Avalanche journey from inconsistent contender to Cup closer won them Game 6

The Colorado Avalanche are the 2022 Stanley Cup Champions. 

Let me type that again, just so that there’s no confusion… The Colorado Avalanche are the 2022 Stanley Cup Champions!

The Avalanche defeated the Tampa Bay Lightning 2-1 on Monday in a nail-biting thriller at Amalie Arena to clinch the franchise’s third Stanley Cup and its first since 2001. 

You all know that I’m going to give you the game breakdown that I always do after a game, it was an incredible hockey game after all and I’m going to finish this unbelievable run by doing what Jared Bednar talked about all season, sticking to the process.

First though, I want to take a second to talk about this team, and an unforgettable night in Tampa Bay. 

I came back to DNVR in November of 2021 with the idea being that I would be around the team on a daily basis, and truly get to know the ins and outs of what makes this group tick. 

From the first day, I could tell this year’s team was different from the ones in the past. I could tell that the past playoff failures had shaped them, motivated them, and brought a level of determination to the entire group that I had never seen up close before. 

It was clear, there was one goal, and nothing else mattered. After a slow start in the first 10 games, the Avalanche were, in my opinion, the best and most consistent team in the NHL. Night after night, week after week, month after month, just running opponents out of the building, and steadily putting distance between themselves and the rest of the Western Conference. 

The roster was littered with players putting up career-best numbers, NHL All-Stars, and a number of guys making their case for several individual awards. They never wanted to talk about that though. It was all about the ultimate prize. Sure, they would acknowledge these things, say it was nice to experience them, but would always come back to something along the lines of “that’s not the goal though.”

All of that other stuff was just fleeting, temporary pit stops on the long, grueling road to the Stanley Cup.

Think of it as a cross-country road trip, but one that has seen your car breakdown and give out three or four times already. Now you’ve got the car running may be better than it ever has, and while it’s cool to see some of the sites and landmarks in states that you’re passing through.. you don’t really have much interest in stopping to admire them because you just want to get where you’re going. 

That was how the Avalanche treated this whole season. Their ability to block out any outside noise was remarkable. Anytime we (the media) tried to ask them about past struggles, if they felt pressure to succeed, to a man they would almost always respond by saying, “that’s your guys’ narrative. We don’t look at it that way.”

It was honestly remarkable. Their outlook and approach was so measured, their focus was so narrow. I remember the answer Jared Bednar gave to a question after his team eliminated the St. Louis Blues in Round 2 of this year’s Stanley Cup Playoffs. He was asked if it was a relief to have the second round behind the after not being able to get past it three years in a row. 

“It’s not about the round,” Bednar said somewhat forcefully. “We were trying to beat the St. Louis Blues. We weren’t trying to beat the second round.”

You could tell that they genuinely weren’t concerned with what had happened in the past, all that mattered was what happened next and being prepared for whatever that was.

This brings us to the story of the night for Game 6. A lesser team may have been overwhelmed by the weight of the moment. Avalanche teams of the past even, may have been intimidated by the task of dethroning the back-to-back Cup Champions on the road.

Not this team though. After weathering the storm you knew was coming in the first period from a desperate Lightning team, the Avs took over and looked like the team that had been there before, unafraid of the moment. 

Cale Makar said after the Cup-clinching game that Game 5 against the St. Louis Blues was the turning point for them. They lost their focus for 10 minutes and it cost them. As it turns out, that heartbreaking loss was the last lesson this group needed to learn.  

“This is the moment,” Makar said of the way his team battled to bounce back after that loss to the Blues. “This is what’s going to make this team go, I feel like from then on, guys were so driven”.

It was that moment that I think prepared them for what they faced in Game 6 of the Stanley Cup Final.

With that, let’s talk about the game. 

The game started with two immediate shots from Nathan MacKinnon, and it looked like they were going to be able to jump on Tampa quickly. Then, less than 10 seconds later, Cale Makar took an interference penalty and the ice began to tilt heavily. 

The Avs were able to kill the penalty, but it gave the Lightning a lot of time to get settled into ether offense. Once the penalty ended, it was an onslaught in the Avs zone. Tampa was throwing pucks on from everywhere, winning races and battles, and was giving the Avs next to nothing. 

Eventually, a strong forecheck forced a turnover right in front of Darcy Kuemper and the puck landed right on Steven Stamkos’ stick. Typically when that happens, it’ll end up in the back of the net, and it did. It was a quick little forehand slipped five-hole. The building exploded, and the Bolts really upped the pressure. 

