STANLEY CUP DUEL CERTAINLY NO DUD
Washington, Vegas entertaining fans so far and it is showing in the television ratings
Two games in, I’m calling it. This Stanley Cup final will not be a dud.
That was the fear when the playoffs began, wasn’t it? That we would have run out of steam by now. That you would have tuned out by now.
That the divisional playoff format, which pitted Boston against Toronto — the second- and thirdbest teams in the East — in the first round and then led Winnipeg into playing Nashville — the two best teams in the West — in the second round, would somehow make the final somewhere anticlimactic.
Instead, eight million viewers watched some part of Game 1 between Vegas and Washington in Canada, which represented a four per cent increase from last year’s Game 1 between Pittsburgh and Nashville. The response was even more impressive in the U.S., where Game 1 drew a 3.72 rating (an average audience of about 4.5 million viewers) — up seven per cent from a year ago — and 3.788 million watched Game 2, which was up 16 per cent from last year and 47 per cent from 2016 when Pittsburgh played San Jose.
Part of that was obviously due to the curiosity of seeing Vegas in the final. But regardless of what caused you to watch Vegas win 6-4 in Game 1, before losing 3-2 to Washington in Game 2, chances are you weren’t disappointed. How could you be?
The playoffs are supposed to be about conservative approaches and tight-checking hockey. It’s board battles and working all game for a chance, which usually is the result of a deflected puck or a mad scramble in front of the net. It’s ugly. Often it’s boring. That hasn’t been the case here. This series has been nasty. And it’s been exciting. There were 10 goals scored in Game 1 and another five in Game 2. None went in off anyone’s rear end.
On one goal, the Golden Knights’ James Neal batted a puck out of the air and then rifled a wrist shot into the top corner past Caps goalie Braden Holtby. Washington then answered back with a tick-tack-toe passing play involving Andre Burakovsky, Michal Kempny and Lars Eller.
Even the saves have been spectacular.
On one end, Marc-Andre Fleury channelled his inner Dominik Hasek with a barrel-roll stop on T.J. Oshie in Game 2. In the same game, Holtby made what was likely the save of the playoffs — and, according to teammate Jay Beagle, “the save of his lifetime” — when he dove across the crease with his stick to rob Alex Tuch of a surefire goal in the final two minutes of the third period that would have tied the game.
There have been bone-crunching hits and spilled blood, gamewinning goals from unlikely heroes and so many lead changes and momentum swings that you’d be a fool to switch channels even a second before the final buzzer.
The defensive gaffes and backand-forth chances might not be the kind of hockey that coaches particularly like. But that’s probably a good thing. In a city that calls itself the entertainment capital of the world, the first two games in Vegas were fun, fast and filled with more surprises than the final reveal of a Penn and Teller illusion.
Really, that’s all we can ask for. This is playoff hockey — finally. A year ago, the Penguins and Predators went through the motions in a championship series that was lacking in goals and completely devoid of passion. It was so dull Nashville’s P.K. Subban was forced to manufacture a beef with Pittsburgh’s Sidney Crosby over bad breath.
Sure, this series began with some over-the-top theatrics courtesy of a pre-game show that was a blend of Medieval Times and Game of Thrones, as well as player introductions performed by Michael Buffer. But the violence has been real with Brooks Orpik unable to speak to reporters after scoring the Game 2 winner because of a cross-check he received to the mouth late in the third period.
“I think it’s playoff hockey and it definitely ramps up, a little bit, the physical play,” said Vegas head coach Gerard Gallant. “Guys are used to getting bumped and banged. It’s part of playoff hockey and you fight through that stuff. I think every team is aware of what’s going to happen.”
In Game 1, the Capitals’ Tom Wilson took a healthy run at Jonathan Marchessault and blindsided the Golden Knights’ leading playoff scorer with a late hit. Two nights later, Vegas retaliated not by going after Wilson, but rather Washington’s leading scorer Evgeny Kuznetsov.
The hit Kuznetsov received from Brayden McNabb might have looked clean, but it knocked Kuznetsov from the game as he clutched his arm.
We didn’t see this type of passion in the Boston-Toronto series or even with Pittsburgh and Washington. But we’re seeing it here with two teams that had no prior playoff history.
Game 3 is Saturday. Here’s hoping it goes the distance.