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The National Hockey League playoffs began way back on April 8 with 16 teams dreaming of Cup glory.
The field has finally narrowed to two - the Detroit Red Wings and Pittsburgh Penguins - as the final series kicks off on Saturday.
Detroit, a veteran-driven franchise, is no stranger to the final, having won the Cup in 1997, 1998 and 2002 (and finishing as the runner-up in 1995 as well). In all, it's the Red Wings' fifth appearance in 13 years.
Pittsburgh hasn't made an appearance in the finals since winning its second consecutive Cup in 1992.
On Monday, following Detroit's Western Final-clinching win over Dallas, Globesports.com hockey columnist Eric Duhatschek wrote:
"In one corner, there are the Pittsburgh Penguins, champions of the Eastern Conference, the young frisky upstarts, closing in on a Stanley Cup championship in only Sidney Crosby's third NHL season.
"In the other corner, here come the Detroit Red Wings, the model of NHL stability, experienced, steady, making their fourth Stanley Cup final appearance of the past 11 years.
"It is a battle for the ages — the star power of the Penguins against the defensive efficiency of the Red Wings — and it is scheduled to begin on Saturday in Detroit."
During the break between the conference finals and Game 1 on Saturday, the spotlight has been dominated by Pittsburgh's dynamic duo of Evgeni Malkin and Crosby. The latter has the chance to further cement his status as the league's biggest star with a big performance in the coming days. As Globesports.com's Tim Wharnsby notes:
"Wayne Gretzky needed four NHL seasons. Mario Lemieux required seven. But Sidney Crosby was swifter than both No. 99 and No. 66. The Pittsburgh Penguins' sensational 20-year-old captain has steered his team to a Stanley Cup final in only his third season.
But Detroit's defence is a formidable one, and will certainly make stopping Crosby and his high-flying teammates a top priority.
On Wednesday, Duhatschek and Hall of Famer Scotty Bowman discussed the potential importance of defensive play on the series. Duhatschek wrote:
"As much as the focus in the Stanley Cup final will be on the scorers — Crosby and Evgeni Malkin on the one side, Pavel Datsyuk and Henrik Zetterberg on the other — Bowman believes championships are ultimately won with defence. Even the most precocious offensive teams of all time — his Penguins, the Oilers of the 1980s — eventually learned to batten down the hatches in the playoffs."
It's a series filled with great storylines, like the revival of hockey in Pittsburgh, the continued excellence of Detroit's 46-year-old star Chris Chelios and the emergence of Pittsburgh's young, unseasoned stars as steady playoff performers.
Duhatschek has gone 11-3 in picking playoff series this spring. On Wednesday, he went out on a limb and picked Detroit to win the Cup in six games.
Who do you like? What storylines catch your interest?
Duhatschek was on-line Friday from Detroit to answer questions on the Cup final.
Join the discussion by submitting your question here.
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Dave Leeder, Sports Editor, globesports.com writes: Hi Eric and thanks for joining us today. In today's Globe and Mail, your colleague William Houston writes:
"Neither the appeal of Pittsburgh's Sidney Crosby nor the attraction of Detroit, the best team in the NHL's regular season, was enough to excite many U.S. newspapers.
Outside Pittsburgh and Detroit, only eight American dailies will staff the series from start to finish.
Representation by Canadian newspapers will be just as slim. Outside Toronto, the Vancouver Sun and Vancouver Province are the only major dailies sending reporters to the final, which will start tomorrow night.
That's a big change from 20 years ago, when almost every major paper in an NHL city covered the event."
Have you noticed such a different? Is it different to cover a Stanley Cup in Detroit than a less-traditional hockey market, like Tampa or Anaheim? Is there a buzz in the Motor City?
Eric Duhatschek writes: Dave, there's no question that covering a Stanley Cup final in 2008 is a vastly different experience than it was in say, 1985, but I'd say it's mostly because of the evolving technologies and more precisely, the presence of so many different television networks.
