Dammit, there goes my chance of winning the NHL Playoffs Bracket Challenge. I picked the Kings to win in 7 games.
Impressive sweep from the Knights, that's for sure.
Ugh...that was just depressing. The thing of it is that I don't really feel like this was a situation in which the Kings crapped the bed. Rather, I feel like all credit goes to Vegas. They looked unstoppable. At times, it reminded me of some of the early/mid-2000s games between the Kings and the Red Wings. Most of the game would involve the Wings getting chance after chance and the Kings dumping and chasing and maybe getting a handful of scoring opportunities. But the way Vegas played this series went beyond that. They were fast and swarming and never seemed to lose energy or focus. The Kings only gave up 7 goals in four games. That's pretty damn good. All of the teams that are
up 2 games to 1 have given up more than 7 goals to their opponents
in only 3 games. But the Kings just couldn't score, so it really didn't matter how few goals they gave up. When the Sharks finish dispatching the Sucks tonight, the next round between Vegas and San Jose should be really good.
Anyone shocked that it's Rinne, Vasilevsky and Hellebuyck for the Vezina? I thought that Rask might've bumped Vas given the latter's sub-standard performance in the stretch, but I guess Rask was fairly ordinary in March as well. Really tough year to narrow it down to 3, because Rask and Fleury were also very worthy candidates.
Predictions:
Hart - Hall, Kucherov, MacKinnon
Norris - Klingberg, Hedman, Josi
Calder - Barazel... doesn't matter who else, he's 100% lock. Gourde should get a nomination. Boesser might've if he hadn't gotten injured - still might get a nomination.
Adams - Gallant ... doesn't matter who else, he's a 100% lock. Too bad, because Bednar and Cassidy are very deserving.
Selke - dunno who the best defensive players are. Karlsson (VGK)?
And whoever the Vegas GM is will win that award.
Drew Doughty is more deserving of the Norris than Roman Josi, and Anze Kopitar will be nominated for the Selke, as will Patrice Bergeron, because he always gets nominated, whether he deserves it or not. Antti Raanta probably deserved a nomination for the Vezina, but he suffered from a crappy team in front of him and being in the Pacific time zone. By comparison, Vasilevskiy -- 12th in GAA and tied for 8th in S% among goalies who played in at least 40 games -- benefited from being on a good east coast team. The nominees should have been Rinne, Fleury and Raanta.