from Fluto Shinzawa of the Boston Globe,

This year, the Stanley Cup Final served two purposes. It confirmed that the Blackhawks are the best team in the league and the top organization following the 2004-05 lockout.

The six-game series also acted as a time machine. It gave observers a preview of the game of the future.

Size and strength will always play a part in the NHL. But hockey is moving rapidly, in all senses of the phrase, toward a speed game. The teams that skate the best give themselves the best chance to win.

Scouts, executives, and coaches will no longer discriminate against 5-foot-8-inch, 183-pound waterbugs such as Tyler Johnson, the postseason’s leading scorer. They’ll recognize that smart and mobile defensemen such as Duncan Keith play elite defense by spending as little time in their own end as possible and constantly moving the puck north.

This is what else they saw in the Final:

■ Get the puck out. No team retrieves the puck and shuttles it out of danger like Chicago. Before the defensemen chase it down, they’re already processing what to do with the puck. Their first move is almost always up and out — along the walls, off the glass, or up the middle. They prefer not to go D-to-D or hinge the puck back to their partners. This negates the efficiency of the opposing forecheck.

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