Prevailing in a tough series, the Belfast Giants are now celebrating their fourth EURO Cup in six seasons. The home team won every game of the Finals Series and three of the games were one-goal wins, including Game 7, when Erik Karlsson tallied on a powerplay in the second period to give the Giants a 3-2 lead. The Berlin Smurfs, playing without their leading scorer Ryan Nugent-Hopkins spent the next 23:26 scratching and clawing for a game-tying goal, but Belfast played strong defense in front of goalie Jonathan Quick and the final horn sounded with Karlsson’s goal standing up as the winner.

Belfast and GM Chris Patton continue to play “beat the salary cap” successfully. In each of their four championship seasons, their lineups featured stars at the top and young talent with low salaries sprinkled in on the lower lines and defense pairs.  In the off season, when player agents demand more money, the younger stars graduate to key roles and Patton trades away talent for what he feels are the missing pieces to his puzzle. He has been right more than anyone else in the game has.

One would have to think the asset well will dry up soon. When he was loading up for Season 8, Patton shipped out veteran James Neal, promising prospects Robert Thomas and Michael Dal Colle, two first-round picks and a second-rounder for one player; Prague’s David Pastrnak. Then Viktor Hedman was swapped with Copenhagen’s Jaccob Slavin in a salary-saving move and Gabriel Bourque went to Madrid for Yasin Ehliz in another move to fit under the cap. Those moves didn’t result in a Cup – Minsk took the Season 8 title.  But a year later, Madrid and Patton were at the table again to whip up a huge megadeal that seemed to catapult Belfast to the Season 9 Cup.

This time, Patton sent 5 assets – including another first-round pick – out the door for two good ones. Longtime Belfast fixture P.K. Subban, Evander Kane and faceoff specialist Nardo Nagtzaam, along with the first-round pick and prospect Filip Westerlund brought Swedes Gabriel Landeskog and Karlsson to Norther Ireland. They were both named assistant captains to Captain Claude Giroux and Landeskog went on to score 50 goals and 100 points in the regular season. Karlsson was first among EURO defensemen in assists with 49 and second to Alex Pietrangelo in points with 53.

Quick, meanwhile, has proven to be worth every penny of his $9 million salary. He now has four EURO Cups and nine individual trophies with more possible in a few weeks. In the playoffs, he had a .926 save percentage to lead everyone.

Berlin has to be optimistic about its future. The Smurfs defeated President’s Trophy winning Athens in the Southern Conference finals and then came within a lucky break or two from hoisting the Cup, even with Nugent-Hopkins on the sidelines with a wrist injury for Games 5, 6 and 7 against Belfast.