Tag Archives: stanley cup playoffs

Another Week Amid the Strange and Misguided…

Posted on May 5, 2010 by Scott Taylor| Leave a comment

The 2010 Winnipeg Goldeyes training camp has started, the second round of the Stanley Cup playoffs are well on the way, the NBA has moved into the second round and the Major League Baseball season is one month into it.

It’s been an odd couple of weeks, but there is one thing we can always count on: Somebody will jerk over somebody else even if it’s just for a laugh.

Let’s ponder the strange and misguided…

1) The voice of my youth passed away on Tuesday night. Ernie Harwell, one of the nicest men I ever met, died of cancer at age 92. The voice of the Detroit Tigers from 1960-2002, Harwell was the quiet, pastoral sound in my head for almost every summer of my life.

I had a long interview with Harwell on the field at Joker Marchant Stadium in Lakeland, Fla., in 2002. He was kind and funny and he could tell one heck of a story. He got his first play-by-play job with the minor league Atlanta Crackers in 1934 at the age of 16 and went on to become, among other things, the only broadcaster ever traded for a player.

In 1948, the Crackers let Harwell out of his contract in order to join the Brooklyn Dodgers as a fill-in for another legend, Red Barber, in exchange for Minor League catcher Cliff Dapper.

When Bo Schembechler took over the Tigers as president in 1992, one of Schembechler’s first decisions was to fire Ernie Harwell. Schembechler, an ex-football coach who proved he couldn’t run a one-car funeral, was eventually dumped and Harwell was re-hired.

Ernie Harwell wasn’t Vin Scully or Jon Miller or Jack Buck or John Gordon or Charley Steiner or Tom Hamilton, great announcers all. Ernie Harwell had a sweet southern accent and a homey approach to the game, and he was the best I ever heard.

2) There is talk in Toronto about changing the nickname of the city’s NBA team from the Raptors to the Huskies.

Only in Toronto would that discussion start. And it starts because the Leafs aren’t in the playoffs, nobody cares about the Argos and nobody knows anything about baseball.

3) I loved how the American media handled Brett Favre’s injured ankle this past week.

When it became apparent that Favre might need minor surgery to relieve pain in the ankle – an ankle he injured long before the Vikings lost the NFC final to New Orleans – it was written this way: “Brett Favre will not be able to return this season without ankle surgery.”

After Favre said he’d contacted noted orthopaedic surgeon James Andrews about the ankle, he posted the following on his website:

I want to add to the information provided in the article that was published this morning on ESPN’s website. Given the reaction to the article, and the typical conclusion jumping, I thought I’d clarify a few things.

While my ankle has been bothering me, the injury is not debilitating. For example, I’m able to work around my property without any problems. Sure – certain exercises cause some ankle pain, but it’s nothing that I haven’t experienced (or played with) before. In fact, many people don’t realize that I injured my ankle before the NFC Championship game. I’ve had surgery on this ankle twice before, and I’ve played with the pain before. The hits I took throughout the 2009 season, including the Saints game, just added to the ankle pain and likely caused some bone spurs.

I don’t believe major surgery on the ankle would be required for me to return in 2010. I’ve consulted with Dr. Andrews on the phone, and a relatively minor procedure could be done to improve the dexterity of the ankle, and to relieve the pain. I’ve put up with pain worse than this in my career, and I didn’t want anyone to assume that the possibility of surgery was the sole factor that would determine whether I return or not. Some people reacting to the ESPN story have made this assumption. I don’t blame them for doing so, given that the term “surgery” often covers a variety of procedures, some more complex than others.

The ankle pain is a factor, but one of many factors that I’ll need to consider in making my decision. Other factors include the input of my family, and the wonderful experience that I had last year with the Vikings.

– Brett Favre

Sounds like Brett Favre will return to the Vikings this season. Surgery or no surgery.

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Mickelson Wins. Woods Entertains. Masters was Great Weekend Drama.

Posted on April 12, 2010 by Scott Taylor| Leave a comment

TAMPA, Fla. — So much for reality TV. Survivor, Dancing with the D-List, the Amazing(ly dull) Race, Undercover Boss. Not one of those examples of cheap network programming could hold a candle to the reality TV we watched from Augusta, Ga., this weekend.

