Despite high expectations coming into the season, Brad Richards hasn't got it done for the Rangers. (Credits: Nick Laham/Getty Images North America) |
Most Surprising Team: Anaheim Ducks
Runners-Up: Montreal Canadiens, Columbus Blue Jackets
If it weren’t for the Blackhawks’ historic start to the 2013 NHL season, the Anaheim Ducks would have been hockey’s best story. A year ago, they finished last in the Pacific Division, and 13th in the Western Conference, ahead of only the Bantam-aged Edmonton Oilers and the Columbus Rick Nashes (more on them in a bit). It was a puzzling campaign for a team that had finished 4th in the Western Conference the year before, racking up 47 wins and 99 points with the same core group of players. But last year, the guys in charge of the Anaheim ship fell asleep at the helm, and though their salty Alternate Captain, Teemu Selanne, did his best to pick up the slack, there were simply too many disappearances to account for. Offensive dynamos Ryan Getzlaf, Corey Perry and Bobby Ryan floundered from start to finish, each one of them falling precipitously off their career averages. While Perry’s measly 60-point encore of his 98-point barrage in 2010-11 was startling, even scarier was the fact that Getzlaf had his worst season since…the Mighty Ducks of Anaheim era. At season’s end, the 41-year old Selanne was first in team scoring with 66 points, a tribute to a Teemu’s agelessness yes, but also a symptom of the team’s three sleeping giants. Selanne isn’t supposed to lead that team in scoring.
This year, those giants have woken up. And two of them – Getzlaf and Perry – have been served breakfast in bed with matching 8-year contract extensions (though Perry got a free side of $3 million bacon.) Getzlaf has already matched his goal output from last season, Perry is well on his way to eclipsing his assists total, and Ryan has worked back into his 2010-11 groove, scoring at about a point-per-game pace. Thanks Teemu, but we’ll take it from here. And Selanne is happy to hand them back the reins, well cognizant of the fact that a team led by 3 young Olympians is better than a team led by a single aging one. In just a year, the Ducks have gone from a team 24th in scoring to 3rd, having racked up the same number of goals (99) this year in 29 games as last year in 40 games, with almost no roster turnover.
At the defensive end of the rink, the Ducks have made marked improvements as well. After finishing 20th in the NHL in goals against last year, the Ducks are up to 5th this year, buoyed by a terrific goalie tandem of Jonas Hiller and 30-year old rookie Viktor Fasth. When Hiller was struggling early, Fasth provided the stinginess in net the Ducks needed, and now that Hiller has found his game – despite insisting on wearing Koho pads (Patrick Roy was the onlygoalie to ever pull off Koho pads) – the Ducks have a two-headed monster between the pipes. This is especially beneficial to Hiller, who has been seriously overworked the past few years in Anaheim (73 starts last year), battling through dizzying bouts of fatigue. With these two goalies keeping each other fresh, not to mention motivated, Bruce Boudreau and the Ducks can rest assured that any obstacles confronting this Ducks team won’t be found in net.
Yep, Bruce Boudreau. You forget he was coaching this team? After his profanity-laden appearance on HBO’s 24/7 and his eventual dismissal from the Washington Capitals, Boudreau became a forgotten figure in this league. But he has brought his gut, his f-bombs, and his offensive philosophy to Anaheim and he has succeeded, finding that tenuous balance between attacking and defending that eluded his teams in Washington. The result is a team with a 22-3-4 record – just 3 points behind another team that did not lose in regulation for 24 games! – and more importantly, a team that is capable of winning in the playoffs.
Another team totally outclassing the 2011-12 version of itself is the Canadiens. And again, with little roster turnover. The biggest offseason change to this Canadiens team came behind the bench, where Michel Therrien replaced Randy Cunneyworth, after Montreal stumbled to a last-place finish in the Eastern Conference. Therrien has taken another small, fleet-footed Canadiens team and squeezed every drop of energy out of them, turning up their offense and shoring up their defense. When his team started out the year hot, it seemed only a matter of time before they reverted to middling form and fell back into the pack. But the Canadiens have done just the opposite, tearing off win after win, on the road and at home, and reminding the puffed-up Boston Bruins that Montreal is the real birthplace of hockey.
