Major sports all have a “Cup”. Only one of them is a healing elixir for the tears of men.
The Stanley Cup is no more than a memento. It is symbolic of eleven months of hardship, pain and perseverance. The Stanley Cup is the only major professional sports championship that involves a team winning 16 games in the playoffs against the best teams in the world, and where each and every game has a potential to lead to a championship. To understand why it is so impossibly hard to win, it’s important to comprehend what the current game is like.
The Game is Faster, More Skilled and Gruelling
Modern-day hockey is almost unrecognisable from that of two decades ago. The “hack and slash” style of hockey that discouraged fans in the late-1990s and early 2000s was eradicated by rule changes which allowed the game to go faster and favoured skill and speed over physicality. In place of the NHL’s of old is the most athletic ever.
Defensemen such as Colorado Avalanche star Cale Makar are a new phenom altogether. They are not bulky bodies who stand on the blueline – they are attack-minded players who can check their shoulder whilst leading an attack, make a 360 metronome pass under full speed and be back in position to defend before the puck carriers get there. And forwards, such as Connor McDavid, that are moving far too fast for television cameras to follow. His skating when under pressure and full-speed acceleration through the neutral zone has changed the way that every NHLteam defends its zone.
What this means is most errors are no longer possible. The loss of a puck, at the wrong time, results in a full tilt two-on-one breakaway. Teams that cannot keep up with the elite not only lose the match but face a variety of different teams in each game in a series.
Culture and Identity Are Built in the Building
First class individual performance is necessary to win regular season games. Rookie draft pick gets a ring. The former is correlated with the latter but they are not equivalent, and sports teams that conflate them have a tendency to win a lot of games without winning a championship.
Atmosphere in the game on the big stage of the playoffs can be a weapon. When a stadium of 20,000 fans all rise in unison to support a penalty kill of their team in their NHL jerseys and create a soundwave that can be felt on the ice by the opposing team – it is a n advantage. Having the home ice advantage is not only an advantage in the schedule, it can be used as a psychological advantage in the playoffs.
Teams such as 2023 Vegas Golden Knights have proven this to be true. Their combination of exceptional goalkeeping, a talented and unselfish group of players and loudest home crowd in the league combined to win a Stanley Cup in their sixth year of business. This wasn’t by accident. It was the foundation.
Goaltending Decides Everything in April and Beyond
The most important person on a professional sports team in the playoffs might be the National Hockey League (NHL) goaltender. For example, an NHL team can shoot 35 shots in 50 minutes and still fall victim to the “something” that an opposing goalie gives to his team on a particular night.
There are any number of examples. Carolina Hurricanes goalie Cam Ward almost single-handedly led his team to victory in 2006. Tim Thomas had a point-blank save percentage of .940 for the entire 2011 playoffs – quite possibly the best individual series of any in history. And more recently, Tampa Bay Lightning netminder Andrei Vasilevskiy showed the world that world-class goaltending and skillful goaltending on a consistent basis is about the only certain advantage a team can have in the sport.
The stress is unfathomable Being in the crease stopping shots at 90-miles-per-hour while being a focal point for a fan base, an entire franchise and a group of some of the hardest working players that would do anything to play for the chance that is a mental toll no other team sport offers.
The Physical Cost of Sixteen Wins
There is heavy conversation of both teams’ training rooms in the build-up to the Stanley Cup Final – triage rooms – or even worse than that. The NHL playoffs are unique in the world of sports as an attritional contest. Guys play with a fractured rib, sprained ligament, fractured finger, divulgent, noncomplaining and often unknown to the public.
The entire regular season – a hundred and sixty-four game competition – is the preseason. The ‘real’ game starts in April when the mild symptoms of the transition from spring road trips to early summer heat can be ignored and when all of the remaining teams have been tested in a regular; the challenge this year is to survive four back-to-back series of best-of-seven games against equally tested and desperate opponents.
Players like third and fourth line grinders are a necessity in this situation. The willingness to play tough defensive minutes and win battles at the boards as well as being able to tire out opposing defensemen over the course of seven games may be more valuable than second line forwards’ points in the regular season. Teams are crowned more by their “show-and-go” forwards than their top-9 forwards.
Final Thoughts
It’s difficult to win the Stanley Cup because it requires all of the above. It takes the finest skating ability of an Olympian, the fastest reaction time of a trained surgeon, the stamina of someone who can perform under the most unforgiving conditions and the strength and fortitude to withstand two months of abuse without succumbing.
Other trophies are awarded to the best, or most talented team, over a short period or at the end of a single game. The Stanley Cup is given to the best all-around team, the deepest team and ultimately the toughest team over the course of a journey that tests the weaknesses of a team.
When the final horn blows and that 35-lb-silver cup is held high – when one is the very best – it is not just a sporting event that one witnesses. You are seeing the most difficult thing ever to do in sport. There is nothing else like it.
