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Stanley Cup Playoffs 2011-2012

Discussion in 'Colosseum' started by Beren, Apr 11, 2012.

  1. Beren

    Beren Lovesick and Lonely Wanderer Staff Member Member of the Week Distinguished Member ★ SPS Account Holder Resourceful Adored Veteran Pillars of Eternity SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!) New Server Contributor [2012] (for helping Sorcerer's Place lease a new, more powerful server!) Torment: Tides of Numenera SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!)

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    Pittsburgh and Vancouver live to fight another day.

    Indeed, quite the explosion by Pittsburgh there.

    And it looks like the Sedin twins found their rhythm again. Will it be enough for a rare series win after falling down 3-0?
     
  2. Aldeth the Foppish Idiot

    Aldeth the Foppish Idiot Armed with My Mallet O' Thinking Veteran

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    My guess is that they all watched the Stanley Cup Finals last year. How did Boston beat what was, by all accounts, a superior Vancouver team? The biggest reason was superior goalie play, but the close second was that they physically beat the crap out of them. Just like most sports - you see copycats. If it worked once, it can work again.
     
  3. reepnorp

    reepnorp Lim'n Lime Veteran Pillars of Eternity SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!) New Server Contributor [2012] (for helping Sorcerer's Place lease a new, more powerful server!)

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    Part of me hopes they push it to OT of game 7 and then lose, getting a taste of what they did to the Hawks last year.
     
  4. Beren

    Beren Lovesick and Lonely Wanderer Staff Member Member of the Week Distinguished Member ★ SPS Account Holder Resourceful Adored Veteran Pillars of Eternity SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!) New Server Contributor [2012] (for helping Sorcerer's Place lease a new, more powerful server!) Torment: Tides of Numenera SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!)

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    /me hands Aldeth a kleenex. There, there ...
     
  5. reepnorp

    reepnorp Lim'n Lime Veteran Pillars of Eternity SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!) New Server Contributor [2012] (for helping Sorcerer's Place lease a new, more powerful server!)

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    The same cannot be said today. Makes me sad to see the Pens go, but I'm as happy as a pig in **** to be able to watch Western conference games on a Canadian network without having Vancouver shoved down my throat. The commentators on CBC are so insanely biased towards the Canucks I ended up watching the finals last year with the TV muted half the time!

    Now, if we can just knock out Ottawa and the Flyers (next round, of course) I can watch the playoffs worry free. I've done so much trash talking over the years that if Ottawa ever wins the Cup I'll never hear the end of it! :D
     
  6. Aldeth the Foppish Idiot

    Aldeth the Foppish Idiot Armed with My Mallet O' Thinking Veteran

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    I cannot deny that the 1st round exit is disappointing. I had hoped - even somewhat expected - that the Pens would make a bit of a run. Yeah, they were the 4th seed because they didn't win their division, but they were as good as, if not better than two of three top seeds. (Although to be fair, I suppose we could say about the same for the Flyers and Devils.)

    But at least the Pens lost to a team of similar skill level. The Flyers winning that series was an upset, but not totally shocking. But the Canucks... I mean come on. Losing the the Kings in itself is not embarrassing, as the Kings aren't half bad. But losing the series in just 5 games, when you finish the regular season with the league's best record... that's pretty embarrassing.
     
  7. Blades of Vanatar

    Blades of Vanatar Vanatar will rise again Adored Veteran Pillars of Eternity SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!)

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    Giroux opened up with a nice hit on Crosby and then put the puck nithe net. It set the tone for the game. Can you say "Team Captain" anyone...
     
  8. Beren

    Beren Lovesick and Lonely Wanderer Staff Member Member of the Week Distinguished Member ★ SPS Account Holder Resourceful Adored Veteran Pillars of Eternity SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!) New Server Contributor [2012] (for helping Sorcerer's Place lease a new, more powerful server!) Torment: Tides of Numenera SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!)

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    Jonathan Quick and Dustin Brown were easily the MVPs of that series. I wonder if Quick is gonna lead a Richard Brodeur-style run to the Cup final.

    Edit: Like we need more proof that Louongo has been overrated for years. I wonder if the Canucks will try to force him to waive his no trade clause now that Schneider appears to be stepping up.
     
