I'm cheering for this team to win the cup

I'm cheering for this team to win the cup


  • Total voters
    101
  • Poll closed .

behemolari

Registered User
Dec 1, 2011
6,021
2,538
If Ovechkin loses in the cup final against Vegas .... man that is not a good look for the league. I really ****ing hate this Vegas team. I have a new hated rival.

Game four put me away from this 'NHL hockey', I hate this league too much and yes I hate that Vegas team too. Until that everything was good, appreciate Wild and Preds even with Subban. I really hope Ovi gets one and travels fast to somewhere where they play actual ice hockey
 

Jetfaninflorida

Southernmost Jet Fan
Dec 13, 2013
15,539
18,564
Florida
Vegas. I am not an Ovie fan. Also, I think that a great coach can accomplish truly great things with a team made up of mostly average players. Vegas has already proven that, but it would put a few more exclamation marks on it.

btw - cheering is probably the wrong word for my. I don't care much who wins, just the better of two bad options for me, for the reasons that I described above.
 

The Blue Baron

Registered User
Nov 13, 2015
15,170
23,975
Hoser Country
th
I changed my vote so you and John C Reilly can take a chill pill now.
 

Larabee

Registered User
Mar 10, 2011
2,764
3,329
Winnipeg
Vegas. I am not an Ovie fan. Also, I think that a great coach can accomplish truly great things with a team made up of mostly average players. Vegas has already proven that, but it would put a few more exclamation marks on it.

btw - cheering is probably the wrong word for my. I don't care much who wins, just the better of two bad options for me, for the reasons that I described above.
Gallant didn’t have this much success in Florida. He’s got a better roster in Vegas. I don’t think you can call them “mostly average”.
 

SUX2BU

User of registers
Feb 6, 2018
17,734
38,509
Canada
Gallant didn’t have this much success in Florida. He’s got a better roster in Vegas. I don’t think you can call them “mostly average”.

The coach of the Atlantic division
Champs in 2015-16 says hi ....
 

Jetfaninflorida

Southernmost Jet Fan
Dec 13, 2013
15,539
18,564
Florida
Gallant didn’t have this much success in Florida. He’s got a better roster in Vegas. I don’t think you can call them “mostly average”.

True, just by the nature of the fact that Florida didn't make a deep playoff run but he had a lot of success there.

Some Vegas players were above average (MAF, March, Neal). Some were considered replacement level. The hockey pundits sure considered the lineup to be average. Even almost up until the Christmas break most were calling for them to fall out of contention. I don't recall them being even considered a playoff team at the start of the year. That was based upon roster evaluation - that's all people had to go on. So if they weren't even a playoff team, I think that makes them actually below average based upon roster evaluation. Of course, after this year some of them will be considered stars.

Re Florida, Gallant gets hired and takes a team that had 66 points the previous year and then turns them into a 91 point team. The next year, he is a Jack Adams finalist coaching the team to a 103 point year. In Tom Rowe powerplay, Gallant is ousted from Florida early in the season. Remember when he was fired and had a cab waiting for him - shameful Florida Panthers management to do that to anyone. Anyway, the team sucks under Rowe as coach. Rowe is fired the following season. Gallant gets hired by Vegas and takes a team that almost everyone in hockey said did not have the talent to compete at a high level (these are the people that know hockey / the pros / the guys that are paid to hockey analyse everyday). Even when Vegas was competitive, they were saying that it wouldn't last. They started to turn in December. Now Gallant and Vegas is at the All Star Game, winning the standings in the West, beating LA, San Jose and now Winnipeg to reach the Stanley Cup Final.

So what do we have here: 25 point improvement in first year with Panthers. Jack Adams finalist his second year with the Panthers, taking team to 1st in Atlantic. All Star Game coach first year back coaching. Takes expansion team to first place in the West in expansion team's first year. Against what all hockey analysts said would / could / should happen. Yeah, I think he deserves some credit as a good coach.
 
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Ducky10

Searching for Mark Scheifele
Nov 14, 2014
19,809
31,386
He was pretty meh in Columbus, certainly nothing to write home about. Regardless, I think it's pretty crazy to take anything away from what Gallant has accomplished this season as a coach. Just in the same way it's crazy to take anything away from Maurice.

Both of them have had great seasons. Does that make them great coaches? Probably not, too much gets made of coaching greatness imo. Coaching in general is a fools game.
 

Jetfaninflorida

Southernmost Jet Fan
Dec 13, 2013
15,539
18,564
Florida
He was pretty meh in Columbus, certainly nothing to write home about. Regardless, I think it's pretty crazy to take anything away from what Gallant has accomplished this season as a coach. Just in the same way it's crazy to take anything away from Maurice.

Both of them have had great seasons. Does that make them great coaches? Probably not, too much gets made of coaching greatness imo. Coaching in general is a fools game.

Maurice was certainly highly effective at managing injuries this year during the regular season - we had a lot of key guys in and out of the lineup and didn't really miss a beat. But I think a key difference is roster. No one was expecting Vegas success with their roster. Gallant overachieved with Florida's roster as well. I don't think we can say the same about Maurice given the Jets roster.

