[NHL] Ice This

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Ice This: For the Glory of the Game

– Steve Price, Inside Pulse Sports
January 18th, 2006
An IP Sports Exclusive

When a legend retires, the world seems to stop for an instant. Because legends never die, you see. They have their own personal seal (which in turn may have been carried into battle by warriors before them) raised to the rafters of their domain, forever destined to be gawked at by generation after generation of loyal followers. Their colors, their number stand as a testament to the hard work and dedication that bettered a franchise, a city, and a people that live and die at the drop of a puck.

And then, when the jersey of an immortal rises into place alongside other immortals, there is a brief period of simultaneous mourning to coincide with the respect and adoration. It’s only after the ceremony is complete, and your hero walks through the tunnel out of sight for the last time … that you begin to realize that your hero, the man that brought your team, your team to the edge of history and back again, is no longer a part of your life. Make no mistake; any sports fan, be it a Dallas Mavericks fan or an aficionado of the Toronto Blue Jays shares a part of their lives with a collective of athletes on game day. No matter how passionate our hatred of them can become when they seemingly exist only to tear your heart out, the respect and adoration that we hold for our favorite players and teams represent a part of our lives more significant than we would like to admit. Seek the opinion of Red & White Sox fans for proof of this.

So when these men (or women) take their rightful place in sports lore, there is an understandable sadness that overcomes us, as it hits home finally, that the old days are no more. These feelings undoubtedly found their way inside New York Rangers’ fans last Thursday night (01.12.06), as one Mark Messier watched his legacy become entrenched in hockey history. The great Mark Messier, one of the all-time greats, regardless of your personal opinion of the man. The same man who dropped a hat trick on New Jersey in a game, let alone a series that he promised to deliver in. The same man who ranks among the top goal scorers in the history of the game itself. Mark Messier essentially said goodbye to us, as his jersey was retired. Thus, on a brisk New York night last Thursday, the fans in attendance at the “World’s Most Famous Arena” paid tribute to a true great. This is, in turn, how we honored him Friday.

Out with the old. In with Alexander Ovechkin.

Sports fans, by nature, have a tendency to look towards the next big thing. Hell, wrestling smarks seem to base their entire column concept around the one wrestler that will revive a dying product. Lord knows football fans in Houston are wondering how long Reggie Bush will take before his metamorphism into Jim Brown is complete. The National Hockey League, meanwhile, is fresh off a year-long lockout that has crippled the sport’s already diminished image amongst its key market: North America. And now, with the pieces of a freshly carved collective bargaining agreement only recently having resurrected the old game, the NHL seems poised to push its new wunderkind, Sidney Crosby as the face of the “new” NHL. If you’re among those that shield yourself from the blatant marketing ploy and refuse to accept the desire of Bettman and Co. to place the Gretzky stigma on Crosby, check NHL.com for me. Under the pull-down menu, count how many “NHL Players” sites there are listed. For a rookie at a relatively young age such as Crosby, the pressure that he was straddled with (and still is to this day) is an enormous burden for a young athlete.

The NHL seems intent on selling our young padawan Crosby to the ends of the Earth. I, however, shall take a different approach. Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, I give you Mr. Ovechkin.

Compared to Sidney Crosby, Alexander Ovechkin is Silence Dogood. Granted, Ovechkin has garnered his own fair share of publicity, thanks in part to his 32 goals, incredible “Phoenix Crusher” shot, and the mini-war between Dynamo Moscow and the Capitals that nearly split the young wing in two. Whereas Crosby was something of the prodigy to be groomed, Ovechkin had to shoe-horn his way into the spotlight. Which now begs the question; is Crosby really the best of the “new” NHL? Is there a rookie out there that dare I say it – tops Crosby on the ice? Funny you should ask.


vs.


Ovechkin vs. Crosby: Round I

Crosby, to date (01.18.06) has managed twenty-two goals and twenty-nine assists to compliment his fifty-one points in forty-six games. For Alexander Ovechkin, the totals amount to thirty-two goals and twenty six assists, which compliment his fifty-eight points in forty-four games played. However, despite playing in two less games than Crosby, Ovechkin has managed to land himself at #2 on the list of goal-scorers at the current time in the NHL. Crosby is just outside of the top ten.

