Dr Dubya

To be fair, it's very obvious Johnson's injured. He's taken one draw in the last 4 games I think. Before that, he'd never played a game without taking a faceoff. He's their #2 faceoff guy and can't take a draw. Something's wrong. That's the playoffs. They look to be falling apart in health like the 2009 Red Wings.

Except it didn't lol. What else did it screw up?

I can't remember seeing so much lop-sided luck in a long time. Crawford turns the puck over and his punishment is Kucherov gets injured. Then he plays the puck in the no-zone and instead of giving away a penalty Bishop makes a mistake and Chicago scores. Wow! This is a test for Tampa.

It's just his way. He didn't in '08. Said he wanted the players to have all the spotlight or something like that. We'll see.

I feel fairly certain that Stevie won't lift the Cup on the ice when they win. He probably won't even join them on the ice.

Agreed. I must say though, while Hjalmarsson has ben solid, Keith and Seabrook have seemed uncharacteristically sloppy at times. Maybe they are wearing down with the major minutes.

The Devils had a decent roster in a terrible conference. Kinda like the Hawks this year. The East was stacked with contendors this year. Detroit wasn't one of them. Sorry.

The other day, I was thinking how cool it must be for Jon Cooper to be in the Finals in only his second full season as coach (3rd season total). I thought, "What an achievement!", but then I thought about it again. It's actually a super common thing these days. New coaches make the Finals ALL. THE. TIME. So I found some bored time and did the research. Since, 1999 only 2 times has a coach been at his club for more than 5 years and made it to the Finals. TWICE! In contrast 8 times a coach has made it in his first season with a team. Equally as amazing is 20 times has a coach made when he was at his club for less than 3 full seasons. So the hope is Holland gives Blashill a damn good team right away, because his window is short! This is probably largely attributable to the fact that coaches move around so often these days, but surely this says a lot about the impact a new voice can have on a team. Edit: Tables don't work here so I can't post a chart - sorry.

I never said any of that lol. Take it easy. But Tampa's roster is far and away better than Detroit's. So I would guess they'd generally fare better than Detroit would. Surely you can't seriously think Detroit has a Stanley Cup roster.

I'd love to agree but I just can't. Yes, we probably could and should have beaten Tampa, but they've really progressed a lot since the Detroit series, and have played much better to get to where they are. I'm dubious about Detroit getting over the line against any of Montreal, New York or Chicago. Edit: And FWIW - I'm still supremely confident the Bolts will take the Cup with much less trouble than everyone thinks.

You know his number wasn't actually "retired" though right? In fact, it had been worn since his retirement. And it also never hung from any rafters right? You make it sound like Illitch personally ripped it from the rafters when he bought the team. That just isn't the case.

From what I've read (1930's was a little before my time), Aurie was never that great of a player and was never the best player on his team at any point during his career. His number was only retired in the first place because he was tight with Jack Adams. That's what I read anyway. If there's any truth at all to that, then why should his name go up there with actual greats of the game. And Red Kelly, well this is another time Jack Adams got his way. Except this time, it seems to have stuck.

Got it. Just seemed like you were suggesting one of these two teams was average with an elite goalie.

Lol. Who's the average team in this scenario?

Watch it happen. The Hawks are a good team. But everyone assumes they must be the best by default just because their players have been on their fantasy teams for 5 years. TODAY the Bolts have better offense. TODAY they have comparable D. TODAY they have better goaltending. The only advantage the Hawks have is experience. Which is something. But it won't be enough. Bolts in 5.

Finally someone else who can see past the past. The thing that makes me sad is the Bolts are very young. So they probably gonna be a Cup favorite for many years to come. In our division.

Last time I was in LA, I didn't see a cloud for a week and it was pretty far south.

Luckily the Bolts will school the Hawks.

Lol Crawford.

I hate the Hawks as much as the next guy, but strike me down if it isn't fun to watch Perry lose like this.

Crawford used to say exactly that as a joke 6 years ago.

Good goal lol

If Blashill focuses his and his top lines energy on running away from the opposing top line, instead of granting them the freedom they've earnt, then he'll rival Boudreau. He destroyed his best player's confidence before the puck was dropped. No surprise he loses almost every game 7 he's in, despite having home ice every time.

Boudreau is easily the most overrated coach I've come across for a while.

It's pretty scary to watch the highest scoring team in the league shut down a game like that. The way they played tonight and in G5, the Hawks or Ducks have very little chance. Tampa can be inconsistent though, so it'll probably take them 5 games to win the Cup.