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NHL playoff previews

The Final Preview: 2012 NHL Playoffs

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If March Madness just ended, then Spring Madness begins tonight, with the two-month ride that is the NHL playoffs. In no other sport is the phrase “second season” more appropriate, and while it would be demeaning to past Stanley Cup winners to call the postseason a complete crapshoot, it is fair to say that what you did prior to this no longer matters and that anyone—down to the lowest seeds in the bracket—can win the Cup if they can put it all together for a good, sustained run. TheSportsNotebook offers its final preview of the 2012 NHL playoffs, with a listing of each team’s odds to win both their conference and the Cup, links to the first-round preview articles we’ve been running the last two days and predictions as to how the bracket will ultimately play out.

Let’s start with the odds. The first number is the team’s chances to make the Finals, the second to hoist The odds are as of this morning at VegasInsider.com.

EASTERN CONFERENCE
#1 New York Rangers (21-10, 11-2)
#2 Boston (9-2, 8-1)
#3 Florida (20-1, 35-1)
#4 Pittsburgh (4-1, 19-10)
#5 Philadelphia (7-1, 14-1)
#6 New Jersey (12-1, 25-1)
#7 Washington (16-1, 35-1)
#8 Ottawa (22-1, 40-1)

WESTERN CONFERENCE
#1 Vancouver (19-10, 11-2)
#2 St. Louis (3-1, 15-2)
#3 Phoenix (18-1, 40-1)
#4 Nashville (7-1, 14-1)
#5 Detroit (13-2, 12-1)
#6 Chicago (15-2, 6-1)
#7 San Jose (10-1, 18-1)
#8 Los Angeles (12-1, 20-1)

If you scroll through the numbers it’s easy to overlook what I consider the most surprising development and it’s that the Pittsburgh Penguins at 4-1, are the favorites to hoist the Cup. I know they’re playing well right now—their 15-5 record over the final twenty games of the regular season is the best in the league and I know they have Sidney Crosby back. Based on that I certainly consider them a threat to win it all, but Marc-Andre Fleury is not a great goaltender and any team I would see as a favorite at this point would have to be dominant in the net.  New York and Boston are such teams, and though I’m biased for the Bruins, I’d have no problem betting them at 8-1 to win the whole thing again.

In the West, I’ve loved Phoenix as a live darkhorse for some time now, thanks to Mike Smith who is the best goalie in the game and should be the league’s MVP.  And though the 13-2 price on Detroit just to win the West is attractive, with the Red Wings being healthy for the first time in several weeks. They could easily lose the first series to Nashville—who at 7-1 isn’t a bad in the West themselves—but then again, that’s why the odds are favorable. The prices reflect a belief in a top-heavy West bracket, which almost presumes a chalk Vancouver-St. Louis conference final. I don’t see it that way, and not just because chalk rarely prevails to that extent in hockey. There are good teams in the middle and bottom of this bracket, and if you like to bet, the West is a good spot to do a hedge, and just spread bets around on the darkhorses and just count on one of them coming through.

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Enough with measuring teams against the odds. Who’s going to win. Below are the first-round matchups, with links to the series previews.  In picking the bracket all the way through, remember that the NHL will re-seed for the second round, with high playing low all the way through.

EASTERN CONFERENCE
#1 New York vs. #8 Ottawa
#4 Pittsburgh vs. #5 Philadelphia
#3 Florida vs. #6 New Jersey
#2 Boston vs. #7 Washington

My first-round picks were mostly chalk, New Jersey being the only lower seed to advance, and they’re only lower-seeded because Florida won a weak division. The Devils are actually a solid favorite to win that series. I don’t like picking chalk, but as we’ll see in a moment I’ll make for up in it the West. My first-round picks would create conference semi-finals of New York-New Jersey and Boston-Pittsburgh. There’s bad blood between the Bruins and Penguins going all the way back to a cheap shot on Bruins’ center Marc Savard that gave him a concussion, effectively ended his career and means Boston doesn’t have the one great offensive player they need. Not that I’m bitter or anything. And I trust the animosity in a Rangers-Devils battle is self-evident. Here’s where I think New Jersey steps it up and springs the upset on New York, with team defense, and the scoring of Ilya Kovalchuk and Zack Parise leading the way. I do genuinely think Boston finds a way to beat Pittsburgh because of better overall defense. That sets up a Bruins-Devils final. I hope I’m not kidding myself, but I like the way Boston righted the ship down the stretch and frankly, if I pick my own team to get this far I’m not picking them to lose to a #6 seed.

