Out with the old, in with the new? Remembering 10 classic Battle of Ontario moments

This post is about the Senators and Maple Leafs, but first I need to tell you a story about the Colorado Avalanche and Detroit Red Wings.

It comes from a game played late in the 1995-96 season. The Wings would go on to win a 7-0 blowout, so you can imagine that the players on both sides were already agitated. At one point, Detroit’s Keith Primeau had his stick slashed out of his hand as he went to the bench. Colorado’s Mike Ricci tried to slide it away, at which point Kris Draper slashed his stick out of his hand. Primeau picked up Ricci’s stick and intentionally broke it. In return, Ricci grabbed a water bottle and tossed it at Primeau, hitting him in, uh, a sensitive area.

It was all very funny, and if you saw the highlight at the time, you probably joked about it with your hockey fan friends for weeks afterwards. It was, we all assumed, one of those memorable hockey moments.

Two months later, some other stuff happened between the Avalanche and Red Wings. And then later, a lot more. And then even more. And these days, when that rivalry comes up, nobody really talks about broken sticks or water bottle tosses.

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The Athletic Hockey Show: Gull you know it's true

On this week's episode of The Athletic Hockey Show:
- Ian gives us an update on Alex DeBrincat
- My theory on what's really going on here
- Should teams trade within their own division?
- Vladimir Tarasenko switches agents
- Father-son combos on the same team
- The 1991-92 San Diego Gulls for some reason, and more...

The Athletic Hockey Show runs most days of the week during the season, with Ian and I hosting every Thursday. There are two versions of each episode available:
- An ad-free version for subscribers that you can find here
- An ad-supported version you can get for free wherever you normally find your podcasts (like Apple or Spotify)

The Athletic Hockey Show: What to root for, what we'd like to see from TNT, an idea for new draft picks and more

On this week's episode of The Athletic Hockey Show:
- What we'd like to see TNT do with the NHL
- Connor McDavid chases 100 points, and other stories to root for
- That weird piece of history that Max Domi might be responsible for
- The Knights beat the Avs in a battle of (maybe) the league's two best teams
- A listener has an idea for NFL-style compensatory draft picks
- How the NHL tried that idea once before, and the loophole that made it a disaster
- Hockey's worst birthday and the tradition it indirectly inspired, a weird European tour and more...

The Athletic Hockey Show runs most days of the week during the season, with Ian and I hosting every Thursday. There are two versions of each episode available:
- An ad-free version for subscribers that you can find here
- An ad-supported version you can get for free wherever you normally find your podcasts (like Apple or Spotify)

McDavid’s 100, Leafs vs. Habs, and six more things to root for down the stretch

We’re headed down the stretch in the regular season, and there’s a good chance that you know exactly what you’re rooting for. If your team is fighting for a playoff spot, or first place in a division where that really matters, you’re locked in. That’s all you care about it, and rightly so. Having something to care about in a season’s final weeks is all sorts of fun.

But what if you don’t? Maybe your team has been out of the race for weeks, or months, or are the Sabres. Or maybe they’re at the other extreme, and have already clinched whatever spot you were hoping they’d earn. If that’s you, you might find yourself staring down two more weeks without any real rooting interest.

I’m here to help. So today, I’ll offer up eight suggestions for outcomes you can root for as the season winds up. It goes without saying that if any of these conflict with what your favorite team needs to happen, you go with your team. Loyalty trumps all. But if you’re neutral, and just looking for one or two things to cheer along and/or get irrationally mad about, I’ve got you covered.

Idea 1: Root for Connor McDavid to get to 100 points

Let’s start with the one that I feel like we can get close to unanimous agreement on.

When the NHL announced that the abbreviated season would be just 56 games long, fans knew that most of the major milestones would be out of reach for another year. Nobody would get to 50 goals, and even 40 might be a stretch. Hitting 100 points? That would mean scoring at a prorated 146-point full season pace. In other words, forget it.

But here’s McDavid having a season for the ages, and he’s got a chance. It’s a slim one – the Oilers have nine games left, and he still needs 19 points to hit the century mark. For most guys, that’s a once-in-a-lifetime heater. But for McDavid? It’s realistic, especially with all his remaining games coming against the Flames, Canucks and Canadiens.

Who’s going to root against this? OK, maybe Calgary fans just out of spite, and we’ll allow that. But everyone else should be on board. McDavid’s brilliance means we’re not getting an Art Ross race this year, or even a Hart Trophy debate. He can at least give us this, along with the ridiculous highlights the hot streak would surely generate.

Ultimately, 100 points is an arbitrary cutoff and it wouldn’t be any less impressive if he finished the season with 99. But fans like round numbers, and it would be undeniably cool to see a player hit triple-digits in a season where it wasn’t supposed to be possible. There hasn’t been a player in a generation who’s as much fun to watch as Connor McDavid. Let’s see the kid go full-on beast mode for the rest of the year and hit the magic number.

Idea 2: Root for the Hurricanes to take the Central and set up an all-Florida matchup

I probably don’t have to sell you too hard on cheering for the Hurricanes. They’re a fun team, they’ve got a ton of skill, and you know they’ll cook up some sort of crazy celebration when it’s all over. Who doesn’t like that? OK, we can think of a few people, but most of us are on board, even if grudgingly.

But that’s not even the best reason to hope Carolina takes the Central. Instead, it’s because the Hurricanes as top seed would put the Lightning and Panthers in second and third, meaning we’d get the first all-Florida playoff matchup in NHL history. Despite being in the same division for almost three decades, the two teams have never met in the postseason. This might finally be the year.

In theory, there’s nothing magical about geography. But in hockey rivalries, it tends to work. The Battle of Alberta was amazing. The Battle of Ontario had some great moments. The three-way Battle of California is mostly on hold, but it was amazing when it was cooking. The Battle of Florida could be next.

