EDM 2-1 OVER VAN!

Van has been eliminated from getting a playoff spot and all the playoff spots for the Western Conference are FINAL. They could change the standings but those 8 teams are there for sure.

I'm appalled to see such a shitty team like Nashville making it into the playoffs. Chris Mason/Dan Ellis ftl.

Last game of the year for the Isles tonight...I'm as sad as I am relieved. Now the real question is where we will land in the 2008 draft. I'm really doubting that we'll get to draft Stevey Stamkos because we currently have an 8% chance at the first pick, so I'm looking at Nikita Filatov, Evgeny Grachev, Mattias Tedenby, Drew Doughty, Alex Pietrangelo, Kyle Beach, and local prospect Zach Bogosian. The only '08 NHL mock draft I've seen tabs the Isles as the #5 pick, selecting Cody Hodgson ('07-08: 68 GP, 40 G, 45 A, 85 pts, +15, 36 PIM for the OHL's Brampton Battalion). They have 0 goalies going in the first round as well, and tab the Kings as taking two defensemen (Drew Doughty & Luca Sbisa) with their two 1st-round picks (#2 and #23 in this mock draft).

It all comes down to this. It's make or break for the Caps. They are in a must win situation. Man I hope they blow it :)

At 4/4/08 11:46 PM, Tluck-Person wrote: It all comes down to this. It's make or break for the Caps. They are in a must win situation. Man I hope they blow it :)

Even if they're in the playoffs do you actually think they will win it?

At 4/4/08 11:50 PM, DarkSoldier wrote:

At 4/4/08 11:46 PM, Tluck-Person wrote: It all comes down to this. It's make or break for the Caps. They are in a must win situation. Man I hope they blow it :)

Even if they're in the playoffs do you actually think they will win it?

That's not what matters to me. If the Caps make the playoffs, I lose $100 bucks. Therefore, I hope they blow it, because then I make $100.

At 4/2/08 04:05 PM, DarkSoldier wrote:

Kevin Lowe may be a bad manager but he would never be stupid to sign Ovechkin A.K.A Barry Bonds.

Wait a minute. You compared a hockey player to a baseball player? I haven't seen Ovechkin grow 5 extra pant sizes in 3 seasons to begin with. Secondly, why the fuck would you compare someone who's always been great in the league from the beginning, to someone who was great in the league, went on a slide, and then suddenly became greater than before. At least with Ovie, the numbers add up.

At 4/5/08 12:37 PM, Tluck-Person wrote:
Wait a minute. You compared a hockey player to a baseball player? I haven't seen Ovechkin grow 5 extra pant sizes in 3 seasons to begin with. Secondly, why the fuck would you compare someone who's always been great in the league from the beginning, to someone who was great in the league, went on a slide, and then suddenly became greater than before. At least with Ovie, the numbers add up.

I don't really watch Baseball. All i knew was that Bonds used steroids and thats why i compared him to Ovechkin. But the thing about the steroids that Ovechkin supposedly uses i was just joking about that.

Hey! I wanna join, i'm a huge Montreal Canadiens fan (we're going first place, WOOT). So,

East: Montreal Canadiens
West: Calgary Flames

At 4/5/08 10:13 PM, Firestom wrote: Hey! I wanna join, i'm a huge Montreal Canadiens fan (we're going first place, WOOT). So,

pfff....Pittsburgh taking first ;)

East: Montreal Canadiens

ewww...

West: Calgary Flames

How about some Edmonton love in there?

At 4/5/08 11:04 PM, DarkSoldier wrote:

At 4/5/08 10:13 PM, Firestom wrote: Hey! I wanna join, i'm a huge Montreal Canadiens fan (we're going first place, WOOT). So,

pfff....Pittsburgh taking first ;)

true. They'll beat the Flyers today.

East: Montreal Canadiens

ewww...

Hey, it's better than Ottawa

West: Calgary Flames

How about some Edmonton love in there?

At least Calgary actually is consistent with making the playoffs (staying in the playoffs is a whole other story with those guys, though.

I think it's safe to say the playoffs are set. It's just a matter of time who faces who.

Anyone want to make predictions of the series?

ohhh ok Dark Soldier, Edmonton tried hard, and Rollie is what Kipper was in 2004. An invincible Great Wall of China, and when Edmonton plays Calgary, Edmonton always puts up a good fight that it resembles bitchy Models on the catwalk rather than Dazzling moves. Except for Sortini, (aka Huggie bear). he just hugs people.

But Rollie what a Goalie.

Now I only did this because I love you Dark Soldier. Well in a friendly Plutonic way of course.

Well look at it this way Dark Soldier, at least your other favorite team the Sharks are playing us. So you might have a small "Chance" for revenge. of course we're going to win....

