A few days ago, in the throes of dengue fever, a painkiller addiction and while being held hostage by terrorists, I wrote the following nonsense:

At some point, however, someone's will gets broken. At some point, someone says, "no mas." That point in time is at hand for the Carolina Hurricanes.

Before I came to that stunningly wrong conclusion, I wrote this:

What a crazy series this has been.

My analogy is a championship fight between two boxers. One smacks the other so hard, you want to hold a mirror over the poor guy's mouth, let alone hold a 10-count. But despite the shot, he somehow gets up off the canvas and finds it within himself to take the fight back to the other guy.

I was sort of half-right, which is appropriate when it's down to two teams. I was just wrong about which team would have the strongest will to win.

For the first few minutes, that was clearly the Carolina Hurricanes. They outhit the Oilers 18-7 in the first period -- which is supposed to be the Oilers' strength.

The Oilers were rattled and the 'Canes picked up a quick goal.

In the second period, Carolina got a power play goal -- something Edmonton never managed to accomplish all game, even squandering a two-man advantage at one point (read this posting for why this gives me a sense of deja vu all over again [sorry, Yogi]).

The score was 2-1, and remained so until Justin Williams potted an easy empty-netter for the 'Canes, making a final score of 3-1.

If your team can score a power play goal or two while shutting down your opposition, and the two teams are otherwise evenly matched, guess which team will win four times out of seven?

Carolina did just that, and so they are rightfully the Stanley Cup champions.

While it's going to be a painful summer for the Oil, keep your chins up, guys. You provided me with one of my best spring hockey fixes in years.