We might get fireworks. Or we might just get two really talented teams battling it out. That would be good too. So here’s hoping the Hurricanes stay out of the way.

And since we’ve slotted in the top three spots in the Central, we may as well do the last one…

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Let’s all boo the 2020 Playoff Disappointment Team

We’ve finished two rounds of the NHL playoffs. Or maybe three, if you count the play-in. Did we ever decide if that counted? I’m not sure we did. I feel like we all kind of just collectively decided not to think about it, and I respect that.

Either way, a tournament that started with 24 teams has seen 20 of them go home. Chances are, that includes your team. And you know what that means: It’s time to pick one specific player to point at while yelling “THIS IS ALL YOUR FAULT!”

OK, that might be a bit extreme. Still, blaming an entire lost season on one guy having a bad few weeks is an important hockey tradition, and we’re all looking for ways to cling to normalcy these days. So let’s do it. Let’s break out the annual Playoff Disappointment Team.

We do this every year, but this season comes with a twist. Since we’ve had 20 teams eliminated, that means we can build a 20-man roster using exactly one player from each of the losers. In some cases, that’s going to make for a tough call, since let’s just say a few of these teams bring more candidates to the table than others. That’s OK, we’re up for the challenge. Unlike these chumps.

Get out your torches and pitchforks, and let’s start blaming some world-class athletes for not living up to our standards.

Goaltenders

Jordan Binnington, Blues
We’ll start with one of the more obvious picks, as Binnington just couldn’t recapture the magic from last year’s run. In fact, we may as well just say it: He was bad. Not streaky, not inconsistent… bad. His final stat line includes an .851 save percentage and 4.72 GAA. Those are numbers that would get you benched in the 1980s, let alone today.

But maybe most impressive of all, he claimed a spot next to Wayne Gretzky’s 92 goals and Bobby Orr’s +124 on the list of unbreakable hockey records by becoming the first goalie in NHL history to finish a postseason 0-and-5.

Pavel Francouz, Avalanche
This feels like a weird pick, and maybe it is, because it’s hard to find anyone on the beaten-and-battered Avalanche who really played badly. And to be clear, we’re not blaming Francouz for getting hurt. But before he followed Philipp Grubauer to the injured list, Francouz stepped in to start the first four games of the Dallas series. And he was, well, not great. He gave up 15 goals while posting an ugly .862 save percentage, and the Avalanche found themselves in a 3-1 hole that they couldn’t quite climb out of. Then he got hurt, and maybe we’ll find out he was less than 100% during the series. But as it stands, it was a rough ending to what had been a surprisingly strong season by a 30-year-old who’s still technically a rookie.

Hockey fans know that sometimes, your team just loses to a hot goalie on the other side. The unfortunate truth is that it can work the other way, and a cold goalie can cost the better team a series. That may have happened here.

Defense

Jack Johnson, Penguins
The Penguins came into the postseason with high hopes, then made a quick exit at the hands of a 12-seed. Not surprisingly, they’ve got plenty of candidates for this squad, and if you wanted to go with a bigger name like Kris Letang or even Evgeni Malkin, you’d have a case. But our spot goes to Johnson, who’s disastrous series had observers tossing around phrases like “fundamentally hopeless”. When your GM has to specifically defend your continued employment after the series, you’ve had a rough postseason.

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Five memorable NHL moments that wouldn’t have been the same without fans

The NHL is on the way back, and we’re just days away from seeing meaningful hockey played for the first time since March. Everything about the situation is deeply weird, from the hubs to the bubbles to the format. But once they actually get out onto the ice and drop the puck, there’s a chance that it might all feel normal.

Well, almost. There’s the small matter of playing without any fans in the building. Is that going to matter? We’ve had this argument before, and no doubt fans around the world will be having it over the next few weeks. For some of us, those empty arenas will be a big distraction. While others will barely notice it at all. Maybe we’ll get a better insight into what’s happening on the ice because we’ll be able to hear the players, coaches and officials more clearly. Or maybe TV will throw a bunch of weird sound effects and CGI into the mix to try to compensate.

Nobody knows what the future holds. And that’s OK because I’m not really the “future” guy around here. But I do know a thing or two about the past, which got me to thinking about some famous and not-so-famous games in NHL history that just wouldn’t have been the same without fans in the building. Today, let’s pay tribute to those die-hards who show up to cheer, boo, pound the glass, wave frantically at the camera and sometimes do a whole lot more than that. Here are five games from NHL history that wouldn’t be as memorable without the fans.

April 19, 2004: Flames at Canucks

The setup: The first-round playoff series between the two rivals had been a classic, and after the Canucks had survived a triple-overtime cliffhanger in Game 6, we headed back to Vancouver for a deciding game.

All of this would have been the same: We would have had a classic from the genre of tight, low-scoring games that defined the era. Jarome Iginla would have still opened the scoring in the first, Matt Cooke would have tied it midway through the third, and Iginla would have restored the lead minutes later. The Flames would have led 2-1 in the final minute, and after a controversial late call against Ed Jovanovski, would have had a chance to ice the game with the goalie out when Iginla got to a loose puck in the neutral zone with seconds left and nobody between him and the open net.

But without fans, we wouldn’t have seen: A fan fire their Canucks jersey on the ice just as Iginla took the shot, nearly landing on the puck and potentially distracting the Flames captain at the game’s most crucial moment.

The shot went just wide, the Canucks scored the tying goal seconds later, and we headed to overtime.

