The 2017/2018 NHL Thread

[gunnar hendershow]

Good news! Tonight is Oilers vs Penguins! McDavid vs Crosby!

Bad news! It's not on TV anywhere in the US except local Pittsburgh stations. We get *checks TV* uhhh Red Wings vs Sabres.

With the future of the league largely on Canadian teams (Matthews, McDavid, Laine) it's gonna be really interesting to see if NBCSN breaks precedent and schedules games featuring these teams or sticks to their routine of big market US teams and also Buffalo.

[Draevyn]

I have the game streaming while I'm at work. The commentary is a bit bland but it's been a decent game so far. A lot of back and forth but not a lot of the McDavid/Crosby showdown really.

[Meacon Keaton]

Anybody wanna go halfsies on NHL TV?  @damshow

[gunnar hendershow]

1 minute ago, Meacon said:

Anybody wanna go halfsies on NHL TV?  @damshow

I've thought about it, but until I finish grad school I'm probably better off not having access to even more live sports.

[gunnar hendershow]

So the Matt Duchene trade has happened.

Duchene heads to Ottawa

Kyle Turris goes to Nashville (and gets a 6 year/$36 million extension)

Colorado winds up with a ton of young players and some picks. From Nashville they got Samuel Girard, a rookie defenseman, prospect Vladislav Kamenev, and a 2nd rounder. From Ottawa they got 2017 1st round pick Shane Bowers, goalie Andrew Hammond, and a 1st and 3rd rounder.

And words I never thought I'd type: Joe Sakic made a hell of a trade.

[Meacon Keaton]

I'd imagine if he hadn't gotten a haul like that, his car would've been lit on fire. 

[Plubby]

We won da ting!

[Cactus Drags]

So I'm currently sat in the airport in Stockholm waiting to go back home. I had tickets for the Avs game last night, and although it sucked to see us lose, in such a stupid fashion no less, the experience was incredible. I'd been to live UK hockey before, but the NHL is (obviously) on another level. The Girard kid we got in the trade seems legit, and McKinnon is FAST. I thought we deserved more from the game to be honest, we had more of the possession and Ottawa only had a couple of chances, which they unfortunately cashed in on.

 

Best thing was our seats were right by the tunnel the Avs came out through, so I got fist bumps from MacK, Kerfoot and Yakupov. And Landy threw a puck at me but it went over my shoulder and my dad was to busy taking a picture of me fist bumping players to catch it for me :@

[TGWL]

This might be one of the saddest EWB hockey threads since I joined EWB. 

Now that we're mid-way, what does everybody think of their teams performance? 

[Ruki]

The Leafs are good, but Babcock is really dumb sometimes. Why is Polak on the team? Why is Komarov getting 3v3 time over literally anyone? Why is Komarov getting the most minutes out of forwards?!

 

But overall, I'm happy. The trio (Marner, Matthews and Mylander) are all amazing, JVR has been doing well, Rielly is coming into his own, and some of our young players (Dermott on his most recent call up, Lilijgren in the AHL/world jrs) have been doing great things. Wouldn't mind a trade or two to shake some things up (like getting Polak away from Babcock...)

[Gabriel]

The Flames are doing about as well as I expected. Their first half has been better than usual, which means if they pick it up in the second half like has been tradition, the playoffs should be in sight. The Jagr experiment seems to have failed, which really is too bad. I think it comes down more to him wanting to be put in the same situations that he has been previously, but being unable to deliver as well as some of our younger guys. Essentially being relegated to a third line guy who gets some power play time probably isn't what he was hoping for when he signed on.

Smith and Rittich have been great in the net for us, which is weird to say as the team's goaltending has been more or less shit since Kiprusoff retired. I've liked a lot of what I've seen from the younger guys this year, and guys like Monahan, Gaudreau, Brodie, Chucky and others shown consistent improvement.

Mikael Backlund continues to be one of the most underrated players in the league.