Colorado struggled to get into any kind of rhythm for more than 10 minutes and looked like they were just hanging on. Hang on they did for the rest of the first and managed to escape the opening frame down by just one. 

The second period got going, and the Avalanche definitely looked a little calmed down. They were able to get their speed going early on, and it paid off early. 

The Avs were able to draw a penalty less than 90 seconds in, and on the ensuing delayed penalty, it was a beautiful passing play by Gabe Landeskog and Bowen Byram to set up Nathan MacKinnon, and MacKinnon absolutely hammer it past Vasilevsky. The Avs were off and running. 

The rest of the second period was one of the best periods of hockey that you’ll ever see. Just two incredibly desperate, highly-skilled teams going head to head. It was a lot of back and forth with the teams tied, and it took somewhat of a broken play for either team to get an edge. 

About two minutes after the halfway mark of the period, the Avalanche got a 3-on-2 odd-man rush going up ice, and MacKinnon was originally the trigger-man. His shot from right in the slot was blocked, and the “rebound” kicked right out to Artturi Lehkonen, who wasted no time putting it on net. 

Lehkonen snapped his wrists as soon as the puck hit his blade, and the initial blocked shot looked like it made it hard for Vasilevsky to track as the puck beat him clean. It was Colorado’s first lead since they scored the opening goal of Game 3. 

I was impressed by Colorado’s pushback to this point. With the way the game got started, it looked like they could get run out of the building early. They were able to hang tough and kept the game close enough to get going with their style of play. 

Problem was, you looked up at the clock and had almost exactly half of a game left, and anybody who has watched this series knew you could just sit back and protect a one-goal lead.

The intensity ramped up after that goal, opening both sides. The Avs upped the pressure on the forecheck, and the Lightning picked up the physicality. Playoff hockey in every sense of the term. 

The Avs had a chance on the power play in the last few minutes of the period, but couldn’t cash in. The second period would end the way Lehkonen left it, with a one-goal lead for the Avs. 

I had a conversation with a member of what you would consider the “national” media during the intermission, and we were saying what an outstanding this series had been to that point. Every game, even the two “blowouts” were just fantastic hockey, and we knew we were in for even more of that in the third. 

The Lightning were going to empty the tank, and the Avalanche were going to have to match that energy and desperation. 

I had made a habit out of texting my mom during the intermissions during the Final, just to talk about the games and how they were going. I wrote to her saying that the Avs had played a much better second period, but would need to take it to another level if they were going to shutdown and eliminate the defending champs. 

“They will! I know it!” was her reply, and you know what? I believed her. 

They had come too far, worked too hard, fought through too much to let this lead and game slip away now, in this moment. 

The third period… what can you say? It was maybe the best period of hockey they had played all season. I’ll actually take it a step further and say it was the best period of hockey this team, with this core, has ever played. 

They were everywhere. Nobody lost an assignment, it felt like nobody lost a race or board battle. If you didn’t know the score, you would think it was the Avalanche who were desperately trying to stay alive. 

The Avs gave Tampa next to nothing, and the only good look the Bolts had was swallowed up by Darcy Kuemper, who was excellent in the game. 

It’s funny, in situations like this one it usually feels like the clock will never run out. But not in this game. I swear, every time I looked up five more minutes had run off. 

The clock kept winding down, and you kept waiting for the big push from Tampa Bay that just never came. 

It was with about 10 seconds left, that I knew they were going to hold on. The Avs had pinned the Lightning in their own zone, and there just wasn’t enough time for Tampa to get back up ice. 

Mikko Rantanen actually jumped off the bench in excitement with about five seconds left, and his teammates were frantically trying to keep him close enough so he wouldn’t be called for a “too many men” penalty (lol).

The clock hit 0.0 and suddenly the dream was a reality. The team poured off the bench and piled onto each other in the corner. All except for MacKinnon and Erik Johnson. Who embraced each other out near the blue line for probably 30 seconds before joining their teammates. 

It was an incredible scene and an incredible night that I’m positive we’ll spend several days and weeks talking about over the summer.

I mentioned it at the very beginning of the playoffs that the Tampa Bay Lightning were the best team in the league until someone proved otherwise. 

Well, the Colorado Avalanche proved otherwise, and now stand on top of the hockey mountain as Stanley Cup Champions.