I loved the fact Phil Mickelson won the tournament (160-under on that golf course is pretty special) and was able to share the win with his wife. Great story. Good for Phil.

However, the real story was Tiger Woods — and what a spectacular story it was. The 2010 Masters was a movie unto itself. Forget that Woods was an amazing 68-70-70-69 to finish in fourth place at 11-under. Forget that after 144 days out of the game, hounded by a sick American mainstream media that had absolutely nothing else to sell, Woods played four rounds under par at a tremendously tough golf course in the middle of a pressure-packed atmosphere that would have brought anyone else on the planet to his knees. It was one of the greatest athletic performances in history and unquestionably the best fourth place finish ever.

But what was even better — and certainly more entertaining — was how Woods played. On the final day, he was three over after the first five and then played the final 13 holes down the stretch at six under. On at least four occasions, you thought Woods was done, ready to fade to the back of the pack. But he kept turning it one, kept coming back, kept making birdies.

It was the best weekend in sport in years. Too bad Woods is going t take more time off.

In the meantime, the Stanley Cup playoffs start this week. If they’re a tenth as entertaining as the Masters, it will be the best post-season in decades.

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Things to Consider With Three Weeks to Go.

Posted on March 19, 2010 by Scott Taylor| Leave a comment

ST. PAUL, Minn. — While the general managers and the league’s other tall foreheads try to come to terms with illegal checks to the head (sorry, boys, but the rulebook is full of rules that would get headshots out of the game), the rest of the NHL is just playing hockey.

So with about three weeks to play before the Stanley Cup playoffs are upon us, let’s take a look at the league from a Winnipeg perspective:

1) Although he says he has not completely made up his mind, it appears that after 18 seasons, former Winnipeg Jets captain Keith Tkachuk is nearing the end of his brilliant career.

Saying his future in St. Louis is now, Tkachuk wouldn’t admit whether or not he was retiring at the end of the season, but he did say, “I often think about this being the end.” No doubt, the Hall of Fame awaits.

2) Remember when the San Jose Sharks had a very comfortable 12-point lead in the Pacific Division? Well, not anymore. That’s because the Phoenix Coyotes have won seven straight and have moved to within three points (at the beginning of the weekend) of the heavily favored and quite talented division leaders.

The 44-22-5 Coyotes have all but assured themselves of a spot in the post-season for the first time since 2002. Now, however, they are closing in on home ice advantage in the West. This should be a great finish.

3) By now, it has to be official. There is no better coach in the NHL than Dauphin’s Barry Trotz (OK, maybe Dave Tippett in Phoenix, but nobody else). Trotz, the only coach the Nashville Predators have ever had, has the no-name, star-less Predators in seventh place five points ahead up on eight-place Detroit (at the start of the weekend).

That shouldn’t happen. The Preds just don’t have the personnel. But Trotz has made them a playoff contender – they beat L.A. on the road this week and have won four straight — and that says more about his brilliance than anything else.

4) Calling it “a retaliatory hit to the head,” the National Hockey League suspended Anaheim Ducks defenseman James Wisniewski for eight games without pay for that terrible hit to the face and head of Brent Seabrook on Wednesday night.

Wisniewski definitely gave Seabrook a cheap shot, but an eight-game suspension after giving Alexander Ovechkin only two? The NHL justice department is completely nonsensical.

5) The Montreal Canadiens have looked very good at times this season. They’ve had two four-game winning streaks. But not until the Olympic break, have the Habs put together so many outstanding games in succession. In fact, with six straight wins heading into the weekend, Montreal has moved into the playoff driver’s seat in the East.

After Tuesday night’s game, a 3-1 win over the Rangers at Madison Square Garden, the Habs moved past Philly and into sixth place in the Eastern Conference (later in the week they fell back into seventh). The Bruins are eighth with 74 points, four points back, while ninth-place Atlanta and the Rangers are seven points back. With only 12 to play, the red-hot Habs are in control of their own playoff destiny.

6) Perhaps no one has noticed, but Winnipeg’s Travis Zajac is having a season to remember. Zajac, the 24-year-old rightwinger out of the University of North Dakota has moved into the Top 35 in NHL scoring with 21 goals and 38 assists.

