Eberle

by Meaghan

I think that I shall never see
A man as clutch as Eberle.

A teen whose stick is clearly blessed,
Who when behind does never rest,
But miracles at will performs,
He nations, teams, and fans transforms.

He lifts them all in hope and joy!
Who is this awesome prairie boy?
Can he also outrun trains?
Does blood of gods run in his veins?

Although sixth gold was not to be,
They’ll never stop young Eberle.

*     *     *

Oh yeah, and I think the Sens probably lost, at least I assume they did since they were down 4-0 last time I checked.

I will now put my record on the line by attempting to guess which teams will move on to the Conference Finals. Rather than predicting a number of games for each series, I’m going to make the potentially daring move of declaring here that all these series will go six games and predicting some other random details about the series below.

I’ve given Radiohead a holiday for this one. Instead, I chose a random yet sort of related song to represent each team and paired the songs to create series playlists on my trusty psychic iPod. I then played each playlist up to seven times on shuffle, counting the first song picked as a win for the team the song represents. I continued this for each series until one team’s song had been picked four times, indicating that the team in question would win four games and therefore the series.

Eastern Conference

(1) Boston Bruins vs. (6) Carolina Hurricanes: The Hurricanes have some momentum from their crazy game seven victory against New Jersey — which I hope you all watched, because it was pretty incredible — but I doubt they have enough energy to carry them through an entire series against the well-rested Bruins, who I believe are simply the superior team

My Prediction: The teams will split the first two games in Boston, but the Bruins will pick up steam as it goes and eventually take the series. Carolina will fail to score a single power play goal.

iPod Prediction: Bruins in 6. We have “The Bear” by The Tragically Hip to represent the Bruins, and “Wild is the Wind” by Nina Simone to represent the Canes. The iPod has the Bruins winning games 1, 3, 4, and 6.

(2) Washington Capitals vs. (4) Pittsburgh Penguins: The Caps’ rookie goaltender Simeon Varlamov looked pretty good against the Rangers, which was good news for Washington. The bad news is that New York’s offence is pathetic and the Penguins will be a whole new kind of test for him. As much as I hate to say so, I think the Pens will win this without too much trouble. By the way, the NHL would like you to note that this series features a couple of pretty good players.

My Prediction: Evgeni Malkin will use his wizard powers to triumph in the battle of the superstars and lead both teams in scoring as the Pens take out the Caps. It will be impossible for TV stations to go more than six minutes without showing one or both of Crosby and Ovechkin on camera.

iPod Prediction: The Penguins (Manhattan Rhythm Kings, “Happy Feet”) beat the Capitals (Mogwai, “Ratts of the Capital”) in 6. The Pens take games 1, 2, 4, and 6.

Western Conference

(2) Detroit Red Wings vs. (8) Anaheim Ducks: Clearly, I was wrong to think Detroit’s experience wouldn’t be a huge factor against the Jackets in the first round. But that was Columbus, and Anaheim may be the only team that can match the Red Wings for playoff experience. They did to San Jose what Detroit did to Columbus. Their victory in that series was impressive and, despite the Sharks’ habit of choking, I’d have to say it was a bigger accomplishment than the Red Wings beating the Blue Jackets. One thing that will be interesting to keep an eye on in this series is the penalties. Both teams have great power plays, but they don’t appear to be as evenly matched on the penalty kill. The Ducks, who were the second most penalized team in the regular season, did a great job of shutting down the Sharks’ power play (with help from the Sharks). The Red Wings, who generally don’t take a huge number of penalties, managed only a 76.9% penalty kill against the Jackets — the Jackets, team of the league worst 12.7% regular season power play — in round one. Goaltending is obviously another thing to watch. Chris Osgood was much less sucktacular against Columbus than he was during the regular season, but can he keep it up against Anaheim’s stronger offence? What about Jonas Hiller? Is he for real? How does he feel about having Tomas Holmstrom’s big hockey butt (TM Kelly Hrudey) in his face for 20 minutes a night?

