ESPN Forecast: Finals predictions

Before the skates hit the ice for Game 1 of the Stanley Cup finals, we asked the NHL experts on our ESPN Forecast panel to predict each game.

Our panel sees the Chicago Blackhawks raising another Stanley Cup, their sixth overall, most likely winning in six games. Meanwhile, our voters give the Tampa Bay Lightning better than a one-in-three chance of pulling the upset and taking their second championship.

We also asked about who would win the Conn Smythe Trophy as playoffs MVP, and votes broke down along similar lines. The Blackhawks have three main candidates: Duncan Keith (39 percent likely to win), Patrick Kane (22 percent) and Jonathan Toews (11 percent). The Lightning have two: Tyler Johnson (22 percent) and Steven Stamkos (6 percent).

How it works: The ESPN Forecast panel predicted each team's likelihood of winning each of the seven potential games and each team's likelihood of winning the series. The top-line "Forecast" is based on a combination of the mean, median and mode of the predictions for each series.

Editor's note: Predictions were made prior to the start of the series.-->

Tampa Bay Lightning vs. Chicago Blackhawksbr/]