Perhaps more importantly, the 6-foot-3, 200-pounder, is a terrific plus-14. By the time the next Olympics roll around, he’ll be one of the best players in the game, if he isn’t already.

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Old coaches, young superstars and the best goalie in the playoffs.

Posted on May 26, 2009 by Scott Taylor| Leave a comment

As we get set to watch the Pittsburgh Penguins eliminate the Carolina Hurricanes in four straight games (barring a miracle), in tonight’s Eastern Conference final there was a boatload of hockey news today.

There was also just some stuff.

Onward:

1) Pat Quinn was hired as head coach by the Edmonton Oilers today. He’s 66. Personally, I like Pat Quinn, a lot. He’s a fine man, who did a wonderful job with Team Canada in Salt Lake City in 2002 and with our national junior team. I had a lot of respect for him when he was head coach of the Leafs and I must admit, he’s always been very respectful to me.

The question has to be in this case: Can a 66-year-old coach find happiness with a young team in Edmonton? Especially after the Calgary Flames just dumped 59-year-old Mike Keenan, another old coach, who gets recycled more than old truck tires. 

There is a difference, however. Keenan is a guy who likes “his guys.” He likes veteran players he knows and can trust. And that’s fine. Trouble is, “his guys” don’t win anymore. Quinn, however, during his time with the national junior team, proved to everyone he can teach young players how to play the game.

And that’s exactly what the Oilers need.

Age has nothing to do with anything. It’s attitude and approach that matters. Quinn might be 66, but he has already demonstrated that he respects young, enthusiastic hockey players and can take those types of players and show them how to win.

Full disclosure: I like Pat Quinn as a person. And I also believe he will be a great head coach in Edmonton.

2) Tonight, we get to watch the likes of Sidney Crosby, Eric Staal, Evgeni Malkin and Cam Ward play an extremely important NHL playoff game.

If the Penguins win, the young stars from Pittsburgh will zoom into the Stanley Cup final for a second straight year (frankly, no matter what the Hurricanes do, Pittsburgh’s offence should put a quick nail in Carolina’s coffin).

What is most interesting, however, is that whenever the media looks for a storyline involving the Pens, it’s always Sidney Crosby vs. (insert name here). Sidney Crosby vs. Alexander Ovechkin. Sidney Crosby vs. Jarome Iginla. Sidney Crosby vs. oh, I don’t know, Johan Franzen?

Unfortunately, the mainstream hockey media loves a story no matter how silly it is. If anyone is looking for a consistent storyline, it should be this one: Evgeni Malkin vs. the hockey world.

This spring, Ovechkin will likely be awarded the Hart Trophy as the regular season MVP and so far in the playoffs, Crosby has the inside track to the Conn Smythe Trophy. 

Meanwhile, all Malkin has done is win the league scoring championship and lead all scorers in the playoffs (12 goals and 16 assists). 

There was a day before all these mouth-breathing TV bingo callers became uber-experts, a day when scoring goals and dishing out assists was an important part of the game. And today, nobody does that better than Evgeni Malkin.

I guess he’s no Sidney Crosby (he certainly doesn’t have the same group of publicists), but he could be the Rodney Dangerfield of the NHL.

3) Of course, if Malkin isn’t hockey’s answer to Rodney D., it’s Detroit Red Wings goaltender Chris Osgood.

Ozzie is close to winning his third Stanley Cup as a starter (he was also on a winner as the No. 2 to Mike Vernon). He’s also been to the finals one other time, been a Vezina Trophy runner-up and won the Jennings Trophy twice. He was the second goalie ever to score a goal (following Ron Hextall), was the No. 1 goalie (statistically) in the NHL in the 1995-96 season, is 10th in the NHL in career wins and the winningest goaltender in Red Wings history. He’s been an all-star, won Stanley Cups in two decades and is on the verge of going back-to-back.

And yet, you ask anybody in the mainstream media and he/she will tell you: “Detroit’s only problem is goaltending.”

Hogwash.

