Alright, let me just come out and say it: the Penguins scare the crap out of me. Not only do they have wunderkind Sidney Crosby running shizz, but I’m not even sure he’s the best player on his own team– to me, it’s the Pens’ leading goal scorer, Evgeni Malkin. Add Marian Hossa into the mix, and yeah, you can figure out why I’ve wanted no part of them for weeks now. But you know what? The Rangers are going to pull this thing off. Now I’m not entirely convinced that we’re gonna go all “1994″ on everyone this year, but this does remind me a lot of that championship season, particularly the part where the Blueshirts knocked off an arguably more talented, but greener, Devils team in the Conference Finals. Yeah, the Devils should’ve won that series at least 2 different times, but it was the Rangers’ guts and savvy (aka Mark Messier) that saved the day. Now 14 years later, it’ll be the likes of Jagr, Gomez, Drury, and Straka leading the more experienced Rangers in a matchup with the NHL’s darling up-and-comers. And sure, this isn’t the Conference Finals either, but it might as well be considering either the Rangers or Pens will streamroll whoever comes out of that Habs/Flyers series.
Beyond experience though, there are two main reasons why I’m going to go against my gut (how often does that work out?) and pick my boys: 1) We obviously have superior goaltending, which is the ultimate advantage to have in postseason hockey, and 2) We won the season series against the Pens 5-3 and, unlike in most other sports, head-to-head regular season records in the NHL are usually a pretty good indicator of how a playoff matchup will turn out– i.e. the Rangers went 7-0-1 against the Devils in the regular season and, well, we all know how that series went. Pick: Rangers in 7
April 25th, 2008 at 6:58 pm
i just dont get why more people dont appreciate hockey. i also dont understand why its impossible to find the PLAYOFFS on network television.
April 25th, 2008 at 10:02 pm
seriously