What it would have meant: Quite possibly, nothing. There’s a good case to be made that the toss came just slightly too late for Iginla to see it. Besides, NHL players can get so locked in with a game on the line that they wouldn’t notice a live bear on the ice with then, let alone somebody tossing a jersey on the ice.

Still … I mean, how crazy was that? It’s hard not to play what-if with that moment. What if the jersey had landed on the puck, or blocked it from heading towards the net? I’m not even sure what the rule would be there, and knowing obscure rules is pretty much my beat.

For the record, Iginla didn’t blame the jersey toss for missing the open net, although he was suspiciously noncommittal — his answer was “I don’t know, I was focused.” Since we all know he’s too classy to make excuses, I’m just going to go ahead and interpret that as “I 100 percent missed that empty net because some fan chucked a jersey at me.”

To make matters even crazier, just a few seconds later Iginla had his stick chopped out of his hand by Brendan Morrison, taking him out of the play just before the Canucks tied the game. It was a clear penalty that wasn’t called, and while officials often ignore stuff late, look what the ref is doing at that exact moment: picking up the stray jersey instead of watching Morrison’s hack.

It all could have added up to one of the most controversial moments in playoff history. Instead, the Flames ended up winning in overtime, so Cooke’s tying goal was a Zelepukin and everyone just kind of laughed it off. And the hockey gods got to work plotting a different way to screw over the 2004 Flames.

March 29, 2001: Maple Leafs at Flyers

The setup: Two good teams faced off in a late-season battle with playoff seeding implications, not to mention a rematch of a 1999 playoff meeting and a potential preview of a series that could happen in a few weeks.

All of this would have been the same: The two teams would have played a tight, hard-nosed game. Dan McGillis would have still opened the scoring in the first, with Gary Roberts answering for Toronto in the second. Early in the third, Luke Richardson still would have hit Darcy Tucker, who sold it like he was dead. Tie Domi would have still tried to get at Richardson. Kevin Collins would have intervened because Kevin Collins always intervened. And once things were under control, Domi and Richardson would have headed to the penalty box to serve matching minors for unsportsmanlike conduct.

But without fans, we wouldn’t have seen: Domi presumably wouldn’t have felt the need to squirt his water bottle into the empty stands. That wouldn’t have led to a Flyers fan deciding to get involved, leaning over the glass in the process. And we wouldn’t have all learned a valuable lesson about just how strong that glass actually is.

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What the NHL’s history of player rivalries tells us about how Tkachuk vs. Kassian could end

Tonight’s NHL schedule features one of the most anticipated matchups of the season so far, as the Oilers host the Flames. It’s an important game, one that could help decide an incredibly close Pacific Division race. But of course, that’s not why everyone is focused on it.

No, for that we can thank Matthew Tkachuk and Zack Kassian. This will be their first meeting since the Jan. 11 game in Calgary that featured several controversial hits, a one-sided fight, and more than a few postgame soundbites. It also earned Kassian a suspension, and led the hockey world to wonder: What comes next?

We didn’t have to wait long to find out, because the Oilers and Flames play twice this week, with tonight’s game followed by a rematch in Calgary on Saturday. Kassian hasn’t exactly been shy about suggesting that he’ll be looking for further payback. Tkachuk’s options are a little more complicated, but it’s fair to say that all eyes will be on both players as we wait to see what – if anything – happens when they cross paths.

So that will be the next chapter in the story. But at the risk of skipping ahead, how will it end? This is hardly the first time that two players have developed some bad blood, so we have plenty of examples of how this might go. So today, let’s dig back into the archives and try to figure out what the end game might look like here.

This can end: With a decisive moment

What happens: After months or even years of a back-and-forth, give-and-take sort of rivalry, something finally happens that tilts the scale. Maybe it’s a crushing hit or some sort of altercation, or maybe one guy just goes out there and wins the big game for his team by actually playing hockey. But either way, everyone remembers the moment, and everyone remembers who won.

Why it’s good: This is the exclamation point on the story, and while it may not end the rivalry completely, it’s pretty definitive. It happens, we all see it, and then everyone moves on.

Why it’s not: Often, “decisive” can mean that somebody gets hurt.

Historical example: Scott Stevens vs. Eric Lindros. They were natural rivals from the moment Lindros arrived in the league, two big physical alpha dogs staking out their territory as franchise players and captains of teams in the same division. They fought in Lindros’ rookie year, traded big hits, always seemed to be in each other’s faces, and competed for the title of the league’s most-feared physical presence.

We all know how it ended.

That was pretty much it for the rivalry. And in some sense, that was also it for Lindros as an elite NHL star. The devastating hit looks very different through today’s eyes than it did at the time. But whether you see it as a clean hit or a predatory headshot – or maybe, based on the rules of the day, both at the same time – it became the rivalry’s definitive moment. And its last.

This can end: With a signature fight

What happens: Enough is enough. Two guys who hate each other and who’ve spent a chunk of their careers exchanging shots on and off the ice decide to settle things the old-fashioned way. They drop the gloves, everyone else clears out, and may the best man win.

Why it’s good: Even if you hate fighting, there’s a certain old-school appeal to seeing two rivals go this route. It’s almost honorable.

Why it’s not: Depending on how you view fighting, two professional athletes settling a score with bare-knuckles fisticuffs can seem silly, if not barbaric. There’s the risk of injury. And half the time, the guy who loses will insist on a rematch, so nothing really gets settled at all.

Historical example: Scott Stevens vs. Dave Manson. Before he was battling Lindros in the Patrick Division, Stevens had an epic rivalry with Blackhawks blueliner Manson. They tangled when Stevens was in Washington, in a controversial fight that resulted in multiple suspensions for biting and eye-gouging. A year later, Stevens wound up playing for the Hawks’ top rival. It wasn’t hard to see where this was headed, and during a brawl that would be remembered as The St. Patrick’s Day Massacre, it got there.

