(by Bill Barnwell)
The idea of the role player's weight being much more important than it really is, particularly in the playoffs, is not limited to America alone. The hockey checking-line winger is normally considered a common appetizer; a mozzarella stick. Tasty -- but very replacable and something you don't want to overpay for. It's pretty hard to mess up a checking-line winger. Once the playoffs come around, the checking-line winger becomes caviar. Some people like it, I guess. The prototype for this type of player? Esa Tikkanen. Why do I remember him? Because he cost the Washington Capitals their only shot at a Stanley Cup.
Why do I care about the Washington Capitals? I'm not really sure. My best guess is that the first hockey game I attended, when I was probably three, was les Capitals facing the Islanders at the Nassau Coliseum. The Capitals presumably won, and I presumably fell in love with Rod Langway (who also deserves an FPotM) and Bengt Gustafasson (who is definitely getting the love soon). As a result, I've stuck with them ever since - even when I lived on Long Island and Dale Hunter decided that assaulting Pierre Turgeon was MANLY-MEATY~!. But I digress.
Tikkanen, when he started
his career with the fading Oilers dynasty in the eighties, was actually
a pretty decent scorer. Of course - he was playing with the best
offensive team in hockey history - so who really knows how good of a
scorer he was. Dave Concepcion had 84 RBIs one season, too. Once the
nineties hit, though, Tikkanen suddenly lost his scoring touch; he had
as many goals (13) in the 1989 playoffs as he had in any of his last
five NHL seasons. He switched organizations eight times in his final
seven seasons, not including his stay with Helsinki during the NHL
lockout. He essentially became a hired gun; a playoff pest. His job was
to be a nuisance to the other team's top line, shutting down their top
winger - not as valuable as, say, a Bobby Holik, but still important.
He'd also get in front of the net and chip in with the occasional goal
- he had nine in fifteen games for the 1997 Rangers. In 1998, he jumped
onto the ship of the Washington Capitals at the trading deadline.
Somehow, the '98 Capitals made it to the Stanley Cup Finals. If I remember correctly, they were the fifth seed in the Eastern Conference Playoffs, and the top four seeds were all eliminated in the first round. Yeah - that would do it. Riding the hot hand of Olaf Kolzig, and somehow defeating the in-his-peak Dominik Hasek (who won the Hart and Vezina Trophies that year and was preposterously good in the playoffs), the Capitals managed to make it to the finals despite having one scoring threat (Peter Bondra). I mean - Brian Bellows was on the first line and the Capitals had literally plucked him in mid-season from Berlin. They were, unfortunately, faced up against the Detroit Red Wings - who, I was strongly assured by every commentator on hockey, need only show up to sweep the Capitals.
The Capitals lost a close game 1 2-1. Game 2 saw the Capitals down 1-0 after the first period, along with the commentators (let's say Barry Melrose and John Saunders) professing their absolute unrequited love for the Wings and HOCKEYTOWN~!~!~!. Great googily moogily. The Capitals, unfortunately, decided to make a game of it. They scored three unanswered goals in the second period and Barry Melrose's mullet knew nothing about it. And then, Esa Tikkanen, who to this point had been an effective (if overrated) part of the Capitals team, ruined it all.
In the third period, the
Capitals were up 5-3. Tikkanen, through one means or another, earned
himself a clear path to goal against Chris Osgood. This was before
Chris Osgood became Shaun King and played so well that Detroit waved
him; this was merely Brad Johnson, to further the Buccaneers QB
analogy. In short, there's no reason Tikkanen couldn't have scored on
Osgood. Knowing this, Tikkanen deked Osgood out of his pads -- leaving
him with a wide open net to place the puck in.
Or not.
Tikkanen, somehow, shot the puck a foot wide. Detroit IMMEDIATELY took the puck to the other side of the rink and scored; turning what would've been a pretty unsurmountable 6-3 lead into a 5-4 game. Detroit naturally tied the game up a few minutes later, and Kris Draper scored in overtime to give the Wings a 6-5 victory. Ron Wilson, the Capitals coach, said after the game that "We had the win right on Esa Tikkanen's stick, for God's sakes." The Capitals never lead again in the series.
On a side note, my father
had managed to procure two tickets to game 3 of that series through
connections; day of the game, we drove down to Washington and went to
will call to find four waiting for us. This, obviously, left us with a
quandary - and these were good seats, too (four rows back behind Kolzig
in the Washington net). It eventually came down to us talking to a
scalper and two people wearing Capitals jerseys...with Tikkanen's name
on the back (that's a pretty impulsive purchase, considering Tikkanen
was getting traded so often and it was very likely he'd cease to be a
Capital in about a week). We sold to the scalper.
Detroit Free-Press Article on Game 2
Tikkanen SPEAKS! IN FINNISH! during a game