More interesting are some of the lesser-known statistics available. Ovechkin averages 20:44 on the ice, compared Sidney’s 19:27. Ovechkin has 218 shots on goal to his credit, versus Crosby’s 154, and Alexander Ovechkin is absolute money in power play situations; he leads all rookies with thirteen goals in advantages. Crosby has eight goals to his credit, but does hold the edge in assists in the power play over Ovechkin by one; Sidney has fourteen assists to Alexander’s thirteen. Ovechkin, however, possesses a goal while short-handed, a mark which only twelve other rookies can claim. Crosby is not among them.

Ovechkin seems to hold more healthy aggression in his play than does Crosby. For all intensive purposes, Crosby seems at times to be a competent weapon on the ice, but at other points, his inadequacies shine through in earnest. He has a terrible tendency to slash at players when he’s being out-skated, a habit which will only be broken with experience. Crosby at points doesn’t feel like he’s completely ready to take that next step and become a superstar, though by a rookie’s standard, he is adjusting to the NHL quite nicely. Nevertheless, Alexander Ovechkin is the more rounded player right now. In fact, the only main category that Crosby bests Ovechkin in right now is assists. That seems to indicate that Crosby’s role right now is that of the complimentary figure in the Pittsburgh shuffle, despite the fact that he is their leading goal scorer. Young Sidney is only eighteen, which is very green for any athlete in most any sport. That he has performed at a level of some respectability to this point should be testament enough to the talent that he does possess. But for the NHL, in an era where goal-scoring takes precedence over almost any other facet of the game, it seems to me that Ovechkin, not Crosby, should be getting the full court press. Ovechkin is more aggressive in his shots on goal than Crosby, he has a better nose for the goal than Crosby, and he is by far more obvert to penalties than the young Pittsburgh center is. Crosby leads nearly all rookies in penalty minutes with seventy compared to Ovechkin’s thirty.

Winner, by way of knockout: Alexander Ovechkin!

Of course, in this discussion, I’m glossing over a far more significant fact that the NHL can latch on to. The crop of rookies invading the ice rinks around North America this year is by far the most promising group in recent history. Crosby, Ovechkin, Marek Svatos, and Petr Prucha are only a few cogs in the rookie movement that has teams across the league abuzz.

At the end of the day, however, there is a somber fact that still remains. While we gouge at statistics for the leading Rookie of the Year candidates and argue over whether or not Crosby is truly the next “Great One”, we still have to accept the fact that the Gretzky’s, Messier’s and Hull’s are gone from the game. Crosby may never replace Lemieux or Messier statistically, and he certainly wont transplant Wayne Gretzky’s importance to the game. Neither will Alexander Ovechkin, for that matter. For years, we as sports fans have heard about and read about the fans of yore. I’m talking about our fathers, and their fathers, and how they had to come to terms with the new generation of hockey players that dominated their era, while they coped with the loss of their own “immortals”. Our generation of the sports fan has now come to that same manifest destiny. We’re at the edge of a major change in Hockey, and it is a change that must take place, for the sake of the game and its existence in the realm of professional sports. At some point in the near future, we’re going to have to accept the Sidney Crosby’s of the world as the new faces of the NHL. But at the same time, we will also be faced with the never-ending presence of the legends of yesteryear, who seem to haunt us with their never-ending presence over the current incarnation of the greatest game on ice.

After all, legends never die, right? Apparently, neither does the eternal quest to fulfill the shoes of an immortal long since passed into the memories of a fan base too stubborn to let go.


That’s it for this week. Be sure to check out Nicky P. and Patrick N. as they literally carry IP Sports on their backs for the rest of us slackers. IP Sports Radio should be up relatively soon, along with this bad boy here. I hope you enjoyed this new format, and if you did (or didn’t), drop me a line and tell me how you feel. Next week, we’re looking at the best of the Eastern Conference, and why Carolina vs. Ottawa could be more competitive than you think. Until then, I am Steve Price, the Host with the Most signing off in 3… 2… 1…

Peace.

A special thanks to Inside Pulse Sports for allowing myself and the rest of the IP Sports family to partake in the greatest online community around. Also, a special thank you for all the prayers I received during my absence. You all are the greatest, and I am proud to be in the company of such magnificent people.

NHL Stanley Cup Playoffs 2006

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Darkness will rule the land.