Who will come away as the 2022 Stanley Cup winners? Will we see new Champions crowned, or a three-peat?
With the Stanley Cup Finals now set in stone, we're officially in for a treat. It's not often where you get to see arguably the two top teams in their respective conferences go head to head for the Cup. The Tampa Bay Lightning and Colorado Avalanche will battle for the greatest prize in hockey and the fans are the real winners either way. Tampa is looking for their third straight Stanley Cup and, if they win, they'll become a modern day dynasty. If you run through the NHL history books, not since the 1980s New York Islanders has any team won 3 straight Cups (the Isles won 4 in a row from 1980-1983). Meanwhile, the Avalanche are looking for their first Stanley Cup since 2001 and boast a pretty impressive lineup that includes the likes of Nathan MacKinnon, Mikko Rantanen and Cale Makar.
Both teams will match up well against one other since they have a lot of similarities with a skilled offense, shutdown defense, though the Bolts will have the edge in goaltending, without a doubt. We mentioned a few of the big guns in Colorado, but the Lightning counter with Steven Stamkos, Victor Headman, and Nikita Kucherov. Colorado defeated Tampa in both meetings this season but that means nothing since the playoffs are a whole different animal and the Bolts are the back-to-back Champs.
For Colorado, this will be their first real challenge in the playoffs since they essentially breezed through rounds 1 and 3, sweeping both the Nashville Predators and Edmonton Oilers, while they eliminated the St. Louis Blues in six games in round 2. As for the Lightning, they were taken to seven games against Toronto, dismantled the President Trophy winning Florida Panthers in a sweep of their own and eliminated the New York Rangers in six games.
This will be a hard-fought series and I can see it going six or seven games. As much as I would love to see the Colorado Avalanche dethrone the back-to-back Champions, I think Tampa's crop of veterans will show why they are the defending Champs for a reason and will remain the NHL's top dogs with their third consecutive Stanley Cup. They say that defense wins Championships. Well, on top of having one of the best D corps in the league, Tampa also has the number one defender in the world. Andrei Vasilevskiy. I don't like ANYONE'S chances of beating him 4 times in a 7 game series.
| POLL | ||
12 JUIN | 272 ANSWERS Who will come away as the 2022 Stanley Cup winners? Will we see new Champions crowned, or a three-peat? Who do you have in the Finals? | ||
| Tampa | 118 | 43.4 % |
| Colorado | 154 | 56.6 % |
| List of polls | ||
