The back to back years that resulted in Penguins-Red Wings finals.
Both series were snoozefests.
I think you'll find a lot of people loved the 2009 playoffs. Lots of enticing storylines there. 2008 was alright as well, the Philly/Washington series was pretty epic. Montreal vs. Boston again. Ah well.
I agree with others 2003 was one of those playoffs that epitomized why the clutch and grab era is history. 2004 was such a great playoff, so I don't get what happened there.
But 2003 had some terrible storylines. Anaheim/Minnesota resulted in a sweep with Minnesota scoring...........one goal. Really Jacques Lemaire? How in the world did this team beat a very good Vancouver team? Okay fine......Cloutier, but still.
Toronto/Philly was a very good series I'll admit though and I say this as a Leaf fan. I guess it just brings me back to the days when they were Cup contenders. But when Jersey beat Ottawa in Game 7 I immediately knew the final would be a snore. Jersey vs. Anaheim? Come on, at least Ottawa played a pretty high tempo offense back then.
Other years that come to mind are many of the mid 1990s years. 1995, 1996, 1997 and 1998 all had sweeps in the final with a grand total of two overtime games to boot combined. The Devils won, the Panthers made the final and robbed us of a classic Pitt/Col final. Lindros choked and was stomped all over in what should have been a classic final and Washington made the 1998 final basically because of the crease rule in the Boston series. Just poor overall playoff years with no enticing storylines and 1998 had only one 7 game series which resulted in a 4-0 Edmonton win.
I'll also nominate 1981. Probably the easiest path the Islanders had in their dynasty. They played Minnesota in the final and that whole playoff had a combined 8 overtime games. Yeah Gretzky had his coming out party but even that series against Montreal was incredibly one-sided.