And how about those Blue Jackets? At the start of the season, did anyone, anyone, think this team would be 2 points shy of the playoffs with 18 games to go? Hell, did anyone think that three weeks ago, when the Jackets were dead last in the Western Conference with 13 points? Either you’re crazy or you’re lying if you gave this team a shot. Columbus dealt away the face of their franchise, Rick Nash, in the offseason, after having shipped out Jeff Carter a few months earlier. Their leading returning scorer was 36-year old Vinny Prospal, who still celebrates goals like he’s a Mite partly because he maintains a child’s love for the game, partly because, well, he doesn’t score all that often. Derick Brassard and R.J. Umberger rounded out the top three scorers coming back for Columbus. (Imagine showing up to coach this team on day 1 of training camp, and seeing what was at your disposal. If bench boss Todd Richards had sat down and waited for his goal-scorers to show up, sure that, any second now, they’ll walk into the locker room, he’d still be glued to his ass.) But when you have guys like Prospal, Umberger and the newly acquired Brandon Dubinsky – guys that honor the opportunity to play hockey for a living by spilling out their guts on a nightly basis – good things are bound to happen. Even at 5-12-3 on March 1, the Blue Jackets were still playing gritty, defiant hockey, well aware that the bulk of their early-season losses had been 1-goal games. Since then, they’ve gone on a 7-0-3 run – 9 of them 1-goal games – pulled themselves out of the Western Conference cellar, and told the Blackhawks hey, we can do this streak thing too. They’re still last in the NHL in scoring, but they have a knack for getting goals at the right time, and with 4 of their next 5 games against Edmonton, Nashville and Calgary, Columbus could very well be inside the playoff picture next week. Keep an eye on these guys.
Most Disappointing Team: Philadelphia Flyers
Runners-Up: New York Rangers, Washington Capitals
Let’s say this outright. 4 days ago, this ignominious distinction belonged to the New York Rangers. A team that had come into the season with Stanley Cup aspirations, having added Rick Nash in the offseason, was outside the Eastern Conference top 8 coming into this week. The same flaws that had plagued this team in the past – paltry scoring compounded by a futile power play – continued to trip them up. And this isn’t to say the Rangers are suddenly lighting the lamp like Gretzky’s Oilers and working the power play like Lafleur’s Canadiens, but they have found a spark. Of course knowing the 2013 Rangers, this spark could be short-circuited in the flash of a Lundqvist pad, and the Blueshirts could be back to square 1. That really has been the story for them this year: 2 wins here, 3 losses there, momentum rising and falling like a seismogram. The balance and depth that lead them to the top of the Eastern Conference a year ago has disintegrated, and the top 6 forwards have not been good enough to counteract the struggles of the bottom 6. Though Nash has been everything Rangers fans had hoped he would be, the team’s other two high-profile stars, Brad Richards and Marian Gaborik, have just 12 goals between them. Both are quickly falling out of favor with the fans in New York, who hate nothing more than a languishing superstar. If it’s true that you are who you walk (skate) with, then the Rangers are the Blue Jackets, at least regarding goals scored. Tell that to GM Glen Sather and see if his soul doesn’t pour out of him in cold, black smoke. This team must start scoring goals like they were designed to if they are going to live up to expectations.
As for the Flyers, they have to start stopping them. And though they have long been a team reliant mainly on its offense, more inclined to win games 5-3 than 2-1, surrendering more than 3 goals per game is no recipe for success. Last year, they found a more sustainable balance between offense and defense, allowing 2.74 goals per game but scoring 3.17, good for second in the NHL. This year, they have tried to follow that same philosophy, but are scoring fewer goals – way fewer – and giving up more. The problem for the Flyers is their usually reliable goal scorers haven’t been so reliable. Captain Claude Giroux, a year after putting together an MVP-type season, has just 9 goals. Danny Briere has 5. Scott Hartnell and Sean Courturier, a youngster who was supposed to add another weapon to the Flyer’s offensive arsenal, both have 2. Jakub Voracek is leading the team in goals, assists and points, in another one of those pleasantly surprising but backwardly portentous situations. Hey great for Jakub, but where is everyone else???
