No. 1: I’d make a lousy owner.
If I owned the Ottawa Senators, I’d have fired Bryan Murray right when the buzzer went to end Game 2. Then I’d have re-hired John Paddock before Game 3.
The Pittsburgh Penguins have made the Senators (a very good team on paper) look weak. Granted, Ottawa is banged-up and that isn’t Murray’s fault, but this team is playing with no heart and Murray has to take absolute responsibility for that.
Midway through the third period of Game 3, the fans in Ottawa were booing the Senators. My sense is, they were booing the coach and GM, not the players. Owner Eugene Melnyk should get rid of that guy before he does any more damage to the franchise.
No. 2: If the Minnesota Wild intend to beat the Colorado Avalanche, they’d better start gooning it up.
OK, so they don’t need to unleash Derek Boogaard on Joe Sakic, but they’d better get tougher, ’cause it’s pretty obvious they can’t skate with the Avs.
When they bang and crash Colorado’s old men — Andrew Brunette, Peter Forsberg and Ian Laperriere are all 34, Ryan Smyth is 33, Adam Foote is 36 and Sakic is 102 — the Wild are competitive. When they try to skate around like Nancy Kerrigan (see Tuesday night’s Game 4), they get killed.
As old as the Avs are, and this team is freakin’ old, they are still fast and skilled and if the Wild’s goons don’t wear them down, Colorado will blow Minnesota out of the building.
No. 3: Before the Boston-Montreal series started, the only real concern in Montreal was the rookie goalie, Carey Price (it seemed to be the only real concern among Habs fans, too.)
Almost everyone seemed to be worried about the kid. Was he good enough? Could he handle the pressure? Don’t forget, the NHL is a lot tougher than the American Hockey League.
Well, on Tuesday night, the guy who singlehandedly led the Hamilton Bulldogs to the AHL’s Calder Cup title last year probably silenced the doubters. With a 27-save shutout, Price gave the Habs a 3-1 series lead over the Bruins, heading home.
The kid can play. Period.
[youtube=http://youtube.com/watch?v=akqU6nX3wvw]
No. 4: The only way Detroit loses to Nashville is because their goaltending isn’t good enough.
The Red Wings are the much superior hockey team, but Dominik Hasek is now the OLD Dominik Hasek, not the old Buffalo Dominik Hasek.
Those two goals he gave up in the third period of Game 3 were embarrassing. If "the Dominator" (and I use the term mockingly) doesn’t pick it up, his fast, skilled and, yes, big, teammates will be eliminated by a club that shouldn’t be allowed on the same ice surface.
No. 5: Washington is more hype than substance.
I love Alexander Ovechkin. If he continues along the same path he’s going along today, he will be remembered as one of the greatest players who ever lived.
Trouble is, the rest of his team isn’t that good and a very smart, tough and talented Philadelphia club — a club that went through a two-month slump this season, a slump that I’m still having trouble trying to understand — is on the verge of blowing the Caps out of the post-season in five.
The Flyers are proving that in the playoffs, at least, a team with the likes of Mike Richards, Scotty Upshall and Scott Hartnell will take apart a team with Alexander Semin, Viktor Kozlov and Sergei Fedorov any day.
As reported in the last blog, I didn’t watch the Rangers-Devils game on Sunday, preferring to watch the Habs and Bruins, instead. As a result, I didn’t see Sean Avery’s shenanigans until well into the evening.
After two days of listening to the complaints about officiating in these Stanley Cup playoffs – and believe me, everyone who has complained has had a right to complain – it was nice to watch a couple of hockey games on Sunday that had more to do with good play than with bad calls.
Back in the spring of 2004, my daughter Betsy and I pulled up to the Marriott in downtown Montreal and felt a difference. A decade earlier, I’d been in Montreal to watch the Stanley Cup playoffs and got the distinct impression that many folks really, really wanted to separate from Canada.
As the first round of the playoffs progresses, we’ll try to take a close look at, at least, one game each night.
If you’re a casual, or even regular, visitor to 
• Arron Asham of Portage, a forward with the New Jersey Devils.
These two teams have despised each other for nine decades and by the end of the opening round of the playoffs, that hatred will not have subsided.
But the Caps also have Nicklas Backstrom, a sweet-playmaking centre who will be nominated for the Calder Trophy as the NHL’s rookie of the year, Mike Green, the most under-rated forward in the East, and three more tremendous Russians, Viktor Kozlov (like Ovechkin, a plus-28), Sergei Fedorov and Alexander Semin.