[LOS ANGELES, CA] -- Still fresh off a visit to the stirring and chilling Winter
Classic, the NHL season now shifts into short sprint mode. More
exacting, a four week rush to the Olympic break and with a condensed
schedule, there's sure to be one or two significant injuries that will
occur before the nations of hockey convene in British Columbia in the
quest for gold.
As we've now past the halfway point in the season, we're
pondering which team will emerge at the top of the mountain in June
and wrest the Stanley Cup from the other 29 combatants. While I won't
disavow my original pick of the Boston Bruins (but given my track
record YOU should), at the 45 plus game mark, there are a handful of
serious contenders that populate the landscape.
The Penguins floundering of late has to be a concern for Pittsburgh
fans. What GM Ray Shero should do is fire the coach and give the team
a fresh voice, whoops, that won’t work two years in a row, now will
it? Any team with jersey numbers 87, 71 and 29 surely stands to be
there late in the race,
The Devils are a nice team, leading the East and hovering 20 games or
so over .500. Zach Parise is doing his best imitation of a Hart Trophy
finalist, Niclas Bergfors is a possible if not probably Rookie of the
Year candidate and when he’s not breaking NHL goaltending records, and
Martin Brodeur just wins games. Coach Jacques Lemaire has returned to
the old swamp (oh, how silly of me, beautiful downtown Newark is the
home to the Devils now) and it’s like he never left. Not only is New
Jersey not surprisingly leading the NHL in defense but their offensive
production is greater than Buffalo, Boston, Philadelphia and the
Rangers. While this team may not be sturdy enough to win all four
rounds of the post season tournament, there’s not a better balanced
team in the East at this juncture.
The Capitals are the most explosive team in the East but their
performance on their current western road trip has done nothing to
convince me that they’ve acquired the mental toughness to win it all.
Alex Ovechkin is always a game changer, an X factor but with three
goaltenders in the mix (rookie Michal Neuvirth has performed
marginally in Semyon Varlamov prolonged absence) and none of them able
to win a Game 7 would you bet on them if they came up against
Pittsburgh again? A rock solid veteran defender wouldn’t hurt either
before I’m ready to anoint them further.
Then there’s the most unsung team of all, those pesky Buffalo Sabres.
They’re a great story; they have longest tenured coach in the NHL in
Lindy Ruff and are a nice team. Can you tell me the last time a nice
team won the Stanley Cup? This one won’t either even with Vezina
candidate Ryan Miller between the pipes. Statistically, Miller has put
together an awesome season and it will be interesting to see how he
does on the big stage in Vancouver as opposed to his daily toiling in
relative anonymity in Western New York. His Olympic performance could
be direct predictor of his Cup playoff work, so watch this cat
closely. The red flag on the Sabres is that when Tim Connolly is your
leading scorer and you probably won’t have a 30 goal scorer on the
roster at Game 82, you can’t be serious about your championship hopes.
Turning to the West, although their presently on the outside looking
in, the Detroit Red Wings are always scary. They’ve been slammed more
than most with the injury plague that’s enveloped the league and their
supporters say, ‘just you wait until we have everyone back at full
strength!’ Time waits for no one in the NHL, not even for the Winged
Wheel, so the wounded better get back sooner than later. The missing
have turned the Red Wings into a passive, mediocre road team and the
one position that has been devoid of injuries, goaltending, has huge
question marks surrounding it. Chris Osgood has been marginal so far,
no surprise to anyone who follows the regular season exploits of
Detroit. The 15 year veteran has been supplanted by good solider Jimmy
Howard, who has served as goaltender in waiting while riding the Grand
Rapids shuttle for the better part of four seasons. No one knows how
Coach Mike Babcock will play it if the Red Wings get to the top eight
(and how strange does that read?) but could you be surprised if Ozzie
started Game 83 with his body of playoff work? If it’s Howard that
gets the first call, how confident would Wings’ fans be riding a
goaltender with one (1) regular season victory coming into this
season?
