Related Resources • Setting up the final: Do the 'Canes have a chance? • The Stanley Cup Bunker

Dateline: May 31/02

"I walked by Patrick Roy this morning and he had those piercing eyes," says Greg Millen of Hockey Night in Canada, doing his bit to pump up the Roy legend as the first puck drops.

The Colorado goaltender's aura of invincibility is a favorite topic of hockey's chattering classes, and Roy's showdown with Dominik Hasek is one of many subplots ingrained in the biggest game of the year: game seven between the Colorado Avalanche and Detroit Red Wings. A better playoff scenario could not be scripted. Each team has invested millions of dollars and thousands of hours with precisely a night like this in mind. Detroit's Joe Louis Arena rings with edgy exuberance.

Within two minutes the Avalanche are caught sleepwalking: They lose a faceoff and confusion reigns. Steve Duchesne is left open at the point, Tomas Holmstrom moves freely to the slot and tips in Duchesne's shot.

The second goal is Roy's fault, as Sergei Federov blows a long one by him. Two goals on two Detroit shots: a stunning opener, but from the neutral fan's perspective not such a bad thing. Colorado needs goals, so now we should see some exciting wide-open hockey.

We do, but it's all at one end. Igor Larionov and Luc Robitaille - hardly the swiftest of Wings - are untouched as they finish a nice passing play. More dreadful Colorado defence helps Holmstrom score again.

Colorado has imploded. The game is 13 minutes old, and it is over.

At the first intermission, the analysts and experts are at a loss. For lack of anything better to say, they suggest that Colorado should focus on getting one goal.

A slightly more composed Avalanche team emerges for the second period, but the Red Wings score within minutes. Then their power play makes it 6-0. The defending champions don't need a goal. They need the clock to run out.

Is the winking television screen telling a lie? Is this the Colorado Avalanche? Is that Adam Foote, one of hockey's most reliable defensemen? Is that Joe Sakic, who could have been called the best player in the world after the Olympics? Where is Peter Forsberg, the unstoppable force of the 2002 playoffs?

And what of the goaltender? Roy's sloppy play in game six helped set up tonight's humiliation, but there were earlier signs of trouble. Roy has been ordinary in these playoffs, allowing too many weak goals. Like a cagey actor who forgets his lines, he managed to string it along for a while, finding his form at critical moments. But tonight the makeshift performance is unravelling terribly.

Roy is on the bench now, a faint smile (of denial?) on his lips as the crowd chants, "We want Roy! We want Roy!" His coach, Bob Hartley, has the glassy eyes of a man emerging from a car accident. Detroit's Brett Hull is interviewed during the second intermission. He can offer no insight. "I can't say that we're disappointed," he says.

The rest of the game is uneventful. Detroit scores again, but this no longer counts as an event. As the final seconds tick down, the crowd raises its pitch and fills the television, engulfing the listless spectacle on the ice. It is the biggest game seven blowout of the NHL's modern era (since 1967). Hasek has his fifth shutout of this playoff year, a new record. Impressive, though Don Rickles could have shut out the Avalanche tonight.

The game feels like a cheat. Colorado has robbed us of what might have been a Stanley Cup classic.

Scotty Bowman, Detroit's ageless coach, points to injuries as a possible explanation. "I've been on teams that were banged up and it's hard to compete," he says, perhaps recalling how his team died in last year's opening round with Steve Yzerman and Brendan Shanahan watching from the sidelines.

Others blame fatigue. Colorado coach Bob Hartley - who earlier in the series called fatigue an excuse for losers - employs the evening's most popular phrase: "The tank was empty."

But no one pretends to have the real answer. It is an unaccountable game. Yzerman looks more bewildered than happy as he gazes from behind a media room microphone. "We thought it would be a 1-0 game, or go into overtime, or be a 2-0 game," says the Red Wings' captain.

"We were still thinking after the first period, 'This isn't the way it's supposed to be.'"