The Penguins and Red Wings battling for the Stanley Cup is exactly what the NHL needs.
It's hard to remember the last time the National Hockey League had a "dream" matchup.
Last year's Ottawa vs. Anaheim final was interesting to fans in those two regions, but it barely registered a pulse in the rest of the hockey world and was an almost nonexistent event in terms of media recognition in the United States.
Edmonton vs. Carolina in 2006: aside from another Canadian dream being dashed, that final was also an event of little interest. Then of course there was the lockout year (enjoying those lower ticket prices?); Calgary vs. Tampa Bay in 2004 (again a regional interest event); the dead puck era - New Jersey vs. fill-in-the-blank; the occasional mismatch (Detroit vs. Carolina, Detroit vs. Washington) or a you-can't score series (Buffalo vs. Dallas); all and all, assorted mismatches, one-sided affairs, small-market matches and the like.
There was a spark of this-is-interesting sentiment when the Red Wings of the Scott Bowman era matched up with what many thought was the long-awaited arrival of Eric Lindros' Philadelphia Flyers in 1997, but that fizzled when the Flyers laid down for a four-game walkover in what became the kicking off point for Lindros eventually being booted from the City of Brotherly Love in one of the longest and ugliest partings in league history.
Which brings us all the way back to 1994 when the New York Rangers battled the tenacious Vancouver Canucks through seven games at a time when the NHL was thought to be on the rise vs. NBA and within the company of other major sports leagues.
Detroit vs. Pittsburgh, the matchup that kicks off the 2008 Stanley Cup final this Saturday in Detroit, has that kind of cache.
It's not just that it features many of the best young and old players in the game. That matters and so does the entertainment value of two teams that skate well and score goals in an entertaining fashion. But what's good for the NHL and best for fan interest in markets that don't usually care about hockey is that the league appears to have brought forth what people expect in a championship series: great players playing for what most everyone in and outside of hockey regard as the two best teams.
To have that happen now, when the league has finally refined its game to the point where change, mostly change for the better, appears to have taken hold, may well be a game-saving event for the NHL.
Coming out of the lockout, the league promised change and it delivered. Certainly it came in starts and stops and fits of halting progress, but over the past few seasons the game has improved to the point where good and great players make good and great plays largely unencumbered by the hooking and holding that for so long choked off individual ability. The league has, to a point, also reined in the individual obstruction and the collective deterrents that allowed trapping teams to dominate play. There is still a lot of trapping and defensive-minded coaches doing their best to keep that "tradition" alive, but the plus in having Detroit and Pittsburgh in the final is that they are two teams with enough talent and ability to overcome it.
Detroit plays a defensive-minded game with all players buying in, but not at the expense of everything else. The Wings have structured the bulk of their defensive mindset not on just clearing the puck, but by getting the puck and keeping it. They play a puck possession game that while not geared to all-out reckless attacking every time the puck is on a Detroit player's stick, is centred on holding on to it until they can get it into the attacking zone and then moving it around with skill and expertise until they create a good scoring chance.
Certainly that works better when players like Pavel Datsyuk or Henrik Zetterberg or Johan Franzen have control, but it also works when a Tomas Holmstrom is creating havoc in front of the opposing goalie and anyone from fourth liners to their superb playmaking defencemen are bombing away from the points.
Pittsburgh is even more dynamic with an arsenal of scoring and playmaking talent in the form of Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin, Marian Hossa, Jordan Staal, Ryan Malone and others. The Penguins, too, like to play a puck possession game, but when they don't have the puck they do play a disciplined defensive game in support of goaltender Marc-Andre Fleury and a defensive corps that while perhaps not as seasoned as Detroit's, still manages to both shut down other team's big scoring threats and make the smart and aggressive plays needed to enable the more offensive-minded players to go on the attack.
Both teams can play the "get it deep, take it to the net" game favoured by hockey old school types who simply don't know any other way, but they also can score off the rush, are excellent in transition and have the kind of creative minds and especially creative power plays, to excel at the "wow factor"; the kind of play and plays that attract not just seasoned hockey fans, but the so-called crossover fans who might be inclined to tune in because it's a championship series and stay because they are so thoroughly entertained.
How many fans is yet to be determined, but the NHL has to be hopeful.
It's expected that most of Canada will watch. True there is no Canadian-based team in the final and that will put off some, but Detroit has built a following off its long run of successes and is geographically close enough to be thought of by some (especially those in Southwestern Ontario) as Canada's seventh team.
In the States, well, the league and its television partners NBC and Versus have given Americans a steady diet of Crosby and the Penguins. Sure it was a gimmick when they staged the latest outdoor game in Buffalo and that brought in a lot of eyeballs because it was, well, outdoors.
But it was no accident that the league brought in Crosby and the Penguins as the Sabres' opponent and they didn't disappoint, especially with Crosby scoring the game-winner in a shootout. That created a buzz for the NHL and they have fed it and fed off it, moving the Penguins to the front of the exposure line. That they didn't disappoint through a series of Sunday appearances on NBC and a stunning run through Ottawa, big-market New York and big-market Philadelphia in the playoffs is an NHL marketing person's dream.
Crosby isn't Wayne Gretzky and comparisons to the Great One are unfair even if Gretzky started them by hyping The Next One back when Sid was in junior, but the package that is the complete Sidney Crosby has arrived and certainly doesn't disappoint. At the still tender age of 20, Crosby is not only the new face of hockey in the U.S, but he is also its spokesman, its focal point and its most complete package in terms of not only having talent on loan from God, but a willingness to play the role as the face and voice of the game.
Crosby is as charismatic as he is good and that's a trait and a burden that no player has truly embraced since Gretzky.
For all his greatness, talent and winning leadership on and off the ice, it's a role that Steve Yzerman never embraced, Mark Messier never completely mastered, Mario Lemieux wanted no part of and no one on the New Jersey Devils was even allowed to contemplate.
That Crosby does and that he brings all that AND a good and entertaining team to a Cup final matchup against a Red Wings team with its own well-recognized talents, history of success and bevy of international stars worth watching (did we mention the all-world talents of defenceman Nicklas Lidstrom?) to this most important stage is a wondrous thing.
That the NHL has finally figured out how to create such a stage, well, one could argue that it doesn't get any better than this; a design that is anything but an accident.
In fact, it is the stuff of which hockey dreams are made.