Game seven.
Regardless of the sport it’ll keep anyone on the edge of their
seat. Tonight the NHL provides us with
three. Say what you want about how many
teams make the playoffs or how long the regular season trudges along, the
bottom line is, when the Stanley Cup Playoffs roll around it’s worth every
minute of the wait and nights like tonight are why.
Leading up to tonight’s three games, 13 of the 45 games so
far in the Stanley Cup Playoffs have gone to overtime and there are plenty of
games that have been decided by one goal that ended in regulation. This is no surprise though. The Stanley Cup Playoffs provide this kind of
excitement annually. From mid-April
until early-June there’s a consistent edginess that resonates throughout the
stomachs of hockey fans as the playoffs unfold.
So it seems only fitting that we would conclude the first round tonight
with three game sevens.
Maybe it’s just me, but I think it’s weird that the Flyers
and Rangers have yet to have an overtime game in their series heading into
tonight’s game. Nonetheless, a historic
rivalry has been renewed with the two teams having met in the playoffs for the
first time since 1997 and it all comes down to one game tonight at the world’s
most famous arena for a chance to move on and play another division rival as
Pittsburgh awaits. The Rangers have
never lost a game seven at home while the Flyers have won their last three road
game sevens. Sign me up.
The next game between the Minnesota Wild and Colorado
Avalanche has its fair share of intrigue as well. In a hockey-crazed state like Minnesota, a
Wild win would sure do a lot for the state considering since the North Stars
moved Minnesota has not had that much in the way of NHL prominence to cheer
about. Then there’s Colorado, perhaps
one of the most exciting teams in the NHL.
With young, fast, explosive, playmaking forwards like Matt Duchene,
Gabriel Landeskog, and Nathan Mackinnon the Avalanche had the third most points
in the NHL this year and are here to stay in part because of the aforementioned
forwards but also because of their coach.
Patrick Roy has done a phenomenal job turning the team into a Stanley
Cup contender after being in the basement of the NHL the last few years. With Roy going from between the pipes to
behind the bench and developing the young talent in Colorado it’s certainly a
great story to keep an eye on in years to come.
Lastly is another rivalry series as the Los Angeles Kings
try to come all the way back from an 0-3 deficit against the San Jose
Sharks. These two have developed quite a
nice west coast hockey divisional rivalry having went seven games in the
Western Conference Semifinals last year and now will go the distance again. Of course Mike Richards and Jeff Carter have
teamed up in LA since leaving Philadelphia in the summer of 2011 and will try
to rally again from an 0-3 deficit again after having done so in 2010 with the
Flyers against the Boston Bruins. San
Jose has had its fair share of struggles in the playoffs in the last decade
while the Kings look to be nurturing quite the playoff pedigree having won the
Stanley Cup in 2012 and going to the Western Conference Finals last year. Can San Jose exercise the demons or will Los
Angeles put themselves into the record books with the 1942 Toronto Maple Leafs,
1975 New York Islanders, and 2010 Flyers as the only NHL franchises to win a
best-of-seven series after losing the first three games? I’d say it’s worth watching.
This is what the Stanley Cup Playoffs are. Riveting action from the first night until
the cup is hoisted and everything else in between is so much fun. Tonight’s just another one of those nights
during the two-month span.
