About 1 a.m. on Sunday, I wasn’t ready to go to sleep.
So what did I do? Like the sports guy I am, I turned on SportsCenter to catch up on the latest sports news. And what was right before my eyes?
The Carolina Hurricanes had lost a 3-2 double overtime thriller against the Tampa Bay Lightning earlier Saturday evening. But – more importantly – the Hurricanes also gained a point to move into first place in the Eastern Conference with one game left in the regular season.
The last time the Canes tasted the playoffs – their magical run to the Stanley Cup Finals in 2002 – I was a sophomore in high school. So, fittingly, I’m now a sophomore in college.
But, oh, the run of the Hurricanes four years ago was one among a few athletic events in 2002 that reminded me to expect the unexpected.
Also that year, the N.C. State men’s basketball team ended a 10-year NCAA Tournament drought, largely on the strength of seniors Anthony Grundy and Archie Miller and a five-man freshman class anchored by Julius Hodge and Ilian Evtimov.
Coming off a 13-16 campaign one year earlier, the team ran up a 23-11 overall record and a 9-7 ACC mark, good enough to tie for third in the conference.
The Wolfpack knocked off top-seeded Maryland in the ACC Semifinals, the Terrapins’ only loss in the last 20 games of its national championship season. Also, State came back to earn a 69-58 NCAA first round victory against Michigan State to end the Spartans’ hopes of reaching a fourth straight Final Four.
Another surprising athletic occurrence in 2002 took place when my sister’s soccer team reached its conference championship game two years after a winless season.
Certainly, it was not even the biggest surprise within its own city, but after such a quick turnaround, it was a big story at my small school.
But, by far, the most surprising development of all in 2002 was the run of the Canes. In Raleigh, far from a hockey city, the Hurricanes made believers of the skeptical basketball fans in the area.
After winning the Southeast Division, the Canes knocked out New Jersey, one of the top teams in the NHL, in the first round in six games. That opening round series against the Devils, which began in April, started a wave of momentum that wouldn’t stop until June.
Next up was another hard-fought six-game series, this one against Montreal and its immovable goalie, Jose Theodore. The Hurricanes found ways to score on Theodore, though, and prevailed to advance to the Eastern Conference Finals.
As the playoffs heated up, the Stanley Cup itself – the coveted world championship trophy – even made a visit to Raleigh’s Crabtree Valley Mall. Far from a hockey fan but definitely caught up in the Canes’ special run, I went to see it and get my picture taken with it.
It was a turning point – I had caught playoff fever for a sport I rarely watched during the regular season.
The Hurricanes outlasted Toronto in six games in the conference finals to punch their ticket to hockey’s biggest stage – the Stanley Cup Finals.
In the first game of the Finals in Detroit – aka “Hockeytown” – the Canes baffled the Red Wings and the Detroit Free Press by taking the first game. After all, the front page of the paper had mocked the Hurricanes in that day’s paper with a reference to “The Andy Griffith Show.”
The Canes would lose the next four games of the series – including a gut-wrenching triple-overtime loss in Game 3 at the RBC Center – but they had won the hearts of the Triangle.
After a two-year playoff absence and a one-year NHL strike, the Hurricanes are back in the mix. Only this time, they could be the favorite because they can clinch the top spot in the East with a win in Tuesday night’s regular season finale against the Buffalo Sabres.
Here’s hoping the playoff magic of 2002 returns four years later and that it lasts a couple weeks longer than it did in its last appearance.
Contact Clark at [email protected] or call him at 515-2411.
