Tuesday, June 08, 2004

Ode to the Stanley Cup

last night, millions of Canadians watched as the dream of bringing "The Cup" home to Canada dissipated. alas, it is now eleven years and counting... fortunately, 15 out of the 25 listed roster players for tampa bay are Canadian, including a guy who had been in the record books for most games played without winning a championship, Dave Andreychuk.

one of the consolations in this Stanley Cup final is that, for the first time in ten years, a Canadian team was in the final to begin with (and taking it to seven games is definitely impressive...and now that i think of it, kind of ironic considering the Flames had missed the playoffs for 7 straight years before making it this far!). also, the teams that really drag down the NHL made it far: "snooze jersey" was eliminated early in the playoffs, and again, the new york rangers and their kajillion dollar payroll didn't even make the post-season. also, two teams i hate, detroit and philly, didn't advance to the final.

but i've gone on too much of a tangent here. what i really wanted to do in this post was pay homage to the greatest trophy in the world, Lord Stanley's Cup. as i watched CBC's coverage of the post-game ceremonies, i felt proud of our sport of hockey. in any other sport, the goal is to win the championship and get a ring. but the Stanley Cup is different. the dream is to kiss that trophy and hold it over your head with reverance, as though it's a god (well, it *is* a Lord!) in no other sport does each heroes visit his hometown WITH the trophy. and come to think of it, there are few sports in which hometown heroes exist anymore. though maybe this is a Canadian thing...across the country, it doesn't matter which team you root for, but you know which players are from your city/town, and your head swells with pride when they win the coveted Cup.

congratulations Tampa. you deserved it.

posted by leor @ 09:14 0 comments