TAMPA - Just about any coach or player to win a Stanley Cup will likely tell you that on the journey to a championship, the first round can often be the hardest round to win.
At the start of the playoffs, players are like kids in the back seat before the start of a cross-country road trip. They are full of energy, bouncing in their seats and ready to get the journey started with everything plotted out for every stop along the way.
Those first couple of hundred miles are full of wide-eyed excitement.
Now, imagine that car was a Lamborghini (hang with me here, I know it's not built for families)...
