Official Hockey discussion thread

I'm not giving up on the regular season, but both Montreal and Ottawa aren't going anywhere. Last night I attended the first Professional Women's Hockey League game in Ottawa, and it was a banger. Great game, even if Ottawa lost, and the crowd was fucking electric. The best attended women's pro game ever.
 
I've been watching PWHL highlights and the games look amazing. Glad you can enjoy them live.

Now here's hoping for a SWE v. FIN juniors final
 
They're doing really good ratings in Canada - 2.9 million people watched the inaugural game. And I can tell you that Ottawa is going to have really good attendance. And I have decent seats.
 
There's a few seats at TD Place that are expensive, and a few seats that are bad. I am not in either of those locations!
 
Ah, I see. That was the case with the Coyotes. The really cheap nosebleed seats (back when they sucked) were like 60 bucks, the players looked like ants and some seats had obstruction. When they started playing better (their 2012 run) those 60 dollar seats jumped to 80 bucks. I remember I went to a game with a few friends and we got a "deal" for seats like half way up on mid ice for like 100 dollars.

With the Roadrunners seats were like from 10 to 25 bucks, it was a 3,000 seat "arena" and no matter where you sat you had a great view of the ice. The first game I went to we sat about 5 rows up to the right of the home net and was still able to see the action on the other end pretty well.

The PWHL arenas, from what I understand, are similar in size housing 3500-4000 seats, right?
 
Onhell said:
The PWHL arenas, from what I understand, are similar in size housing 3500-4000 seats, right?
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It depends. Toronto is playing in a place that has 2700 people. Montreal is playing 66% at Verdun, which can have 4400, and the other 33% are at Place Bell, which holds 10,000. Ottawa's TD Place holds 8400. Boston is playing at Lowell which has 5000, NY in Bridgeport with a max size of 8000, and Minnesota is playing in a full size NHL arena, 17000.
 
This guy showed up on my youtube feed a while back and I like his stuff. Especially his video on the Red Wings Avalanche rivalry (see below, age restricted due to the blood and violence). He calls it the greatest rivalry ever. Just from his voice alone I know he wasn't alive to witness it first hand lol, but it did get me thinking. I don't know about "all time," but definitely of MY time. I mean, Penguins/Flyers games are always chippy. When and if the Canadians and Bruins meet in the playoffs it's going to be a good time, but aside from that... can't think of any actual heated rivalries like that particular Colorado v. Detroit. No one is hyped for the battle of southern California when Anaheim plays L.A, and when was the last time the battle of Alberta lived up to the hype? Even when they met up in the playoffs not that long ago it was very... meh.

His video got me thinking on a lot of things, but one in particular was something I had mentioned to a friend of mine a while back. From 1995 to 2003 the cup was essentially passed around by three teams, with Dallas sneaking in there. But essentially New Jersey, Detroit and Colorado ruled the league. Dallas made back to back Finals appearances, but the team they lost to in 2000 was NJ. The team they beat to get there? Colorado. Just insane!

Anywho, here's his vid and I recomend his other stuff too:
 
Onhell said:
Even when they met up in the playoffs not that long ago it was very... meh.
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The last Battle of Alberta in the playoffs was fucking awesome, what are you talking about?

The Wings/Avalanche rivalry is dead, it was never really a franchise rivalry, it was a player rivalry.
 
LooseCannon said:
The last Battle of Alberta in the playoffs was fucking awesome, what are you talking about?

The Wings/Avalanche rivalry is dead, it was never really a franchise rivalry, it was a player rivalry.
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I'm talking about, as a non-Canadian, it was very meh. Don't know what I was expecting, but not that.

The biggest reason the Wings/Avs rivalry is dead is Detroit moved to the East. They don't see each other as much and chances of meeting in the playoffs just got harder considering they'd have to meet in the Finals. Not impossible, The Wings and Pens met in back to back years, but still... they haven't met since those series in 08-09 and Still waiting on a Det/Col final.
 
Onhell said:
I'm talking about, as a non-Canadian, it was very meh. Don't know what I was expecting, but not that.
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The hockey was top notch, some of the best of that playoffs. I don't know if you're expecting fisticuffs as part of a rivalry anymore but that shit's going the way of the dodo.
 
LooseCannon said:
The hockey was top notch, some of the best of that playoffs. I don't know if you're expecting fisticuffs as part of a rivalry anymore but that shit's going the way of the dodo.
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No, no need for fisticuffs. Hockey can be tense, physical, chippy, without the need for fights or head-hunting. Again, I LOVE Olympic hockey and World Championship Hockey which is usually played on the bigger ice which allows for "prettier" plays and less physicality. It just feels Calgary was owned by EDM without putting much of a metaphorical fight.
 
