The 2021-22 NHL Season is over now let’s look ahead to next year
By Jim Lynch
The NHL handed the Stanley Cup out to the Colorado Avalanche on Sunday night after the Avs beat the Tampa Bay Lightning in game six by a score of 2-1 to capture the Stanley Cup.
The Avs are now the champions. After back-to-back seasons of the Tampa Bay Lightning finishing the year on top, the Avalanche got things done finishing the 2022 playoffs with a record of 16-4, one of the best in league history.
The Tampa Bay Lightning gave it their all in the Stanley Cup Final, and getting back to the final definitely was no small feat considering some of the opponents they had to get through to get there.
The Lightning have been in this position before, losing in the Stanley Cup Final in 2015 to Chicago. They now have the same short summer as the Avs, only without the Stanley Cup.
Colorado has one heck of an offseason ahead of them. Their road to defending their championship is not going to be easy with 12 players on expiring contracts now looking for news deals. Some of those players include goaltender Darcy Kuemper and star forward Nazem Kadri.
Check out the moment the Avalanche were awarded the Stanley Cup last night:
The next big date fans need to look forward to is the NHL draft. The draft takes place on Thursday, July 7th and Friday, July 8th a little over two weeks away.
This is when teams are going to be looking to rebuild their rosters or make a few moves for next season. It really does feel like not a lot of time from now till then and that has to do with getting the league back on track to their normal schedule next season.
The Canadiens will be picking first overall in the draft and the Devils and Coyotes will be following them rounding out the top three picks in the draft.
There are plenty of free agents to keep an eye on going into this summer. To name a few, Johnny Gaudreau, Filip Forsberg and Claude Giroux are all expected to hit free agency.
The 2022 offseason is here and already I have myself counting down the days until the start of the next season on October 11, 2022. The countdown sits at 106 days.