From February 15th to June of 2009 is as much fun as I have ever had as a sports fan of any sport. I'll never forget the cups in '91 and '92 or where I was watching the playoffs/finals of those years, but then the gut-wrenching end to '93 and '96 and other flameouts, disappointments, and dying alive. Many of us older fans weren't sure if we'd ever live to see another cup. Then, the lottery, the Geno, Gary Roberts, Ruutu, Laraque, Staal and Gonchar gave us so much entertainment and hope. I remember hitting refresh no less than 7,486 times on trade deadline day of 2008 and yelling, "We got Hossa! We got Hossa!" outside of school (I'm a teacher) at 3:05 to everybody around and nobody knew what a Hossa was (other than 1 or 2 kids).
But then the fall of '08 made us think it was a flash in the pan. These guys stink. They can't get out of their own way. How could they be that bad? Then Bylsma came in and with the structure of Therrien's system, while taking the reigns off the thoroughbreds, we go 18-3-4 in the final 25 games. Trade deadline of 2009 brought us a 'minor acquisition' of Bill Guerin for a conditional draft pick, and Chris Kunitz for Whitney, completely overhauling the first line.
Those playoffs were outstanding. First round, the Fratboy Flyers: Shhhhh! (Kunitz murders Timonen),
second round, beating the Caps is always entertaining, third round- Malkin's utter dominance over the Canes, and of course an epic seven game redemption against the Red Wings. (Handshake gate)
So much fun!