NHL 2017-2018

[Bucki1968]

38 minutes ago, billchao said:

Ok.

That's called getting shut down by the opposition.

I love how you're harping on two guys for underperforming in a team sport on the team touted as having the most depth of talent in the entire NHL this year. I love sports fans, they crack me up sometimes.

Yes I am harping on two guys who didn't step up. Especially guys getting paid what Stamkos is getting paid. Steve Yzerman showed up in big spots. So did Gretzky. Messier. Hell...even Darren McCarty Dino Ciccarelli. . When you get shut out two consecutive games when you are supposed to have that much talent...it's either the players or the coaching. The Lightning stud goal scorers vanished. Not sure what is wrong with stating the obvious?

[billchao]

3 hours ago, billchao said:

Oh right. I'm sure the vast majority of Federov's playoff points were acquired in empty net situations

I looked it up. He scored 3 ENG his entire playoff career.

Obviously that means he must have had 70 assists on ENG to pad his stats 😉

[DaveP043]

2 hours ago, billchao said:

That's called getting shut down by the opposition.

I love how you're harping on two guys for underperforming in a team sport on the team touted as having the most depth of talent in the entire NHL this year. I love sports fans, they crack me up sometimes.

Whether we say the Caps shut down the Lightning's big guns, or whether we say the TB big guns failed to show up, I'm pretty pleased with the results  .  The level of effort throughout the line-up, and the near-elimination of serious mistakes was pretty heartening to see.  A few pretty lucky bounces didn't hurt either.  Now on to Las Vegas.  I don't know enough about that team to be scared, or to be confident, but I'll be watching every game from the edge of my seat.

[billchao]

1 hour ago, DaveP043 said:

Whether we say the Caps shut down the Lightning's big guns, or whether we say the TB big guns failed to show up, I'm pretty pleased with the results  .  The level of effort throughout the line-up, and the near-elimination of serious mistakes was pretty heartening to see.  A few pretty lucky bounces didn't hurt either.  Now on to Las Vegas.  I don't know enough about that team to be scared, or to be confident, but I'll be watching every game from the edge of my seat.

I looked it up on https://www.hockey-reference.com/ for the series and then had to do a little bit of number crunching of my own, but Stamkos and Kucherov both came out positive in possession metrics at 5v5 (and that's including games 2 and 6 where the two were completely dominated in possession). Overall, the run of play was in the Washington zone when those two were on the ice 5v5. They did their jobs, they just didn't score. I didn't dig deep enough to figure out why, but I don't really care and it doesn't matter anyway.

[mcanadiens]

Didn't get to see the end, but that was a heck of a cross check to set up the go-ahead goal by Reaves. Really amazing they let that go.

[iacas]

3 minutes ago, mcanadiens said:

Didn't get to see the end, but that was a heck of a cross check to set up the go-ahead goal by Reaves. Really amazing they let that go.

Could've gone either way there. That shit happens all the time. Watch Patric Hornqvist any time he's on the ice, basically.

The late hit by Wilson is the headliner. He purposefully targeted an impact player well after the puck was 30, 40 feet away.

[BamaWade]

Man, the refereeing throughout these playoffs just seems sub-par.  Yeah, I thought so for my Bruins, but write that off to bias, right?  But I still seem to think so even in series I have no fan stake in.  I get the game's faster, you can't see everything, etc...but wow there are a lot of bad misses.

I agree it's a hit that goes uncalled plenty, but the Reaves cross-check was the epitome of a cross-check, right at ground-zero in front of the net (resulting in a score)...and was supposed to be taken out of the game years ago.  Coulda/shoulda been 2.

But the Tom Wilson hit--good God I came unglued (for a neutral fan); interference on a predatory level, with a linesman a few feet away at the boards (and a ref deep in the zone looking right back at it), and it took a serious confab just to deem it a minor and match it down to 4-on-4 (on a hit I didn't see, but apparently was also blatant interference).  I watched #43 the entire shift up to that point; he was trying to make a statement...he quit playing hockey and was just running everyone he crossed--nothing illegal--but you could tell his pea-size cretin brain was just driving him to cross the line, and IMO, he did exactly that with the Marchessault hit.

