Shank's Stanley Cup Wrapup

It's pretty much what you'd expect:

Feels like a lost opportunity as Bruins fall in Game 7

No one around here was ready for this.

A Boston team losing a championship game? Impossible.

But it happened. The Bruins were spanked, 4-1, on Garden ice in Game 7 of the Stanley Cup Final Wednesday. The St. Louis Blues won the first championship in their 52-year history. A Boston hockey season that started in September in Beijing ended in abject disappointment nine days before the start of summer. It was a stunning defeat in an era when we have become accustomed to only good things happening to Boston teams. And it feels like a lost opportunity.

Back On The Bruins Bandwagon

The Bruins won Game 6 of the 2019 Stanley Cup finals, 5-1 over the St. Louis Blues. Here's an outline of the Bruins discussion Shank will regurgitate on the radio tomorrow morning:

ST. LOUIS — Folks here were ready to knock down the Gateway Arch and party like it was 1999 — back in the days when they had a team that went on to win the town’s only Super Bowl.

The city that gave the world Stanley Musial was going to win its first Stanley Cup, and as many as 40,000 ticketless fans gathered outside the arena in anticipation of victory. The Cup was in the house, and the Blues were ready to claim it for the first time in their 52-year history.

The St. Louis Post-Dispatch didn’t even bother to wait. Sunday’s e-edition of the local journal delivered several messages of congratulations many hours before the start of Game 6. The premature puck elation included a letter from Blues chairman Tom Stillman, thanking fans for a “dream come true” and referencing how excited he was about the upcoming parade on Market Street.

You know the drill by now - standard (if brief) game recap, historical Game 7 numbers, etc.

False Expectations

Shaughnessy doesn't really get sports, does he?

Today he calls the Bruins a feel-good team on the level of the '67 Red Sox, the 1970 Bruins or 2001-02 Patriots.

For anyone who was watching, there's a big difference. The 1966 Red Sox finished 9th in the American League, 26 games behind the World Series winning Orioles. They has not been to the World Series since 1946 and were not expected to break that streak in 1967.

The 2000-01 Patriots finished 5-11 and in last place in the AFC East. They had missed the playoffs the year before as well, and had never won a Super Bowl.

The 1970 Bruins, on the other hand, were coming off one of the best seasons in club history, having set a franchise record 100 points and making it to the Eastern Division finals. They did not sneak up on anyone.

As for the 2011-12 Bruins, they won the Northeast Division with 102 points. They were the defending Stanley Cup Champions. They did not sneak up on anyone either.

The Red Sox and Patriots teams were utter surprises. The two Bruins teams are just doing what we expected them to do.

Look away.

Cold as Ice

Shaughnessy on hockey is like nails on a chalkboard, except nails do have their place in a classroom while The CHB has no business anywhere near anything with ice, except maybe a scotch glass.

All it took was one loss for Shank to roll out those tired tropes about bad bounces from-- get this -- 1990. Let's just forget that those Bruins were facing modern hockey's equivalent of the
'27 Yankees, while this year's edition won the Stanley Cup just two seasons ago.

And thank god the B's won in 2011, lest we be treated to a new CHB money grab: The Curse of the Zamboni.

The One Where Dan Goes to the Stanley Cup and Reports on a Baseball Game

It was a game about nothing.

That's the takeaway from The CHB's recap of Game 1 of the Stanley Cup. Comparisons abound to the Red Sox in 2004 and 2007, the Patriots-Bears Super Bowl in 1986 (when Mike Ditka was a coach!) and the 1918 World Series.

Oh yeah, and a Larry Bird mention. What more could we ask for in a column about hockey?

His Cup Runneth Over

The CHB thinks a Stanley Cup would be the ultimate response to the Boston Marathon bombings. This smacks of a future book.

Callous and calculating as ever, be His Shankness.