Beginning in the nation's capital...
OTTAWA SENATORS (7th in the East last season)
Coach: Craig Hartsburg
Captain: Daniel Alfredsson
Assistants: Dany Heatley, Chris Phillips
-Once the elite team in the East for a significant stretch, the Ottawa Senators have the potential to be great, but as last season proved, they are their own worst enemy. After an impressive run to the cup final two seasons ago only to lose to the Anaheim Ducks, the Senators started last season with an amazing 15-0 record. Once their "star" goaltender Ray Emery returned from injury, the fact that Martin Gerber was keeping his own caused a goaltender controversy in Ottawa, plummeting themselves to nearly missing the playoffs all together. If you ask me, the only controversy in net was that they were extremely unfair to Emery, snowballing the situation to where Emery took out his frustration in an unacceptable fashion. Emery is the freakin man, and Martin Gerber is one of the weakest goaltenders in the league. But enough about last year.... The Senators are off to a good start, with a 1-0-1 record after the opening weekend in Sweden against the Pens, and aside from losing star defensemen Wade Redden and Andrej Meszaros in the off season, Jason Smith fit in well, and we all saw some good things from new Senator Alex Auld in between the pipes. Ottawa also has a rookie coach in Craig Hartsburg, but if his coaching style on the world stage in his 2 gold medals with the Canadian Juniors are any indication, they'll be ok. Overall, the Senators are looking ahead to the playoffs, but they are up against tough competition in Montréal, NYR, New Jersey, Pittsburgh, Philadelphia, Tampa Bay, and perhaps wildcards Buffalo and Washington. Wait...doesn't that put them in 9th????
LES CANADIENS DE MONTREAL (1st in the East last Season)
Coach: Guy Carbonneau
Captain: Saku Koivu
Assistants: Chris Higgins, Alex Kovalev
-I honestly don't know what to say about the Habs this year. An incredible season last year, finishing atop the East was cut short by a tough Philadelphia team, so this year with aquisitions like Alex Tanguay, Robert Lang, and the big bad Georges Laraque, is anything short of a Stanley Cup a disappointment? To say that the Habs have unbelievable pressure on them is an understatement, as the team is entering its Centennial year. Perhaps it would be a story-book ending for the Habs to hoist the Cup in June, so the added pressure could make it much more difficult. "Pressure" is also a word thrown around when we consider the Habs' starting goaltender, sophomore sensation Carey Price. In a move by Bob Gainey that stunned the league at the trade deadline, in which he made Price the starter after Huet was traded, many thought that Price would be the next Roy or Dryden and carry the team to a Cup victory in his rookie season. With a solid young backup in Jaroslav Halak, the Canadiens have no problems in net. Come to think of it, they have no problems on defense, no problems on offense, and an excellent coaching staff in the Carbonneau/Muller tandem. Overall, out of the 6 Canadian teams, the Habs are best contructed for a cup win. Predictions? I would have to say a Conference final loss to one of these 3 Atlantic division teams: The Penguins, the Flyers, or the Rangers.
TORONTO MAPLE LEAFS (The worst damn team in sports)
Coach: RON WILSON
Captain: WHO CARES
Assistants: WHO CARES
-Good lord. That's all that I can say. Kudos to GM Cliff Fletcher for doing some much needed housecleaning this past Summer, as he followed up on what I said back in early August and shipped off Bryan McCabe to what appears to be the Maple Leafs farm team, the Florida Panthers. Maybe a reason why the Leafs are so bad is because they keep doing business with teams like the Panthers....no? I can only imagine players that are lounging in the heat of Florida in the Summer when they get the phonecall that they have been traded. Here's how the conversation may go:
Agent: Hey Mike (Van Ryn), I've got some good news
Van Ryn: Oh hello agent, that is awesome...what you got?
Agent: I know you like the weather down there, but I made a deal to get you
traded from that god awful team
Van Ryn: Super duper...where am I headed?
Agent: You're going back to Ontario, closer to your hometown of London!
Van Ryn: Get the hell outta here, I'm going to be an Ottawa Senator? That's
awesome!
Agent: Ahhh yeeeahhh the thing about that is.....you'll be playing with the Maple
Leafs
CONVERSATION OVER AFTER MIKE VAN RYN GIVES HIMSELF A CONCUSSION FROM BANGING HIS HEAD SEVERAL TIMES ON THE CONCRETE DRIVEWAY OF HIS FLORIDA HOME
But I digress...Let's recap on the Leafs chances this year. Who do the Leafs have for a top-6 forward crew? Well there's Nik Antropov, Jason Blake, Niklas Hagman, Alexei Ponikarovsky, Matt Stajan, Alex Steen, and Dominic Moore, who all combined for 235 points last year. (Just a side note...Ottawa's top 6 forwards tallied just shy of 400 points). My predictions for this year?
1. Luke Schenn (An awesome SK product) will lose his mind
2. Ron Wilson will turn to the bottle
3. Group councelling sessions for troubled Leafs Fans will be the
new thing to do in Toronto on a Friday night
4. The worst teams in the AHL, CHL, and the ECHL will all have
better records than the Leafs.
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