I can’t tell you how sick I am of hearing our TV experts talk of Tim Thomas this or Roberto Luongo that or Cam Ward… whatever. The best goalie in the playoffs last year was Chris Osgood and clearly the best goalie this year is Chris Osgood.

At 37, he’s never been better. Right now he leads the playoffs in wins with 11, is second in goals against average at 2.14 and fourth in save percentage at .921. He’s 11-4 in the post-season, has an assist and a shutout.

He’s often hung out to dry by his always-attacking teammates and yet he’s made some magnificent saves in this year’s post-season. He’s been tremendous.

At this stage, I don’t want to argue with the experts who believe Crosby is a shoo-in to take the Conn Smythe. But there is still a lot of hockey left.

And right now, the best goalie in the playoffs has not been Jonas Hiller, Cam Ward or Tim Thomas. It’s been Chris Osgood.

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What the NHL Should Do and Why It Doesn’t

Posted on May 2, 2009 by Scott Taylor| Leave a comment

With a truly outstanding Stanley Cup playoff spring in full bloom, we enter May with another mind-numbing discussion of the Phoenix Coyotes financial woes and whether or not the Coyotes might one day return to Winnipeg.

It’s mind-numbing because it’s moot. It’s mind-numbing because far too many commentators are just catching up with old news (read this headline today: Suddenly, players’ union singing Canada’s praises. Wow, “suddenly?” NHLPA executive director Paul Kelly has been singing Canada’s praises for more than a year). And it’s mind-numbing because commissioner Gary Bettman is still more concerned about doing right by himself and a handful of owners, than doing right by the game.

We got word this week that the league had bailed out the financially  moribund Coyotes once again and that it was the NHL, not Doug Moss, Wayne Gretzky et al., who were running the team. That turned out to be patently false, as far too many of these newspaper-reported items have turned out to be, and while the NHL did, in fact, send the Coyotes a pile of dough, the league did not take over the team.

Not like that would matter. As long as Bettman is commissioner he will insure that there will be a franchise in Phoenix. After all, he’s the guy who put that team in the desert and he will fight to the death (of the league?) to keep it there.

After all, despite what a lot of hockey fans really want to believe, Bettman isn’t stupid. He knows his reputation relies on his decision, made early in his career, to place teams in the American south. He believed in the “footprint,” and despite all the signs to the contrary — and everything that isn’t outright delusional in this world — the footprint has, to this date, failed to provide the revenue or the fan base that Bettman was so sure the NHL would receive.

Tampa, Fort Lauderdale, Nashville, Atlanta and Phoenix are great places to live (I’d move to anyone of them tomorrow), it’s too bad the folks who live there aren’t hockey fans. 

A simple combination of history and mathematics would suggest that by moving teams from the U.S. South and Southwest to Ontario, Quebec, and the Canadian West, it might not guarantee absolute financial success, but it will guarantee a fan base and therefore a legitimate chance at financial success.

Certainly, in Winnipeg, an NHL franchise would lose money, but not the $40 million that Phoenix lost on operations in 2008-09.

However, once again, that’s moot, at least until there is a new commissioner.

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Hawks take it to lethargic Flames

Posted on April 25, 2009 by Scott Taylor| Leave a comment

Sitting in front of the 46-incher watching the Chicago Blackhawks drill the Calgary Flames, I can’t help but think that the Flames forgot how to win.

On one hand, it’s no surprise that the Hawks are winning at home. After all, they win a lot of games in front of those crazy fans at the United Centre. On the other hand, it’s hard to believe that after slipping past Calgary  3-2 and 3-2 in the first two games of the series (games that could have gone either way), the Hawks have come back home and made a joke of Game 5. At least, after two periods.

It’s already 5-1 and the Hawks have owned this game from the opening faceoff. And they’ve owned it because the Flames have let them have it. After two hard-hitting, attack-attack-attack games in Calgary, the Flames started out on their heels in this one and then just went ahead and dug themselves a hole.

The Flames played with emotion in Games 3 and 4 at the Saddledome and dominated both nights. Now, two days after winning 6-4 on Wednesday (after winning 4-2 on Monday), the Flames have backed away from their hard-hitting, hard-checking attack and allowed the Hawks to, once again, take the game to them.

