NHL Stanley Cup 2009

[holden]

I'm a born and raised Pittsburgher, so the Penguins are my team. But what a series against the Detroit Red Wings in a rematch of the 2008 Finals?

Hockey. The more I watch, the more i appreciate the balance between finesse/skill and brute force/determination.

[ndrwrld]

i expect the Pens to win game 6 at home.
back to Detroit for game 7.
anything can happen then.
go Pens.

[den]

I totally became a hockey fan this year. The turnaround of the Blackhawks franchise is amazing. Previously, the Hawks were a sad franchise in the third largest city despite being one of the original NHL six, with a Cubs-esque championship drought (1961). The new owner signed loads of young talent (Kane, Toews) and finally put all of the games on tv. It's a bit hard to watch hockey on tv, but being able to tune into it is the first step, and the action draws you in. Hopefully the Blackhawks can keep their young foundation together and be a true contender in the years to come. I made a foolish bet for a night's worth of drinks on the outcome of the Hawks-Wings series. For the Finals, I suppose I'm leaning Wings. I was up in Michigan watching the games last week, and it'd be nice to rep the Western conference. Plus back-to-back Cups would give the Hawks something to shoot for. And to be honest, Michigan needs some good news lately. Regardless, it's nice to have two hockey towns in it, rather than a San Jose or Carolina.

[stimpee]

So, its 3-3.

The trophy is getting a bit big as they add layers to the bottom, one day it will be just too big to lift!

[den]

Originally Posted by stimpee

So, its 3-3.

The trophy is getting a bit big as they add layers to the bottom, one day it will be just too big to lift!

That would be awesome. I think the Cup is hands-down the coolest trophy in sports.

[IsiliRunite]

I'm not too happy with the officiating so far this series... I think the NHL front office does not like teams made of foreign, excellent players.

Back to the present. If Datsyuk was playing in the first four games this series would not have made it to game 7. The sad part about this series is that both teams are arguably worse than they were last year....Still, I'm giving Pittsburgh a decent shot to win this game 7, but considering away ice, a victory might require uncharacteristically good play from the Penguins for that to happen. Look for the home ice ~65% faceoff wins and Detroit's ability to line change before faceoffs (to lock-up key defensive targets) to push Detroit over the edge.

For the sake of my state.

(The Carolina Hurricanes have a huge fanbase. Expansion teams of the past 12 years do not...)

Post-game edit:

Blown calls. That is all.

[ndrwrld]

Penguins win game 7 !

to all you all blaming the refs...bitch, pleeeeez.
next, you'll bitch about the ice conditions.

[holden]

Hooray Penguins! First, my Steelers, now the Pens. Love ya' Pittsburgh!

What a series, though. The Red Wings are a scary, talented, relentless team. Penguins got it done through determination, but i really wasn't expecting it, given the experience and depth of Detroit. Nice to see Talbot, Staal, Kennedy and some of the other position players step up and score, while stars Malkin and Crosby had their hands full with the Detroit checking.

Hockey - what a sport of finesse, skill, brute force...and what a playoff season!

[IsiliRunite]

Originally Posted by ndrwrld

Penguins win game 7 !

to all you all blaming the refs...bitch, pleeeeez.
next, you'll bitch about the ice conditions.

Yeah, you're dumb. The Penguins scored first on a blown icing call that should be made 100/100 times. Throughout the series the referees miscues were lop-sided... 21 seconds of 6 men on the ice, Malkin scoring a goal on an offsides play later in the series. The entire series had NBA levels of officiating influence.

Its funny how a Maple Leafs fan would be so oblivious to bad officiating... officials gift you many chances because you are Canada's team. Go back to Tim Horton's where you can actually win arguments about sports! If you want to ruffle feathers, you could at least go about it intelligently.

Injuries and officiating are the only things I blame, outside the Red Wings' lack of overall fire. If Evgeni Malkin didn't play in the first four games of the series, would everyone be on the Wed Wings' nuts for winning? You can't come back and be 100% on your first, second, or third game back.

The Penguins played hard, obviously, and both teams deserved to win. Certain factors outside of athlete play sort of pushed the deck in their favour, though, and that's why I'm not too concerned that the Red Wings lost. We'll see what happens when the Penguins are paying a huge amount of their cap for two players and they have a cup hangover. When both teams were healthy and hungry, the Red Wings won 4-2. To arc a story line, however, this series will be looked back on in 20 years as a series that Sidney Crosby battled back from a 0-2 series and lead his team past the goliath Red Wings. Red Wings will have another cup by 2015, I think. They draft extremely well and drafting is quite important in the cap era. I wish I could make such predictions about Chelsea... NHL is more predictable, though!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Icing



what's the hold up? There are officials dedicated to making that call. The game was pretty even until that point. This wasn't some Ovrebo shit you can say directly made one team lose, but the bad call did nudge the series in one direction. Game 6 had some quite shitty penalty calling inconsistencies, too. I will gladly go back over the 2008 and 2009 full-play off DVDs with anyone and score bad call for bad call.. Detroit usually gets the short end of the stick per game, and usually wins the game anyways. Sometimes 60/40, sometimes better or worse. I'm a very "fair" sports fan who knows the games pretty well and watches all his teams' games, I honestly feel as though anyone at home would make these observations.

Grats Penguins. Damn Crosby waited one hell of an eternity to shake the Red Wing's hands....