Unfathomable?
Thinking outside the Ox, 2021 can be the Year of the Nuggs/Avs.
Denver has a chance to set the remarkable record as the only city in North American sports history with NBA and NHL championship teams in the same season.
Wow is a factor.
Only eight times has a metropolitan area in the United States or Canada simultaneously sent franchises to the Stanley Cup finals and the NBA Finals.
Weirdly enough, this is only the eighth season in the 25 since the Avalanche joined the Nuggets in Colorado that the two teams have reached the postseason.
Hoops and pucks together forever. Titletown 2? Do you believe in phenomenon?
Could downtown Denver host the Major League All-Star Game, the Stanley Cup finals and the NBA Finals in July?
How about championship parades July 17 and 24?
The Avs are favored to win their third Stanley Cup title. They swept the Florida Panthers in 1996 and prevailed in the seventh game in 2001 over the former Colorado Rockies.
The championship odds for the recipients of the President’s Trophy are 9-2, just ahead of their fiercest rivals and future playoff opponents, the Golden Knights, at 11-2.
The Nuggets, not the preeminent preference in the NBA at 25-1, are eighth overall behind the Nets at 23-10, the two L.A. teams, the ye-gads Jazz, the 76ers, the Bucks and the Suns.
The Avalanche got all the respect, while the Nuggets get none despite the Bubbleblasters’ impressive run in 2020, the presence of the MVP and the opportunity to finish the regular season as the third seed Sunday.
Under the leadership of Tim Connelly and Joe Sakic and coaches Jared Bednar and Michael Malone, the Avalanche and Nuggets each have advanced to the postseason for the third straight season — with the hockey side losing in the second round the past two years and the basketball team falling in the second round in 1918-19 and the conference finals last season.
The teams possess the arsenal of talent that Kroenke & Son couldn’t accomplish with their Premier League club, and the Avalanche and the Nuggets aren’t trying to break away from the NHL and the NBA to form another league.
Thank goodness the regular season is over. Despite the evil billionaire quarrels of Altitude Sports and Comcast to prevent a majority of the hundreds of thousands of loyalists of the Nuggets and the Avalanche from seeing two special teams on local TV, all postseason games will be on real TV with quality network broadcasts.
So, how high can the Avs and the Nugs go?
After the Avalanche’s arrival from Quebec City in 1995, the teams weren’t concurrently in the playoffs, shockingly, until the 2003-2004 season. The Nuggets had suffered through an eight-year drought, then another dirt duration from 2013-2018.
The once-distinguished reputation of the Avalanche faded when the playoffs went missing from action for eight of 11 seasons (2006-2017).
Both are back at the big time and the same time — and could pull off The Dynamic Double Deed.
In 1957 and again in ’58 the Celtics and the Bruins became the first basketball-hockey combo from one city to make it to championship series. The Celtics beat the St. Louis Hawks the first year, lost to them the second. The Bruins were beaten back-to-back by the Montreal Canadiens’ dynasty.
The Knicks and the Rangers were next in 1972, but the New York City pair lost to the Lakers and the Bruins. Two years later the Celtics defeated the Bucks as the Flyers conquered the Bruins.
Michael Jordan’s Bulls of 1992 overwhelmed the Trailblazers, but the Blackhawks fell to the Penguins. In 1994 the Rangers and the Knicks came close to the double deal with the Rangers outlasting the Canucks, but the Knicks lost in seven to the Rockets.
And the most recent dual title threat was advanced by the Devils and the Nets of New Jersey in 2003. In the Finals the Devils won, the Nets lost.
This year the seven locales represented in the NBA and NHL playoffs are Miami, Boston, New York, Washington, Toronto, Charlotte and Denver.
The odds, in the Year of the Ox, on the Avalanche and the Nuggets, and the dreams teams have, accomplishing the feat are fathomable.
Get it on.
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