After all the board-shaking wreckage … after all the high-speed hits … after all the loud collisions and cross-ice cursing, a night of noise came down to Tampa Bay’s Brayden Point skating in, quietly and alone, on Florida Panthers goalie Sergei Bobrovsky.
He made a feint. A slide to the backhand. And then a Sunday night of big moments came to this final one, a stealth shot between Bobrovsky’s legs with just over a minute to play.
That’s what we’ve missed for so much of 25 years. That’s the kind of non-stop nastiness and all-out adrenaline rush you can’t appreciate until you’re in the middle of.