  9. reepnorp

    reepnorp Lim'n Lime Veteran Pillars of Eternity SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!) New Server Contributor [2012] (for helping Sorcerer's Place lease a new, more powerful server!)

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    Now that my Hawks are out it's time to cheer for my backup-backup team: GO PREDS GO!!

    Am I the only one who thinks the West is just more interesting than the East right now? At this point I'm almost assuming Philly is going to make quick work of the rest of the East, I really don't see anyone stopping them now. The West, on the other hand, the four remaining teams are just firing on all cylinders right now. Regardless of which team makes it to the finals I won't be too surprised.
     
  10. Aldeth the Foppish Idiot

    Aldeth the Foppish Idiot Armed with My Mallet O' Thinking Veteran

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    One thing that always fascinates me about hockey is that there are more upsets in playoff series than you see in any other sport. The whole concept behind a series is that the better team should win. If it's just one game, a team that plays exceptionally for that one game could win.

    To use an example of football from this past year, I doubt that Giants would have beaten the Packers in a 7-game series, not that football is a sport that lends itself to series play.

    In basketball again, it's one thing for an underdog to win a game or two in the series, but in general the better team wins out.

    In baseball, it's a little different, because in the playoffs, teams cut down on the number of players they use - most notably pitchers. So the team that has the best two or three pitchers, is for playoff purposes, the better team, and that team usually wins. So even if the team with the best couple of pitchers didn't have the best record in the regular season (maybe their 4th and 5th starters weren't very good), there is a logical explanation why you see this in the baseball playoffs.

    With hockey, you'd think it would be more like basketball, where talent wins out in the end, but hockey seems to be the sport where there is the least advantage of being among the top seeds. Look at how many times a #1 seed has made a first round exit in just recent years alone. There is no real difference between the number of players used in hockey - it's not like you only play your best two lines in the playoffs, like in baseball where only your best pitchers get starts. I have no explanation for why this occurs.
     
  11. Beren

    Beren Lovesick and Lonely Wanderer Staff Member Member of the Week Distinguished Member ★ SPS Account Holder Resourceful Adored Veteran Pillars of Eternity SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!) New Server Contributor [2012] (for helping Sorcerer's Place lease a new, more powerful server!) Torment: Tides of Numenera SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!)

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    Oh, looks like we'll have a new Stanley Cup Champion this year. So hard for anybody to establish a dynasty this day and age of the salary cap.

    Let's look at the dynasties of the 80s and the pieces they had.

    The Islanders:

    Playoff goalie - Billy Smith
    Playmaking Center - Bryan Trottier
    Snipers - Mike Bossy, John Tonelli
    Offensive / puck moving defenceman - Denis Potvin (although he was the complete package as a defenceman)
    Power Forward - Clark Gillies
    Defensive Forward - Butch Goring
    Shutdown Defencemen - Ken Morrow, Gord Lane, Dave Langevin

    The Oilers:

    Playoff goalie - Grant Fuhr
    Playmaking Center - Wayne Gretzky
    Snipers - Jari Kurri, Glenn Anderson, Esa Tikkanen
    Offensive / puck moving defenceman - Paul Coffey
    Power Forward - Big hard to move Center - Mark Messier
    Defensive Forward - Craig MacTavish
    Shutdown Defenceman - Kevin Lowe, Randy Gregg, Lee Fogolin

    Now let's look at the pieces Pittsburgh had:

    Playmaking Center - Sidney Crosby
    Big talented hard to move Center - Evgeni Malkin
    Offensive / puck moving defenceman - Kris Letang
    Two way 3rd line Center - Jordan Staal

    and ...

    Well, where were consistent shutdown defencemen when Pittsburgh needed them, especially when Philly had the power play?

    And Fleury is no playoff goalie, or at least he wasn't this year.

    Crosby and Malkin between them took up at least $18 million worth of cap space. Where was the money needed to add the other pieces?

    That was my long winded way of making the point. Crosby and Malkin are the perfect one-two center punch to build a dynasty team around. But the cap space issue makes it hard to build around them. Even now, there's questions surrounding whether Staal will want to stick around as a 3rd line center making $4 million a year.

    There's a similar debate going on in the Edmonton Oilers message boards. Yeah, we missed the playoffs again, but we were rocked by injuries all year. Yes, I'll use that excuse.