WESTERN CONFERENCE
#1 Vancouver vs. #8 Los Angeles
#4 Nashville vs. #5 Detroit
#3 Phoenix vs. #6 Chicago
#2 St. Louis vs. #7 San Jose

Note that lower seeds Detroit and Chicago are favorites to win their series, Phoenix, like Florida, only has the 3-seed because of winning a weak division. Here’s where I’m getting crazy. As outlined in the series previews, I’m picking Los Angeles to shock the world and beat Vancouver thanks to superior defense and the great goaltending of Jonathan Quick. St. Louis barely survives a brutal seven-game war with San Jose. And Detroit and Phoenix also move forward. This sets up series of St. Louis-Los Angeles and Detroit-Phoenix. I’ll take the Blues and Red Wings to advance there, which sets up a series between Central Division rivals. St. Louis fought all year to climb out of Detroit’s shadow after the Red Wings’ record home winning streak of February, and pulled away in the division. To draw a baseball analogy it’s like what happened in the National League Central a year ago, when Milwaukee finally got out of the shadow of the Blues’ baseball neighbor, the Cardinals. The teams still ended up playing in the final round of their respective league playoffs. This spring, St. Louis learns how Milwaukee felt, and it’s the Detroit Red Wings who move forward.

That sets up a Cup Finals of Boston-Detroit. My logic of the Eastern Conference Finals—if you’re going to pick your own team to go this far, you don’t stop now—doesn’t apply here. When the Red Wings are healthy, I think they’re the best, most balanced team in hockey and they have the goaltending that at least matches—if not slightly exceeds Boston. For those reasons, the Cup returns to Motown for the first time since 2008.

NHL Playoffs 1st Round Preview: Philadelphia-Pittsburgh

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The Pittsburgh Penguins and Philadelphia Flyers have had each other in the crosshairs for several weeks, as the Atlantic Division runner-ups who would have each won the Northeast and Southeast Divisions over Boston or Florida respectively, instead settle for being seeded in the 4-5 spot on the bracket with Pittsburgh holding home-ice advantage. TheSportsNotebook previews the battle of West vs. East in the state of Pennsylvania…

I’m generally skeptical of the idea that we should expect a lot of scoring in any big matchup involving quality teams, but especially in hockey. But if we’re going to make an exception, this would be the series to do it. Pittsburgh and Philly have well-established track records of generating high shot volumes, speaking to their ability to play as a team, and they’ve got their share of individual stars who can finish the job.

Let’s start with Pittsburgh, who led the NHL in both goals scored and shots. The center position operates at some level beyond exceptional. Evgeni Malkin is one of the best in the game, a contender for the MVP award, a 50-goal scorer and a good passer. Sidney Crosby, when healthy, is one of the best to every play the sport and at long last, Crosby is healthy. Then on the third line there’s Jordan Staal, whose 25 goals and 25 assists would mark him productive enough to start elsewhere, including on playoff teams. On the wings, James Neal leads the way, and while he is on the injury report with “Lower Body” listed as the reason, I generally assume a guy is going to play at this time of year, until we hear something more definitive than mild question marks. Neal is a top scorer in his own right.

Philadelphia center Claude Giroux also shows up on the injury report and didn’t play when these two teams met in Saturday’s regular season finale. But my understanding is that Giroux, one of the game’s best assist men, was simply ill and there should be no issue in this series. Giroux’s prime target is Scott Hartnell, a solid scorer and pretty good passer on the left wing. There are no stars on the right wing, but the position is deep with respectable passers, and one of them is Jaromir Jagr. He may be 40 years old. It may have literally been another millennium when he was a key part of back-to-back championships for the very Pittsburgh team he faces now (the 1991-92 Penguin teams where Jagr rode the coattails of Mario Lemieux) and won an MVP award (1999). But if you think playoff experience counts for something in a series where every edge will be firecely contested, than keep an eye on Jagr.

