The last time there was a Stanley Cup Final featuring the same two teams as the previous year was 1984, when the veteran, four-time defending champion New York Islanders and bearded greats like Denis Potvin, Bill Smith and Clark Gillies faced off against the clean-shaven Edmonton Oilers led by Wayne Gretzky and Mark Messier. The only men on that Oiler team even capable of growing a beard may have been Glenn Anderson and Grant Fuhr. Youth was served in that series, as the Oilers ended the Isles' drive for five and began a dynasty of their own, with five Cups in seven years.

This year, the defending champion Detroit Red Wings, one win away from their fifth Cup in 12 years, are the hirsute veterans opposing the barely post-adolescent duo of Sidney Crosby and Evgeni Malkin, this generation's version of Gretzky and Messier. After the way the Red Wings played in Game 5, it's not a stretch to say a minor miracle would be required for Sid the Kid to do what Gretzky did.

But this isn't a column about who'll win the Cup. Well, it is, sort of. It's fitting that for a game played on ice, the winning team -- or for now, the team with the best chance to win -- is the group that looks best prepared to tackle the ice. With Yukon Cornelius.

Sure, we love to hate the Red Wings because of their persistent dominance (yes, we know, it's like rooting for the Yankees). But you have to respect the beards and the effort so many of the Wings have made to grow them. If more of the Penguins could be like Brooks Orpik and Bill Guerin, the situation might be reversed.

We leave it to you: Which Wing looks most like Yukon?

Johan Franzen


Kris Draper


Henrik Zetterberg


Daniel Cleary


Ty Conklin


Kirk Maltby


Just for the heck of it ... Marian Hossa or Boris Becker? Who's wearing #81?