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The Chicago Blackhawks Marian Hossa took a nasty illegal hit from the Phoenix Coyotes‘ Raffi Torres tonight that left him motionless on the ice. As you can see after the jump, Torres left his feet for the hit so he’s likely going to face a suspension. He’s a repeat offender, so he could face 10 games.
Brendan Shanahan needs to send a message to Torres before he paralyzes somebody.
I don’t know too much about the NHL and hardly pay attention to it all season, even the playoffs.
This year is different though. [Read more...]
When it comes to coaching, a termination is much more than the loss of a job. It has the potential to tarnish one’s reputation and damage a coaching career for life. For the most part, coaches are measured on their wins and losses. They depend on the talent, health, and cooperation of their players to make wins happen, but when the team falls short, somebody is to blame.
And as the figurehead of team, it’s typically the coaches who get the boot first. Sometimes the win-loss ratio isn’t the problem at all, but actually an issue of insubordination or bad judgment on the coach’s part.
But are these good enough reasons to fire a coach and damage the team morale? If everyone deserves a second chance, then maybe we should reconsider the fairness in these eight coaches’ dismissals.
The Chicago Blackhawks are set to take on the Phoenix Coyotes in (wait, what? Phoenix has a hockey team?? Yes, they do. Does anyone go? No, no they don’t.) in the NHL Stanley Cup playoffs opening round.
The #4 vs. #5 seed series begins at 9 pm ct Thursday April 12th in Phoenix as they have the home-ice advantage.
The Chicago Blackhawks evened their series with the Phoenix Coyotes at one game apiece with a thrilling 4-3 overtime victory at Jobing.com Arena in Phoenix, last night.
Much like Game 1, Game 2 offered a similar pattern and flow to the game: the Blackhawks opened the scoring early in the first period – in Game 1, Jonathan Toews scored the game’s first goal in the first four minutes of the game, in Game 2, Bryan Bickell scored the first goal of the game three minutes into the game; the Coyotes built a steady lead in both contests; then the Blackhawks scored a goal late in regulation – in Game 1, Brent Seabrook scored with 15 seconds remaining in regulation, in Game 2, Patrick Sharp scored with just six seconds remaining in the game.
I continue my analysis of the 1st round Stanley Cup playoff series by analyzing the playoff series between the St. Louis Blues and the San Jose Sharks.
The St. Louis Blues became the surprise team of the regular season, particularly after they hired Ken Hitchcock after a 6-7-0 start and catapulted themselves to the one of the top records in the National Hockey League (NHL). Hitchcock’s coaching efforts transformed the Blues from a disappointing team to one that shut down opponents with a gritty, defense-first, two-way style of play and stellar goaltending with the league-leading goalie tandem of Jaroslav Halak and Brian Elliot.
We now embark on the greatest playoffs in all of sport, the Stanley Cup playoffs, the prize of which brings the toughest of men to tears and stamps and catapults previously solid National Hockey League (NHL) players to legend status.
I will analyze the playoff series between each of the NHL Central Division teams participating in the Stanley Cup playoffs – the St. Louis Blues, the Nashville Predators, the Detroit Red Wings and the Chicago Blackhawks. Fortunately for me, the Red Wings and the Predators play each other so that mitigates my overall efforts, which is otherwise known as ‘killing two birds with one stone.’
I begin by analyzing the playoff series between the Chicago Blackhawks and the Phoenix Coyotes.
I will also offer my predictions and analysis for the remaining Central Division teams who are participating in the playoffs.
For the third time since 2008, the year that the Cubification of the Chicago Blackhawks started, the team is raising ticket prices. That was the year snake oil saleman John McDonough and his lickspittle Jay Blunk came to the team and took over the front office.
Hockey may be the sixth or seventh favorite sport, or at least the NHL is the sixth or seventh favorite league in United States, but the insane consumer demand in Chicago actually justifies the Hawks’ obscene price hike.
Hard to believe that for every year of the preceding decade up until 2008, the team was averaging just 6-7,000 fans a night. Just five years ago, you could get a 300 level seat for $8 if you had a college ID.
Are you ready for the most horrible attempts at both the American and Canadian National Anthems ever? There’s been worst renditions of each song at a sporting event, but you won’t find a worse combo platter of these two at a hockey game.
The fans at the Ottawa Senators vs. Pittsburgh Penguins game had to endure the closest thing to a human singing version of Miss Piggy you’ll ever see.
Check out Sidney Crosby trying to hold in his laughter at the (0.21) mark.
The Detroit Red Wings have been beset by a series of key injuries – team captain Niklas Lidstrom, Johan Franzen, Jakub Kindl, Darren Helm, Patrick Eaves, Jonathan Ericsson and goaltenders Jimmy Howard and Joey McDonald, amongst others. And while Lidstrom’s, Kindl’s and Howard’s returns are imminent and Pavel Datsyuk has recently returned from missing 11 games with arthroscopic surgery on his knee, the Wings have struggled mightily during the month of March, going winless in 8 of their past 9 and 11 of their past 14 games, including a six-game winless streak (0-4-2).
Not coincidentally, their slide began when Lidstrom was sidelined with a deep ankle bone bruise.
The Chicago Blackhawks have been the National Hockey League’s (NHL’s) second hottest team, behind only the scintillatingly-hot Pittsburgh Penguins who have sported a 13-0-1 record recently. The Blackhawks have blistered their way up the NHL’s Western Conference standings at an 8-1-1 clip, including a recent 5-0-0 run, all of this being done without the services of their captain and leader Jonathan Toews, who has missed the past 14 games with a concussion.
In spite of this devastating loss, the Blackhawks are only one point out of the Western Conference’s 4th position.
A headshot like this will probably earn a suspension. Not thinking this is the type of behavior the NHL wants to condone in future hockey games.
At 5:54 in the second period Tuesday night, Jamie Benn of the Dallas Stars took a nasty shot to the jaw from Phoenix Coyotes Capt. Shane Doan. Benn fell to the ice.
This sparked some brawling between the two teams and a whole ton of penalties.
