So here we are almost at Christmas. But will Canada get the gift of more than one of its NHL teams in the post-season next spring?
Montreal, the only team to reach the promised land last spring, looks solid, while Toronto, Vancouver and blueline-battered Winnipeg are currently holding down playoff positions.
Edmonton’s gone already. Calgary has slipped, losing eight straight and it’s a little difficult to say where Ottawa is headed under new coach Dave Cameron.
Sportsnet, in the first year of its 12-year broadcast agreement with the NHL, would surely love to see more CanCon in the 2015 playoffs.
My best guess? Based on what we know now, three teams seem to be a reasonable target, with the Habs almost a lock.
The Leafs and Canucks? The Canucks and Jets? Or could the Flames claw back into the fight? Post-world juniors, this is going to turn into real dogfight.
More weekend takeaways:
The college way: The tensions between U.S. college hockey and the Canadian Hockey League have been building for a number of years as they compete for players, and certainly suggestions that American players such as star forward Jack Eichel and goalie Thatcher Demko might leave school after the world juniors would exacerbate those tensions.
It seems almost unthinkable that Eichel, in his first year at No. 1-ranked Boston University, would bolt. His inner circle says he won’t, and the Saint John Sea Dogs, who hold his CHL rights, say they have no indication he’s coming. There is some chatter that next spring’s Memorial Cup hosts, the Quebec Remparts, who acquired goalie Zack Fucale last week from Halifax, would be interested in trading for Eichel if it was possible he might come.
Demko was drafted by the Canucks last year and is in his second season at Boston College. His rights were held by the WHL’s Spokane Chiefs until last week when they were traded to Calgary. Would the Hitmen make that deal unless they had some belief Demko might come out? Calgary was successful in luring Adam Tambellini out of the University of North Dakota last winter.
It’s really hard to read the tea leaves on these situations. Charlie Coyle bolted Boston University three years ago to play for Saint John. Last summer, Columbus draftee Sonny Milano was going to attend Notre Dame, and then Boston College, and ended up fooling everyone by joining the OHL Plymouth Whalers.
Losing and the Norris: The recent collapse of the Flames – a worse possession team under the newly extended Bob Hartley than Edmonton was under fired Dallas Eakins – won’t leave GM Brad Treliving too upset, one thinks. Treliving’s one of the sharp young execs in the game, and he knows that to become a contender, the Flames need at least one more “A” prospect to join with Sean Monahan, Sam Bennett and the others Calgary has in its system.
The recent fall, however, would seriously endanger defenceman Mark Giordano’s chances of winning the Norris Trophy. Fair or unfair, it’s tough to win that award on a non-playoff squad.
Ovie Buying In?: It’s been an interesting turnaround year for Washington’s Alexander Ovechkin, who has 15 goals, a pace which would leave him shy of 40 for the season. The good news is he’s a plus-7 under Barry Trotz, numbers which are a major departure from his 51 goal, minus-35 effort of a year ago.
Interestly, the Caps are actually scoring a bit more as a team, and allowing slightly fewer goals. Right now, they hold down a wild card berth.
Can’t Always Be Jake: Seriously, it’s time for Randy Carlyle to quit pointing at Jake Gardiner every time he wants to scratch somebody. If Carlyle wants to make an impact, he could ask captain Dion Phaneuf to take a seat for a game. Lord knows, Phaneuf made enough mistakes on the weekend. Or Joffrey Lupul, who had some awful plays Saturday night. That would make an impact.
From Germany with Love: The cool part about Philly goalie Rob Zepp winning his NHL debut at age 33 is that it came after the Newmarket native spent the last seven seasons with Berlin of the German elite league. Zepp was there long enough he competed for Germany three times at the world hockey championship.
It was in Berlin during the most recent lockout he caught the eye of Flyer star Claude Giroux. The Flyers signed him this year to work with youngster Anthony Stolarz, and now Steve Mason’s bad back has Zepp in the NHL.
But Edmonton not so keen on Germany: So the world juniors are a good competition level for Curtis Lazar, Mirco Mueller and David Pastrnak, but not Leon Draisatl as part of Team Germany? Bizarre.
Additions Not Yet Adding: Anaheim’s having a great season despite injuries and despite the fact GM Bob Murray’s stop-gap acquisitions have yet to pay dividends. Ilya Bryzgalov, in two appearances, has a .789 save percentage and a 6.40 goals against average. Rene Bourque has one goal in 14 games since being added from Montreal. Defenceman Eric Brewer played two games after being acquired from Tampa and promptly broke his foot.
Twin Cities Goalie Uncertainty: Strange but true: Minny’s Darcy Kuemper has been pulled in his last five home starts. The Wild’s goalie situation is unsettled again this season, and while there was hope that Josh Harding might supply some answers after a stint with Iowa of the AHL, he was hospitalized with dehydration in his second game with that team two weeks ago and has yet to begin practicing again.
Slumps and Mega-Slumps: Michael Ryder of the Devils has now gone 20 games without a goal. He’s closing in on last season’s mark when he went 23 games without a goal.
Frontline Sniper For Sale?: We’ll see if T.J. Oshie gets moved by the Blues when the trade freeze is listed in two weeks. Boston is said to have interest, and both St. Louis and the Bruins seem to have some interest in making a move. Oshie, however, has two more years at $4.175 million per season, and few teams want term. He’s an interesting player, but he’s now 27 and into his prime and has just five goals and seven assists this season.
San Jose Finding The Way: The Sharks won their fifth in a row Saturday night over the Blues, with Marc-Eduard Vlasic scoring late and Brent Burns getting the OT winner. So is San Jose finally getting it going? Maybe. They’ve won eight in a row at home, and Saturday was their first sellout at home since Nov. 6.
Cruelty of Shootouts: Sunday night was a night for painful shootout setbacks. Detroit has lost six games in a row including Sunday’s shootout loss to Colorado, which was it’s fourth shootout loss among those six setbacks.
Edmonton, meanwhile, blew a 5-2 lead to Dallas at home, and in the shootout had three chances to win the game but none of Matt Hendricks, Ryan Nugent-Hopkins or Mark Arcobello could get it done. Interesting, former first overall pick Nail Yakupov wasn’t asked to take any of Edmonton’s eight free shots.
Full Gainers and Other Dives: James Neal became the first NHLer last week to be publicly identified and fined ($2,000) for diving. Others may join him soon, as 24 other players are believed to have been given diving warnings.
Every Monday morning, the diving review panel reviews upwards of 25 clips from the previous week, and then the nine members vote. Six votes are necessary for a formal warning. What will be really interesting will be if the coaches start getting hit. Once any single team accumulates four fines, the coach of that team starts being subjected to fines as well.
Gone But Not Forgotten: Nice to see one former Pittsburgh player come to the defence of ex-coach Dan Bylsma, fired at the end of last season.
It’s not like (Bylsma) was a chump or something,” said defenceman Matt Niskanen, now with Washington. “But that’s how he was treated. He won (Pittsburgh) a Cup, you know?”
What Me, Worry?: Interesting interactions between Boston coach and veteran defenceman Dennis Seidenberg over the weekend.
“I don’t think anybody here thinks (Seidenberg) is playing at his full potential right now,” said Julien. “He has to find his game and once he finds his game, he’ll be a lot better.”
When Seidenberg was asked by reporters if he felt he’d been struggling, he said, “No.”