VM1138

Um...Ozzie ain't too shabby when it comes to handling pucks. How about we just stick with him?

You're right. Hossa is such a bum. It's not like he could ever carry a team (along with Datsyuk) for a season and help them limp to the playoffs after everyone else on the team took a year off. Bum. Seriously, the Hossa and Datsyuk hate is mind-boggling. Yeah, they've disappeared. No, I don't have an explanation, but these guys are amazing players and it's easy how quickly everyone forgets. Obviously something bizarre is happenign to have BOTH of them just disappear. Zetterberg, too, until the last couple of games. Both Hossa and Datsyuk are making things happen. For some reason, their shots aren't going in.

I know, it's amazing how much of a fan favorite Lilja has become this season. A lot of us always liked him, btu were frusrated by his occasional brain lapses, but he's been nothing but great this year for us. I actually advocated letting him go last year, and I'm now one of those eagerly awaiting his return. A Lilja-Ericcson pairing could be one of the most entertaining Defense pairings in the league.

I gotta say one thing here. Generally the yougn captains annoy me to no end, but I've never seen anything in Toews that makes me think he's a whiner or not mature enough to do it. THat could change this series, though. The Wings have a tendency to bring out the whininess in opponents.

I hope one of the Hawks touches the octopus. Do it!

Bowman can advise them, but I don't think he really knows anything special about the Wings nowadays. He probably has a little inside information that doesn't really help the Hawks. Anything he knows Quennville can probably learn from watching tapes.

Technically we're tied. The extra 2 to make 13 were actually when the Cup wasn't an NHL only trophy. Sort of gives them a fake edge. Oh, and they were the St. Pats. Not sure if they were roster-wise the same team, though.

I think Abdelkator might be switched out for Leino, but maybe not game 1. Only because we have Helm but we're going to need offense. THen again, with Hossa, Datsyuk, and Zetterberg finally able to score we might not need Leino to overpower Chicago and could use Helm and Abdelkador to bust some heads.

You know, generally I feel sympathy and respect for the team that lost, and it's always sad to see them so upset about their loss, knowing that they lost everything. But in this case, being the Ducks, I hope they never make playoffs again, or experience heartbreak every time they do. Hell, I even felt bad for Crosby last year. But this time? Nothing. Have fun golfing you goons.

Okay, so in all my years of being a die-hard hockey fan, I apparently never bothered to learn the rules of a faceoff. After watching the Wings get kicked out of virtually every faceoff circle this series, and hearing the complaints about how the Wings cheat at faceoffs, can someone please explain the rules to me? And also, is there any merit to the cheating by the Wings? The only thing I have noticed is that getting chippy before the puck is dropped is not tolerated, but half the time the Wings get thrown out of the circle I never noticed anything untoward.

Yeah, unless the refs ever let players get past the shoving and hugging matches, a truly great rivalry will never emerge for any team.

You have a point, though I do think he stole a game early on in this series, I can't recall which game it was, though. But with close games in all but two games, we can't undervalue what Ozzie did for us. If he had been even slightly underperforming we'd be toast.

If Colorado ever fields a decent team again, it could come back. We've seen glimmers of it occasionally. Despite the teams being compeltely different from the rivalry, the history that is there could spark a renewed rivalry someday.

Eh, don't count your chickens before they hatch. On paper, yes, no team can touch us. But in a real series, where injuries, momentum, and fluke plays determine the outcomes, who knows. Chicago is hot, they are hungry, but they are also inexperience and play a style of game the Wings have been known to dominate. This series should be the Wings playing their type of game, which means no team stands a chance, unlike the last series where they had to respond a lot to Anaheim's occasional dominance. Also, what about the East? Pittsburgh is a dangerous, dangerous team this year. They have an axe to grind against us, they have about as experienced as the Wings were last year now. I'd say while on paper the Wings win easily, in reality it's probably evenly matched. And who knows about Carolina. THey shouldn't have made it this far, so I won't count them out as a threat, either. That being said, I do have "the feeling" that I had last year. It just seems like fate is carrying the Wings forward to repeat, I don't know.

