A super tight race for playoffs in NHL’s east
Oh, my. A snowstorm and a seven- or eight-team Eastern Conference playoff race. It doesn’t get better than this — unless you’re sitting under a palm tree sipping margaritas from a coconut.
I’ve seen playoff races. We’ve all seen playoff races. But I don’t know if I’ve seen so many teams crowded into such a tight space so late in the season.
Saturday morning, it looked like this, following the Tampa Bay Lightning, who are so far out in front they can spend the rest of the season giving players time off and tuning up for the playoffs. For the rest, the race is so tight you can hardly get a shiv in its ribs:
New York Islanders: 60 points Toronto: 60 points
Washington: 59 points Columbus: 59 points
Boston: 59 points
Montreal: 59 points
Pittsburgh: 58 points
The Buffalo Sabres are still in it as well, with 54 points in 48 games, but they have faded to the fringe of the race and need a hot streak to get back in it. The rest — oy!
The Islanders led the Metropolitan Division and Toronto was a solid second in the Atlantic, so both had a leg up on the rest. (And, yes, the irony of the John Tavares move from one team to the other has not escaped us. Nor has the fact Barry Trotz is one helluva coach, a fact that seemed lost on Capitals management after their Stanley Cup win.)
Going into Saturday night’s game at home against the bottom-feeding Philadelphia Flyers, the Canadiens had a chance to vault into the top of the bunch. But the Flyers are a different team with Carter Hart in goal and the Habs wasted their chance.
Disaster? Not quite — all the other teams in that bunch who were playing Saturday also lost. The Bruins, Blue Jackets and Penguins all went down as well, Pittsburgh by a 7-3 score to the Vegas Golden Knights with Casey DeSmith in goal and the Penguins as sloppy as they can get.
On paper, you would think the Penguins, Capitals and Bruins, all perennial contenders, are the teams from this group that can’t miss. But the Penguins have lost four of their last seven, DeSmith has struggled lately, Sidney Crosby isn’t quite the force of nature he has been, and nothing is set in stone.
So this morning, the standings looked as they had Saturday morning, give or take a few games in hand. Toronto, Washington, the Isles, Columbus and Pittsburgh have all played 48 games, Boston 49 and the Canadiens 50. (The Sabres, four points back of Pittsburgh, had also played 48 games.)
Since winning the Stanley Cup in October, the Leafs have been treading water, more so since the much-ballyhooed signing of holdout William Nylander. Toronto is still one of the favourites, but the Leafs still have the problems they had before the signings of Tavares and Nylander: a suspect defence and goaltending that is not bad but something less than all-universe.
The Leafs hosted the Arizona Coyotes on Sunday night — an excellent way to get healthy in a hurry— but lost 4-2. The Caps also lost — 8-5 to Chicago — and the Islanders won 3-1 against Anaheim.
Six teams in the East now have betweeen 58 and 60 points.
The surprise is the Canadiens are in it at all — not to mention the Isles, who weren’t contenders with Tavares, but were leading the division without him.
Perhaps we shouldn’t call this a playoff race at all. With Buffalo the only outsider within striking distance, it’s quite probable all seven teams will make it. The question then isn’t so much getting a ticket to the dance, it’s jockeying for position and homeice advantage — and the name of the game is Avoid the Lightning.
The Bolts somehow managed to lose to the Leafs at home last week, but that’s deceptive. They’re as loaded up front as Toronto and they’re stronger on defence and in goal. With the Predators struggling a bit and the hockey universe not quite willing to believe in Calgary, Tampa Bay is the team to beat.
Right now, the Habs are a good bet to draw the short straw and get yet another matchup with the Lightning, the fourth since 2004, unless the Sabres get hot and ruin the party, which is entirely possible.
That’s the thing about what is essentially a 30-game season. Anything can happen. Over 82 games, the cream tends to rise, but over any short stretch (October, say) you never know.
In ways apart from the game on the ice, the Maple Leafs are by far the more frightening opponent. With fans in Toronto expecting Mike Babcock’s team to breeze to its second cup in six months, the atmosphere in Hogtown will be morbidly hysterical — and you can multiply that by 1,000 if the Canadiens are the first-round opponent.
Given fans in Montreal start hitting the hysteria button in mid-August, that’s a matchup only a masochist would crave. A masochist — or a hockey fan. Sometimes, it’s hard to tell the difference. jacktodd46@yahoo.com Twitter.com/jacktodd46