Tom Dundon’s NHL team just won a championship. Now he gets his shot with the Blazers.

When Tom Dundon bought the Carolina Hurricanes, plenty of people rolled their eyes.

He cut costs. He questioned spending. He looked at things that had always been done a certain way and asked why.

Naturally, critics called him cheap. Sound familiar?

Fast forward to today and the Hurricanes are Stanley Cup champions.

Now Dundon is hearing many of the same things after purchasing the Trail Blazers.

He’s been criticized for trimming expenses, restructuring parts of the organization and generally operating differently than many NBA owners.

Some of that criticism may be fair. Some of it may not.

But here’s the part worth remembering: People said his approach wouldn’t work in hockey, either.

Then Carolina became one of the NHL’s model franchises.

Dundon has repeatedly insisted he isn’t opposed to spending money. He simply wants to spend it on things that help teams win.

“I just don’t want to waste money. I want to invest it,” he said recently.

That doesn’t make him popular. At least not right now.

The real question is whether it works.

If Portland starts winning, nobody will care how many people traveled on road trips. Nobody will care when hotel rooms were checked out. Nobody will care how many employees worked in the business office.

They’ll care about victories.

That’s what happened in Carolina. Now Dundon gets a chance to prove it can happen in Portland, too.

Critics remain skeptical. They were skeptical before the Hurricanes won a championship as well.