Colorado Avalanche brace for Tampa Bay Lightning, knowing 'toughest round is still ahead of us'

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The Colorado Avs aspire to become the Bolts. The Avs are one win away from their first Stanley Cup win in 13 years.

The two-time defending champion Lightning beat the New York Rangers in the Eastern Conference finals on Saturday to advance to the Cup Final for the third year in a row. The Avs have been looking for excellence from the bay. If only they could dethrone the NHL's powerhouses.

To be the best you have to be able to beat the best. It's them. Everyone is trying to model after them. For the third year in a row, they made the Final. They have won two in a row. Every team is trying to stay relevant in all the conversations with the best teams in the league in order to prove that they are one.

Colorado has started groundwork there. In the Stanley Cup playoffs, the Avs are 12-2 so far, sweeping through the first round against Nashville and the Western Conference finals against the Eskimos. The Clarence Campbell Bowl was secured by Colorado on June 6, but they have not played since.

It was poetic to see the bay again. Colorado can measure itself against the club that has dominated their sport the past couple of years in the hopes that they'll be the next club to dominate.

"They're a really good team, but we're confident in ourselves as well." We have a good group of people. Getting to the Cup Final is difficult. We're looking forward to it. We need to play our best to beat them. We're looking forward to that challenge.

Colorado has not faced a team like the one in the playoffs. The Lightning are aggressive in boxing teams out around the net and have gotten great goaltending from Andrei Vasilevskiy. When Colorado took a 3-2 lead over New York, Bednar said his focus was on getting ready for the next opponent.

He told them to play to their identity. We have certain keys that we look at and try to accomplish in the offensive zone. We need to start with our skating. They're a deep team with a lot of commitment on the defensive side of the ball. It was great to see great goaltending. They are back where they were for a reason. The team is very difficult to beat. We will have to be prepared.

It's important to know how to win when it counts in the playoffs. Gabriel Landeskog, Colorado's captain, said that it's important for the Lightning to have that at this time of year.

Colorado is going to use its recent rest as a weapon. Nine days off between the end of the second-round sweep of Florida and the start of the first-round series against the New York Rangers made a noticeable difference. Between the first and second-round games, Colorado didn't have the same problem. The current eight-day break is not thought to be an issue by the Avs.

Landeskog said that they weren't using anything as an excuse. We are going to make sure we practice hard and rest up. We have a lot of that group. We're prepared for what we have to do. I think rest is beneficial.

The chance to win that long-coveted Cup is the most important thing to Colorado.

Landeskog said it was exciting to be one of the final two teams. The toughest round is yet to come. It's going to be fun to see what we can do as a group. Over the last six weeks or so, we have played some really good hockey, and we want to keep that going.