Of course no dissection of the Flyers would be complete without bringing up Ilya Bryzgalov, so here goes. The enigmatic Russian netminder has delivered essentially the same results as last year, when he was good not great, and sometimes terrible. This year though, his unspectacular play has been magnified because the Flyers simply aren’t defending in front of him. But coach Peter Laviolette is going to continue to turn to Bryzgalov and hope that he finds his game, because the answer to their goaltending troubles certainly does not lie in Michael Leighton or Brian Boucher. You hear that Flyers fans? Your fate is in the hands of Mr. Universe!! Something tells me the closed-doors meetings are going to continue in Philadelphia.
Most Surprising Player: Viktor Fasth (ANA)
Runners-Up: Nazem Kadri (TOR), Chris Kunitz (PIT)
Before signing with the Ducks last May, 30-year old Viktor Fasth had these career options: continue playing in the Swedish Elite League or become a full-time teacher. He certainly has lectured and schooled, but shooters, not students, have learned his lessons. And if they didn’t know who he was two months ago, they know who he is now.
Since making his NHL debut on January 26th, Fasth has posted a gaudy 11-2-1 record, 2.00 GAA, and .927 save percentage. In those last two categories he ranks above reigning Vezina finalists Henrik Lundqvist, Johnathan Quick and Pekka Rinne. His intrusion on the NHL’s goaltending aristocracy is almost impertinent. It’s also refreshing – in the same beguiling manner as Cory Conacher’s rise from anonymity as we discussed on Tuesday. There will always be players out there that we don’t know about, until they get tired of waiting, stick both their hands out, and introduce themselves. Fasth’s introduction involved an 8-game winning streak to start his NHL career – just 1 shy of the record set by Ray Emery – and a beautifully unrealistic .957 save percentage in his first 4 games.
Kadri is a player we knew more about coming into the season, as a former first round draft pick of the Maple Leafs. But whether or not the super-skilled forward possessed the pluck and the moxie to succeed at the next level remained to be seen. 30 games into his first full NHL season, Kadri has 11 goals and 19 assists for 30 points, suggesting he’ll be a staple in the League for a while. He has scored a slew of pretty goals for the Maple Leafs this season – helping them back into NHL relevance along the way – but if there was one moment that undeniably declared his arrival, that said okay, he’s for real – it was this silky-smooth hat-trick goal he scored against the Islanders on the last day of February.
Most Disappointing Player: Brad Richards (NYR)
Runners-Up: Ryan Nugent-Hopkins (EDM), Travis Zajac (NJD)
This one pains Rangers fans to read, and pains me more to write. But Brad Richards, he of the 9-year, $60 million dollar contract, gives us no choice. His 4 goals rank 203rd in the NHL. His 11 assists rank 107th. His 15 points rank 152nd. His $12 million 2012-13 salary ranks 2nd. And though it’s not his fault he’s making that ghastly amount, it is his fault he’s not living up to it. Richards was brought into New York to remedy two of the team’s ailments: the aforementioned feeble offense and punchless power play. Last year, though not heroic, he was certainly effective, providing the Rangers a top-tier center and a power play quarterback. And the critics excused the drop in his offensive production given the Rangers’ defense-first philosophy, and the greater success of the team. This season, they said, with Rick Nash in town, Richards would stuff the stat columns again, the way he did in Tampa Bay. Such high expectations only make his struggles even more disappointing.
