The Lightning have done things we haven’t seen in decades with their run of Final Four and Cup Final appearances.
And that’s the beauty of all this - it’s subjective and open to debate. There are no black and white rules or official checklist to enter the hall of dynasties. It’s a very subtle but important difference. One could argue that Tampa Bay’s the best team of the cap era but it needs a third Cup to be the most accomplished. Otherwise Tampa Bay has an edge in every other category, whether it be Cup Final berths (they’re tied with Pittsburgh, but the Penguins needed a longer stretch of years), Final four appearances or regular-season points percentage. If you only value Stanley Cups and nothing else, then the Lightning still have to get their third championship to be crowned the best team of the salary cap era. Tampa Bay has made it to the conference finals, or Final Four, six times in the last eight years, which again, puts them in rare company.
This is more than just a three-year stretch of excellence for the Lightning though. That’s historic company to be in since those are two of the NHL’s most iconic dynasties. The only other time it’s happened since the 1980s was the legendary New York Islanders, who won four straight Cups, including five straight Finals appearances between 19. The last time it happened was Wayne Gretzky’s 1983-85 Edmonton Oilers. No team has made the Stanley Cup Final three times in a row in the last 36 years. What’s special about the Lightning is that they’ve followed up those consecutive titles with another Finals appearance. That may seem like a high number but it’s becoming an exceedingly rare accomplishment - four of those seven repeat winners happened between 19 - and Pittsburgh and Tampa Bay are the only teams to win back-to-back in the last 24 years. Including the Lightning, there’s been a repeat Stanley Cup winner seven times since 1979-80. That leaves out plenty of legendary dynasties from Original Six teams but that’s why we specified “modern dynasty” right from the start.įor starters, let’s contextualize Tampa Bay’s back-to-back titles. I’m only going to go as far back as 1979, the year the NHL took four teams from the WHA, as it’s much easier to have playoff success and win Cups when there are only 17 or fewer teams in the league compared to 32 now (31 in the case of when Tampa won). Let’s start by highlighting their postseason achievements and seeing how many other teams in the modern NHL have achieved similar heights. What we need is historical context to get a true sense of Tampa Bay’s dominance and whether it’s earned the dynasty label.
Tampa bay lightning roster 2014 full#
Tampa Bay has won 82 playoff games, the equivalent of a full regular season, since 2014-15 which is nearly double the next best team, the Pittsburgh Penguins. The postseason, of course, is where the Lightning start to blow everyone out of the water. 633 winning percentage, a difference of 34 standings points. After Washington, no other team is particularly close, Boston’s next with a. 660 mark (separated by just two standings points). For me, however, it should begin with being decisively better than any other team in your era.
How do we define a dynasty? It’s subjective. Win or lose, is that already enough for them to be crowned a modern dynasty? Let’s dive in. The Lightning have earned their third consecutive Stanley Cup Final berth and are hunting a rare three-peat. One lucky bounce in say basketball usually doesn’t make a huge difference since tons of baskets are scored - there are so many more events in a single NBA game that the impact of one flukey event isn’t nearly as large.Īll of that brings us to the Tampa Bay Lightning. One lucky bounce can have a massive influence on the outcome of a hockey game where both teams usually combine for less than 10 goals. Beyond the salary cap rules, hockey’s also the most susceptible of the four aforementioned sports to random variance.
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