My Prediction: Hiller won’t feel great about the Holmstrom thing, but he’ll feel good enough to keep the Wings’ offensive production fairly low (with help from Anaheim’s deep defence). Osgood will return to form in the bad way. Teemu Selanne will flash back to 2007 and pick up his game enough to ensure that he haunts the Wings’ dreams for another year. The Ducks advance to the Western Final.

iPod Prediction: “The Big Three Killed My Baby” by Detroit natives The White Stripes represents the Red Wings; “Rubber Ducky” by Ernie from Sesame Street is the Ducks’ song. My iPod sees the Wings losing games 1 and 4, but coming back for victories in games 2, 3, 5, and 6 to win this series in 6 games.

(3) Vancouver Canucks vs. (4) Chicago Blackhawks: Roberto Luongo played exceptionally well in round one against St. Louis. Nikolai Khabibulin had a great first round series too, but he’s very very old. Advantage: Luongo. He seems like a man on a mission right now, as do Canucks players like Alex Burrows and the Sedin twins. As good as the Blackhawks looked against Calgary, it must be said that the Flames looked equally bad and were already kinda defeated going in.

My Prediction: Luongo will have two shutouts as Vancouver wins the series. The Canucks will play a very physical type of game, and the series will feature at least one brawl brought on by a big hit on one of Chicago’s star players.

iPod Prediction: For Chicago, it’s Sufjan Stevens’ “The Black Hawk War, or, How to Demolish an Entire Civilization and Still Feel Good About Yourself in the Morning, or, We Apologize for the Inconvenience but You’re Going to Have to Leave Now, or, ‘I Have Fought the Big Knives and Will Continue to Fight Them Until They Are Off Our Lands!’” For Vancouver, “Hobo Humpin’ Slobo Babe” by Whale (because their logo is a whale, mmkay). The Canucks will lose the first two games, but win games 3, 4, and 5 en route to a (presumably dramatic) 7 game series win.

Sens Watch

Let’s all take a moment to mentally punch Christoph Schubert in the face for allegedly breaking Anton Volchenkov. SCHUBERT!! WHY ARE YOU STILL HERE?

Now that we’ve got that out of our system, let’s pat Jason Spezza on the head: he’s currently third in tournament scoring with seven points in Canada’s first three games. Keep it up, Spezz. I hear there might be an opening on the Olympic team.

One consequence of the Ducks’ domination of this series: Joe Thornton and Patrick Marleau should probably hold off on booking tickets to any Canadian Olympic Team-related events. It seems like the Sharks are going to have to get rid of one or both of these guys at this point. I can’t imagine it being a very happy offseason in San Jose.

Ryan Getzlaf, on the other hand, can plan on a trip to Vancouver next February (if there was any doubt).

The Ducks’ win has set up interesting second round matchups in the Western Conference. Chicago will face Roberto Luongo Vancouver, while Anaheim takes on Detroit. The Ducks-Wings series, of course, pits the last two Stanley Cup champions against each other, and I’m sure we all remember that the Ducks beat the Wings en route to their Cup win in 2007. The Wings were able to handle the Blue Jackets so easily in round one partly because they simply have a better roster, and partly because their past playoff experience prepared them for the higher level of play required in the postseason. The Ducks, having pulled the same feat on a Sharks team with a much deeper roster than the Jackets have, are one of the few teams that might actually be able to counter the Wings’ experience.

It’s also interesting to reflect on the way the Ducks handled their team this season. At the trade deadline, Anaheim sent Travis Moen and Sammy Pahlsson, two key figures from their Cup win, to the Sharks and Blackhawks respectively. Chris Kunitz was also traded away in February of this year. (We should note that all of these trades took place after Brian Burke had left for Toronto.) I was shocked to see those players, particularly the first two, sent away given that they appeared to me, at least, to be quite important pieces of the Ducks’ roster. Certainly, I think winning the Cup in 2007 would have been much more difficult without that line of Moen, Pahlsson, and Rob Niedermayer (just ask Jason Spezza and Dany Heatley’s therapists). But clearly the moves, perhaps designed to shake up the team, worked out: the Ducks, who were out of the playoffs at the deadline, came together and played well enough to squeak into the last playoff spot and build a fair bit of momentum going forward.