Things did not start off so horribly for Richards. In the team’s first five games, he tallied six points, and showed early signs of chemistry with Nash. In the 23 games since then though, he has just nine points, and has not put forth a multi-point performance since January 26. To say Richards is cold is to say the Miami Heat are warm. He has been ineffective on the power play, and nearly invisible 5 on 5. He’s not so much so snakebitten or unlucky, as he is simply inefficient. His game, typically fluid and free-flowing, is jarringly out of sync. If Richards doesn’t put his play in tune, the only harmony in the Garden will be the crowd’s boo’s raining down onto the ice.
It’s tough to deem Nugent-Hopkins one of the season’s three most disappointing players, but the standard he set for himself last year in his rookie campaign justifies it. Nugent-Hopkins netted 18 goals and racked up 52 points in 62 games in 2011-12, establishing himself as one of the Oilers’ top offensive threats. This year, as if he felt he didn’t yet belong among the league’s elite, as if he had shown up to the party too soon, Nugent-Hopkins has bashfully backed off. In 27 games, he has just 2 goals. For an offensively-challenged Edmonton team struggling to stay in the playoff race, the disappearance of their third-leading scorer from 2011-12 is costly. Then again, this kid is a mere 19 years old, and if I – and probably most people reading this – had 11 points to my name as a 19-year old in the NHL, I’d be feeling pretty swell.
As for Zajac, the departure of linemate Zach Parise has been crippling. When Minnesota signed away the New Jersey captain this past summer, Devils fans looked to Zajac to step up and fill the void. But Zajac has not shown the shoulders to carry the load for the Devils, as evidenced by his 9 points through 30 games.
ECF Prediction: Pittsburg Penguins over Boston Bruins
The Bruins have a great thing going in Boston. A good goalie having a terrific season, a stable of hard-nosed, talented forwards, and a steady, imposing defensive corps. If it sounds familiar, think about the 2010-11 Cup-winning Bruins team. But the Penguins have an even better thing going in Pittsburgh. They are dismantling the Eastern Conference, and doing it without reigning MVP Evgeni Malkin. They score goals almost at will, averaging more than 3.5 per game. The first line of Dupuis-Kunitz-Crosby is flat out deadly, and the three play off each other so seamlessly and so intuitively it evokes images of the criss-crossing, back-passing, free-wheeling Soviet Union teams. And in case you forgot, James Neal, the NHL’s leader in game-winning goals, is on this team too. With Marc-Andre Fleury between the pipes, a Stanley Cup to his name already, this team has all the pieces for another deep playoff run.
WCF Prediction: Chicago Blackhawks over Anaheim Ducks
If last night’s game between these two teams was any indication, a 4-2 comeback win for the Ducks, this would be an awesome series. Two talent-rich teams that love to score, two surprisingly dominant goalie tandems that love to stop scorers, and two coaches that love to push the tempo. With each of these teams not far removed from Stanley Cup championships (the Ducks in 2007, the Blackhawks in 2010), their clashing desires to get back to the summit would generate an incendiary flavor. Ultimately, Chicago’s depth on defense would make the difference, but this series has 7 exhilarating games written all over it.
Stanley Cup Prediction: Penguins over Blackhawks
If you look back at the teams that have hoisted hockey’s holy grail in the past, almost all of them have this in common: a backbone in net. And though Corey Crawford and Ray Emery have been sensational this year for the Blackhawks, if I’m entering the playoffs tomorrow, I want Fleury between the sticks. A goalie tandem in the regular season is an effective strategy, but in the playoffs, when teams need a singular puck-stopper that they can always turn to, the strategy can pose problems. Who do you put in net tonight? Who do you put in net tomorrow? In the playoffs, especially the later rounds, the goalie with momentum is more dangerous than the goalie who got last night off. At that point, adrenaline surging through the body like shock therapy, fatigue is an after thought. Furthermore, in the tumultuous journey to the Stanley Cup, the need for a sense of steadiness and stability is essential. An indisputable number-1 goalie can provide this for his team; a rotating tandem cannot (think Roberto Luongo, Corey Schneider, and the 2011 Canucks).
I like the Penguins in 6.
But don’t take our word for any of this. Except Crosby winning MVP. You can put some money on that.
See ya Tuesday.
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