EDMONTON — The sounds and the silence of Game 7s walk through the halls of Rick Bowness’s memory like ghosts in a museum.
There was the soul-crushing silence of June 15, 2011, when as a Canucks assistant Bowness watched a Game 7 just get further and further away from the grasp of a Vancouver team that fully expected to win its first Stanley Cup.
They’d scored the most goals in the league that year, allowed the least, had the most points, and had left Vancouver a few days before with a 3-2 series lead. But somehow, the Canucks lost that Game 7 despite a lineup that was more than worthy of a parade.
“That stays with me,” the now Dallas Stars head coach says, a lifetime hockey man’s wry smile saying more than he is willing to verbalize.
Then, there was the time the Canucks beat Dallas in double overtime. Or that night in the old Boston Gardens when the Bruins closed out Buffalo.
“I remember the noise comin’ out of that place that night,” he said, smiling again. “There have been a lot of good, happy Game 7s, and there have been some devastating ones.”
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Friday night in Edmonton will be all about the baggage for the Colorado Avalanche and Dallas Stars, two teams that identically bowed out of last year’s playoffs in seven-game, second-round defeats. Colorado dropped its series to San Jose while the Stars lost to St. Louis, their second seven-game loss to the Blues in four years.
One team will shed its baggage, while the other will carry home a carousel-full from its opponent.
“Does tomorrow define the Colorado Avalanche organization? Maybe. Maybe not,” mused Avs defenceman Ian Cole. “If we win, it certainly would define the Colorado Avalanche organization.”
And if they lose?
“It’s important that we know where we are, and how important that game is,” Cole concluded. “Because it really, really matters.”
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It was dissimilar journeys that delivered these two clubs to this pressure-packed junction, Colorado having won Games 5 and 6 after falling behind 3-1, while the Stars faltered. Now they’re just trying not to choke away a series they had firmly in control.
“We put ourselves in a spot to play this Game 7, so we’ve got to look forward to it,” said Jamie Benn. “One game, winner take all. A really exciting time for our team.”
Yeah, must be … exciting. Gulp…
“Now that we’re here, it doesn’t matter,” argued Joe Pavelski, asked whether a Game 7 feels any different depending on how one arrives there. “In (Colorado’s) situation, they’re excited for it. We would have liked to close it out, but we’re here. We’re excited.
“Game 7s, they are special. As a kid growing up you think about them. As an adult, you lay in bed and you think about them, at times,” chuckled the former Shark, a leader on a San Jose team that could never quite reach its goal. “Coming into this (Stars) group this year, you understand some of the areas where they’ve been in the past. It’s not far off from where I’ve been.”
So there is both team baggage, and personal baggage that plays into a Game 7 like the one to be played in the Edmonton bubble at Rogers Place. Bowness has seen both, and knows exactly what he’ll be looking for from his roster.
“Getting by this, it’s hard,” he began. “Now, it’s up to the individual to rise to that challenge. To take their game to another level. To want to be on the ice, want to be a factor in the outcome of the game. Don’t shy away from it.
“It’s when you have to face yourself as a man, as a professional. ‘OK, I can handle this challenge. I want to be on the ice and be a difference-maker out there.’ That’s the approach we have to have.”
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You wonder about the Stars’ psyche. Whether Bowness will speak those exact words to his players, or does he think it doesn’t need to be said?
Dallas had this series in the bag, then watched Colorado claw back from the grave. The Stars’ history is not unlike the one Pavelski left behind in San Jose: playoff pool killers who have good regular seasons but find a way not to get the job done in the post-season.
“At times it’s human nature,” Pavelski said. “But being in enough of these situations — down or up — I’ve been on teams that handled them really well. Other teams haven’t.
“This group, we’ve been prepared, ready, And at times we haven’t had the right game. Or the right start. And you end up in a situation like this.”
A situation like this.
Hmmmm…