This has me thinking about 2007, and where that year’s two Cup finalists find themselves two years later. By my count, there are only 11 players on the current Ducks roster who were with the team when they won the Cup: Getzlaf, Corey Perry, Teemu Selanne, Rob and Scott Niedermayer, Francois Beauchemin, Chris Pronger, Todd Marchant, George Parros, Drew “Brother of Ryan” Miller (who only played in three playoff games in 2007), and Jean-Sebastien Giguere (who has played in zero playoff games in 2009 while a strangely calm playoff newbie named Jonas Hiller carries the Ducks in goal). The Sens have about the same number of players left from that year: Heatley, Spezza, Daniel Alfredsson, Mike Fisher, Chris Kelly, Chris Phillips, Anton Volchenkov, Christoph Schubert, Mike Comrie (on his return engagement), and Chris Neil. Both teams have maintained a core of key players while making significant changes to the rest of their rosters.

A major difference between the two teams is that no Ducks player has a cap hit as high as either Heatley or Spezza. Of the Ducks’ forwards, only Getzlaf and Perry make over $4 million per season, while the Sens have Heatley, Spezza, Alfredsson, and Fisher all above that level. The Ducks have spent their biggest money on defense and goaltending, with Pronger, Scott Niedermayer, and Giguere (maybe not the best investment at this point) all making over $6 million. They’ve benefited from the emergence of cheap young talent in the forms of Bobby Ryan, who produced 31 goals this season, and Hiller. The Sens have seen great potential from young players like Nick Foligno, but haven’t seen anyone have the type of breakout year that Ryan and Hiller are currently providing for the Ducks. Anaheim also hasn’t dealt with the same coaching turmoil that Ottawa has: Randy Carlyle is still behind the bench.

All this might help explain why, while the Ducks are waiting for round two to start, the Sens find themselves either golfing or playing in the World Championships — which, it must be said, some of them are doing rather well at. Jason Spezza is currently tied for Canada’s team lead in scoring with five points, and Dany Heatley and Mike Fisher each have two goals. Apparently, Anton Volchenkov has left Team Russia due to a leg injury he sustained against Germany, but I haven’t been able to find any detailed information about what happened or the severity of the injury.

In non-Sens World Championships news, Rick Nash will not be joining Team Canada: according to TSN’s Darren Dreger, Nash has a rotator cuff injury that will require several weeks of rehab. I’m disappointed — a line of Nash-Spezza-Heatley was sounding like a pretty heavenly concept to me, kind of a hockey dream come true — and I wish #61 a quick and full recovery.

Next up for the Sens are the Leafs on Saturday, a game which unfortunately coincides with Team Canada’s semi-final matchup against either Russia or the Czech Republic in the World Junior Championship. If you watched the epic Canada-USA game last night, then you know that the Canadian kids have been providing some pretty ridiculously good entertainment and, like me, you will probably skip the battle of teams trying to out-suck each other in the Tavares sweepstakes (can there really be a “winner” in this game?) in favour of watching the actual Tavares, who is far more interesting.

Pensive Moment

I was reading the bloggers’ wishes for hockey in 2009 over at the New York Times’ Slap Shot blog, and I couldn’t help noticing that three of 14 bloggers wished for the NHL to try pleasing the fans it’s already got rather than constantly changing everything in (fruitless!) attempts to bring in new fans. This is definitely one of my personal issues with the league. In my opinion, trying to make hockey something it’s not only makes it look silly to non-fans, and is the last thing the league should be doing to bring in new people. There is a reason those of us who already love hockey love it so much. Other people would figure it out too, if the NHL would just let it be.

Go little Sens go!

Oh, I think the big Sens are playing today. Or something. And there will be another live blog, if you like that sort of thing. I do like that sort of thing, but the aforementioned paper-writing HELL may dictate that I have to miss this one.

I think many of us were hoping the team could come to an agreement with Vermette before the arbitrator had to get involved, but that is looking more and more unlikely as the hours pass by and still there’s no news of a deal. I’m no expert on the NHL Collective Bargaining Agreement, but as I understand it, the arbitrator can only award a one- or two-year deal. There are rules governing this, and they have to do with whether or not Vermette is eligible to be a UFA next year, and that is another thing I’m not sure about. But whatever the case, we can be sure that Vermette will not come out of arbitration with a contract longer than two years. If he gets a one-year deal, then no discussions regarding an extension of that contract can take place until after January 1.

