I think the first thing that jumped out at me was the uncertainty of it all.
Nothing was ever quite secure for the Toronto Marlies this year, right down to the last few seconds. Being at Coca-Cola (then Ricoh) Coliseum for the two previous Calder Cup Finals, they were both reasonably foregone conclusions. 2012, the Marlies’ first trip, was one where they were hopeful but really had no shot in, broken down and injured against one of the best AHL rosters ever assembled in Norfolk. It was a quick sweep, with the final game basically settled by the second shift of the third period.
In 2018, Toronto felt like a team with years of unfinished business and infinite depth, and while the final went to seven games, the finale was one Toronto dominated from the first shift and had the goals to create breathing room even before they popped an exclamation point trio in the final four minutes. They had a couple of brushes with fate in its first and final rounds, but largely dominated its season, breezed through its middle set of games, and knew it was expected to win. Every line, every pair featured at least one player who either had been or was going to be a regular NHL player. They were inevitable.
This time? Tense until the end, especially given the Thursday night’s Game 4, where the building had shifted into preparation mode as the third period started only to have it’s bubble deflate early in the third period and outright collapse three minutes into overtime. On Friday, that feeling remained once again, as the closer wasn’t the 6-1 blowout we’d seen in either of those previous finals, but yet another game that went down to the wire.
How it all unfolded seemed to follow the theme that has followed this team a lot in the last couple of weeks. Setbacks taken, lessons learned, response given.
Two Chicago goals that sucked the life out of the Colaseum on Thursday? Happened again on Friday – this time as regulation’s openers rather than it’s closers – but the Marlies were better prepared to play their way out of it, only letting Chicago feel the comfort of insurance for about a minute and a half, and squaring up the contest in a little over five minutes of game time.
William Villeneuve made a game-changing mistake in overtime the night before? No matter, he’ll set up what ended up being the biggest goal of the season with three minutes to go in the second, whisking over a faceoff victory to Vinni Lettieri for a rocket of a one timer.
Chicago head coach Spiros Anastas suggests after Game 4 that they may have figured out Artur Akhyamov? No matter, the 24-year-old netminder was ready to put an exclamation point on his Jack A. Butterfield Trophy (Playoff MVP) bid on the second half of a back-to-back.
The Wolves clawed back within one before the start of the third? No matter, this time they were prepared to close, putting up a stifling effort for much of the third period and getting in the right spots to prevent Chicago’s final push from spilling over.
This was a group that went through the ups and downs throughout it’s regular season. They finished the season with as many losses as they had wins. They had their wildcard series and first two playoff rounds all go the distance. They faced a third-overall opponent in the Conference Finals who went 6-2 in their first two rounds and knocked them out on home ice. They closed out the year winning six of their final seven games and ten of their final thirteen a little over two months after losing five of six in the middle of a battle for playoff seeding. There were circumstances of hope going into the postseason, but not many of expectation.
Honestly speaking, when I made my reappearance at the rink in April, I figured I was getting a couple of games of practice in before a long summer of planning. It ended up being a two and a half month roller coaster that revealed a lot about a group I didn’t have the same familiarity with as the last time around.
Maybe that’s the defining characteristic that 2026 will have over 2018. The first group played like they were expected to win. This one played like they didn’t know they were expected to lose. There’s a distinction there, and it comes in the the rolling with the punches and punching back even harder, snowballing momentum along the way. Yesterday, those efforts got rewarded.
We’ll dive more into the exacts of the last few games and the playoffs at large over the coming days.
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