NHL 2016 - 17

[Parrothead]

The season is underway. Auston Matthews, the Leafs' first overall pick from the draft, scored all 4 of Toronto's goals in their 5 - 4 OT loss to Ottawa. Home opener will be against the Bruins, tomorrow night.

This is the Leafs' centennial season. They started off as the Toronto Arenas back in the 1917 - 18 season, later becoming the St. Patrick's and finally being re-named Maple Leafs when Conn Smythe purchased the team. Today the Leafs organization released the Top 100 players in franchise history. Fittingly the top spot goes to Dave Keon (Leaf 1960 - 75), MVP 1967 playoffs, 4 Cups with the team in the 60's. This season also happens to mark 50 years since the Leafs last won the Cup. The Leafs' "Legends Row" statues of Dave Keon, Tim Horton and Turk Broda were unveiled yesterday. The playoff runs of the Leafs in the early '90's are memorable, but so are the Leafs of the '70s when the team featured players like Dave Keon, Darryl Sittler, Lanny McDonald, Borje Salming, Ian Turnbull, Tiger Williams, Ron Ellis, Brian Glennie, Eddie Shack, Mike Palmateer between the pipes. Coaches Red Kelly and Roger Neilson.

The league will also be marking it's centennial, so one of the Jan 1, 2017 outdoor games will be the Centennial Classic from BMO Field, Leafs hosting the Red Wings.

[Rommie]

Parrot, did you see my note that I'm moving to Toronto in January? Didn't know it was the centennial this year! Was *definitely* already looking up when the Pens play the Maple Leafs, they do one series together in Toronto and I definitely want tickets if at all possible.

[Parrothead]

Enjoy the game, if you get tickets!

The NHL will be marking 2017 as it's centennial year. Looks like the Centennial Classic will be the only game on Jan 1, 2017. The league had moved the Winter Classic to Jan. 2, as the first falls on a Sunday.

The team policy on retiring numbers only if the player suffered a tragedy, while a player for the Leafs. The only retired numbers were 5 - Bill Barilko, died in a plane crash in 1951. He had scored the Cup clinching goal for the Leafs, that season. 6 - Ace Bailey, hit from behind in a game in 1933, fractured his skull, recovered but career was over. The Leafs have opted to "honour" players by having their numbers raised to the rafters, but not retiring them. This policy changed today. Prior to the game, all new banners for these players were raised to the rafters of the ACC and the numbers of the 17 honoured players were retired. The Leafs now have 19 players' numbers retired, six of them shared:

1 - Turk Broda, Johnny Bower.
4 - Hap Day, Red Kelly.
5 - Bill Barilko.
6 - Ace Bailey.
7 - King Clancy, Tim Horton.
9 - Ted "Teeder" Kennedy, Charlie Conacher.
10 - Syl Apps, George Armstrong.
13 - Mats Sundin.
14 - Dave Keon.
17 - Wendel Clark.
21 - Borje Salming.
27 - Frank Mahovlich, Darryl Sittler.
93 - Doug Gilmour.

Surprisingly, only one current roster player had to change his number. James Van Riemsdyk went from wearing number 21 to 25.

New Stanley Cup banners were raised to the rafters, too. The Cup on each banner resembles the look of the Cup, at the time it was won.

Oh yeah, Leafs beat the Bruins 4 - 1.

[Rommie]

Now we just have to hope a Canadian team makes it to the playoffs!

No seriously, I hope the Maple Leafs will do well this year. It has been a good half decade since I was living in North America during hockey playoffs, and I can't wait! (I'm also just plain excited to watch hockey more often, as its propensity for evening games really screws with the European time zone.)

[Thumper]

And the Jackets are in the basement. I picked my 5 games a few weeks ago. I tried to pick ones with teams I've never seen play, but they got all eaten up before I could get them. Mrs. T wants me to bail on our ticket group and concentrate on OSU hockey. We went to 4 Buckeye games last year and had a (cheap) blast at all of them.

