The Jets’ best players are every bit as good as what we’ve witnessed from the ‘Canes or the Knights.
But that might be where the comparisons become divergent. These teams are relentless, physically and emotionally. There are no shifts off. No lapses of concentration. There is an intensity in these games that few in the NHL can match.
And these teams are deeper. Logan Stankoven, Brett Howden, Eric Robinson, Nick Dowd. Every player to a man knows his role, and knows how and when to shine. It is a treat to watch.
As Carolina and Vegas move to the desert for games 3 and 4, teams like the Jets have to be wondering what it will take to be as complete as these two teams — and, just as important, how long it will take to be that good.
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