First among equals

After 40 long years and, in the last decade, after watching every other major sports team in New England win championships, the Boston Bruins hoisted the Stanley Cup following a Game 7 victory over the Vancouver Canucks forever spoiling Boston fans and solidifying the city's place as the Sports City of the decade and a year.

It was an amazing run by the Black-and-Gold and, perhaps, might sit as the greatest of all of the recent Boston champions. Better than three Patriots win, better than the Celtics victory in 2008 and maybe even better than the Sox of '04 and '07.

I'm not trying to detract from any of the other six combined titles because they were are remarkable. But when you look at the Bruins, there seems to be that level of one-upsmenship over the other teams.

To begin let's look at how the Patriots compare. Of the three Superbowl championships the only one that comes close to comparing is the victory in 2001 in which the Pats were colossal underdogs throughout the playoffs and especially in the Superbowl against the defending champion Rams. Like the Bruins the Patriots had several relatively unknown players and no one at the time would have known that Tom Brady would become the MVP he has. Both teams were also pushed to the brink with the Bruins twice going down two games to none just as the Patriots had to engineer a game winning drive.

Despite the similarities the Bruins get the nod here because of the Pats, as I recall, didn't lose an emotional and physical leader like the Bruins did with Nathan Horton.

The remainder of the Patriots titles, as great as they were, I don't think anyone saw them as the underdogs the Bruins were.

Next let's look at the Celtics. I don't think anyone expected the Celtics in 2008 to lose the finals with a healthy Big-3 and the beginning of the emergence of Rajon Rondo. No one expected the Bruins to win beginning this season. And even at the start of the playoffs, after the nightmare of last year fans were absolutely hesitant to hitch to the Bruins wagon.

Like the Celtics and the second two Patriot titles, I don't think anyone expected the 2007 Red Sox to lose. They were clearly the best team in baseball that year and it showed throughout the season. Perhaps though the closest competitor was the 2004 Red Sox.

It was a year that no one expected to happen and especially after going down 3-0 to the Yankees, fans were ready for the seemingly inevitable, another year of heartbreak. Yet the Sox responded to the adversity, rallied around each other and responded by overcoming their 86-year-old demons. Likewise the Bruins responded to adversity, coming back from two-down to both Montreal and Vancouver, rallying around each other in reasons to Horton's injury and winning three game-sevens in the postseason, a first in the NHL.

So where do the Bruins get the edge? It comes down to the finals. After the Sox took down the Yankees, I'm sorry St. Louis, but there was no way the Sox weren't going to win. Lifting the weight of the Babe energized the Sox to the point that the '04 World Series was a mismatch to end all mismatches. Meanwhile the Bruins victory was not a foregone conclusion and they had to band together one more time against a team who most people thought would beat them.

So that's my case and my evidence as to why this Championship will rank first among all of the championships we've gotten to enjoy. At the end of the day though whether you agree or disagree, one thing is certain, Boston's revitalized love-affair with its sports teams just got another joyous boost and the honeymoon shows no signs of letting up soon.