BOSTON — The Stanley Cup was in the house, in a crate, which is exactly where it seemed as if it would stay until tomorrow night in Chicago as the clock tick-tick-ticked down on Game 6 with the Bruins leading by a goal.
But then the Cup came out of hiding in all its glory to be hoisted in the air by captain Jonathan Toews and all of the Blackhawks following the most stunning final minutes of one of the most stunning Finals in NHL history.
“I don’t even know what happened or who scored the goals, to tell you the truth,” a former Ranger named Michal Rozsival said after winning the Cup for the first time in his 12-year career. “First we were behind, then we were resting on the bench to prepare for overtime, and then suddenly we scored again.
“There was a little bit of chaos on the bench.”
To tell you the truth, there was a little bit of chaos around the Boston net when the Blackhawks scored twice from in front within 17 seconds at 18:44 and then at 19:01, first Bryan Bickell and then Dave Bolland, to overcome the 2-1 lead the Bruins had achieved at 12:11 when Milan Lucic scored.
The series that began with triple overtime had ended improbably, if not impossibly with 3-2 Chicago inscribed in history the way the Blackhawks’ names will be inscribed onto the Cup. The Blackhawks had walked the high wire to complete a wire-to-wire act in which the club established its Manifest Destiny by going the first 24 games of the 48-game regular season without losing in regulation.
“The whole year, it was so special,” said Patrick Kane, who won the Conn Smythe Trophy after scoring seven goals in the final eight games of the tournament, including a pair in Game 5. “We were down 3-1 [in the conference semis] to Detroit, down 2-1 in this series and in the last couple of minutes …
“This team is unbelievable.”
The Blackhawks have won twice in four seasons in becoming the first team to win multiple Cups since the NHL re-opened for business in 2005-06 following Owners’ Lockout II. In 2010, they beat the Flyers by winning a Game 6 in Philadelphia on an overtime goal by Kane after the Flyers had tied the match with 3:59 to go in regulation.
“I told the guys [on Sunday] that there would be a lot of ups and downs in this game just like the one in Philly,” Kane said. “It looked like we were on our way to Chicago for Game 7, and now this.
“You can’t write this script.”
It was Emile Francis, the old Cat, who once observed that hockey is a slippery game for after all, it is played on ice.
Never was the sport more slippery than it was last night for the Bruins, who six weeks earlier had pulled off the most remarkable escape trick in NHL playoff history by scoring twice within 31 seconds in the final 1:22 of regulation to tie the Maple Leafs in Game 7 of the opening round before winning in OT.
One man’s — or one team’s — miracle is another’s stunned disbelief. See: Wilson, Mookie, Buckner, Bill and the Mets and the Red Sox for reference.
“It’s a bad feeling; bad, like an awful feeling,” said Johnny Boychuk, the Bruins defenseman who lost Bolland in front on the winner. “You can’t really describe it.
“As a player it’s probably one of the worst feelings you can get when you are up by a goal with 1:20 left and somehow you lose the game. It’s just like a total shock.”
It was seismic, this one that served as a culmination to a Blood ’n Guts series through which the hockey wasn’t always great and wasn’t always pretty but through which the competition was memorable and served the sport well.
Toews, who scored Chicago’s first goal before assisting on the Bickell one that tied it, played despite missing the third period of Game 5 in the aftermath of absorbing several blows to the head. Boston’s Patrice Bergeron, who missed the third period of Game 5, played last night with a broken rib, torn cartilage and a shoulder separation he sustained in Game 6.
Everyone but everyone was beaten up by the end that simply came out of nowhere and left Rozsival and his teammates champions of the NHL.
“Oh My God,” the defenseman said. “When I left New York I was at the bottom. Now I am at the top.”
It’s an upside-down world, all right, never more so than last night.