Les Habitants!

 You gotta love the Stanley Cup playoffs. They're the best of all playoffs because stuff happens there that rarely happens in any other playoffs.

Like the Montreal Canadiens, for instance.

Who, OK, have happened all the time in the Stanley Cup playoffs, but not recently. And by "recently" we mean "not since Tone Loc was a thing."

That would be 1993, which is the last time the Canadiens reached the Stanley Cup Final. That's 28 years to you and me, boys and girls, and that's a good stretch of time for a franchise that won the Cup every other year or so back when Rocket Richard and Guy Lafleur and Yvan Cournoyer (the most mispronounced name in hockey history) were doing their thing.

Now they're back in the Final again, thanks to a 3-2 overtime victory that rubbed out the Las Vegas Golden Knights in six games. This means hockey royalty has returned to its anointed place, sort of. And by "sort of," we mean "not really, because these Les Habitants are not the Richard/Lafeur/Cournoyer Les Habitants.

These Habs are as un-Habby as un-Habby gets.

They are, you see, the doggiest of underdogs, because they had the worst won-lost record of any team to make the playoffs this year. Their archrival, the Toronto Maple Leafs, were supposed to take them out in the first round.

Unfortunately for Leafs fans, the Leafs did their usual Leaf things, mainly choke big-time after forging a three-games-to-one lead. So on the Habs went and on they kept going against the form sheet, and now they're in the Final.

Which is great, understand, even if Carey Price is their goalie these days instead of Ken Dryden or Jacques Plante. And even if someone named Arrturi Lehkonen scored the clinching OT goal last night, and not, say, Serge Savard. 

It's great because it means an actual iconic hockey city has a shot at hoisting the Cup instead of, you know, some city in Florida or southern California or even Texas, for God's sake. And it's the underdog this time, which only makes rooting for them sweeter.

Thanks, hockey.