And so a one-year deal probably means another stressful trade deadline for Vermette — something I can only imagine he’d like to avoid if at all possible.

If the Sens don’t like what the arbitrator awards Vermette, they can walk away. By doing so, however, they allow Vermette to become a UFA and end up losing him for nothing — something I am very sure Murray would like to avoid.

The team’s other option, of course, is to sign Vermette and trade him. (I have heard that it’s not possible to trade a player before January 1 after he’s gone to arbitration, but I wasn’t able to confirm that during my whirlwind tour of the CBA, which by the way is online here if you ever feel the sudden need to bring on that head-spinning, eyes rolling up in your head type of confusion that can only be induced by reading the most twisted form of legalese.) There is no shortage of rumours, as usual, about Vermette leaving town, and Allen Panzeri listed a few of the potential destinations being named for our Hot French Guy in an article in the Citizen this morning. The Vancouver Province had already done a piece on the Vermette to Vancouver rumours last Thursday, which suggested that Vermette could be the Canucks’ “Plan B” should Mats Sundin decide not to sign with them. With the ever increasing timeframe for Sundin’s decision getting more and more vague — he’s now gone from “around August 1″ to “sometime in August,” according to his agent, J.P. Barry — you have to wonder what this means to Vermette’s future, or at least to the Sens’ list of options for what to do with Vermette. Can a team like the Canucks afford to sit around and wait for Mats? Will his delay make them more or less eager to talk to the Sens about a trade? Is Sundin’s wishy washy behaviour in some way a passive aggressive attempt to screw the Sens over? You can just never trust a Leaf.

In the future, though, I think there could be one exception to that rule, and that exception takes the form of one Luke Schenn, or High King Luke the Magnificent, as I’ve decided to call him from now on, due to his really startling resemblance to Peter from the Narnia movies, which I have now seen up close and in person, having attended two of the Red vs. White games at the Canadian National Junior Team Development Camp at Ottawa U this week. Schenn was one of the players I thought stood out the most in the games I saw, along with Drew Doughty, John Tavares, and Nazem Kadri. I admit there’s a distinct possibility that he stood out to me mostly because of the Narnia thing and because of his mesmerizing good looks (and yes, I know it’s inappropriate for me to be checking out 18-year-old boys — whatever); however, I’m sure I was also impressed by his play. He’s big, he’s got a steady presence on the blue line, and, though he’s billed as a defensive defenceman, he seems to have a pretty good shot. I don’t know why the Leafs had to draft him. It just doesn’t seem right.

Tavares really caught my eye during the World Junior tournament last year, and he is extremely impressive in person as well. Doughty showed some fantastic skill with the puck, and if I were a Kings fan I’d be very happy indeed to have him in the system. Kadri, meanwhile, is someone I had never heard of before, but he’s very exciting to watch. After one rush he made, the people behind me were yelling “Sick!!” and the entire crowd was pretty much oohing and aahing. I also kept my eyes open for Sens prospect Louie Caporusso, who was a last minute addition to the roster. He was playing on Team White’s top line with Tavares and Kyle Turris in the first game I saw and seemed to do well. In the other game I went to, I thought he looked feisty: I noticed him in a few scrums.

Also spotted at the development camp: me, missing a stair and totally taking out my right ankle/foot/lower leg as I tried to get down to my seat on Sunday evening. With the leg in pretty severe pain all day on Monday, I emailed my friend the radiologist for advice and she told me an x-ray is probably a good idea, so I will be paying my doctor a visit tomorrow. Man, these hockey-bystander injuries are the worst.

Despite the loss, it was a really entertaining tournament, particularly due to the awesome play of Heatley and his linemates, Ryan Getzlaf and Rick Nash. Individually, these guys are all great players: they have size, strength, skill, and the ability to score. Combine them, and you get the Heatzlash, an unstoppable all-Canadian entity that terrifies the living daylights out of other countries’ defencemen and goaltenders.

