The start of the season is tough, because you always want to make grand statements about teams when you’re really just working off of a small data set. Watching last night’s Rangers-Devils, on Versus (I’m one of the 50 people left with Versus), I was very impressed by the Devils. They didn’t look like a [...]

So Todd Bertuzzi is back with the Wings. I understand the attraction to Bertuzzi. He’s big. He once had great hands. In a lot of ways, he’s the North American version of the prototypical Detroit forward. But to be more precise, he was the North American version of the prototypical Detroit forward. He’s six-years removed [...]

I’m very surprised Sergei Zubov is close to signing a KHL deal. Zubov is 39 and coming off an injury-plagued season, but I would think there might be a few NHL teams interested in signing one of the game’s all-time great offensive defensemen. If nothing else, Zubov could probably quarterback the powerplay as a special [...]

One way you know it was a great game seven is that there just wasn’t much to say about it. It completely spoke for itself. The Penguins were flawless for two periods and strong enough for the third. Defenseman Brad Stuart, whose turnovers and pinching led to both game seven Penguin goals, says he’d like [...]

So tonight’s the night for Detroit or Pittsburgh. Tim Panaccio says the Penguins need a role player to step-up and pull a Ruslan Fedotenko circa game seven of the 2004 Stanley Cup finals. I think Fedotenko, who now plays for Pittsburgh, is a logical candidate for that role, but maybe it’s too obvious. Meanwhile, moving [...]

Fantastic game six last night. And for all of the talk about Detroit’s defense driving their offense, Pittsburgh did a tremendous job, at least for the first two periods, of letting their defense be a catalyst for their offense. Mike Heika said the game deserved to be on NBC. I think NBC should show the [...]

I’m not sure tonight’s game six is going to be the Detroit cakewalk everyone seems to think it will be. The big factor working in Pittsburgh’s favor? Getting away from those Joe Louis boards, which they never seemed to adjust to or to be prepared for. The big difference in Detroit’s game five rout was [...]

So what did Pittsburgh do right in their win over Detroit? Quite a few things. Their powerplay was finally effective against the Wings. They managed to get pucks deep in the Red Wing zone. They kept the Zetterberg/Lindstrom match-up out on the ice for longer shifts, plus lots of ice time in general. I think [...]

Brent Sutter is starting to look like another successful graduate of the Mats Sundin Rapid Decision-Making Program. He’s still not sure he wants to coach the Devils next season. The longer Sutter waits, the less effective he’ll be as a coach if he decides to return. Would you play hard for someone who was that [...]

So this year’s Stanley Cup finals will be a rematch of last year’s. The Blackhawks magical run through the post-season finally ended last night. It’s interesting how close the Detroit-Chicago series actually was. Chicago had a decent chance to win games two and five. Another season or so of experience and the Blackhawks might have [...]