At 4/6/08 10:15 PM, hongkongexpress wrote: Well look at it this way Dark Soldier, at least your other favorite team the Sharks are playing us. So you might have a small "Chance" for revenge. of course we're going to win....

pfff...wait until the drop of the puck. Jonathan Cheechoo will have the Flames skating in circles ;)

At 4/5/08 01:42 PM, DarkSoldier wrote: I don't really watch Baseball. All i knew was that Bonds used steroids and thats why i compared him to Ovechkin. But the thing about the steroids that Ovechkin supposedly uses i was just joking about that.

Well, it backfired. Please don't make joking references about players using steriods, without at least sustained media speculation to back you up, since that's pretty much all we've got to go on with Barry Bonds :P

The whole steroids issue is a nasty thing to deal with and I don't want to see teams victimised because of idle talk.

Good to see the Avs getting a win on the 25th Anniversary of my birth. Hopefully, we're warmed up against our first round opponents, the Wild and I'd like to see us play well enough to warrant a place in the second round.

If we don't play well enough, we don't deserve to get into the next round of the playoffs. Simple as that

Predictions
East - Series wins in round 1 for Montreal, Pittsburgh, Philadelphia and New York. The difficult one to pick there is the Caps / Flyers, as AO has never played in the postseason at NHL Level before. His stats playing for Dynamo Moscow were frankly shite, but he is 3 seasons more experienced now and he has come off a career year.

West - Series wins in round 1 for Nashville (!), San Jose, Colorado and Dallas. The year of the Underdog is here, I say. I think that Detroit will either fall at the first or go all the way and I know which prospect is more attractive for me.

Bergeron is cleared for the playoffs and is ready to be in the line-up of the bruins soon...

At 4/7/08 05:16 PM, DarkSoldier wrote: Bergeron is cleared for the playoffs and is ready to be in the line-up of the bruins soon...

I still think that Montreal is going to beat the Bruins. The only problem they might have is that Price doesn't have any playoff games under his belt.

Though he's got to learn sometime.

Tampa Bay get 1st round draft choice.

Just imagine...Lecavalier, Stamkos and St.Louis!

At 4/6/08 10:19 PM, DarkSoldier wrote: pfff...wait until the drop of the puck. Jonathan Cheechoo will have the Flames skating in circles ;)

Only if Joe Thornton feels like passing him the puck.

At 4/8/08 07:46 PM, DarkSoldier wrote: Tampa Bay get 1st round draft choice.

Just imagine...Lecavalier, Stamkos and St.Louis!

That could be as good as...Lecavalier, Richards and St. Louis!

Get real my man, Tampa will continue to play like shit unless they shore up their defensive corps. There's not much to be scared of when your defensive tandems are Dan Boyle-Shane O'Brien, Paul Ranger-Filip Kuba, and Alexandre Picard/Brad Lukowich-Mike Lundin/Matt Smaby. Hell, even Boyle was shitty this year. Being -29 isn't gonna help too much, and I don't think that the Bolts realize that in order for their two future netminders, Ramo and Smith, to blossom, they need an actual defense behind them.

When the Islanders have a better defense than you, you know there's some problems. Oh, and it doesn't help that their bottom two lines are complete garbage (Karl Stewart-Craig MacDonald-Junior Lessard, Andreas Karlsson-Nick Tarnasky-Jason Ward), either.

a pity that Yeller didn't get a hatrick. Oh well. a win is a win.

At 4/10/08 01:16 AM, hongkongexpress wrote: a pity that Yeller didn't get a hatrick. Oh well. a win is a win.

Gritty for you guys, gritty for the Avs as well. Joe Sakic does it again - his 8th OT winner in the playoffs and we grind out a 1-0 lead in the series. We're guaranteed a split now, but if we can take a 2-0 lead, I'll be very happy.

Scott Gomez played his best game for some time, tallying 3 assists to lead the Rangers over the Devils. Those series are certainly worth a watch.

mannn, the flames got dominated a lot more than I expected. On the flip side, kipper was much better than I expected.

I actually picked the flames in this series, as they match up very well against the sharks. They won the regular season series, Nabs is incredibly overrated and deserves no consideration at all for the vezina, the flames are actually a superior team 5-on-5, and the only scoring rates campbell has improved has been the powerplay.

If the flames can keep out of the box and avoid losing the puck possession battle like they did last night, I don't expect the series to last too long.

At 4/10/08 10:01 AM, VeryProudofYa wrote: I actually picked the flames in this series, as they match up very well against the sharks. They won the regular season series, Nabs is incredibly overrated and deserves no consideration at all for the vezina,

I'm going to be annoying on this part, mainly because of the stats that Nabby has produced this season.