One of the most memorable fights of the ’90s didn’t exactly smooth over the bad blood, but it served as a climax to the rivalry. And at least nobody got bitten or gouged.

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Grab Bag: Toronto Maple Leafs excuses, no spitting allowed and a Norris Division coach fight

In the Friday Grab Bag:
- My spies have compiled a list of Maple Leaf excuses
- Should you spit on people? A debate
- An obscure player who recently put up an epic stat spoiler
- The week's three comedy stars
- And the only worse thing for a Leafs coach than getting fired: Having Jacques Demers try to strangle you

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Podcast: Follow the bouncing Hoffman

In this week's episode of Biscuits, the Vice Sports hockey podcast:
- Dave and I discuss the Mike Hoffman trade
- Dave and I discuss the other Mike Hoffman trade
- Wait, what is going on with Mike Hoffman trades?
- The whole season-long mess in Ottawa
- Is Erik Karlsson next?
- Barry Trotz walks away from the Capitals
- The John Tavares sweepstakes are almost here
- The Galchenyuk/Domi trade
- And lots more...

>> Stream it now:

>> Or, subscribe on iTunes.

Grab bag: Shoot the glove

In the Friday Grab Bag:
- I have an idea for how we handle Henrik Lundqvist during the Rangers rebuild.
- The Derick Brassard trade may have changed everything and we missed it.
- An obscure player from the deadline day Stastny trade. No, the other one.
- The week's three comedy stars
- And this week's YouTube breakdown marks the 25th anniversary of Teemu Selanne's most memorable moment...

>> Read the full post at Vice Sports

What your favorite Battle of Ontario moment says about you

With less than a week to go before the playoffs start, there remains a good possibility that we’re going to see a series between the Maple Leafs and Senators. That would be a great matchup – one of the best possible – and would feature two underdog teams that few expected to be in the playoffs at all.

But more importantly, it would mark the resumption of the Battle of Ontario, the rivalry that dominated the province for a good stretch of the pre-lockout years, and continued to simmer after that even though one of the teams decided not to make the playoffs anymore. It was a great rivalry, one that alternated between dramatic playoff showdowns, legitimate bad blood, and goofy “Wait, did that really just happen?” scenes.

But which Battle of Ontario moment is your favourite? And more importantly, what does that choice say about you as a person? Let’s find out, as we run through 12 of the most memorable moments in the rivalry’s history.

Moment No. 1: Daniel Alfredsson’s hit from behind on Darcy Tucker

A rarely acknowledged fact about the Battle of Ontario is that it didn't always involve all that much bad blood. In 2000 and 2001, the two teams hadn't built up much in the way of animosity, and the matchups felt like more a geographic novelty than a real rivalry. Even the two fan bases largely got along.

But it's not hard to pinpoint the exact moment that changed. It came in the final minutes of game five of the 2002 matchup between the two teams, with both the game and the series knotted at 2–2.

You really couldn't draw up a better playoff controversy. Tucker was a divisive player, beloved as a gritty warrior in Toronto but viewed as a pest and diver by Sens fans. Meanwhile, Alfredsson was considered a virtual saint in Ottawa, but the moment transformed him into the rivalry's arch-villain in the eyes of Leaf fans.

Having Alfredsson escape a penalty for drilling Tucker into the boards was near-perfect; having the Senators' captain score the winning goal seconds later was downright diabolical.

What it says about you: You are a Senators fan, and there's a 90–per cent chance you remember this moment more fondly than your wedding day or the birth of your children.

Moment No. 2: Ricard Persson boards Tie Domi

Domi was front and centre throughout the rivalry's heyday, and normally anything that left him bloodied would be just fine with Ottawa fans. But that wasn't the case in game six of the teams' 2002 second-round matchup, when a hit from behind worked against the Senators just two days after Alfredsson flattened Tucker.

The Senators were looking to close out the series on home ice, and had jumped out to an early 2–0 lead that Leafs coach Pat Quinn later admitted had him worried the final might end up being 10–0. Ottawa fans were already breaking out the mocking "goodbye" chant. That's when Persson decided to drill Domi from behind, cutting the Leafs' enforcer and earning a five-minute major.

The Leafs scored twice on the power play, and went on to win the game 4–3. The two teams headed back to Toronto, where the Senators went out meekly with a 3–0 loss.

The hit led to one of the rivalry's most memorable quotes, when Alfredsson told reporters that they'd be going on to the next round "if Domi had better balance".

What it says about you: You're a Leafs fan, and your life goal is to someday meet Domi and personally thank him for not having better balance.

Moment No. 3 The first shootout

When the NHL emerged from the year-long lockout that killed the 2004–05 season, it was with a full slate of 15 opening-night games on Oct. 5, 2005. But only one, featuring the Leafs and Senators in Toronto, went to a shootout, marking the first time in league history that the tie-breaker gimmick made an appearance.

Alfredsson got the honours of taking the first shot and scoring the first goal. Three current Hall of Famers were involved in Dominik Hasek, Ed Belfour and Eric Lindros. Dany Heatley ended it by scoring the first-ever shootout winner. And yet somehow, the most memorable moment from the whole thing has become Jason Allison's slow-motion attempt, which is rumoured to still be going on to this day.

What it says about you: You still think the shootout is cool. Hi there, Mr. Bettman, thanks for reading.