I wouldn't say it warrants supplemental discipline (and none came), but that oughtta be a 5 minute major every single time.

Didn't notice...was that a Wes McCauley led crew last night?  I like WM, and figure he's reffing the SCF at some point, but not sure how the rotation works.

[billchao]

1 minute ago, BamaWade said:

Man, the refereeing throughout these playoffs just seems sub-par.

All NHL officiating in the postseason is always sub-par. They throw out the rulebook for the playoffs and it's really stupid. What other major sport has two different sets of rules (albeit unwritten) for the regular season and the postseason?

The Reaves crosscheck was bullshit but not calling interference on Wilson initially was ridiculous.

I like how MLB actually brings in more umpires to get calls right. I know putting in more officials on the ice can be a problem, but couldn't they just expand the power of the linesmen?

But they don't want well officiated games. They want playoff hockey to be for tough guys, to let the boys play, and all the other tropes they use to justify rewinding the rulebook to the hack and slash era an entire season was lost in an effort to get rid of.

[iacas]

What's terrible is that Olympics and other forms of International hockey are SO WELL officiated.

[Warren Zevon]

  Congrats to both teams in the finals.  Job well done for a great first season, Vegas.  They've kind of set the bar high for themselves. 

  And good for the Caps.  It's been a long time coming.

  I love how Bettman gets booed every time.

[Warren Zevon]

Also, I’m LMAO at the lady(?) in the white dress whose chest popped out during Ovi’s lap.  What happens in Vegas doesn’t stay in Vegas when it’s broadcast around the world.  

[allenc]

13 minutes ago, Warren Zevon said:

Also, I’m LMAO at the lady(?) in the white dress whose chest popped out during Ovi’s lap.  What happens in Vegas doesn’t stay in Vegas when it’s broadcast around the world.  

Missed it.  Pics?

[DaveP043]

      

[billchao]

Finally people can stop criticizing Ovechkin for not being a "winner" or whatever, as if not winning the Stanley Cup somehow made him less than one of the greatest players of all time.

Also I'm surprised they have so many ice level mics during celebrations. Lots of f-bombs being thrown around on live TV.

[DaveP043]

6 minutes ago, billchao said:

Finally people can stop criticizing Ovechkin for not being a "winner" or whatever, as if not winning the Stanley Cup somehow made him less than one of the greatest players of all time.

Also I'm surprised they have so many ice level mics during celebrations. Lots of f-bombs being thrown around on live TV.

It was pretty cool to see the emotion on his face, during the last few minutes on the bench, and afterwards on the ice.  He liked the Conn Smythe, but he was overjoyed to lift the Stanley Cup.  

I was really impressed with Vegas, especially last night.  I kind of thought they might run out of emotional energy if they didn't score in the first 10 minutes of the game, but they were intense right to the end.  

[mcanadiens]

Fitting that the franchise that suffered the worst-ever first season would beat the club with the best-ever inaugural. 

Perhaps Ron Low was smiling last night. He had a 5.45 GAA in 74-75 and won all eight of the Caps victories that year.

 

[billchao]

25 minutes ago, DaveP043 said:

It was pretty cool to see the emotion on his face, during the last few minutes on the bench, and afterwards on the ice.  He liked the Conn Smythe, but he was overjoyed to lift the Stanley Cup.  

I was really impressed with Vegas, especially last night.  I kind of thought they might run out of emotional energy if they didn't score in the first 10 minutes of the game, but they were intense right to the end.  

Really entertaining 3rd. DSP scoring the game-tying goal while being tripped has to be an instant classic.

[iacas]

2 hours ago, billchao said:

Finally people can stop criticizing Ovechkin for not being a "winner" or whatever, as if not winning the Stanley Cup somehow made him less than one of the greatest players of all time.

The two were separate things. He was a great goal-scorer. One of the best ever. Still is.

But he wasn't a "winner" yet. The criticisms of him there have been, IMO, fair. I think he was even stripped of his captaincy briefly, or benched a few years ago. That doesn't reflect well.

You can be critical of one area without detracting from another.

Congrats to the Caps. Except Niskanen, Oshie, Orpik, and particularly perpetual thug-head Tom Wilson.