I have heard a few Sens fans being a bit critical of Heatley for his awesome World Championship performance. “Who is this guy wearing #15 for Canada?” “Where was he when the Sens were in the playoffs?” I understand where this comes from, and to be honest I was irritated at Heatzza for signing on to play for Team Canada when it seemed they were both exhausted by the end of the Sens’ season. But in the end I’ve had to conclude that seeing those two pick up more “big game” experience can’t be bad, and should benefit the Sens in the long run. Spezza, in particular, should have gained a lot from playing on the fourth line in this tournament. He was praised in the media for the way he handled his reduced role, and appeared to adjust his game fairly well as the tournament progressed. If any of it stays with him, it’s going to be a boon to the Sens’ organization.

As for the people criticizing Heatley, well, I’d just like to remind them that a player fitting his description scored 141 goals for Ottawa over the last three seasons and led the NHL in playoff scoring (along with Alfie and, oh yes, Spezza) in 2007. There’s no argument that either of these guys performed well in this year’s series against Pittsburgh, but the entire team had fallen apart. I hardly think blame for the loss can be pinned on them and them alone. By the end of the Sens’ year, everyone seemed miserable. If playing in this tournament helped Heatley and Spezza rediscover the joy of hockey, then I’m all for it.

Aside from potential future benefits to the Sens, the other great thing to take from this tournament is that Canada’s 2010 Olympic team should be really, really freaking amazing. This was an excellent Canadian squad, and when you think about some of the people who weren’t there — Crosby, Iginla, Lecavalier, Thornton, Phaneuf, Luongo, Brodeur — it’s hard not to get very excited about the possibilities for 2010.

I also got to learn more about some players I wasn’t overly familiar with before, like Brent Burns and Mike Green and Dan Hamhuis and Duncan Keith, all of whom were impressive (I especially liked Burns and Green), and I got to watch The Amazing Rick Nash several games in a row, and I realized that Ryan Getzlaf is actually not so bad. Slightly bitter about that one because I do try to keep my level of Ducks-hatred as high as possible, but I suppose I can get away with liking one player on the team. Maybe the super high intensity of my hatred for Pronger balances it out.

After the gold medal game ended, I switched over to the Pittsburgh-Philadelphia game. The Penguins won the series today. The Sens are officially no longer Eastern Conference Champions. And the Penguins are going to the Cup Final. HOW WONDERFUL. FEEL MY JOY. WHOOP DEE BLOODY DOO.

So the Ducks get better (in theory; maybe Selanne will suck? Sure he will!) and the Sens continue this awful downhill slide they’re on. Ray Emery showed up late for practice yet again today. I just … hate both the goalies right now, so much. So, so much. I want to love them, but I can’t do it. Gerber at least comes to the rink. If only he would play well.

To cheer myself up, a bit of fun: TSN put up a thing today where people can pick their own rosters for the 2010 Canadian men’s Olympic hockey team, so I did that. Who knows what things will be like in two years, but it was a neat exercise anyway. I record my roster here for future review:

Forwards
Daniel Brière
Sidney Crosby
Shane Doan
Mike Fisher
Dany Heatley
Jaroma Iginla
Vincent Lecavalier
The Amazing Rick Nash
Martin St. Louis
Joe Sakic (assuming he’s still able to play)
Jason Spezza
Eric Staal
Joe Thornton

Defence
Jay Bouwmeester
Brian Campbell
Mike Green
Ed Jovanovski
Scott Niedermayer (even though he is LAME … if he “retires” again I would obviously have to substitute someone else)
Dion Phaneuf
Chris Phillips

Goaltenders
Martin Brodeur
Jean-Sébastien Giguère
Roberto Luongo

Three French Canadian goalies, a mix of young superstars and veteran leaders, no players with really bad karma (Chris Pronger was not selected for this reason), and lots of Senators. Ah yes, this team would be very good indeed. My team is also very hot, it should be noted, especially if Luongo can be convinced to cut his hair. Just put me in charge now, Hockey Canada, because I smell gold!