THE BUSTED WINDOW OF CONTENTION WON'T STAY OPEN: THE NHL 2023-2024 SEASON THRED (INC KNIGHTS HANGOVER & PANIC MOVES. HOCKEY IS THE BEST)

Caps get in the playoffs despite a negative 37 goal differential

i actually sort of respect that flyers move lol

Are we sure Tortarella knew they had been eliminated when he pulled the goalie? (Wasn’t watching the game)

i'm guessing he didn't! but if he did, it would be tremendously funny

red wings scored a tying goal against montreal with 3 seconds left in their game, and detroit getting a point was enough to knock philly out. philly pulled the goalie seconds after the red wings goal, so Torts probably did not know.

Keystone cops coaching for a keystone cops franchise.

Wings missed their chance at the playoffs when they were dog shit for the first two weeks of March. Going thru on tie breakers and last second goals should never have been necessary.

Happy Trails Jeff Carter #gkg

Ryan and Ashley Smith of Smith Entertainment Group bought the team and its existing hockey assets for $1.2 billion from Alex Meruelo, sources told ESPN. Meruelo had owned the Coyotes since buying the franchise for $300 million 2019, but the league lost patience in his ability to find a long-term arena solution in Arizona and facilitated a sale.

meruelo only got $1B of it -- the other $200m was split amongst the other teams -- but that's a tidy profit from being an utter failure for five years

Reminds me of some MLS owners

Disappointed that Matthews missed his 70th. (Guessing that, analytically, he's not one of the Top 10 players in the league?)

i think he totally is

Total non-fan for most of the year, just curious. Glad to hear that.

lotta ways to look at it; here's one: https://www.hockeystatcards.com/all

he's an MVP finalist 3 of the last four years (including this year probably). He's arguably the best defender among the 4-5 forwards with massive scoring numbers.

salt lake team will be called 'utah', may not have a nickname until year two

at least one of mcdavid, mackinnon, kucherov and matthews *won't* be an mvp finalist but i really don't know who

crazy that there were two 100-assist seasons the same year. I think MacKinnon will win the Hart and McD will be second but the choice between Kucherov and Matthews for third is practically impossible

Hellebuyck and my guy Quinn Hughes also putting in MVP-worthy years. Fun season!

yeah there are certainly arguments for quinn hughes (and panarin too)

barring mackinnon going apeshit tonight, kucherov will win the scoring race and i believe he's scored or assisted on over 50% of tampa's goals. plus there's a pretty big gap between him and anyone else on the lightning, so i think i'd vote for him

otoh mcdavid/matthews/kucherov have already won harts, so yeah probably mackinnon. i won't be mad

barring mackinnon going apeshit tonight

well he needs four points in two periods

man the leafs are just a vehicle for pain

you love to see it

i attended the MTL-TOR WPHL game in Montreal today, breaking another attendance record. really fun! (except for the ending, boo!!)

nice

leafs . . . resilient! (strong attempt to blow it with idiotic late penalties tho)

islanders blow three-goal playoff lead for the first time in franchise history, get utterly dominated over the last 30 minutes, half the team gets misconducts for cheap-shotting people with under a minute left

lotta goals in the central this year

The Leafs are only the #2 hockey story in St. Marys (I assume they're at least that), where the Junior B Lincolns are trying to win the Sutherland Cup for the first time since 1976. They're in a round-robin with Fort Erie and Letterkenny Listowel right now, 1-1 so far--I think that's the final stage.

isles giving up three goals and the lead in the final 2 minutes was a low point of the year, and unfortunately also indicative of the season they’ve had. so many blown 3rd period leads. I wanted to get myself a game misconduct by the end, too.

a rare game in which both teams pulled the goalie

xp clemenza how far south/west of you do people start turning into detroit sports fans? or do you actually have to cross into michigan for that?

let's finally go to overtime (in florida)

(xpost) St. Marys is almost exactly halfways between Toronto and Detroit (just slightly closer to Toronto); a friend and I have July tickets to see the Dodgers in Detroit. I know my neighbor across the street is a big Tigers fan. To answer your question, my guess is there are many Tigers and Red Wings fans here (especially as London, which is 40 minutes away, used to field a Tigers farm team).

And two guys I bowl with hate the Leafs; one of them told me tonight he takes more pleasure from the Leafs losing, especially 7th games, than he does from his team, the Oilers, winning. Which is...weird!

This truly is the best time of the year

xp intersting thanks! i mean i knew that a *lot* of canada hates the leafs, but not that the hatred loomed quite so close

is there any possible way the kings win this in OT

No

otm

gah, can't believe i lost faith and turned it off in the second. GKG

rip bob cole

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b63sDrzPt9c

Aw :(

Damn

was not expecting bob to outplay vasilevskiy

TBL has been a little suspect this year, feels like they have lost a step

i think the islanders won every single faceoff in overtime

o the leafs

i don't even know what they should do! they could use better defense and goaltending i guess . . . but they have an astonishing forward group that just seems to not win playoff games

they've already got max domi and ryan reaves -- that's a lot of grit! are they supposed to trade nylander for cal clutterbuck or something?

running into the bruins in the first round doesn’t help

BROCK BOESER

what a fucking game

canucks did absolutely nothing all game, saved by the post on an empty net, and come out with the win

6+ periods, 32 SOG, 60 shots against, 2 wins

nobody realizes it, but you don't need to take shots to win