Colorado Avalanche will face Tampa Bay Lightning in Stanley Cup Final

DENVER (KDVR) — The Colorado Avalanche will face the Tampa Bay Lightning within the Stanley Cup Closing after the Bolts defeated the New York Rangers within the Jap Convention Closing to win the best-of-seven collection 4-2 Saturday night time.

The Lightning are the defending Stanley Cup champions of the final two years, beating the Montreal Canadiens final season and the Dallas Stars within the 2020 COVID season.

Nikita Kucherov led the Bolts within the postseason with 23 factors. Ondrej Palat and Steven Stamkos trailed behind with 16 and 15 factors, respectively. However Tampa has extra depth than simply these gamers, getting double-digit factors from defenseman Victor Hedman and 4 different gamers with greater than 5 factors.

If Brayden Level will get again within the lineup and Andrei Vasilevskiy stays on high of his sport, the Bolts are going to be a fair more durable crew to beat.

Tampa completed the common season in fifth place within the Jap Convention with the identical variety of factors because the Rangers.

They beat the Toronto Maple Leafs in seven video games within the first spherical of the Stanely Cup playoffs. The Presidents’ Trophy-winning Florida Panthers had been swept by the Lightning within the second spherical.

The Avalanche confronted the Lightning twice throughout the common season profitable each contests by one purpose. The primary assembly in October went to a six-round shootout with Cale Makar scoring the game-winner. The second matchup on Feb. 10 was a 3-2 win at Ball Enviornment.

Whereas the Avs swept the Nashville Predators within the first spherical and the Edmonton Oilers within the Western Convention Closing, the St. Louis Blues handed the crew their solely two Stanley Cup playoff losses.

It’s been 21 years for the reason that Avalanche gained the Cup when now common supervisor Joe Sakic was the captain.

The collection will start in Denver at Ball Enviornment since Colorado has a greater regular-season document than the Lightning. Recreation 1 is scheduled for six p.m. on Wednesday.

Full Stanley Cup Closing schedule

• Wednesday, June 15: Tampa Bay at Colorado
• Saturday, June 18: Tampa Bay at Colorado
• Monday, June 20: Colorado at Tampa Bay
• Wednesday, June 22: Colorado at Tampa Bay
• Friday, June 24: Tampa Bay at Colorado (if essential)
• Sunday, June 26: Colorado at Tampa Bay (if essential)
• Tuesday, June 28: Tampa Bay at Colorado (if essential)