>> Read the full post at Sportsnet

Grab Bag: WJC pathos edition

In the Friday Grab Bag:
- Why it's perfectly OK to criticize WJC players even though they're just kids
- Does the Blue Jackets' shootout-aided win streak really count?
- The Blues ridiculous alumni roster leads to this week's obscure player pick
- The week's three comedy stars
- And a YouTube breakdown of Don Cherry trying really, really hard not to murder anyone in the immediate aftermath of the 1987 Piestany brawl

>> Read the full post at Vice Sports

Beyond John Scott: A brief history of NHL enforcers turning out be more talented than we thought

Even as the regular season resumes, the hockey world is still buzzing over John Scott’s all-star weekend. Voted in by fans at least partly on the assumption that he’d be embarrassed by the 3-on-3 format, Scott instead scored a pair of nifty goals and earned MVP honors in a scene straight out of a movie script.

It all made for a great feel-good story. But maybe we shouldn’t have been quite so shocked. After all, Scott’s not the first NHL tough guy to step outside of his comfort zone and deliver an impressive performance. The enforcer role may be fading from the NHL, but the guys who’ve done the job over the years have a long history of being surprisingly multi-talented.

So for this week’s top five, let’s go beyond the All-Star Game and look at some other areas where NHL tough guys unexpectedly made their presence felt.

5. In a pro wrestling ring

The hockey world has seen plenty of cross-overs with pro wrestling; former Ranger Ted Irvine’s son did pretty well for himself in the ring, and Mean Gene Okerlund’s son once suited up for the Islanders. And who could forget about this guy?

But perhaps wisely, this generation of sports entertainers have tended to stay away from hockey’s tough guys. One notable exception: the time one WCW villain decided to go after a Chicago Blackhawks owner.

While it didn’t feature many punches, legend has it that that scripted battle was nearly preceded by the real deal. The lesson, as always: Bob Probert didn’t take any nonsense from anyone.

>> Read the full post at The Hockey News

When NHL compensation rules go bad (or: How Mark Messier became a Shark)

Hockey history is a rich tapestry of traditions, trends and innovations. Many stuck around to become part of the game's enduring fabric. Others, not so much. "It made sense at the time" is an ongoing feature in which we'll look back at one of the odder things that used to be part of the NHL's culture and wonder how exactly it made sense at the time and that everyone was OK with it.

At least week's board of governors' meeting, the NHL surprised no one by doing away with its much-maligned compensation plan for hiring coaches and GMs. The system had been meant to standardize compensation for teams that hired away personnel who were still under contract to other teams, but was doomed by confusion over whether it should apply to those who'd already been fired.

In other words, it was a nice idea in theory that turned into an embarrassing mess once it saw the light of day. It will probably not shock you to learn that this is not the first time this has happened to the NHL.

In the years leading up to the 2004 lockout, the NHL featured an ever-increasing disparity between franchises in terms of revenue and spending power. This led many to yearn for a hard salary cap, while others proposed milder solutions like a luxury tax or increased revenue sharing, but virtually everyone agreed that it was a problem. And this was especially true when it came to free agency, as small-market teams found it difficult to hold on to star players who knew that a big-market payday was looming on the horizon.

The NHL's higher-ups, to its credit, took action. They couldn't solve the problem -- that was what the coming lockout would be for -- but they could do the next best thing and even the playing field.

>> Read the full post on ESPN.com

NHL stock watch - October edition

It’s the end of October, which means two things for NHL fans: Your Twitter feed is being overtaken by awkward photos of your favorite players in horrible Halloween costumes, and it’s time to take stock of the first month of regular-season action.

We’ve already covered most of the big trends — Canadiens good! Blue Jackets bad! Ducks maybe even worse! — so we won’t rehash those here. Instead, let’s drill down a bit to some of the league’s other moving parts. Here are some of the first month’s more interesting stories and the direction they’re headed.

Stock Rising: Max Pacioretty

It feels like it shouldn’t be possible for a player in the ravenous Montreal market to be underrated, and that’s especially true when that player is the captain. But I think there’s a good case to be made that Pacioretty has spent most of his career in that category. He probably won’t be there much longer.

Pacioretty sits tied for sixth in the NHL in scoring with 11 points through Montreal’s first 10 games. He’s unlikely to keep up that pace; he’s never topped 70 points or been a point-per-game scorer in his career. But he has been one of the league’s most consistent wingers, good for 30-plus goals and 60-plus points year after year. Since his breakout year in 2011, Pacioretty has more goals than any pure winger other than Alex Ovechkin — more than Patrick Kane, or Corey Perry, or Phil Kessel.

And yet you rarely hear him mentioned with those sorts of guys, despite playing in arguably the most rabid media market in the league. If anything, he’s often been underappreciated. Maybe that’s because the low-key Pacioretty can’t compete with the star power of a Carey Price or P.K. Subban. Maybe it’s a style thing; Pacioretty is more likely to score based on opportunism and his quick release than on highlight-friendly end-to-end rushes. Or maybe a city that’s used to cheering on legends like Rocket Richard and Guy Lafleur has trouble getting excited for a player who’s merely very good.

But in any case, Pacioretty deserves more credit than he gets. Of course, once he’s led the 81-1-0 Habs to a Stanley Cup, that should change.

Stock Falling: Goalies We Thought Were Good

Among goaltenders with at least five starts heading into last night’s action, just four had posted save percentages under .875. One of those is Jonas Hiller. The other three were expected to be good.

Nobody has had a strong start in Columbus, but no one there has been worse than Sergei Bobrovsky. He ranks last in save percentage and goals-against average and has already been quoted as having “zero confidence.” That’s not what you want to hear from a goaltender, especially one who’s just three years removed from a Vezina Trophy. His numbers have been trending in the wrong direction since then, but they were still solid enough last season that you’d assume this is just an early-season blip. The Blue Jackets better hope so; Bobrovsky is signed through 2019 on a deal that carries the second-biggest cap hit of any goaltender.