He's come up with the 4th most wins of any regular season performance ever. That's got to be worth a mention, even if it was down to the assistance he had from his teammates ont he defensive aspects.

His GAA was 3rd in the league at 2.14. Sub-2 would be spectacular, but considering that the best was Chris Osgood's 2.09, I think he did really well. Granted, his Save percentage was only ranked T-20th in the NHL and it's only as good as Jose Theodore's, but it's still above players such as Ryan Miller (.906) and Miikka Kiprusoff (.906) He was tied for third in shutouts, behind Henrik Lundqvist (10) and Pascal LeClaire (9)

I personally think that Lundqvist has had a better year and should get the Vezina nod over Nabby. Not because Nabby is overrated, but because Lundqvist had a better year.

You can't get 40 shutouts in the NHL and not be any good, can you?

At 4/10/08 01:16 AM, hongkongexpress wrote: a pity that Yeller didn't get a hatrick. Oh well. a win is a win.

Whatever, EA predicted San Jose to win the series 4-2. So..Calgary winning 2 games is being expected in my mind ;)

At 4/10/08 03:46 PM, Coop83 wrote:

At 4/10/08 10:01 AM, VeryProudofYa wrote: I actually picked the flames in this series, as they match up very well against the sharks. They won the regular season series, Nabs is incredibly overrated and deserves no consideration at all for the vezina,

I'm going to be annoying on this part, mainly because of the stats that Nabby has produced this season.

He's come up with the 4th most wins of any regular season performance ever. That's got to be worth a mention, even if it was down to the assistance he had from his teammates ont he defensive aspects.

His GAA was 3rd in the league at 2.14. Sub-2 would be spectacular, but considering that the best was Chris Osgood's 2.09, I think he did really well. Granted, his Save percentage was only ranked T-20th in the NHL and it's only as good as Jose Theodore's, but it's still above players such as Ryan Miller (.906) and Miikka Kiprusoff (.906) He was tied for third in shutouts, behind Henrik Lundqvist (10) and Pascal LeClaire (9)

I personally think that Lundqvist has had a better year and should get the Vezina nod over Nabby. Not because Nabby is overrated, but because Lundqvist had a better year.

You can't get 40 shutouts in the NHL and not be any good, can you?

If anything, the goals against to save percentage discrepancy only strengthens my argument. All the goaltending stats that rely on team metrics he's excelled in, but in actually stopping shots? Yea, right down at the bottom of the league. It's easier to play a large quantity of games when you face such a low number of shots per game. And when you consider that his backup outplayed him by a large margin, yeah, he shouldnt even get consideration

Meanwhile, players like JS Jigs are ignored. Despite the fact that he has the second best save percentage, second best goals against, is one of the leaders in wins, faces more shots per game than nabs and stops a larger percentage of them. If Jiggy hadn't been hampered by injuries, he'd win it, after all, his numbers are better than any other tender.

So, if jigs isn't in the conversation and nabs doesn't deserve it all, Lundqvist probably deserves the nod.

Fellas, fellas, fellas.

Ty Conklin for Vezina 2007-08

At 4/10/08 04:25 PM, VeryProudofYa wrote: So, if jigs isn't in the conversation and nabs doesn't deserve it all, Lundqvist probably deserves the nod.

I picked a guy I thought was good for the Vezina. I was saying that Nabs isn't overrated. I hope that the shutout last night went some way to proving that, especially that save he made against Owen Nolan. You can't save the shots that aren't getting through, but if you save the ones that do, you're in a better position, surely

At 4/10/08 10:15 PM, Buddhist wrote: Fellas, fellas, fellas.

Ty Conklin for Vezina 2007-08

Who?

SJ 2-0 over CAL!

Series tied 1-1!

sharks ftw!

At 4/11/08 04:06 AM, Coop83 wrote:

At 4/10/08 04:25 PM, VeryProudofYa wrote: So, if jigs isn't in the conversation and nabs doesn't deserve it all, Lundqvist probably deserves the nod.

I picked a guy I thought was good for the Vezina. I was saying that Nabs isn't overrated. I hope that the shutout last night went some way to proving that, especially that save he made against Owen Nolan. You can't save the shots that aren't getting through, but if you save the ones that do, you're in a better position, surely

Meh, he is overrated. The fact that he's getting any consideration at all for the best goaltender award proves without question he's an overrated. Additionally, you're making too big a deal about a shutout. Kari Lehtonen recorded 4, so? Also worth noting that he only had to make 21 saves in order to record it.

Dan Ellis - Vezina winner, 07-08

DON'T DENY IT