    But look at the young talent we're stocking up on. Ryan Nugent-Hopkins, Taylor Hall, Jordan Eberle, Magnus Paajarvi, Teemu Hartikainen. And we just won the "Fail for Nail (Yakupov)" sweepstakes. Oscar Klefbom, Martin Marincin, and Martin Gernat are on their way as defencemen prospects. Question is: are we gonna be able to keep the core around once they're all past their entry-level contracts? Us Oiler fans are hoping they'll mollify their salary demands so they can assemble a winner. And indeed, all of those Oilers players have publicly indicated they plan to stay Oilers for a long time to come. But there's no guarantee once UFA time rolls around.
     
  12. Beren

    Beren Lovesick and Lonely Wanderer Staff Member Member of the Week Distinguished Member ★ SPS Account Holder Resourceful Adored Veteran Pillars of Eternity SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!) New Server Contributor [2012] (for helping Sorcerer's Place lease a new, more powerful server!) Torment: Tides of Numenera SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!)

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  13. reepnorp

    reepnorp Lim'n Lime Veteran Pillars of Eternity SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!) New Server Contributor [2012] (for helping Sorcerer's Place lease a new, more powerful server!)

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    Ugh that does explain a lot. Two of your key forwards playing poorly against the hottest goalie still playing and that is just a recipe for disaster.

    The West blows me away right now. The fact that none of the remaining teams have ever won a Cup will make for an interesting finals, I think. At this point I just don't want the Coyotes to win because that might make people think Bettman knows what he's doing.

    Then there's the East. If you took the players on Philly and stuck the under almost any other team name, I'd definitely be cheering for them. Sadly, in the decade I've been watching hockey the Leafs have only made the playoffs twice, and both times were eliminated by the Flyers, so out of sheer principle I cannot cheer for them, regardless of how much I like all the players.
     
  14. Barmy Army

    Barmy Army Simple mind, simple pleasures... Adored Veteran

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    If the Caps don't win, I'd absolutely love Phoenix to win it. For some little market from the desert who nobody is meant to care about to win the cup would be just magical. And it would give NHL.com another chance to pull out the epic 'That's all she Yote!' pun.
     
  15. reepnorp

    reepnorp Lim'n Lime Veteran Pillars of Eternity SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!) New Server Contributor [2012] (for helping Sorcerer's Place lease a new, more powerful server!)

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    Well my original plan forthe evening was watch the NYR-WSH game, then watch the end of the PHX-NSH game. Definitely wasn't expecting the former to be the 20th longest NHL game in history...

    May not have had the outcome I was hoping for, but it still featured some fantastic goaltending. If Holtby can keep playing this well next season and beyond, then the Caps will finally have the security they need so desperately in net.
     
  16. Barmy Army

    Barmy Army Simple mind, simple pleasures... Adored Veteran

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    What the Caps need is a huge clear out. Semin, Green, Chimera, Brouwer, Poti can all go and stop sucking up cap space.
     
  17. Beren

    Beren Lovesick and Lonely Wanderer Staff Member Member of the Week Distinguished Member ★ SPS Account Holder Resourceful Adored Veteran Pillars of Eternity SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!) New Server Contributor [2012] (for helping Sorcerer's Place lease a new, more powerful server!) Torment: Tides of Numenera SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!)

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    Well, Ovechkin was quite a cap hit this season too. ;)

    And maybe Vancouver's bowing out in the first round isn't THAT embarrassing either, since LA is now really doing a number on St. Louis as well.
     
  18. Barmy Army

    Barmy Army Simple mind, simple pleasures... Adored Veteran

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    Ovechkin is worth too much to the franchise of the ice to ever trade him. There's just no way.
     
  19. Merlanni

    Merlanni Veteran New Server Contributor [2012] (for helping Sorcerer's Place lease a new, more powerful server!)

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    An epic match.
     
  20. Beren

    Beren Lovesick and Lonely Wanderer Staff Member Member of the Week Distinguished Member ★ SPS Account Holder Resourceful Adored Veteran Pillars of Eternity SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!) New Server Contributor [2012] (for helping Sorcerer's Place lease a new, more powerful server!) Torment: Tides of Numenera SP Immortalizer (for helping immortalize Sorcerer's Place in the game!)

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    Marty Brodeur's last hurrah? I think some people can make the case that he's been just as good as, if not better than, Patrick Roy.
     
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