In Colorado, Semyon Varlamov has been nipping at Bobrovsky’s heels at the bottom of the stats page. Yet he’s just two years removed from finishing a close second in the 2014 Vezina race. And the guy who beat him out for that award, Boston’s Tuukka Rask, has been almost as bad. Rask posted a shutout Tuesday, and it still left him with the league’s third-worst goals-against average.

History tells us that all three guys will be fine — always rely more on the big sample size of a career’s worth of work than on a few shaky weeks, especially with goalies. But the position is a funny one, and a rough enough start really can torpedo a season if it burrows far enough into a guy’s head. Goaltending is voodoo, and right now the Blue Jackets, Avalanche, and Bruins are hoping it won’t end up being the evil kind.

Stock Rising: Jamie Benn

Benn was one of the league’s best stories last season, winning the Art Ross as the league’s top scorer with a four-point game on the season’s final night, including the clinching point with just 10 seconds left.

It was a cool moment, one that capped off a breakout season for the 26-year-old winger. But it wasn’t one that anyone expected him to have much chance of repeating. After all, his 87 points last season was the lowest total to lead the league in over 50 years, helped by some second-half injuries to Sidney Crosby. Benn had earned the title, but his reign was assumed to be a Jarome Iginla–style one-and-out, a case of a player having the good timing to enjoy a career year in a season when everyone else went cold.

But as the season’s first month draws to a close, there’s a familiar name right back on top of the league scoring race. After Tuesday’s three-point performance, Benn has 15 points through nine games, good for the league lead. He remains a key part of the high-flying Stars offense, one that’s made Dallas the most entertaining team in the league.

If he stays healthy, there’s no reason to think he can’t challenge for yet another Art Ross. And this time, nobody will be able to call it a fluke.

Stock Falling: The Islanders’ New Home

The Islanders finally moved out of Nassau Coliseum, generally considered the worst arena in the NHL, at the end of last season. Their new home is the Barclays Center in Brooklyn. It’s fair to say reviews have been mixed.

The Barclays Center isn’t anyone’s idea of a classic hockey arena; in fact, it’s barely a hockey arena at all, depending on where you get stuck sitting. It also seats just 15,700 for hockey, the second-lowest capacity in the league. And so far, the Islanders are having trouble filling even that many seats, as many of their fans don’t seem to like the new building. Plus there’s that weird SUV parked in the corner that makes you think you accidentally tuned into a Spengler Cup game.

The good news is this doesn’t seem to be affecting the Islanders, who are icing one of the best teams in the league. And it’s not like the franchise had a ton of options. The Islanders desperately needed to get out of the Coliseum before it completely fell apart, and when they couldn’t make a deal to stay in Uniondale, they took what was available. The Barclays Center may be far from ideal, but it was almost certainly the best option.

As with most NHL problems, winning will fix some of this. If the Islanders keep playing like they have been, attendance should get a boost, and maybe some of those fans will realize they don’t mind the new rink so much after all. The flip side is that the seats stay empty and an Islanders team that could be a Cup contender finds itself heading down the stretch without any discernible home-ice advantage. We’ll see how it works out, but the early returns aren’t encouraging.

>> Read the full post on Grantland

The Heavyweight Belt of NHL Rivalries

The Championship Belt is one of my favorite recurring Grantland features, having covered everything from NFL quarterbacks to MLB pitchers to action movie heroes. But we’ve never broken it out for hockey, even though it feels like a natural for the sport. That ends today. After all, it’s the offseason, which is one of the times during the year that hockey fans like to argue with each other.

But for what? We could go with the obvious, like handing out a championship belt for the best player or top goaltender, or maybe best team. We could even do the championship belt of the actual pugilists, from Dave Schultz to Bob Probert and beyond. In fact, let’s be honest, we’re absolutely going to do that last one someday. But that day is not today.

No, today we’re going to crank up the degree of difficulty with something a little trickier: the heavyweight belt of NHL rivalries. Hockey has always been made for inspiring hatred between teams; it’s practically why the game was invented. But at any given time in league history, which one rivalry reigned supreme?

First, a few ground rules. We’re looking for rivalries between teams — there’s no individual category here. We’re also limiting this to NHL rivalries, so we won’t be including international rivalries like Russia vs. Team USA, Russia vs. Canada, and Canada vs. Sad Americans Getting Silver Medals.

So what makes a rivalry? This being hockey, bad blood will obviously be a key factor, but it’s not the only one. We’re looking for some staying power — one random brawl won’t be enough to earn the crown — and the stakes matter, too. Two teams may hate each other, but if all they’re fighting over is last place in their division, it’s probably not much of a rivalry. Finally, we’ll invoke what we can call the Ric Flair rule — to be the man, you have to beat the man, so in the case of any close calls, the reigning champ keeps the belt.

Sound good? Then, as legendary enforcer Dave Semenko would say, let’s go for a canoe ride. Anyone want to help set the mood? Ah, yes, I see we have a volunteer.

Thanks, Tie. Let’s head back a few decades, and start at the beginning.

The Original Six era: Canadiens vs. Maple Leafs

Two key points here. The first is that this is a fairly easy call, since the Leafs and Habs were the two best teams of the era. They combined for the most Stanley Cups, they met in the most finals, and they had the best regular-season records. In a six-team league where everyone is a rival to some degree, this is the one that always stood out.

The second point is that, somewhat surprisingly, this is the last time we’ll see this particular combination show up on our list. While the Leafs-Habs rivalry is to this day considered by many to be the greatest in hockey, that’s almost entirely based on history and their rabid fan bases, as opposed to anything that’s happened on the ice. That’s largely because the teams last met in the playoffs in the ’70s, and then spent almost two decades in different conferences, not to mention that the Leafs have been terrible for much of the past 35 years. They nearly met in the Stanley Cup final in 1993, which would have been insane, but it didn’t happen, and despite some recent near misses they’ve yet to meet in the playoffs since. If they ever did, they would probably take the belt back by default, but that’s a debate for another day.