Vancouver, hmm, the last time I saw them they were getting run out of
the United Center by a Patrick Kane hat trick and they’ve provided
great entertainment when Mikael Samuelsson told the entire country of
Sweden what to do with their Olympic selections. They’re presently in
a great dogfight with Calgary and Colorado (nope, I’m not considering
them OR Phoenix) and if they emerge from the pack, they be battle
tested for the post season. Henrik Sedin has laid down an excellent
first half, you have to like the depth of the forwards and I bet San
Jose GM Doug Wilson is thinking that Christian Ehrhoff would be
looking pretty good in teal these days. The problem here is that this
is a finesse team and when push comes to shove in the chase for the
Cup, they won’t push back. For all his statistical greatness, would it
surprise you to know that goalie Roberto Luongo is a .500 goaltender
(11-11) in the post season? When I think of Looie, all I see is that
wicked backhander by Patrick Kane beating him in Game 6 of the
Conference Semis last year.
The Calgary Flames are the best team in the Northwest but if they
can’t get by the likes of the Canucks and the Avalanche in the
divisional race, would they really be a factor in the post season? You
can vote yes due to the deepest defensive corps in the league or you
could vote no because Brent Sutter was the coach that oversaw the
Devils late third period collapse against Carolina in Game 7 last
season. You could vote yes because Miikka Kiprusoff is a strong Vezina
contender or vote no because with Daymond Langkow and Olii Jokinen at
their 1-2 punch at center, that’s not exactly Crosby and Malkin. Too
many minus balancing out the pluses for me, thanks.
As we get closer to home, the San Jose Sharks are always an intriguing
bunch. GM Wilson definitely wanted more sandpaper on this squad and
they do look to be tougher this season without giving up too much
talent. He guessed right a few times with his moves; Dany Heatley has
provided a lot of points without any controversy and Patrick Marleau
has flourished without the misplaced “C” on his jersey and with less
responsibility as a wing for Joe Thornton. Joe Pavelski, Ryan Clowe
and Devin Setoguchi have built chemistry and points on the second
forward line and Dan Boyle has shown that his destined to be team
captain with his combined play and leadership. The goaltender, Evgeni
Nabokov has once again posted sterling regular season digits and the
Sharks look to devour the competitors in the West on the way to
another division title. The downside in this pretty picture is the
same one that’s been hanging heavy over this team like the fog does so
many mornings in the San Francisco Bay. Can they survive four rounds
of madness after an 82 game calmness that is their regular season?
Though changes have been made, it’s the same core players (read:
Thornton, Marleau, Nabokov) that was woefully underachieved during all
post seasons in recent Sharks history. We’ll take a timeout and wait
until April to see if anything’s changed in the Tank.
So that leaves just one and a pretty good one at that. Some say
they’re the glamour boys of the league, the franchise to model
rebuilding projects after (LA Kings GM Dean Lombardi publicly admits
it) and certainly one of Commissioner Gary Bettman’s favorites. They
play in a major US market; have revived the echoes of an Original Six
team’s deep history and routinely sellout to crowds of 20,000 plus
every night.
No, not the Montreal Canadiens.
The Chicago Blackhawks meteoric rise has continued on pace for the
first half of the season. Even with the biggest fish in the free agent
offseason frenzy Marian Hossa, out for most of the first half, the
Indian hasn’t missed a beat. They play a hard, fast and most
importantly, an entertaining game especially at the United Center
where they’re virtually unbeatable.
But naysayers argue that the Chicago goaltending tandem, Antti Niemi
and Cristobal Huet only have six playoff victories between them or
just five more than the aforementioned Jimmy Howard and indeed, a
definitive fatal flaw in the quest to win 16 post season games. But
supporters will counter with the fact that these two fine gentlemen
are on track to win the Jennings Trophy, symbolic of the team with the
lowest goals against average in the league. While regular season
hardware means little in the pursuit of the grand prize (just ask the
Sharks), it’s the ‘why’ there in contention for the award that is the
moral to the story.
As it stands now, there isn’t a team in the NHL that can beat the
Blackhawks in a best four out of seven series. Going down their
roster, they have the most talent in the league man for man, so much
so that they are the primary player in the embryonic Ilya Kovalchuk
trade talks. The grand Chicago rebuilding plan that started in 2003
has come to fruition, last year’s conference final at the hands of the
Red Wings was the precursor and this year appears to be both the
culmination and coronation.
Dennis
Bernstein, the man behind SCORE! Media and an NHL
Analyst with ESPN Radio, is the Los Angeles
Correspondent for
The Fourth Period Magazine and a Columnist
for TheFourthPeriod.com. You can also visit
Dennis on
Twitter.
