After the first two periods, I already had a much different body written out in my head for this Afterwords.
The theme was going to revolve around how the Dallas Stars got the 4-0 win fans had expected after the first period of Game 1 (or at least a similar dominating score). How the national narrative of Game 1 — that the Colorado Avalanche are relentless, and can’t be stopped even when trailing deep — was going to be erased. The new narrative would be how the Stars had Colorado’s number, that they were able to consistently outgun them by a healthy margin save for an unfortunate, power play fueled collapse in Game 1.