The first Stanley Cup final match between the Tampa Bay Lightning and the Dallas Stars will take place on the night of September 19-20 Moscow time.
Usually at this time, teams hold training camps and prepare for the next season, rather than completing the previous one.
But this year, all plans were confused by the coronavirus pandemic.
Nevertheless, it will still be possible to play the main trophy of the National Hockey League (NHL).
The current playoff final will be the southernmost in history.
Florida and Texas did not have their own professional hockey clubs until 1993, but have already won the Stanley Cup once.
Dallas did it in 1999, and Tampa did it five years later.
Since then, both teams have reached the decisive stage, but have not achieved success.
Apart from the geographical factor, this confrontation will be unique for a number of reasons.
For the first time in the history of the final round of the playoffs, head coaches, who in the recent past stood on the same side of the barricades, will lead their teams into battle.
Tampa mentor John Cooper and Dallas colleague Rick Bowness worked together at the Lightning for five years and fought the Chicago Blackhawks in the 2015 Stanley Cup Final.
In 2018, the coaches parted ways - Cooper continued to build a superclub in Florida, and Bowness entered the headquarters of the Texas team.
At the end of 2019, the specialist temporarily took over the leadership of Dallas.
Prior to that, Bowness had only been an assistant for 15 years.
Now he is the oldest head coach in the NHL and a participant in the Stanley Cup final.
The current series will be especially interesting for Russian fans.
For the first time since 2000, six Russian hockey players, equally representing both clubs, reached the decisive stage of the playoffs.
Nikita Kucherov, Andrei Vasilevsky and Mikhail Sergachev can win the trophy as part of Tampa.
Alexander Radulov, Anton Khudobin and Denis Guryanov will play for Dallas.
All six of them have never won the Stanley Cup yet, so the list of 31 Russian hockey players who won the trophy in past years will definitely add three names.
The fact that both teams have Russian goalkeepers makes this year's final even more unusual.
Although the NHL has always had a lot of goalkeepers from Russia, they rarely fought for the trophy directly.
Only Nikolai Khabibullin, who won the Stanley Cup with Tampa in 2004, and Vasilevsky, who came on as a substitute in 2015, succeeded in this.
Even such eminent goalkeepers as Evgeny Nabokov, Ilya Bryzgalov and Sergey Bobrovsky could not play in the final.
Yet Khudobin had that chance when he joined the Boston Bruins in 2011.
But then he remained in reserve and watched from the outside as his club won the Stanley Cup, but he himself did not become its formal owner.
This season, the situation could repeat itself, but Ben Bishop's illness made Khudobin the main goalkeeper for Dallas.
The Russian took this chance of his life perfectly, and now he is waiting for a meeting with Vasilevsky.
“It's great, of course, that two Russian goalkeepers will play in the final.
In general, six of our guys will play in the final.
This is great too.
Do I know Andrey?
Of course I know.
We talked with him at the World Championships.
Are we friends?
Not really.
And here, in the "bubble", they have not crossed yet.
His style of play ... This is a very technical, fast, agile, tall goalkeeper who moves well on skates and shin guards, reads the game.
A good goalkeeper.
There will be an interesting series, ”Khudobin said before the first match.
At the start of the Stanley Cup final, Kucherov is in the lead in the list of scorers.
In 19 games, he scored 26 (6 goals + 20 assists) points, while the most productive hockey player "Dallas" Miro Heiskanen - four points less (5 + 17) and two more games played.
The Russian also boasts a +15 utility, which is second only to his teammate Hedman (+19).
It should be noted that Viktor, along with Nikita and Andrei Vasilevsky, are considered one of the main contenders for the title of Most Valuable Player (MVP) in the playoffs.
Kucherov's performance could grow even stronger if his troika with Brandon Point and Stephen Stamkos is revived.
Both have faced injuries this year, but if Point missed only a few playoff games because of them, the Tampa captain has not been on the ice since 25 February.
Recently, Stamkos has been training with partners, and his chances of performing are already assessed as quite realistic.
But he will still miss the first game, and instead Ondřej Palat will most likely come out again.
Dallas has no staffing problems, and several field hockey players, including both Russians, can boast of brilliant game statistics.
Radulov has already scored four winning goals in the playoffs.
His streak has now spanned three games in a row, and his bond with Jamie Benn instills fear in opponents.
The Canadian has already scored 18 (8 + 10) points and is ranked 12th in the sniper list.
Guryanov can even become the best sniper in the Stanley Cup.
He already has nine goals and is second only to Bo Horwat of the Vancouver Canucks.
However, the Canadian will no longer be able to replenish his track record, which is why Point and Hedman, as well as his Starz partner Joe Pavelski, become Denis's main opponents.
At the same time, the Russian knows firsthand what it means to take on the role of a leader at key moments.
Thus, in the final matches of the series with the Calgary Flames, Colorado Avalanche and Vegas Golden Knights, he scored five goals and performed three assists.
Now the 23-year-old hockey player will have to prove his accuracy in the matches against the former teammate in the youth team Mikhail Sergachev, who will be very difficult to cope with.
The defender is indispensable at Tampa in both the majority and minority play.
On average, he performs 2.42 power moves per match and does not forget to sometimes connect to his team's attacks.
But the defensive qualities of Sergachev in the final will have to come to the fore, since in Dallas all links can attack, and danger can be expected from any player.