That strategy doesn’t work against a young team with as much skill as Chicago. Jonathan Toews, Patrick Sharp, Patrick Kane, Brian Campbell, Cam Barker, Kris Versteeg, Martin Havlat et al, just eat up the wide-open, no-hit style the Flames have thrown at the Hawks (Saturday) tonight.

Now, granted, I know that the intensity with which the Flames played on Monday and Wednesday, is almost impossible to maintain. It’s extremely difficult to bang and crash like that every, single shift, every single night. Especially, when a number of your bigger players are nicked up.

But that’s the only way Calgary will beat Chicago. If they don’t go back to that style on Monday, they’ll lose the series.

Tee time anyone?

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Nobody playing better than Red Wings, and for all the right reasons

Posted on April 20, 2009 by Scott Taylor| Leave a comment

I have a dear friend, Scott O’Neil, who is the production manager at 92-CITI-FM. He’s the guy who makes all my NHL, NASCAR and NFL Reports sound so good.

 

O’Neil is like most sports fans. When it comes to anything other than his two favourite teams, he’s a smart, sophisticated fan who can look at objectively at any issue — either on-field or off.

 

However, when it comes to his two passions — the Minnesota Vikings and Detroit Red Wings — he can get downright apoplectic. Nervous, cranky, bitter. When his teams don’t win, he’ll be happy to whine about it for hours on end.

 

In fact, before the playoffs started last week, he was giving it the old “woe-is-me” routine about his beloved Wings and how they were going to get ambushed and upset by the Columbus Blue Jackets, a decent club, but a club that shouldn’t be in the same league as the Red Wings, let alone the same opening-round series.

 

So while Scotty was going off about how “Ozzie had to be at his best,” and how “Kronwall can’t take any stupid penalties,” and about how “this team will get frustrated by (Columbus goalie) Steve Mason and start taking too many offensive chances,” I couldn’t help but wonder what it’s like to love a team so much that you actually become irrational when talking about them.

 

Anyway, after the Wings disposed of Columbus 4-1 and 4-0 in the first two games on the Western quarterfinal, I tried to figure out exactly why the Red Wings are so successful.

 

Here’s a five-point conclusion:

 

1) Chris Osgood is a much better goaltender than the so-called experts think. Nobody wants to give Ozzie any credit, but he’s been superb for a number of post-seasons and looked unbeatable in Game 2 this past weekend.

 

2) The Wings play just as well in their own end as they do in the opposing end and they’re frightening in the offensive zone.

 

3) The Red Wings special teams are better than any other special teams in the game today — when they want to be. The Wings scored three power-play goals in Game 2 and allowed none. In Game 1, they scored one power play goal and allowed none. This Wings team, right now, is just about perfect. 

 

4) They aren’t bored anymore. The 82-game regular season appears to bore the Wings to tears. They have not shown either cockiness nor boredom in the first two games of the post-season. 

 

5) The Wings move the puck better than any team in hockey. Some teams can’t complete one pass in a row. Watching the Wings breakout, you’ll often see them complete five, six, seven passes in a row. No team handles the puck better and no team breaks out of its own end quicker (OK, maybe Boston’s break out is just as good, but they don’t handle the puck as well).

 

The Wings are a great team that should win their second straight Stanley Cup title. However, saying that that suggests that another team’s goalie won’t steal a series from the Wings and we’re already watching Nikolai Khabibulin, Henrik Lundqvist and Roberto Luongo steal series right now.

 

What is it that one very smart general manager once said? “We call it the Stanley Cup playoffs because we can’t call it goalie.”

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Toews Shows How Good He Is.

Posted on April 17, 2009 by Scott Taylor| 1 Comment

I have to admit, I was thrilled watching Winnipeg’s own Jonathan Toews and Cam Barker play so well against the Calgary Flames on Thursday night.

 

Toews dominated the ice on almost every shift and Barker showed that he’s a force on defence, perhaps even a future all-star.

 

Both players were appearing in their first Stanley Cup playoff games against a very good — and an extremely gritty — Calgary Flames team that quite honestly played an almost perfect road playoff game on Thursday night.

