Bruins Come Up Sevens To Win Stanley Cup

Image via WikipediaThe NHL's Stanley Cup goes to the Boston Bruins, who shut out the favored Vancouver Canucks 4-0 Wednesday night in Game 7 of the finals.  Brad Marchand and Patrice Bergeron scored two goals each, and goaltender Tim Thomas made 37 saves to ensure the victory.

The Bruins won their last Cup back in 1972, during the Phil Esposito-Bobby Orr era.  It also marks the second time the Canucks lost the Cup to an Original Six team that hadn't won in decades, with that one being the New York Rangers in 1994.

The Bruins are also the first team to win three Game Sevens to get to the Cup, having also defeated the Montreal Canadiens and Tampa Bay Lightning in earlier rounds to become Eastern Conference champions.

This has been one of the roughest Stanley Cup finals in recent memory, in ways that could only be appreciated by Mike Tyson and Evander Holyfield.  Besides the alleged biting incident in Game One, Nathan Horton of the Bruins and Mason Raymond of the Canucks were sent to the hospital because of devastating hits that laid them flat on the ice.  Both were up and around for the final game, but as spectators.

Until Game 7, the home team had won every game.  The Canucks won close games in Vancouver, while the Bruins enjoyed blowouts in Boston.  But this time the Bruins were one of the few teams to win a seventh game on the road, the last one being the Pittsburgh Penguins on Detroit's home ice two years ago.

Roberto Luongo of the Canucks was in goal for Team Canada when they won the men's hockey gold medal over the United States at the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics.  A year later, on the same Rogers Arena ice, Luongo had to settle for the silver.  His Bruins counterpart Tim Thomas got to dance around the rink with the Stanley Cup, as well as having his picture taken with NHL commissioner Gary Bettman as recipient of the Conn Smythe trophy for being the MVP of the playoffs.

No Canadian team has won the Stanley Cup since the Canadiens last did it in 1993.  With some fans  reacting in un-Canadian-like fashion by torching cars on the streets of Vancouver, the wait continues.  Wonder how Bostonians will react?

UPDATE:  A bit more on the post-game disturbances.  Canada's Globe and Mail reports that Vancouver police used tear gas to disperse the rioters, and that 140 had to be hospitalized.  The CBC's website says that the police arrested more than 100 people, and that the chief of police described the ones who started the trouble as "anarchists" and "criminals".  So not all Canucks fans were sore losers.  They just weren't fans at all.