For as good as these offenses are though, the goalies are a problem. Both the Penguins and Flyers play good team defense, ranking 4th and 7th in shots allowed respectively. But the bottom line ranking on goals allowed is 17th and 20th. And when you look at the save percentages of Marc-Andre Fleury at 91.3% and Ilya Bryzgalov at 90.9%, you see why. This isn’t free-throw shooting where 90 percent makes you great. A good goalie needs to be up at 92% and before you think that’s splitting hairs, consider the huge volume of shots they all saw over the 82-game schedule and how many saves encompass a single percentage point. Both goalies have been sieves this season.

The teams have similar profiles, but the devil is in the details. Pittsburgh’s a little bit better offensively. Fluery is a little less worse than Bryzgalov, a goalie who was supposed to make a big difference for a Philadelphia team derailed by this same problem a year ago. And the one area where they are different is the ability to kill penalties. For whatever reason, Fleury has been better here than in 5-on-5 play (or the Penguin defense just rises up in desperation when they’re a man down, I don’t know, but the results speak for themselves). Philly can’t kill penalties. Then let’s tack on the intangibles in that Pittsburgh is hot, having won 15 of 20 and the emotional lift given to this team down the stretch by Crosby’s return is hard to quantify. It’s certainly reasonable to think Philadelphia can win this series. I find it less reasonable to actually predict them to do so.

NHL Playoffs 1st Round Preview: Ottawa-NY Rangers

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The New York Rangers won the Atlantic Division and earned the #1 seed in the NHL’s Eastern Conference playoffs. The Ottawa Senators lost three in a row to end the year and slip to #8, even though they’ve been securely in the bracket for some time. TheSportsNotebook previews their first-round series…

If Ottawa is going to have any chance of pulling an upset—and for those who don’t follow hockey regularly, an 8-seed beating a 1-seed is less surprising in the NHL than it is for any other sport, then they have to do it with open ice and higher-scoring games. The negative to this means that the Senators play no defense. Their defenseman are very good with the puck—Erik Karlsson has 59 assists, and Flip Kubal and Sergei Gonchar are skilled with the puck as well, and the defenseman are able to feed a quality scorer like Milan Michalek. On the front line, Nick Foligno and Daniel Alfredsson all do a good job passing. In short, this is a very complete offensive team, perhaps underscored by the fact they rank better as a unit in the 5-on-5 game than they do on the power play.

What the underdogs don’t do is defend. It’s great to have your defenseman feeding puck, but winning in the playoffs in any sport is about defense, and the Senators lack thereof means the Rangers are going to get their share of opportunities at the net.  A concern that seasoned NHL observers have is that forward Marian Gaborik is the only player proven he can light the lamp in the playoffs. For New York to open this series up and win it decisively, the way they are capable of, meaning Ryan Callahan and Derek Stepan have to get in on the scoring and center Brad Richards needs to get his people the puck with a chance to do something.

If New York can’t produce against the weak Ottawa defense, they still have ways to win. The Rangers have the best record in the East, because they defend as a complete team. Ryan McDonagh and Don Girardi lead up a group of defenseman that observers praise for their passion and teamwork, and the statistics say their sixth-best in the NHL and preventing shots. And if a shot should get off? You only have Henrik Lundqvist, one of the top two or three goalies in the game, ready to snare it.

Neither team comes into the postseason particularly hot. Ottawa lost 11 of its last 20, including the aforementioned three-game skid. New York split its games over the same timeframe.

I know in hockey anything can happen, but the teams I like to pull upsets are ones who can turn a series into a long, grinding affair. Ottawa’s not that kind of team. There are concerns that New York may be getting tired at this point in the schedule and that perhaps the very passion they play with hasn’t been paced properly and will leave them tired. It’s a reasonable concern, given the .500 play over a good chunk of recent games, but if the worst anyone can say about the Rangers is that they play too hard, that strikes me as a very compelling reason to say their big season won’t end here.