hockeyfanatic

My first thought was that Niedermeyer is retiring. I wonder, though...is Schneider there to replace him *IF* he decides to retire? Maybe Anaheim isn't sure whether Scott will retire. It is a lot of money between Niedermeyer, Pronger, Schneider, and Giguere...but is Selanne retiring? I'm not very familiar with the salary cap situation in Anaheim, is it possible they could afford both d-men? The thought of Anaheim's defense if Neidermeyer doesn't retire is scary. His retirement seems likely, but I still have to wonder...

Wasn't Radulov leading the Preds in points when he got a one game suspension in Round 1? He doesn't have the same kind of star power as Pronger, but he was certainly a big part of the team at the time. It was a similar type of hit. Granted, the player he hit (Bernier?) didn't come back in the game, but he was ready for the next game. They should really consider that, but they probably wont. I think Pronger would be suspended if Holmstrom hadn't come back and the Wings kept quiet and inserted him into the line-up for Game 4. As it is, he'll probably get a verbal reprimand at best. It's unfortunate, but the league makes a lot of decisions based on injury.

Why? It's a foreign language. Zidlicky should be pronounced the same way, but he asked to be called by the Americanized pronunciation awhile back (if I remember correctly). Kinda like Spezza is pronounced Spet-za. It's Italian, so double z makes a different sound than you would hear in English. Bertuzzi should be pronounced the same way, I think, but his family probably adopted the Americanized pronunciation a long time ago, like a lot of immigrants have.

Is that Grigorenko?

"Now if they can pound the Red Wings harder than the Flames gave it to them in the opening round, the Sharks should have no trouble advancing to the conference finals." I like how the 'Detroit is soft' mentality is still being perpetuated. The second paragraph of the article also makes it sound like the Flames physical play forced the Wings into a game they want to stop playing. I dunno, it seemed like the Wings set the tone early in this past series. I see no reason for them to change a winning formula.

DET/SJ - Detroit in 6 ANA/VAN - Anaheim in 6 BUF/NYR - Buffalo in 6 NJD/OTT - NJ in 7

You beat me to it. Octopi rock

Holy crap! Don Cherry was talking about the Wings-Flames game, and he didn't criticize the Wings?! Think I even heard him grudgingly compliment the team, though it was quick, so maybe I'm hearing things. Yeah, I must be....it is Cherry after all.

Yeah, that's exactly what I was thinking after seeing the replays again. I think both were probably clean now, but I can certainly see why both may seem questionable. And good to know about the CBC announcers.

About the Phaneuf hit on Datsyuk...I wonder which channel the people who think it was dirty / clean were watching. I certainly thought it was clean initially, but CBC had another angle that showed what appeared to be an elbow (and the CBC announcers thought so too, and said Dion was *very* lucky he didn't get called on it). I dunno... looking at that picture it doesn't look like an elbow. Maybe the other angle was just misleading, because a couple angles they showed certainly looked clean. I've only seen replays of the angles where it looks clean, so I'm starting to think it was. I also noticed that they didn't credit Cleary with a single hit on NHL.com and the Phaneuf hit wasnt in the Game 2 highlights. I wonder if they thought the legality of both hits were questionable?

You must be thinking of a different hit. I think they are talking about the elbow Phaneuf delivered to Datsyuk's head. Luckily, Datsyuk got right back up.

Dumont scored shorthanded when it was 5 on 4. Then San Jose took two penalties and gave Nashville a 2:00 minute 5 on 3 PP. Dumont scored a second time at the end of Nashville's PP.

You're right, the league should do anything it can do destroy the game of hockey. We can start by giving Bettman a lifetime contract, no? There's nothing wrong with overtime in the playoffs, it adds to the excitement. It's not like we have games going to 4th OT every night. If we did, it might warrant some attention. A shootout would be a terrible idea.

I'm suprised to see Cheechoo playing. I didn't realize he was ok.

I thought the pick in 2008 would *only* be given if Bert were to resign, and it would be a second rounder. It was a 2nd round pick that would become a 1st rounder?

Ah...remember when playoff hockey didn't involve powerplays for 50% of the game? Those were the days...

WEST: Detroit 4-2 over Calgary Minnesota 4-3 over Anaheim Vancouver 4-2 over Dallas San Jose 4-2 over Nashville EAST: Buffalo 4-1 over New York Islanders New Jersey 4-2 over Tampa Bay New York 4-2 over Atlanta Ottawa 4-2 over Pittsburgh

People should keep that in mind. I seem to recall quite a few of our back-to-backs were against teams that were in the middle of homestands with a day full of rest. It isn't exactly the same situation when both teams have to travel at the same time.

Det-Nsh would be a great series, and it would do wonders for the rivalry too. I'm rooting for Nashville, not because I like you guys, but because I don't want to face San Jose later! Nashville in 7.

It matters some. If the Sharks win their last game and Nashville loses theirs, San Jose will move into the #4 spot because they will win the tiebreaker. I don't think Nashville wants to lose home ice advantage in the 1st round.

Ah, the wonderful things you learn as a science major Stereochemistry taught me that left-handed people are evil. What would we do without Latin nomenclature? And speaking of chemistry, I can only hope Bertuzzi finds some chemistry with Lang. The 2nd line was great last night, but I can't help being excited about adding Todd into the mix. See...it's on topic!

You know, "sinister" in Latin actually translates to "left-handed". No kidding.

I think it's more likely to be a 1st in 2007, and a conditional pick in 2008 (2nd maybe, depending on if he resigns or not, which would make it a second 1st). Even that seems a little light, considering Florida is trying to save face after the Luongo deal. They would probably want a player or prospect too, but it wouldn't be someone on the level of Kindl.

Coburn was involved in the Zhitnik trade, not this one. Only player Atlanta traded for Tkachuk was Metropolit.