Official NHL thread?

[Nabby]

Saw that the Sharks smoked Anaheim... a good team. Cheechoo looked pretty good on the stat sheet. I think that guy is a complete SNIPER who's just had a few off years.

Also saw that Vancouver smoked Calgary... didn't see that coming.

Oil doesn't play until Sunday... I can't WAIT!

He's been working off of injuries and his head getting to big to carry these past two seasons. This year he looks like the old Cheech that scored 56 goals in a season.

There were three major things that changed with the head coach switch, that I noticed at least:

1) Sharks work ethic. They worked hard, every friken shift. Sharks have had a bad tendency to try and protect a slim lead. I know, I saw most of last seasons games.

2) The power play was scary good. None of this standing around crap they did all of last season. Quick passes, all players cycling, and getting that puck to the net.

3) Penalty kill. Sharks were great last season with it and this season they look even better. Why? because they're sacrificing the body to block shots. Their timing on shot blocking was also great.

Bottom line, I think the Sharks looked a lot like Detroit on Thursday. Wonder why .

[Spank_Me_Hard]

The Oil are undefeated!

[r'aggro]

Awesome game tonight, Flyers @ Sharks. The wrong team won but it had everything you want to see in a game. These two play each other again this week in Philly, can't wait to see it. I love these home/away series! A lot of tension and aggro tends to build up during the first meeting, leaving the door wide open for a real battle in the second game.

One schedule revision I like for this year is the reduction in games vs division rivals from 8 to 6. It means more cross-conference games for every team, and I love the variety. For you western conference guys, imagine playing the Devils 8 times a year.

[Recon]

dont get me started on scheduling...

Wings get shafted every year......just so they can prop up ticket sales and tv revenue in the western division

[r'aggro]

How so?

It makes more sense for the wings to be in the eastern conference, though.

[Spank_Me_Hard]

WOW are the Oil looking good!

4-0... with all of those teams being ones of decent quality. The Oil have a hellacious starting schedule... with most of their next 12 or so games on the road.

Erik Cole looked AMAZING! No goals, but was throwing his body around and was a force. And Cogliano impressed me too... you could tell that Calgary's D was afraid of his speed... that fear resulted in a pretty nice goal on his part.

And did anybody see Boyd get PASTED into the boards by McInyre? Boyd goes about 190lbs and McIntyre is about 265lbs... here it is:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GNZ3C560rrs

And of course the guy the he ended up figting he outweighed by about 75lbs too... LOL!

[r'aggro]

I heard Cogliano developed some hands to go with those skates; makes for a nice offensive threat.

[Spank_Me_Hard]

I heard Cogliano developed some hands to go with those skates; makes for a nice offensive threat.

When Horcoft went down last year Gagner, Nilsson, and Cogliano were all counted on that much more. They were forced to grow up.

All of their second half of the season was a 180 degree difference from the first half. Where they stated off the season looking like 2 rookies and a second year player, they ended the season looking like NHL veterans.

Cogliano's goal was a highlight type of goal. He DROVE the defenceman back with his blazing speed and then cut directly across of him and Kipper and ROOFED a wrister.

I think that Nilsson (who alos looked amazing last night), Gagner, and Cogliano all have the potential to be stars in this league. Though I am expecting at least ONE to hit a bump on the learning curve this year and not progress as fast as the others.

[dyne]

Well my Hawks got rid of Savard and replaced him with Quennville. Apparently Kane took it pretty bad. Haven't gotten to watch much since I'm transitioning between cable to dish right now.

I thought they were going to be pretty good this year. Instead, watching every game has been like getting kicked in the junk over and over.

Last nights game was just absolutely brutal. I have a feeling they'll keep Hasselbeck out the rest of the year. There's not much left to salvage with all the injuries.

[r'aggro]

What's with firing Savard just a handful of games into the season? I'm sure he'll get another job shortly, but it seems like a really rash move,--especially if the team's best forward got on with him so well.

[dyne]

No clue. He singlehandedly put people in those seats the past couple years. Until last season the city didn't give a damn about the team. They finally got their tv deal back and there was a lot of money pumped into the hype machine. I could see them canning him after 10 games with 1 or 2 wins, but 4?

[Spank_Me_Hard]

Well my Hawks got rid of Savard and replaced him with Quennville. Apparently Kane took it pretty bad.

Kane DID take it pretty hard.

I've never seen anything like that before...

And I think that the 'Hawks management over reacted.... cripes... it's just a few games into the season! After a HUGE offseason by the 'Hawks! Give the guy a fricken chance to show what he can do with the new talent!

On the flipside... I think very highly of Quenville.

[Snakespy]

I dunno what it is but I just don't really care about hockey anymore since there is not one game televised this year. Its all on cable so no hockey for me I guess edit: Go Avs still I suppose!

[Recon]

dont get me started on scheduling...

Wings get shafted every year......just so they can prop up ticket sales and tv revenue in the western division

Travel time is number one...especially during the playoffs no other team has to travel as far as the wings do during the playoff series.

And lack of original rivalry games.....lack of Toronto, Montreal, Chicago, games....Its always a big topic of discussion on local radio shows how the wings are always used to prop up the Western division as attendance goes up something like 150% when the wings games come to towns

[r'aggro]

Sure, the wings are the best team and other cities want to watch.

Places like Dallas, Anaheim and SJ are all pretty long flights from Detroit, that's why I think they are a better geographic fit for the eastern conference. There would need to be some kind of realignment due to the concentration of teams in the northeast though.