 

In the end, Toews played more than 17 minutes, had an assist and was a plus-one in a 3-2 Chicago win in overtime. In fact, it was Toews who set up Barker’s first-period goal. Barker, by the way, had a goal AND an assist and was also a plus-one.

 

In fact, the NHL’s own panel of experts selected a Barker shift midway through the third period as the game’s “best shift of the night.” The Hawks’ No. 1 draft pick in 2004, did have a terrific shift midway through the final period when he freed himself up for two great scoring chances.

 

Still, as outstanding as Barker was on Thursday, Toews was even better.

 

And frankly, it made me laugh. After reading all these so-called media experts — the ones who claim to know more than the coaches — continue to leave Toews off their personal selections for Canada’s 2010 Olympic team, I have to wonder how some of these clowns get credentials for the games.

 

If the Canadian team doesn’t have a leader like the 6-foot-2, 210-pound Jonathan Toews anchoring its third line, it will fail to win gold again. On Thursday, he not only had an assist and was plus-one, but he had three hits and won 10 of 14 faceoffs. He is one of the best players in the world and he shouldn’t have to prove it anymore.

 

It’s amazing to think the young man is not yet 21. 

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According to form III. Game 3: Detroit 5, Dallas 2; Pittsburgh 4 Philadelphia 1.

Posted on May 13, 2008 by Scott Taylor| Comments Off

Hey folks, getting excited about a Detroit-Pittsburgh Stanley Cup final? 

 

We’re on the verge… 

 

Tuesday night in Philadelphia, the Penguins got two goals from Marian Hossa and a couple of assists from the brilliant Sidney Crosby (and he WAS brilliant) en route to a 4-1 blistering of the Flyers. With the win, the Penguins take a 3-0 lead in the Eastern Conference final. Game 4 goes Thursday in Philadelphia, but it’s merely a formality. The Flyers can mail it in.

 

Of course, when you’re outshot 25-18 in your own building in a Game 3 you absolutely, positively have to win, you’re already mailing it in.

 

Based on what we watched on Tuesday, it would appear the Penguins are just as dominating as the Wings and that means this spring’s Stanley Cup final might be the best in years. Detroit’s complete destruction of an undermanned Dallas Stars team has been a thing of beauty. Tuesday night, however, Pittsburgh’s 4-1 win over Philly was just as impressive as Detroit’s 5-2 shellacking of Dallas on Monday. 

Right now, both Detroit and Pittsburgh lead their respective conference championships 3-0 and, yes, both teams have been as spectacular as 3-0 series leads would indicate.

Both teams are big, both teams can score, both teams have skill and both teams favour offence over defence, so we could soon be treated to one of the greatest Stanley Cup finals in history. Hopefully, Dallas and Philadelphia will just curl up into the fetal position and we can end these listless Conference finals. 

On Monday, I was talking to my old pal Theoren Fleury, who is doing extremely well as a Calgary entrepreneur these days, and he told me that he doesn’t watch a lot of hockey, but when he does, he watches the Penguins.

“I love the Penguins because they don’t play any defence,” Fleury said. “It’s go, go, go. Outscore the opposition. It looks like they’re actually having fun.

 

“I mean, listen, I have 100,000 hours of video tape of me playing for Dave King and Pierre Page and you know what they stressed. Well, guess what? We never won. It doesn’t work. That boring, defensive, trapping style is bad for the game and unless you have 20 guys with no hockey skill who will buy into that system, you don’t have a chance. Whoever won playing that style? Tell me. Even when it was popular, Detroit and Dallas and Tampa, with all those scorers, won. 

 

“That’s why I like Pittsburgh. They play to outscore their opponent. That’s hockey.”

 

It’s the way Detroit plays, too. And that’s why I can’t wait for the mere formalities that are these Conference finals to come to a quick, merciful end. 

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According to form. Game 1: Detroit 4, Dallas 1; Pittsburgh 4, Philadelphia 2.

Posted on May 10, 2008 by Scott Taylor| Comments Off

Nashville Predators head coach Barry Trotz was a guest of the Tom & Joe Show on 92-CITI-FM on Thursday morning. One of the best interviews in all of professional hockey, Trotz told Tom McGouran and The Coach that while he loved Dallas and thought the Stars had a great team, he felt Detroit had way too much firepower.

