Jarome Iginla began as the golden boy of the playoffs, the skater the NHL was to ride all the way to the figurative bank. But it turned out to be Brad Richards—and not so much Iginla—whom fans will now remember as the face of the 2004 Stanley Cup. And just about nobody saw it coming.
For quite some time and in the collective eyes of much of the world, Richards has skated in the shadow of Tampa Bay teammate Vincent Lecavalier. The two are both centers. They are both 24—separated by just 11 days, in fact. They were both taken in the 1998 Entry Draft. Lecavalier was the top pick, though, deemed by many as the next Gretzky, while Richards went 64th, a third-rounder. Moreover, Lecavalier has not gone a year in Tampa without making headlines of some sort, as his temper and matinee-idol good looks have made him a consistent source of news.
The pair made the Lightning’s top three for regular season points in the 2002-2003 campaign when Lecavalier notched 78 and Richards 74. In last year’s playoffs, though, the two ranked fifth and sixth with six and five points, respectively, and Richards’ 0-5-5 performance was especially noticeable in light of the much-discussed raise in salary he managed to gain the following summer.
This season, though, Richards’ numbers left no doubt. Skating in every single game, the Canadian recorded 26 goals and 53 dishes, good enough for 79 points and third place on the Lightning. Lecavalier managed 66 points.
And Richards’ postseason only reinforced this arrival. He led his team with 26 points, 12 of them from goals. In Game 6, when Tampa faced elimination in Calgary, Richards netted both regulation goals and assisted on the game-winner in overtime, almost single-handedly carrying his team to a decisive Game 7 which the Lightning would ultimately win.
Richards’ Conn Smythe, then, came as little surprise. But though he remained the universal choice, it might not have been entirely unjust had the hardware gone to teammate Martin St. Louis. St. Louis won the Art Ross Trophy for regular season scoring as well as the Hart Trophy for the regular season MVP. He also scored the game-winning goal in Game 6, keeping Tampa in the finals. Sitting two points behind Richards with 24, he drew a penalty in the last five minutes of Game 7, one which ultimately quashed Calgary’s final push.
Goaltender Nickolai Khabibulin also came through for the Lightning when it counted most. After two carefree periods between the pipes in the final game, Khabibulin suddenly found himself facing a firestorm of Calgary shots, and he produced a highlight-reel of diving saves and split-second reflexes which preserved the 2-1 Lightning lead until the final buzzer.
It was the last of a series of dramatic spans throughout the finals. Lecavalier’s head was slammed into the glass. Ruslan Fedotekno, one of Tampa’s most potent scorers, suffered a face-first fall into the boards that gave way to a rectangular bruise, one which swelled upon his face and sidelined him for an entire game. And then there was the goal that wasn’t: the shot in Game 6 which would have won the Stanley Cup for Calgary—on home ice, no less—but which was ruled inconclusive and discounted.
Replays appeared to show the puck crossing the line before ricocheting off of Khabibulin’s pad and out of the goal, and the NHL officials saw those same replays. However, there remained the question of an optical illusion: did the puck really cross the line, or was it rotating in the air, thus only giving the appearance of crossing the line? The NHL could not be sure, and so the finals stretched on to another game, one which Calgary would lose. Flames fans are sure not to forget that play anytime soon, just as Baltimore Orioles fans still speak of Jeff Maier with tinges of hatred in their voices.
Goal or not, though, Tampa Bay now has a Stanley Cup to celebrate. It seems almost wrong, doesn’t it? You have to look back 12 seasons to find the last time a franchise north of the border won the Cup—which was, coincidentally, originally a Canadian “challenge cup” which was passed from team to Canadian team.
As the NHL nears an almost-certain lockout, everything within the League appears out of whack—the fact that the Cup will spend the year in Tampa is just another in a long line of peculiarities.
This year’s Stanley Cup finals proved exciting, though. The Lightning and the Flames were evenly matched almost every step of the way. The series inched along at 1-0, 1-1, 2-1, 2-2, 3-2, 3-3, until Tampa finally prevailed. It was a test of stalwart goalies and explosive offensive superstars, and as the games progressed, the television ratings increased incrementally. But even though more and more people watched, with the most tuning in for Game 7, the numbers were still meager. The NHL is still in trouble. And isn’t it a shame to have the Stanley Cup spend perhaps its last year in Florida?
Rebecca Seesel is currently a student at Harvard University and contributes to SportsFiends.com on a variety of sports. When not cramming for finals she is also a writer for the Harvard Crimson sports section.