[gunnar hendershow]

In this household we cheer for the Sabres and Canadiens. I am proud to sum up this NHL season in one convenient picture.

I'm already doing some research on Winnipeg and Vegas so I can be a proper bandwagon fan come the playoffs.

[Ruki]

22 hours ago, damshow said:

In this household we cheer for the Sabres and Canadiens. I am proud to sum up this NHL season in one convenient picture.

I'm already doing some research on Winnipeg and Vegas so I can be a proper bandwagon fan come the playoffs.

Man. Vegas. Am I right?

[gunnar hendershow]

1 hour ago, Ruki said:

Man. Vegas. Am I right?

I have an acquaintance from around here who quit being a Caps fan after yet another playoff collapse and adopted the Golden Knights since he likes to go out and gamble in Las Vegas a few times a year. Everyone gave him a hard time. Nobody's laughing now.

But man who hasn't fallen in love with Vegas? It's like every wacky sports movie underdog story. A bunch of cast-offs and rejects come together to become something great. Even their coach was given a raw deal by the Panthers. And add in the fans cheering the first season of pro sports in the city's history. They're practically invincible at home.

[Hewey]

Penguins finally seem to be getting it together, but I'd like to see them get a proper 3C and another defenseman before the playoffs

[gunnar hendershow]

With this being the unofficial halfway point I guess it's time to look at the standings and figure out what to expect going forward.

Tampa Bay has basically spent all season with the look of the best team, but how many times does the best team at the ASG go on to be the best team in the spring? Pittsburgh is heating up but a cold stretch could see 4 or 5 clubs leapfrog them in the loaded Metro. The Atlantic is the opposite, you basically have TB, Boston, and Toronto beating up on most of the worst teams in the league this year. Out West it's all about Vegas, and I think they keep their run going. Just so much going right for them. Don't think they win the conference but it'll be a really fun run nonetheless. Nashville has gotten hot and seems a safe bet to win the West, but there's a lot of teams like St. Louis, Winnipeg, and recently Colorado who might have something to say about that. The Kings have had a slow stretch but they've also allowed the least amount of goals in their conference thus far, that tends to be a favorable stat come playoff time.

Hugely disappointing season for Edmonton, turning into that way for Chicago, Ottawa somehow is a real mess after that surprising run last year, and Montreal has had a number of nightmarish outings. Bergevin surely has to be on the outs after this year, he's somehow managed to just about ruin a team that had a core of Subban & Price and looked poised to compete for much of this decade. Meanwhile Buffalo, Arizona, and Vancouver trudge along as the league's very worst yet again.

Also while unlikely the "doomsday scenario" for the playoffs is still in play where a 6th place team in one division has a better record than the 3rd place team in the other division. Giving us another fun offseason of discussion about the playoff format.

I guess if I had to make predictions I'd say East finals are Washington and Tampa Bay, West finals are Nashville and LA. Cup Finals are Tampa Bay beating Nashville.

[million$$man]

Paul Ranger. Former 1st round draft pick of the Tampa Bay Lightning. 

I think people, myself included, sometimes forget that sports figures are humans and have real emotions. I know that I was a vocal detractor of his for his last bit in Tampa.

As someone, who had his father commit suicide, this story is very thought provoking in the sense of how I think about people essentially playing a game.

Very brave of the man to open up about his issues. 

Edited February 1, 2018 by million$$man

[Hewey]

Fleury's first trip back to Pittsburgh is tonight, man, been looking forward to this.

[Draevyn]

I had such a love/hate relationship with Fleury but I hope Matt Murray plays. Student vs Teacher storylines are some of my favourites.

[million$$man]

8 hours ago, Hewey said:

Fleury's first trip back to Pittsburgh is tonight, man, been looking forward to this.

My GF moved from Pittsburgh to Tampa 3 years ago, and is a huge Pens fan.

She buys Center Ice just to watch all the Pens games.

Man, the local feed for Pittsburgh stayed through the first commercial break to show the Pens tribute video for Fleury. Awesome thing to be able to see.