[Parrothead]

Oops, guess this season is also the 50th for "The Second Six". Four are easy: L.A. Kings, Pittsburgh Penguins, Philadelphia Flyers and St. Louis Blues. Things get a bit complicated with the other two: Minnesota North Stars - Dallas Stars and Oakland Seals - California Golden Seals - Cleveland Barons - Minnesota North Stars - San Jose Sharks. Happy 50th Seasons to the "Second Six" .

I still miss the purple and gold uniforms of L.A. - memories of the "triple crown line" of Dionne, Simmer and Taylor. Flyers and the "Broad Street Bullies" of the '70's. Blues were in the Stanley Cup finals their first 3 seasons (West Division was made up of the six expansion teams). They were swept in all three appearances, twice by Montreal and then by Boston. The 1970 final against Boston being famous for "The Goal" scored by Orr in OT of Game 4, to clinch the Cup. Ah, memories.

[Thumper]

Morning Edition on NPR had a great interview earlier this week with Wayne Gretzky. I think it was David Green talking with him. He was humble, soft yet well spoken, and said some wonderful things about his idol Gordie Howe.

[Parrothead]

Other than election coverage, tonight I'll watch the Kings vs. Leafs. Friday night the Flyers are in town playing in the Hall of Fame game. This year's inductees: Pat Quinn (builders category) and players: Eric Lindros, Sergei Makarov and Rogie Vachon. Info

[Thumper]

Once again I have to throw away 2 tickets to a CBJ game. Our group has a draft at the beginning of the season where we each pick our games. Some games I want, some I'm stuck with. Then I find I can't go, usually a Kid performance or school function. And then I can't give the tickets away much less sell them. It's bad enough I have to go to a game I didn't really want to go and watch exceedingly bad hockey. But to buy expensive seats and then just set them on fire. Mrs. T is going to pull me out of the group again. And I can't say I blame her this time.

(Sorry I guess this is supposed to be about hockey. How's that going?)

[SciFiFisher]

Once again I have to throw away 2 tickets to a CBJ game. Our group has a draft at the beginning of the season where we each pick our games. Some games I want, some I'm stuck with. Then I find I can't go, usually a Kid performance or school function. And then I can't give the tickets away much less sell them. It's bad enough I have to go to a game I didn't really want to go and watch exceedingly bad hockey. But to buy expensive seats and then just set them on fire. Mrs. T is going to pull me out of the group again. And I can't say I blame her this time.

(Sorry I guess this is supposed to be about hockey. How's that going?)

The usual. Somebody won. Somebody lost. A great fight was had by all.

[Thumper]

[Parrothead]

Hey Thumper, the Blue Jackets have quite the win-streak going.

I'm currently watching the Detroit vs Toronto Centennial Classic alumni game. Detroit leading 3-2. Red Wings have the likes of Mickey Redmond, Dino Ciccarelli, Kirk Maltby, Igor Larionov, Sergei Federov, Kris Draper, Brendan Shanahan, Larry Murphy, Niklas Lidstrom, Chris Chelios, Paul Coffey, with Legace and Hodson playing net. Leafs have likes of Darryl Sittler, Lanny McDonald, Tiger Williams (a great line from the past), Darcy Tucker, Tie Domi, Wendel Clark, Mats Sundin, Dave Andreychuck, Doug Gilmour, Gary Roberts, Rick Vaive, Borje Salming, Dave Ellett, Bryan McCabe, Al Iafrate. Netminders: Mike Palmateer, Felix Potvin and Curtis Joseph. Game is now tied at 3.

ETA: We was robbed! Detroit scored with 1min 5 secs. left in the game. Draper scored on a rebound. The nitpick was the rebound was off a slapshot by Ciccarelli. Slapshots aren't allowed in Alumni games. An alumni game between Chicago and St Louis started awhile ago, but right now Canada vs US is more important.

[Thumper]

Took Dad to the Jackets' 13th in a row a week ago against the Bruins. It was an ugly win. But if you're going to win 13 in a row, not all of them are going to be pretty. They won their 14th a couple days later. Pretty long streak in this league. I've got tickets to two games in a couple weeks. Hope to go to at least one and not have to throw another pair of tickets away.

[Thumper]

And the "Great Streak" is over in devastating fashion. We'll see how they handle it. SOP is to go into a total collapse thwarting any chance of a playoff appearance.

