Despite some very long odds, certain Canadian NHL teams are still talking playoffs.
Want a sucker’s bet?
Find someone who will bet you that more than two Canadian teams will make the National Hockey League playoffs this season, and you’re almost guaranteed to make money.
As general managers across our country threaten to make trades that never seem to happen anymore, and beg for consistency from a lineup that hasn’t delivered anything of the sort through 33 games thus far, it is time for a Canadian reality check.
Toronto? The chances of the Maple Leafs making the playoffs stand at less than one percent after 33 games.
Toronto is playing .424 hockey. According to the website sportsclubstats.com, in order to have even a 20% chance at finishing in the No. 8 spot, they’d have to play .633 hockey the rest of the way.
Leafs general manager Brian Burke threatened again on Tuesday to shake up his roster if this one does not show signs of making the playoffs. As if today’s GM can simply snap his fingers and — voila! — turn a loser into a winner mid-season.
"We’ve got to figure out if this group is going to be able to turn this thing around," Burke told the Fan 590 on Tuesday morning. "If not, we need to make some changes when we come out of the trade freeze after Christmas."
Calgary?
It is becoming a familiar chorus that goes something like this: "We’ve got to go on a run here, before eighth place gets too far away."
Edmonton?
How about Tom Renney — head coach of a team that has been in 15th spot in the Western Conference virtually since the season began — talking playoffs the day after an impressive 6-3 win over Columbus?
"Nothing will surprise me with this group at all," said Renney. "It won’t surprise me when we make the playoffs. I think the biggest surprise may be if we don’t."
With a 2.7% chance of making the playoffs, Renney will be the only one bowled over when the Oilers miss the post-season for the fifth straight season.
And finally, Canadians have Ottawa.
There, a promising-looking lineup when the season opened has been sewered by poor goaltending and major under achievement by free-agent signing Sergei Gonchar (four goals, minus-19) and Alex Kovalev (16 points, minus-9).
The Sens, like everyone else, are remaining positive despite a creeping sense that the playoffs are getting away, with the halfway point of the 2010-11 season just around the corner.
They’ve got to tighten things up.
"We keep saying that," Chris Neil recently told Ottawa media. "We’re getting close to halfway through the season… You hope to correct these things your first 5-10 games into the season. It’s still the same thing. I think we’ve just got to bear down. We need everyone on board."
Forget about Vancouver and Montreal for now.
They are five and six points ahead of the ninth place teams in their conferences. Though it’s not unheard of to blow that lead, it is certainly not common, and both are solid teams in divisions that aren’t strong.
Thus, sportsclubstats.com has Vancouver with a 98.2% chance to make the post-season, while Montreal is at 90.2.
Of the other four Canadian teams, the chances of even one making the grade are historically slim.
Here are the percentage ratings based on December 20’s standings: Toronto (0.8%), Ottawa (1.9%), Edmonton (2.7%) and Calgary (5.9%).
But hockey is full of upsets, right?
Last season Calgary dropped eight points in the standings, falling from seventh place on Dec. 20th to ninth at the end of the season. Vancouver picked up nine, and the Canucks went from 10th place on December 20 to the No. 3 seed (fourth in points overall).
In 07-08 the Canucks plummeted from the No. 3 seed on Dec. 20 to 11th in the Conference by the time 82 games were played. And Pittsburgh, during the 2005-06 season, made up 27 points, eliminating a 14-point deficit on Dec. 20 to finish fourth in the East.
The moral of the story?
It can be done, but when you are the Leafs, how long are you going to bet on a long shot?
Prior to Tuesday night’s action — when Toronto didn’t play — the Maple Leafs were 10 points behind eight-place Boston. Though there have been some horrific falls, when injury strikes and a team falls from third to 12th in the conference, those playoff spots are almost always snapped up by teams hovering at No. 9 or 10 on Dec. 20.
Neither Toronto (10 points back), Ottawa (six), Calgary (eight) or Edmonton (10) fit that description. In fact, all but Ottawa would have to leapfrog at least five teams to make the playoffs, a nearly impossible hurdle.
"I know how deep the care is here," Renney said of his Oilers. "I know how willing they are to be coached and how proud they are to be here doing this."
You can’t blame a coach for believing.
No matter how poor the odds.
