END OF REGULAR SEASON

Boy, now things really get fun. For me, there isn't anything better than the first round of the Stanley Cup Playoffs.* 16 teams, 8 series and a whole lot of intense and exciting hockey. In the pre-lockout NHL, PLAYOFF HOCKEY was a completely different animal as refs looked the other way unless the run of play threatened to get out of control.

But in the post-lockout world, there's a real chance that PLAYOFF HOCKEY may very well devolve into playoff hockey. The league has promised that standards of enforcement during the regular season will be carried over into the playoffs. And that should give all of us some pause, because, for the most part, the one part of the NHL that wasn't broken pre-lockout was PLAYOFF HOCKEY.

In any case, I'm not out to be a kill joy. The Off Wing Stanley Cup Challenge is in full swing, with Detroit and Calgary seeming to be the early favorites, with New Jersey getting some later play from the readership. We're going to have all sorts of predictions here in the next few days, but the one engine I've learned to count on this time of year is Colby Cosh's NHL Playoff Odds Report. I laughed when his projections for the 2003 Playoffs put Minnesota in the Western Conference Final, but a few weeks later I wasn't laughing anymore. In a lot of ways, I missed it as much as I missed the Playoffs themselves last year.

So here's the spreadsheet. Before you read any further, you might want to take a quick look at this post from 2003 where Colby explains his methodology. From left to right, each number represents the percentage chance of that team moving on to the next round. Be sure to check back every night, as Colby promises the numbers will be updated every night after the completion of each game.

         Rd2       CF      Fin     Chmp

 Ott    82.2%    42.4%    23.4%    11.7%

 Det    67.1%    53.3%    34.7%    21.8%

 Mtl    58.4%    32.0%    20.1%    10.8%

 Dal    85.2%    53.4%    28.4%    15.5%

 NYR    80.1%    42.7%    21.3%    10.1%

 Car    41.6%    27.1%    13.2%     6.0%

 Buf    74.7%    39.2%    18.3%     8.2%

 Cgy    63.2%    32.9%    14.1%     6.5%

 Edm    32.9%    14.0%     8.1%     3.6%

 SJ     70.3%    25.2%     8.5%     3.0%

 Ana    36.8%    13.7%     4.7%     1.6%

 Phi    25.3%     7.5%     1.8%     0.4%

 TB     17.8%     4.8%     0.9%     0.2%

 NJ     19.9%     5.3%     1.0%     0.2%

 Colo   14.8%     2.6%     0.6%     0.1%

 Nas    29.7%     5.5%     0.9%     0.2%


     Cdn team in final    56.1%

     Cdn team wins Cup    32.7%

     Cgy-Edm meeting:      7.9%

Gotta love Colby's little nugget for the Battle of Alberta crowd. At a first glance, it would seem that the favorites for the Cup have to be Detroit, Ottawa, Dallas, Montreal and the Rangers. Interesting, and there's more counterintuitive indicators that deserve some more attention. To deal with those, I split the table into Conferences. I'll be going East to West.

        Rd2       CF      Fin     Chmp

Ott    82.2%    42.4%    23.4%    11.7%

Car    41.6%    27.1%    13.2%     6.0%

NJ     19.9%     5.3%     1.0%     0.2%

Buf    74.7%    39.2%    18.3%     8.2%

Phi    25.3%     7.5%     1.8%     0.4%

NYR    80.1%    42.7%    21.3%    10.1%

Mtl    58.4%    32.0%    20.1%    10.8%

TB     17.8%     4.8%     0.9%     0.2%

At first glance it's easy to see the projection has Ottawa, Buffalo and the Rangers with the easiest time in the first round, with Carolina and New Jersey the teams most ripe to be upset. Colby mentions that his model makes adjustment for the complete disappearance of backup goalies from the postseason, something that certainly explains what at first glance would appear to be a surprising outlook for the Rangers. It also confirms something I suspected, that Martin Gerber is the weak link in Carolina that may very well get them packing for Doral much earlier than most fans anticipate. Still, my heart wants Carolina to come roaring out of the East. Their depth at center is just unreal, and I could see them wearing down just about any opponent when it comes to trading chances. Still, the numbers are the numbers.

As Colby wrote in this year's cliff notes:

It corrects team strengths for the absence of backup goalies, where teams are known to be riding a single starter through the playoffs. Nashville's strength, for example, has been heavily discounted to account for Tomas Vokoun's season-ending injury. Where a starting goaltender suffers a season-ending injury during the playoffs, his team's chances will be adjusted correspondingly.

Hence, the Habs look a heck of a lot better with Cristobal Huet in goal than Jose Theodore. Bottom line: Ottawa is still the favorite in the East, with the Habs, Rangers and Sabres close behind. Very close.

Now it's time to look at the West.

        Rd2       CF      Fin     Chmp

Det    67.1%    53.3%    34.7%    21.8%

Dal    85.2%    53.4%    28.4%    15.5%

Cgy    63.2%    32.9%    14.1%     6.5%

Nas    29.7%     5.5%     0.9%     0.2%

SJ     70.3%    25.2%     8.5%     3.0%

Ana    36.8%    13.7%     4.7%     1.6%

Colo   14.8%     2.6%     0.6%     0.1%

Edm    32.9%    14.0%     8.1%     3.6%

Wow. Talk about a much different picture. There are really only two favorites, Detroit and Dallas, but there's an odd wrinkle there. I couldn't help but notice that Detroit's chances to move out of the first round, while still solid, are lower than San Jose's and only a shade higher than Calgary's. And can we be surprised? Is there no one in Detroit that isn't feeling a little trepidation that Manny Legace -- with all of five games of post season experience -- will be the playoff starter? Sure, he was better than Chris Osgood this season, but he's never been tested in May or June. I know I'd be worried.

The team I focused on right away was Dallas, the team with the best chance of moving on to the second round. The numbers may be the numbers, but I wouldn't be too comfortable rising Marty Turco into the playoffs. His save percentage this year is almost 20 points off his career average, and it's dropped for two consecutive seasons. Of course, goals against isn't just a function of a goalie's performance, it's also heavily reliant on the total performance of the team. So, you could make an argument that the style of play Dave Tippet installed in Dallas this year helped cover up a rather ordinary performance on Turco's part.

So Turco is only a link in the chain, though it appears he is the weak link. Isolate it, and I think he'll break. Something tells me Colorado head coach Joel Quenneville knows this all too well.

Also of note, Dallas won a lot of games in the shootout, and I'm not sure the kind of luck Jussi Jokinen has is going to translate well into multiple playoff OT.

Overall, these numbers confirm a take James Mirtle will be making in a roundtable discussion over at JABS sometime today or tomorrow: That the East is a crapshoot, and the money in the West ought to be concentrated at the top of the ladder.

As for my pick, well, I guess you'll all just have to wait until Friday for that.

Remember: Entries for the challenge are due before game time on Friday. Carnival of the NHL submissions with Postseason predictions are due in on Friday morning -- and if you like, toss in your picks for the postseason awards too. I'm looking forward to seeing what everyone else produces.

UPDATE: Here's a great history of the Cup from PsychCentral. It comes with this interesting factoid:

The two years that the NHL has not had a Stanley Cup Champion, 1919 and 2005, the Boston Redsox's had won the World Series the prior year, 1918 and 2004.

Thanks to SportsFilter for the pointer.
______________________________________________
*At least from my experience, interest in Off Wing seems to peak in March and April during the stretch drive and into the 1st round of the playoffs, but falls off precipitously once the 1st round series start finishing up. Fewer teams, less interest.

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