 

Like many of us, Trotz expects an extremely short series in the Western Conference final.

 

As for the Philadelphia-Pittsburgh Eastern Conference final, Trotz believes that if the Flyers bang and crash, they might have a chance against a Pittsburgh team that Trotz also says has “far too much firepower.”

 

“If Philadelphia plays the same type of intimidating game they did against Montreal, they could make the series a long one,” Trotz said. “But that Pittsburgh team has a lot of talent and toughness. When you can throw Malkin, Crosby, Hossa and Staal out there, when you have two tremendously talented offensive-type lines, and they won’t back down, you can be a pretty formidable team.

 

“Philadelphia works very hard, but Pittsburgh keeps coming at you all the time. I won’t say Philadelphia can’t win the series, it’s just going to be very difficult.”

 

After the opening games of the two series, it was pretty obvious that Trotz’s assessment was dead on.

 

On Thursday night, the Red Wings just dominated Dallas. The Wings scored three power-play goals, built a 4-0 lead and coasted (as they often do) to a 4-1 victory. Big Tomas Holmstrom, who found himself a nice comfortable spot in front of Dallas goalie Marty Turco, led the way for the Wings with a goal and an assist. It was Detroit’s seventh straight playoff victory and set up a do-or-die situation for Dallas on Saturday.

 

That’s right, do-or-die.

 

Already down 1-0, if Dallas loses on Saturday, they’ll fall behind 2-0 and no matter how well they play the rest of the way, they will NOT win four out of five against the Red Wings. 

 

Trouble is, what can Dallas possibly do to beat Detroit if Chris Osgood plays well in goal? Osgood is, after all, the only weak link on this Red Wings team, and if he shuts you down (Detroit outshot Dallas 31-21 in Game 1), it’s pretty much hopeless. Dallas isn’t big enough, Dallas isn’t fast enough, Dallas can’t match up and Dallas can’t shut down the Wings power-play. 

 

Game 1 was not only a statement by Detroit, it was a sign of things to come.

 

Over in the East, Philadelphia got a couple of quick goals by Kenora’s Mike Richards and took a 2-1 lead on the Pens, but before the second period ended, Pittsburgh was up 4-2 and in the third, Malkin and Co. just shut down the Flyers.

 

What we found out in Game 1 of this series, is that Pittsburgh is just as tough and maybe tougher than the Flyers and if the bangin’ and crashin’ doesn’t work, Philly could go down quickly.

 

We still figure the Flyers will have some jam at home, but after Malkin got drilled a couple of times and still got up to score two goals and dish out an assist, the writing was on the wall. Unlike Montreal, Pittsburgh isn’t going to back down and that will spell doom for Philadelphia.

 

We selected Pittsburgh in seven. The Pens are now 9-1 in the playoffs and we might have underestimated their toughness. 

 

* * *

 

A couple of coaches were fired this week.

 

On Wednesday, to no one’s surprise, the dysfunctional Toronto Maple Leafs fired head coach Paul Maurice, the only good thing the Leafs had going for them the last two years. That franchise is in worse shape than we thought.

 

Two days later, ex-Maple Leaf Joel Quenneville was let go by the Colorado Avalanche. Quenneville was 131-92-23 in three seasons with Colorado, coaching a team that was old and on the slide after a decade near the top of the NHL. It was probably a blessing that Quenneville was given a chance to look for work elsewhere. The Avs are going nowhere but downhill.

 

The Leafs, meanwhile, are a mess. Currently being run by an old coot named Cliff Fletcher who destroyed the club with some dreadful trades in the late 90s (and the Leafs haven’t recovered) then went on to collect a million dollar paycheque to screw up the Phoenix Coyotes, Toronto is now without a head coach, a real general manager and probably a captain. Maurice, who had one year left on his contract, compiled a 76-66-22 record in two seasons as Toronto’s coach but failed to make the playoffs in both years.

 

Maurice and Quenneville are both class acts and relatively young and will find work. Both franchises, however, are in big, big trouble. Colorado is getting older by the minute while Toronto is just bad news.

 

In fact, the next coach in either city had better not buy a house. 

  

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