Ok, back to the season at hand. The Oilers are on a 13 game win streak. On it's own it's cool, but nothing special. The record is 17 games, Columbus went on a 16 game tear in '17 and a couple of teams have a 15 game streak. What makes this MIND BLOWING is this is the longest streak by a Canadian team... EVER. Yup, more than the 70's Canadians and 80's Oilers. These teams OWNED the league back then, but NEVER had a Win streak longer than 12 games. Like... W...T...F. This is very impressive. I wonder if they can pull a Pittsburgh and win the Cup after going on a tear with a new coach. The Pens have done it twice, in 08-09 when they fired Therien and hired Bylsma and again in 15-16 when they fired Bylsma and hired Sullivan. I'm sure there are other teams that have done it as well, but can't think of them off the top of my head.
 
The 80s Oilers had Grant Fuhr in nets, so you could always count on them to just get 10 goals scored against them every now and then. My feeling around the Oilers is that a 13 game win streak is notable, but not great. If they beat the record, it still won't be as impressive due to mandatory wins in each games. I don't think Kris Knoblauch is doing anything special, the Oilers had a garbage PDO and regression was likely to occur once Connor McDavid played through his abdominal strain and Stuart Skinner regained some form. And then that happened and legitimately I don't think the coaching matters.

The one where the coaching definitely mattered was 2019, when Craig Berube took over the Blues.
 
LooseCannon said:
My feeling around the Oilers is that a 13 game win streak is notable, but not great. If they beat the record, it still won't be as impressive due to mandatory wins in each games.
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I still think it's great, because even with mandatory wins... no other Canadian team has done it.... any team doesn't do it regularly. It's far from an easy feat. It's the same argument people are using to discredit Fleury in passing Roy in wins. "Oh well, he has shootout wins." So? If it really was THAT significant why didn't Lundquist get to 500 wins? Or Luongo? How come Quick is still below 400? Not to mention Fluery has 3 cups (as many as Brodeur) and a Vezina.

I can see your point, however, considering the level of talent in the league as a whole and especially in EDM with McDavid and Draisaitl.
 
Goaltending has changed from the heady days of Roy and Brodeur, too. How many goalies play more than 60 games a season now? Brodeur was playing 75+ for a lot of his career. Fleury might be the last of his breed of goalies who play that many games.
 
Skinner just broke Fuhr's record for goalie win streak with his 11th straight win. Took a look at Fuhr's stats and O...M...G. LC, you were right. To be fair his numbers are on par with other 80's goalies, but dude had a .900 Sv% twice and GAA below 2.00 never. In fact, his best numbers were a Sv% of .903 in 95-96 with STL and a GAA of 2.43 in 98-99 also with STL. Aside from those years his numbers are just awful but modern standards. And he can probably thank those stats to the Dead Puck Era.
 
bearfan said:
Hey @LooseCannon Question for you, I read an interesting article in the Athletic about new arena sites for the Senators. Interested in your perspective on this.

theathletic.com

Ottawa mayor Mark Sutcliffe on new arena: 'There's got to be a way to do it downtown'

Sutcliffe sat down with The Athletic to discuss the possibility of a new Senators arena in the heart of Ottawa's downtown core.
theathletic.com theathletic.com
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First off, Sutcliffe really sucks as a mayor. All he cares about is getting cash to his corporate buddies. He's highly opposed to using lands owned by the National Capital Commission because there won't be any land sales to local developers and there's less property taxation for the city. The sites they recommend have significant challenges.

The DND site is the headquarters of the Department of National Defense, and it seems like a really good site (right on transit, near a major mall so there's parking and restaurant) except for one thing: The Department of National Defense doesn't plan to vacate the building until the late 2030s or early 2040s.

Ottawa Tech High School is almost exactly as bad as the NCC site vis a vis access to real downtown, and it's not cleanly on a transit stop, which should be a must.

L'Esplanade Laurier is a government building they are intending to vacate, but there's almost no real parking and it's several blocks from the train. It does have okay restaurants and stuff (my office is right across the street).

Most Ottawans vastly support the NCC site. Because it's right on transit, hitting downtown, getting food, then riding down to the arena is extremely easy as we wait for the local shops and stuff to be built up. Parking can be added if that's what required, although a transit-first strategy should be considered. Atop that, they've already announced plans to develop portions of the site with housing and shopping, so that will probably be done before any arena.

More than anything else, we want them to pick a spot where they can begin construction quickly. The CTC is old, gross, and in the middle of fucking nowhere.
 
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