I believe that coaching can make a big difference. I think Vegas is a good example of how great coaching can get a team to achieve great things even with what are mostly about average players.
 

Ducky10

Searching for Mark Scheifele
Nov 14, 2014
19,809
31,386
I think people underestimate how difficult it can be sometimes to manage really talented rosters. That's where i think coaches like Q, Babcock, Sutter and maybe even Sullivan to a lesser extent separate themselves. Bowman was probably the poster boy for this. There is a reason more talented rosters often don't go all the way, it's usually not x's and o's related. Very rarely in fact.
 

Ducky10

Searching for Mark Scheifele
Nov 14, 2014
19,809
31,386
Top 4 teams in the NHL failed to reach the final.

Coaching, I guess.
 

Ducky10

Searching for Mark Scheifele
Nov 14, 2014
19,809
31,386
Only 1 of those 4 was beaten by Vegas.
Only 1 of those teams beat the best team in the league and only one lost to the 7th place team. Of the top 4 teams, only Boston lost to a higher ranked team.

What's your point?
 

Jetfaninflorida

Southernmost Jet Fan
Dec 13, 2013
15,539
18,564
Florida
Only 1 of those teams beat the best team in the league and only one lost to the 7th place team. Of the top 4 teams, only Boston lost to a higher ranked team.

What's your point?

You made the point that coaching was the reason that the top 4 teams in the NHL didn't make the cup final. I was pointing out that only 1 of those 4 teams was knocked out by Vegas, the expansion team.

2 of the 4 top teams were knocked out by 2 of the top 4 teams. That portion of the post season was pretty normal, so probably not a coaching issue there.
 

Ducky10

Searching for Mark Scheifele
Nov 14, 2014
19,809
31,386
You made the point that coaching was the reason that the top 4 teams in the NHL didn't make the cup final. I was pointing out that only 1 of those 4 teams was knocked out by Vegas, the expansion team.

2 of the 4 top teams were knocked out by 2 of the top 4 teams. That portion of the post season was pretty normal, so probably not a coaching issue there.
Pretty convenient logic really. Doesn't hold much water.
 

Board Bard

Dane-O-Mite
Jun 7, 2014
7,886
5,054
True, just by the nature of the fact that Florida didn't make a deep playoff run but he had a lot of success there.

Some Vegas players were above average (MAF, March, Neal). Some were considered replacement level. The hockey pundits sure considered the lineup to be average. Even almost up until the Christmas break most were calling for them to fall out of contention. I don't recall them being even considered a playoff team at the start of the year. That was based upon roster evaluation - that's all people had to go on. So if they weren't even a playoff team, I think that makes them actually below average based upon roster evaluation. Of course, after this year some of them will be considered stars.

Re Florida, Gallant gets hired and takes a team that had 66 points the previous year and then turns them into a 91 point team. The next year, he is a Jack Adams finalist coaching the team to a 103 point year. In Tom Rowe powerplay, Gallant is ousted from Florida early in the season. Remember when he was fired and had a cab waiting for him - shameful Florida Panthers management to do that to anyone. Anyway, the team sucks under Rowe as coach. Rowe is fired the following season. Gallant gets hired by Vegas and takes a team that almost everyone in hockey said did not have the talent to compete at a high level (these are the people that know hockey / the pros / the guys that are paid to hockey analyse everyday). Even when Vegas was competitive, they were saying that it wouldn't last. They started to turn in December. Now Gallant and Vegas is at the All Star Game, winning the standings in the West, beating LA, San Jose and now Winnipeg to reach the Stanley Cup Final.

So what do we have here: 25 point improvement in first year with Panthers. Jack Adams finalist his second year with the Panthers, taking team to 1st in Atlantic. All Star Game coach first year back coaching. Takes expansion team to first place in the West in expansion team's first year. Against what all hockey analysts said would / could / should happen. Yeah, I think he deserves some credit as a good coach.

Lawless had an interesting take on Gallant a couple of days ago. https://www.tsn.ca/radio/winnipeg-1290/lawless-the-golden-knights-never-quit-1.1092203 Basically the Vegas players can do whatever they want offensively (probably not totally descriptive) as long as they bust their butts backchecking and getting the puck back. The interesting thing isn't that Gallant preached that to his players, probably a lot of coaches do, but that the players bought it so readily and play it so eagerly and persistently.

I'd still rather see the Caps win the Cup.
 

Board Bard

Dane-O-Mite
Jun 7, 2014
7,886
5,054
2 of the 4 top teams were knocked out by 2 of the top 4 teams. That portion of the post season was pretty normal, so probably not a coaching issue there.

Holds a lot of water. Those results were Mickey Mouse compared to the biggest aberration in this year's playoffs -- the Jets bowing to what was, according to experts and those who looked like them, a significant underdog.

I'd still rather see the Caps win the Cup.
 

Ducky10

Searching for Mark Scheifele
Nov 14, 2014
19,809
31,386
Any coach is going to win with .947 goaltending.

If MAF continues his torrid play, the Knight win. If he doesn't, they don't.
 
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