It just shows once again in the NHL that the regular season is not very meaningful. The REAL season begins after the teams walk through 82 games. Let's drop the regular season to 60 games and add another round of playoffs.
And Don Cherry (talk about jerks!), please say something else to excite the Canes and their fans.
Nice to see exciting hockey again in Carolina.
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The favorites could have been outworked by youthful exuberance.
Go Sharks! It is time for a cup.
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As a Penguins fan, I'm philosophical about their four-game first-round elimination at the hands of the upstart Islanders, which was only a surprise to anyone who wasn't paying attention. With the way the Penguins played this season and with the head-scratching moves GM Jim Rutherford has made the last couple years, they richly deserved a swift first-round exit.
I'm more saddened by the Lightning seeing their historically great regular season rendered pointless by a humiliating first-round sweep. For one thing, because I like the Lightning. But also because I'd like to see regular-season success be rewarded, if only so that the regular season matters more. I'm not sure what the answer is though. One idea I've heard kicked around is for the highest seeds to pick their opponents from a pool of qualifiers in the conference.
Once the Pens and Lightning were knocked out, though, I was all in on the first-round chaos, especially the Hurricanes' ouster of the Capitals:
* It's great to see a drifting franchise in a non-traditional hockey market get re-energized and reconnected with its community.
* It's great to see the consummate underdog upset the defending champs.
* And best of all, it's great for Carolina's victory to be at the expense of my team's bitterest rival. Alexander Ovechkin can at least relish winning his fist fight with that 19-year-old kid.
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@Mitch Gitman
Point 1: that fight did as much as anything to rally Carolina to the win - game and series.
Point 2: both players should have been ejected from the series for fighting - as should be the penalty for all fights. Whatever place it once had in the game, its well past time to eliminate bare knuckle brawls from the sport.
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@JNS Totally agreed. Dropping the gloves is an absolute anachronism in today's culture where we're finally up to speed on brain trauma. It only inhibits the appeal of the game anymore. NHL should have the guts to adopt a zero-tolerance policy.
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