The Colorado Avalanche have won their first Stanley Cup Finals in 21 years, beating the Tampa Bay Lightning 4 games to 2. Tampa Bay had won the previous two Cups. Cale Makar was awarded the Conn Smythe Trophy for postseason MVP. Makar said, “We knew the job that we had to do. But we needed to just talk about staying mentally locked in and not looking too far ahead. It was (Andrew Cogliano) and (Gabriel Landeskog) and (Nathan MacKinnon) speaking and basically just calming the guys down and making sure that regardless of the outcome, just put it all out there and see where the game lies, and that’s kind of where our minds where at. I felt like throughout this whole game, our mentality was just win that period and win the next one, get the next shift and we were never looking too far ahead to the outcome – and we definitely feel like we earned that one.”
Personally, I am happy that the Lightning lost because I was getting sick of them winning all the Cups. I like the Avs a little bit, too. Cale Makar is a special talent, and I feel like he can become a star in this league. I think this is the start of something special for the Avalanche.
The Lightning scored first in Game 6, with Steven Stamkos scoring in the first period. It stayed 1-0 after the first period. In the second period, Nathan MacKinnon scored the tying goal for Colorado, and then a few minutes later, Artturi Lehkonen scored the Cup-winning goal.
Congratulations to the Colorado Avalanche! Will they repeat next year, or will a different team lift the Stanley Cup? We’ll see.
Source: ESPN.com’s Kristen Shilton’s ”Colorado Avalanche win first Stanley Cup since 2001 with Game 6 comeback;Cale Makar awarded Conn Smythe Trophy
