from Frank Seravalli of The Daily Faceoff,

Before the Colorado Avalanche kissed Lord Stanley’s freshly dented mug, before the champagne soaked their shirts, there was a quiet elevator ride from the press box to ice level at Amalie Arena for the disparate management groups of these two titans after a heavyweight slugfest.

There was no hooting and hollering, no backslapping, no hugging for Avalanche GM Joe Sakic and his team – definitely not in front of the competition, that isn’t in Sakic’s humble nature.

As the doors closed, Lightning GM Julien BriseBois turned to Sakic and said: “You’ve set the standard now.” Sakic thanked him, and without a blink, responded: “You showed us the way.”

It was a passing of the torch just minutes before the official passing of the Stanley Cup, to a new and worthy champion for the first time in three years. The Colorado Avalanche climbed the Stanley Cup summit for the first time since 2001 – and did so with one of the most dominant performances the hockey world has ever seen.

The Avs ran through the playoff gauntlet with a 16-4 record. Only one team since 1987, when all four rounds moved to best-of-seven, has captured the Cup with fewer than four losses: the 1988 Edmonton Oilers. That’s the type of company Colorado has kept.

In a sport so random and unpredictable, it’s so rare that a team lives up to the preseason hype and runs the table the way the Avalanche did in 2021-22. And to do it, they slayed the two-time defending champion Lightning in clinical fashion with a 2-1 win in Game 6 on Sunday night.

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