[Thumper]

After dropping two in a row, the CBJ stopped the bleeding with an overtime win last night. I've got tickets for next Thursday and Saturday. Trying to dump one game and hopefully make it to the other.

[Tarragon]

I'd like to see a Canadian team lose the Stanley Cup to Chicago.

[Thumper]

Went to CBJ game last night. Ottowa is struggling to stay out of the cellar, Jackets supposedly on top. I didn't see that. Jackets spent most of the game unable to cross center ice. Ottowa got a 2-0 gift from the hapless Jackets who looked like they'd rather be doing their taxes. The Jackets spent the last 6 minutes of the game with 5-3. 5-4, 6-4, and 6-5 skater advantages and maybe got one quality shot on goal. Ottowa almost iced the win 3 times with a potential 3rd goal during the circus. Even the fans were losers in the gimmick games during the timeouts.

[Parrothead]

Pssst, it's Ottawa, or just call them the Sens.

The Leafs' three game win streak ended with a loss to NYR, last night.

[Thumper]

I get "Senators" mixed up with the Washington Senators.

For "prospective bottom feeders" they were better skaters than CBJ, always had open aggressive passing lanes, got to loose pucks better, and took advantages of opportunities and CBJ mistakes. Won handily and decisively, despite being out shot.

(Sorry for the misspelling)

[Parrothead]

Leafs are in the playoffs for the first time in 4 years. They will face Washington in the first round. A win or tie against Columbus yesterday would have given the Leafs third in their division, setting off a series against Ottawa. A win for Columbus was good heading into the playoffs, they face Pittsburgh in the first round. Not sure of Western Conference match-ups, the East are as follows:

Washington vs Toronto
Montreal vs NYR
Ottawa vs. Boston
Pittsburgh vs. Columbus

ETA:

This year 5 of the 6 Canadian teams made the playoffs, much better than the 0 of 6 last year. A dream scenario, and I mean dream scenario, would be the Leafs winning a Stanley Cup 50 years after their last Cup win, it would also be their first appearance in a Cup Final since '67

[Rommie]

I went to the game on Saturday! Mainly because they were playing the Penguins rather than knowing the game was going to be as huge as it ended up being, and it was the only time I could watch them while here. Well unless we play each other again in the playoffs.

The energy was pretty unbelievable by the end. Everyone standing, too excited to sit in their seats, and that come from behind... even this gal in her Penguins hat couldn't help but be excited. Plus hey, I got my goals from Crosby and Kessel, which is what I wanted, and it wasn't even the best of the Pittsburgh lineup, so hey.

[Parrothead]

I was glad to see the Leafs win Saturday night, didn't want to see things get decided on Sunday. The young Leafs have been impressive. Auston Matthews set a team record for most goals (40) and most points (69) by a rookie. Mitch Marner most assists (42) by a rookie and Nylander had most power play points (26) and longest points streak games 12. These three rookies all reached 60 pts this season.

The Western Conference match-ups:

St. Louis vs Minnesota
San Jose vs Edmonton
Nashville vs Chicago
Calgary vs Anaheim

[Thumper]

Well unless we play each other again in the playoffs.

Wow, I didn't know you played hockey too!

Saw the third period of the Jackets' Leafs' game Sunday. Finally a wind for Cbus. I think they'd lost the last 6. So they stumble into the playoffs and prepare to get brutalized by Pittsburgh. The Penguins smacked their @sses last month and said, "see you in a couple of weeks, b|tches."

I may get to go to Game 4. My buddy who runs our ticket group probably cannot go and asked if I'd be interested in buying his ticket. Only downside is the guy in our group who has the other seat is a huge Penguins fan. I told him that doesn't bother me, one of us will be happy at the end of the game.

[Rommie]

Plus hey, there is actually going to be a Game 4 still.

No really hope you make it, it sounds fun!

[Thumper]

Yes more than likely, there will actually be a Game 4.
Last time CBJ were in the playoffs, I was at their last game in Cbus when Pittsburgh clinched and moved on. I think that was Game 6 though. I wouldn't count on a Game 6 this time around. Not given what I've seen this season.