Colorado’s patience, how intangible assets challenge Tampa’s crimes unanswered

After years of success after the recent season, including five Stanley Cup pairs and five of the last six conference finals, Tampa Bay Lightning has transformed from Team Speed ​​& Skills to Team Intangible. From a high-flying attack team hunting down others, they have basically become a position-healthy defensive Jaguar note that they have told their enemies. .. “

And again, they didn’t.

Tampa Bay, annoyed as a team, stayed leisurely and patiently, even though the opponent seemed to be carrying it. They had the ultimate confidence in Andrei Vasilevsky, and his opponents were frustrated, open, and had to add one or two chances for Lightning to score and win. Like his prime minister, Tiger Woods, sometimes their reputation was forced to beat others.

Still, at some point, you must be able to launch some kind of attack to win the game. And as they got more injured, it became a bigger challenge. They didn’t have Briden points like Round 1. There, the Bolt team on the rope saw him go directly to the Maple Leafs crease and finish the rebound goal to maintain the hope of the cup. It obviously hurt them.

Beyond that, however, they couldn’t get a score of depth like in the last few years, and they simply couldn’t dial it in an attack, to an aggressively talented person. The Colorado Avalanche team remains as defensively rugged as they knew they needed to counter. This time, it became the reputation of Avs. Alex Killorn (19:16 TOI per game), Anthony Cirelli (19:16) and Brandon Hagel (14:21) played in all 23 Lightning playoff games, combining five goals. Kiron, who scored 25 goals in the regular season (and 8 goals in 19 playoff games last year), was blanked at zero. So many players only needed to pay attention to the details of defense and position play, and they were good at it. But it came at a cost.

I don’t think Tampa was attacking at the same depth as in the past. Because I remember that the Bolt team, who won the cup, scored a big goal from the third line of Yanny Gould, Blake Coleman and Berkeley Goodrow. The decisive difference: Colorado wasn’t Dallas, and they were certainly not Montreal, not even near. This year’s Lightning Deep Forces faced a chore that was very different from Coleman-Gourde-Goodrow. Avalanche was very well trained during this playoff and recognized the weaknesses of Tampa Bay. They were more devoted to the struggle because they didn’t have another offensive gear to kick it.

Colorado Avalanche stole the game plan from Tampa. It was to play smart and positional and kill your opponent. you, And you will have to go through each of our last. “

Whether or not he was “aggressive”, Avs scoring was hampered throughout the series, but he was happy to concede that he couldn’t create Tampa Bay. This is the most straightforward stats in the series and why I keep the finals sticking to the patience of the position. If Bolt sat down and Avs desperately opened and waited to make a mistake in this series, what they hurried off was:

A hot bowl with nothing.

Avalanche had more rush chances on average than Bolt in more than six Stanley Cup Finals games 6 per game (According to Sportlogiq). Six The extra rush chance was ultimately different.

The Stanley Cup winner is in a hurry and Arture Relay Konen makes an incredible off-hand one-time shot to find the top corner. Place the pack there again. But very like hockey, it’s not luck. Because they created enough chances to be so “lucky”. Making your own luck is why you love teams like Avs that create volume opportunities, as it’s always in the big picture of hockey.

Much has been said about Lightning injuries and the inability to stay in top of this final, but don’t pretend that Avs has reached its maximum capacity. Andre Brakovsky was injured, Valerie Nichushkin was injured, and in hell, Nazem Kadri had his trainer skate and play in the oven mitt (and won the OT winner). Sammy Girard was injured and couldn’t make it to the finals.

Even if injured, Avalanche played at a maturity that other Lightning opponents couldn’t. Colorado wanted to use Bolt well to open the series, Tampa went into full block mode, played low scores and relied on their experience and patience. In games 3, 4, 5, and 6, Avs scored 2, 3 (with overtime), 2, and 2 goals. But instead of starting cheats and stretching and opening up to produce more for the goalkeeper, they realized that in order for Tampa to win, they also needed to score.

Lightning deserves to be loved as a “team intangible” this year, and they certainly blocked great shots and proved to be warriors. But don’t lose those same Avs demonstrations.

It’s coaching, leadership, and playing (and sometimes losing) big enough games to make sure that forcing play and seizing opportunities can fill you in the postseason. You have to trust it to come, you have to trust the plan, and when an aggressively talented team reaches that point, they rarely beat It’s impossible.

This final was two teams that “never win”. As a result, I was happy to see the series. Avalanche took advantage of all the tough experience of the last few years to play his opponent Jack Squat at the moment of the season, losing only four playoffs.

Lightning was certainly a valuable enemy, but Avalanche deserves a champion.

What a Stanley Cup Final.