THEY hugged and cried and grabbed each other's shoulders just to have something to hang onto, so wondrous and knee-weakening was the moment.
After dreaming of this day while they skated on frozen lakes and backyard rinks, after looking at the Stanley Cup longingly from afar, the Ducks claimed the glorious trophy as their own Wednesday with a 6-2 rout of the Ottawa Senators that ended the finals in a stunningly swift five games.
Like so many other hopeful souls who migrated to California to pursue their dreams, the Ducks toiled in obscurity for a decade.
A team that includes a farm boy from Saskatchewan, a stoic Swede, a Finn with an atypically happy nature, a sprinkling of Americans and more than a dozen sons of Canada came together on the common ground of frozen water to become the first California-based team to claim the most revered trophy in professional sports.
After hoisting the Cup above his head and affixing a loving smooch, team captain Scott Niedermayer passed it to his brother, Rob, to the roaring approval of the sellout crowd at the Honda Center. Rob, the muscular winger who lifted his game to new heights this spring, passed the Cup surely to Chris Pronger, who handed it off to Teemu Selanne, the popular winger who had waited 15 years for this and couldn't hold back a flood of tears.
It was the climax of an unlikely journey for the Ducks, who were born in 1993 amid the squawk of plastic duck calls and grimaces on the faces of horrified hockey traditionalists.
Launched as part of the National Hockey League's expansion beyond its roots in the Northeast and Midwest, the Ducks had only a few months to build a team and create an identity. They also had to compete with the L.A. Kings, who were part of the NHL's first major expansion in 1967 and had just completed their most successful season, which ended in a five-game loss to the Montreal Canadiens in the Stanley Cup finals.
Although the Ducks had a sparkling new arena in Anaheim and the backing of Disney's marketing genius, they were the second banana in a market that hadn't always shown it could support one banana.
In 1993, though, the Kings were at their peak. They had the game's greatest player, Wayne Gretzky, and a celebrity-studded following. The Ducks had a ragtag roster of castoffs and wannabes that included enforcer Stu "The Grim Reaper" Grimson and the enormously talented Paul Kariya, who became their first 50-goal scorer but had precious little support.