Leafs-Habs will always be an important rivalry, even if it’s just simmering under the surface, and a Saturday matchup between the teams should be on every fan’s bucket list. But if it’s still considered the greatest in the sport, that’s more out of force of habit than anything, which is why the belt won’t be returning here in the post-1967 world.

Runners-up: Wings vs. Hawks, Habs vs. Bruins, and the other 12 rivalries that were even possible in a six-team league.

1968-1973: Bruins vs. Canadiens

Now here’s an Original Six rivalry that didn’t miss a beat once expansion arrived. These teams combined to win each of the first six Stanley Cups of the post-expansion era. The first three of those were anticlimactic; thanks to the league’s ridiculous decision to put all six expansion teams into one division and guarantee one a berth in the final, Montreal and Boston got to take turns stomping the overmatched Blues from 1968 to 1970.

When they weren’t rolling the Blues, they were often facing each other in the playoffs, with the Canadiens winning all three matchups during this era. The best of those came in 1971, a seven-game classic that featured Montreal’s memorable comeback win after trailing 5-1 in Game 2.

Runners-up: Canadiens vs. Black Hawks, Blues vs. North Stars, the NHL’s divisional formatting vs. common sense.

1974-76: Flyers vs. Rangers

You couldn’t do a list like this without prominently featuring the Broad Street Bullies. The question is who to pair them with, given the Flyers were hated by just about every team in the league (and even beyond). In fact, it’s tempting to just say “Flyers vs. Everybody” and be done with it.

But that feels like a cop-out, so let’s give the other spot to the Rangers, the team that came closest to derailing the Flyers during their back-to-back Cup-winning years in 1974 and 1975. That came in the 1974 semifinal, when the teams met in a seven-game classic in which the home team won each game, and which featured enough animosity that even dropping the puck for a simple faceoff ended up being an adventure.

Runners-up: But seriously, the Flyers vs. Everybody.

1977-79: Bruins vs. Canadiens

Boston and Montreal regain the title thanks to a pair of meetings in the Stanley Cup final, both won by Montreal. But perhaps the most famous moment of the rivalry’s long history comes in 1979, when the teams met in the semifinal (with a slam-dunk finals matchup against the Rangers awaiting the winner) and played one of the most famous Game 7s the league has ever seen.

Runners-up: Rangers vs. Islanders, which was just getting started. Speaking of which …

1980-82: Rangers vs. Islanders

This is one of those classic rivalries that has to find its way onto our list somewhere. While the teams had been division rivals since the Islanders entered the league in 1972, and had met in the playoffs for the first time in 1975, the rivalry as we know it didn’t really begin until 1979. That was the year Islanders defenseman Denis Potvin broke the ankle of Rangers forward Ulf Nilsson, all but ending the latter’s career as a productive NHLer and leading to the introduction of perhaps the most famous chant in NHL history: “Potvin sucks.”

The teams faced each other in the playoffs that season, with the Rangers winning in six. That would be the last series the Islanders lost for almost five full years, as they launched into a dynasty that saw them win four straight Cups from 1980 to 1983. Along the way, they faced (and beat) the Rangers every year from 1981 to 1984. That was the last time the Isles would beat the Rangers in the playoffs, although their fans would still get another decade of use out of the withering “1940” chant.

>> Read the full post on Grantland

Five thoughts on the WJC

I realize many sports fans don’t understand hockey’s World Junior Championship. There’s a good chance you’ve never heard of most of the players. Depending on your level of fandom, it’s possible you’ve never heard of any of the players. It’s a single-elimination tournament in a sport that really needs long series to get any kind of fair outcome, so the odds of the whole thing being won by the legitimately best team are marginal. The very best players in the age group, the ones you’d really want to see in this kind of event, are almost all missing because they’re already in the big leagues. And, of course, these are just kids, so the level of play isn’t exactly pro level, and there are some brutal mismatches.

You know what that sounds a lot like to me? March Madness! You like March Madness, right? Good. Think of the WJC as hockey’s version of March Madness, except instead of everyone’s rooting interests being driven by some tenuous former ties to some school and/or gambling, it’s based on strident nationalism.

You’re onboard with that, right, America? I knew you would be. Here’s the bad news: Team USA went home early, and we’ll get to that in a few sections. But we still wound up with a pretty decent matchup for last night’s gold-medal game, so let’s start there as we run down five key thoughts from the last two weeks of teenage spirit.

1. We got a big rivalry game for the gold …

Canada vs. Russia was international hockey’s original rivalry — the two nations were trying to pulverize each other years before the Miracle on Ice — and it has provided some of the sport’s most memorable moments in the decades since. That’s especially true at the WJC, where Canada and Russia have met for the gold eight times since 1999 (not to mention this infamous debacle back in the Soviet Union days.)

So last night’s gold-medal matchup between Canada and Russia was a worthy one. And it delivered on what we’ve come to expect between the two teams: bad blood, plenty of skill, and an almost unbearably dramatic game.

That last bit seemed like it would get the night off midway through the second period. After Canada jumped out to an early 2-0 lead just a few minutes into the game, Russia fought back to even the flow of play and closed the gap to 2-1 by the end of the first. But Canada took a 5-1 lead on second-period goals by Sam Reinhart, Connor McDavid — more on him in a moment — and Max Domi, shifting the game firmly into blowout territory.

