[NHL] On The Blue Line

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Well, the Olympics are thankfully over. Prior to the break I was really looking forward to seeing how the tournament would end out but even before the medal round my interest in the entire process was pretty much at zero. Whether it was the lack of stellar play on Canada’s part or the sheer mediocrity of Team U.S.A. or a combination of other things, this years men’s hockey tournament was hardly a spectacle.

The hoopla over the Rick Tocchet gambling ring died down once the games started, so at least there was that positive to look at. Unless you’re Wayne Gretzky, then you’ll never be done talking about it.

Overall, the Games can be broken down to this:

The Good

Switzerland
They played very well and impressed a lot of people with their wins over the Czech Republic and Canada. Their victory over Canada was just the beginning of more failures to come for the Canadians and was a good stepping stone for the Swiss national team heading into the next World Cup and Vancouver 2010. Apparently, or more like, factually, the Swiss head coach was also the head coach of Belarus back when the Belarussians upset Sweden so he’s got a knack for pulling out a win against hockey powerhouses.

Mike Modano’s Comments About Team USA

“I’ve seen a lot of the familiar faces, I’ve been with USA Hockey for a long time, and it’s probably time some things changed,” Modano said.
“Just how things are operated, how things are run behind the scenes. You would think USA Hockey would be more of a well-oiled operation. It’s frustrating. We’ve put a lot into it, we’ve come a long way, and you want things to run smoothly behind the scenes.”

Modano went on to complain about players having to be “on their own” as far as “hotels, tickets, flights” and would probably have complained about some other crap had he been benched earlier than the 3rd period against Finland but he only got that far and that was more than far enough. It certainly doesn’t take much to see that many changes have to be made with USA Hockey and some of these changes may have to occur behind the scenes as Modano points out and that’s fine. Unfortunately for USA hockey the best man for the job behind the bench is no longer with us and fans really can’t see all the “behind the scenes” stuff that Modano hints at not running smoothly.

What the fans *can* see is what’s going on on the ice and it’s horrendous. Team USA needs about two generations of talented hockey players to come up soon if they plan on being competitive in international competition. Modano is no youngster and he is currently the best American player out there and that’s just not good enough. Keith Tkachuck had 0 points in 6 games and was -5 which has nothing to do with Modano but are very telling numbers for a guy who was supposed to carry the load for the U.S. offensively. Team USA made a good move by not adding Roenick to the roster, it was a good step in getting fresh blood into to the games but once again, USA Hockey is running on an I.V. instead of pushing for the rise of new blood.

The Bad

Injuries
Once again, the biggest worry of GM’s, coaches and fans was without incident as several players have returned to the NHL without being able to play. The list includes: Dominik Hasek, Pavol Demitra, Sami Salo, Alexander Frolov, Mattias Ohlund and Jaromir Jagr. Speculation is already abound that the NHL will no longer allow it’s players to participate in the Olympics after the 2010 games in Vancouver. Most people would agree with that decision as the NHL is without a doubt the premier hockey league in the world and Olympic games are out of their jurisdiction. The NHL has no say in scheduling, team management or what happens when a player is injured. This is all something that the NHL knew since allowing it’s players to participate in 1998 and every four years the number of disgruntled NHL fans seems to grow. The Olympics can be exciting and is definitely a different brand of hockey but at the end of the day most fans would rather see Thornton in his Sharks jersey and Jagr in his Rangers jersey than representing their country….or representing North America and the World respectively.

Canada Hockey
What the hell happened here? This collection of talent had Gold Medal written all over them and when all things were settled the Canadians were elminated in the semi-finals and didn’t score in 15 of the last 16 periods that they played in. It was so bad that even Wayne Gretzky has hinted at questioning his future with the entire operation but that’s once again Gretzky taking the blame for something that he had no control over. All of the guys on the Canada roster know what to do on the ice…or would think that they do. They went out there and played the most uninspired hockey in the entire tournament and their flashes of brilliance barely ranged above the ‘Lucky’ radar. Canada will be on home turf in Vancouver and hopefully THAT will be enough to have the guys on the team play at the calibre that everyone knows they can be at. If not, then the NHL can definitely sign off on letting their players play in the Olympics.

So the NHL resumes with most teams having about 25 or so games left to play on the regular season schedule. Most teams are lucky and don’t have to worry about many injuries…except for the Blackhawks who had no one playing in the Olympics and therefore have no injuries but there’s nothing lucky about the Hawks so they don’t count.

In the Western Conference Detroit and Dallas remain as the favorites to make it to the Cup Finals with teams like Calgary, Nashville and Vancouver chasing them for top spots. In the East we have Carolina and Ottawa with the Rangers and Flyers right behind them.

The race for Rookie of the Year will continue with Ovechkin and Crosby being the leading candidates and in other candidates who any other year would win the Calder that include; Petr Prucha, Marek Svatos and Dion Phaneuf.

And maybe, just MAYBE those Bluejackets can start picking it up and win some games. Hell, the Blues have been, why can’t the Jackets?