Brilliance on the part of Babcock. I noticed the lineups as soon as the game started. We have the talent and the chemistry to basically throw together whatever lines we want, which makes it virtually impossible for the other team to defend against. It obviously worked. Although, for the next series I think we should go back to the normal lines to start. Datsyuk, Hossa, and Zetterberg's drought may end with a fresh opponent and we should give them the opportunity to dominate together. Comrade Wasabi, you bring up a good point. The past two years Chicago has basically copied the Wings style. They are like Wings Light (not that I'm trying to belittle them or pretend like we're going to breeze past them). But when a team tries to play the Wings game against the Wings, it usually doesn't end up well.

The rivalry between the states of Michigan and Ohio stretches back to at least the early 1800s. No two states (to my knowledge) hate each other as much, which is partly why the rivalries between Ohio and Michigan sports teams tend to be elevated. The WIngs are simply in a league of their own. Very few teams are actually competitive with them, which is why Wings fans don't feel a rivalry with many teams. Naturally those teams fans would hate the Wings and they would feel some obsession with defeating them. It would be the same if the tables were reversed. Now, Chicago may some day be a true rival, but they're not yet. They have a talented squad and the games between Detroit and Chicago haev been getting contentious. But it takes more than a year or two of contentious games to build a real rivalry. Look at all the s*** that has gone on between Detroit and Anaheim over the years and that's STILL not technically a world-class rivalry. There's a rivalry there, for sure, but to me it's still awaiting that spark to send it into "grown up rivalry" territory. So, if this series goes 7 games, and we face a few more times in the playoffs with each team winning a series or two, THEN it'll be a rivalry.

You're right. It still shocks me how dominating Montreal has been up until the '90s, really. They had quite a few stretches of 4 or 5 cups in a row. As awesome as a dynasty is, I think that that many in a row for the league is bad. Gotta piss off other fans quite a bit. Here's to the Wings extending their dynasty this year!

So I was curious tonight. Not just about how many Cups each team had, but what percentage of the time in the league each team had. The teams with the highest Cup win percentage relative to their years in the league (Counting only the years the Stanley Cup was only an NHL trophy, I figured it was only fair): 1) Montreal Canadiens (25%) 2) Detroit Red Wings (13.3%) 3) Edmonton Oilers (13.2%) 4) Toronto Maple Leafs (12%) 5) New York Islanders (11%) Bottom Feeders/Underachievers: 5) Philadelphia Flyers (4.8%) 4) Chicago Blackhawks (3.6%) 3) Carolina Hurricanes (3.3%) 2) Calgary Flames (2.7%) 1) Dallas Stars (2.4%) The rest were all in the middle somewhere. Not sure what the point of this is. Maybe it's satisifying to see that the Wings are overachievers compared to the LEafs? Or that the Islanders show up as one of the more successful teams in the league, when amount of years in the league are taken into consideration? It's late, I couldn't sleep, so do with this what you will. Oh, and Anaheim came in at 8th with a healthy 6.3%.

It all depends. If they start performign in the next round, we know that the Anaheim series was an aberration and I say yes, we need to resign him.

Zetterberg was huge for us, he had a few Conn Smythe plays. I don't know what happened to him, Hossa and Datsyuk scoring wise, but they had a great series. They were all over the ice making things happen. Just snakebitten. I have a feeling they will explode next series.

I love having Hudler around, the guy will be a beast next year. Depth is extraordinarily important, but having "depth" like Hossa, Zetterberg, Datsyuk, Lidstrom, etc. is even better. I'm sure there's a way to keep Hudler and Hossa. And yes, Kopecky should be sent packing.

That Scotty Bowman, he's untested but perhaps one day he will be a decent coach.

Cleary did hold (and maybe pushed, it's hard to tell) the pad, but his push was NOT the one that put the puck in the net. Hiller jerked his foot to reposition and that's what sent the puck into the net. Good goal.

IF we beat Chicago (and of course we can't atke that for granted) it's kind of neat that we'd end up in a rematch of one of our last two Cup wins. I'm not sure who I'd face. I know next to nothing about 2009's Carolina team, and Pittsburgh is a little more dangerous and experienced than last year.

Helm=playoffs. Seriously, even if he ends up suckign ina long regular season, the guy was born for playoffs and should be locked up for hsi entire freaking career.