Apparently somebody forgot to translate that memo into Russian, because the visitors stormed back with three goals in a four-minute span to close the gap to 5-4 by the end of the second. It was an admirable comeback from the Russians, and the first real adversity Canada had faced in the tournament. It also brought back memories of the 2011 gold-medal game in Buffalo, played exactly four years ago. That was the final that saw Russia storm back from a 3-0 third-period deficit with five unanswered goals, a loss that still stings Canadian hockey fans.

There’d be no third-period collapse this year, or any third-period goals for that matter. The teams played a furious period with plenty of chances, but Canada held on for the 5-4 win to take home the gold, the country’s first in six years. It was an enormously entertaining game, if you can ignore that anyone with a rooting interest hated every second of it, and put a nice exclamation point on a fun tournament.

2. … but we didn’t get the big rivalry game

While Canada and Russia will always be the old favorite, there’s no better international hockey rivalry right now than Canada vs. Team USA. And that’s especially true at the junior level, where the American program has very nearly caught up with its northern neighbors, winning gold in 2010 and 2013. Games between the two countries tend to be emotional affairs, as the two sides don’t seem to like each other very much.

We did get a Canada/USA matchup to close out the round-robin, with Team Canada earning an entertaining 5-3 win on New Year’s Eve. But there would be no rematch in the elimination round, with the Americans dropping a 3-2 decision to the Russians after drawing a tough matchup in the quarterfinals. That loss sent Team USA home without a medal for the second straight year.

So has the American development program taken a step back? Hardly. While it’s always disappointing to go home empty-handed, the WJC format basically ensures that at least one top team will be out early. That American loss to Canada dropped them down to second place in their group and led to a tough matchup with the Russians, and an undisciplined effort combined with running into a hot goaltender spelled doom.

The loss hurts, but in the big picture the Americans are on the right track. They came into this year’s tournament as one of the favorites and will head into next year’s event the same way. Other than Canada, no nation is producing as much high-end offensive talent as the Americans are these days. Assuming they don’t panic based on a few years of tough matchups and bad luck, they’ll be just fine.

>> Read the full post on Grantland

The Venn Diagram of Hockey Hatred

There’s an old stereotype that hockey fans hate everyone. And like most stereotypes, it’s simply not true.

For example, we don’t hate Teemu Selanne. And, uh … well, that’s pretty much it, actually. Other than Selanne, yeah, we hate basically everyone else.

But we hate some people more than others. And our hate isn’t random — it’s based on a series of expectations, passed down from generation to generation, that govern how those in the hockey world should behave. Every fan knows them.

They’ve just never been written down … until now.

Here are the four key reasons a hockey fan would hate someone:

They're overexposed

Hockey players are supposed to blend quietly into the background. Anyone who gets too much attention — whether they asked for it or not — eventually becomes a target.

They just won’t be quiet

Much like small children, hockey fans expect our heroes to be seen but not heard. Anyone who makes any noise or (god forbid) actually forms an opinion must be silenced.

They take cheap shots

Hockey has a code. No, nobody has ever seen it or could agree on what it is. But the code is real, and taking a cheap shot violates it. Probably. Sometimes.

They just have one of those faces, you know?

Come on, we all know them when we see them.

Those are the four tenets of hockey hatred. And once you understand them, you can categorize all our hate into one neat diagram. Like this one...

>> View the full diagram on Grantland

At the combine: A look at the top prospects for the 2013 NHL draft

In hindsight, the photographer picked a weird
time to ask Drouin and MacKinnon where they
thought Seth Jones would get picked

The NHL scouting combine is being held this week in Toronto, which makes this as good a time as any to have a look at the top prospects for next month's draft.

Well, technically a better time would be right before the draft. But thanks to the lockout, there appears to be a good chance that this year's draft will be start 15 minutes after the conclusion of the Stanley Cup finals, so we might as well go ahead and do the preview now.

Here are sixteen top prospects who can expect to hear their names called at the 2013 entry draft in New Jersey.

Seth Jones - This big strong defenceman would be a perfect fit in Colorado thanks to his ability to protect goaltenders from traffic in the crease and forwards driving the net and crazy coaches who keep trying to fight them.

Nathan MacKinnon - Scouts in Florida say he's exactly the kind of player who could really bring Panthers fans out of their seats, so based on recent attendance figures he's apparently already been playing there for a few years.

Jonathan Drouin - Oh sure, he racked up the points in Halifax playing on a line with MacKinnon, but let's see what he can do when he's stuck in Tampa Bay playing with Steven Stamkos and wait actually he'll probably be pretty good at that too.

Nikita Zadorov - The 6'5" 230 pound teen did very well on the Wingate cycling test, assuming that the bicycle immediately exploding is considered a good thing.

Max Domi - Is well-known for having grown up with famous NHL bloodlines, in the sense that every time his dad came home from work he'd leave a trail of the blood of famous players all over the house.

Read the rest of this post...

Grantland: Seven shades of dirty hockey

The hockey world is still buzzing over Erik Karlsson's horrific injury, with the debate raging on about whether the awkward hit by Pittsburgh’s Matt Cooke should be considered dirty.

Well, maybe “debate” isn’t the right word; outside of Ottawa, the play is mostly seen an unfortunate accident. But “raging” probably still fits, at least when it comes to minority opinions like the tirade from Senators owner Eugene Melnyk.

But the bigger problem here is that we often don’t even know what “dirty” means. The term can describe different things to different fans, and these days it casts a wide enough net that it is often meaningless.

We need more than just “dirty” or “not dirty." So I’ve taken a crack at breaking down the seven levels of dirty. I’ve also included some examples — a list that, unfortunately for hockey fans, is far from definitive — a well as the short- and long-term consequences. It won’t settle all the arguments, of course, but at least it might help us figure out what we’re arguing about.

>> Read the full post at Grantland