Most interesting last day in regular season

[Scott Stevens]

02/03?

From the Art, Maurice and maybe even Hart perspective, Foppa and Duke blacked Naslund's trophy shelf.

“We choked.”

 

[Ignatius]

I also remember the last day of the 09-10 season. Crosby 49 goals OV and stamkos with 50. Crosby also make Sedin fans **** there pants with 5 points before the second period was done was classix

I remember that day, I was p***** because Stamkos scored an EN goal to tie Sid for the Richard.

The most memorable last day of the season game for me was the 2010 Rangers-Flyers shootout extravaganza. What is interesting is that the winner, the Flyers, got into the #7 seed while the losing Rangers were out altogether. It set up the Flyers Cup run and Montreal's borderline miraculous "Halaking" of the heavily favored Caps.

 

[bobholly39]

I also remember the last day of the 09-10 season. Crosby 49 goals OV and stamkos with 50. Crosby also make Sedin fans **** there pants with 5 points before the second period was done was classix

Funny I don't remember this at all

Looking back it seems like at game 74 with 8 to go (he played 81 total so this was his 73rd game) Crosby has 89 points.

In the last 8 games of the year he scored 20 points to reach 109. That's pretty cool heck of a come back

Not that dissimilar from McDavids comeback this year

 

[Nathaniel Skywalker]

Funny I don't remember this at all

Looking back it seems like at game 74 with 8 to go (he played 81 total so this was his 73rd game) Crosby has 89 points.

In the last 8 games of the year he scored 20 points to reach 109. That's pretty cool heck of a come back

Not that dissimilar from McDavids comeback this year

Crosby finishing third in hart voting that year was a crime. The very least he should have been second

 

[Ace36758]

Troy Murray scored for the hawks against the leafs in the last game of the 1989 regular season, in OT. Winner of the game was in the playoffs, the loser out. Chicago qualified with 66(!) points.

The Hawks actually got all the way to the conference final that year, but lost to the flames in 5.

 

[c9777666]

Troy Murray scored for the hawks against the leafs in the last game of the 1989 regular season, in OT. Winner of the game was in the playoffs, the loser out. Chicago qualified with 66(!) points.

The Hawks actually got all the way to the conference final that year, but lost to the flames in 5.

It was the closest Chicago came to missing the playoffs during their streak of 28 straight years in the postseason from 1970-1997

 

[Langdon Alger]

2007 NY Isles (with backup goaltender Wade Dublywicz) Beat the devils in the shootout to knock out the rangers and leafs and make the playoffs.

The best part was Don Cherry being mad New Jersey didn’t start Brodeur in a nothing game for them.

 

[Blade Paradigm]

Yes, in one day Naslund lost the Art Ross, Rocket Richard, Hart, AND division. He basically lost his potential legacy that day.

yeah, totally weird to think that one regular season game could be the difference between HHOF and not even close.

It boggles the mind to think that Naslund was so close to sweeping the big awards and fell a quarter-inch short: Art Ross, Rocket Richard, Hart Trophy, Lester B. Pearson Award in 2002-03.

He also led the NHL in goals and points between 2000-01 and 2003-04. He was an NHL first-team all star in 2002, 2003, and 2004. When he retired, he was the Canucks' franchise leader in both goals and points.

Now he is perhaps the least recognized of the Canucks' greatest stars.

Sports | On the verge of triumph, Canucks choke | Seattle Times Newspaper

Monday, April 7, 2003 - Page updated at 12:00 AM
Steve Kelley / Times staff columnist
On the verge of triumph, Canucks choke

...

Across the street, the early April regular-season finale was sold out, and the noise inside GM Place suggested something special was about to happen.

They came here yesterday to celebrate. The Vancouver Canucks were going to win their first division championship in a decade. Their left winger, Markus Naslund, was going to win the goal-scoring and scoring titles, and, eventually, the most valuable player trophy.

This game against the going-nowhere Los Angeles Kings was going to be the jumpstart for a wondrous Stanley Cup run.

But with so much to win, the Canucks lost. The game. The division championship. And all of that hardware for Markus Naslund.

They played scared. They made mistakes that real Stanley Cup threats don't make. They didn't look much like the team that had earned a franchise-high 104 points.

They looked more like some other recent Vancouver Canucks. Like the Canucks of 1999 or 2000, or some of those other bleak years since they last went to the Stanley Cup Finals in 1994.

They were in first place for the past four months. They were in first place going into the 82nd game of the season, but with so much riding on one game, the Canucks, well they, um ...

"We choked," Naslund said after the 2-0 loss to the Kings. "We had this game in our hands to take care of it. Just get a point. One point and we would have won our division. I don't want to call it a choke, but if you don't take advantage of two chances in a row to finish it off, then I don't know if you deserve to win it."

Vancouver had a 3-1 lead at Phoenix on Wednesday, but the game ended in a 3-3 tie.

The Canucks had their chances against Kings goaltender Jamie Storr yesterday, but they missed open nets and fanned on golden chances.

Two opportunities against bad teams, and the Canucks couldn't win. And, while they were losing to the Kings, Colorado was winning the Northwest Division by beating St. Louis.

...

"Choke is a little too strong a word," said Naslund, who finished the regular season with 48 goals and 56 assists, second in scoring to his good friend, Colorado's Peter Forsberg. "But on the other hand, we got to face it that we didn't play well the last two games. The two biggest games of the year, and that's something we got to change. We can't fool ourselves and pretend that we did play well. Because we didn't."

...

"We choked . . . We had this game in our hands to take care of it. Just get a point. One point and we would have won our division. I don't want to call it a choke, but if you don't take advantage of two chances in a row to finish it off, then I don't know if you deserve to win it." - Markus Naslund, April 2003

"Choke is a little too strong a word . . . But on the other hand, we got to face it that we didn't play well the last two games. The two biggest games of the year, and that's something we got to change. We can't fool ourselves and pretend that we did play well. Because we didn't." - Markus Naslund, April 2003

One night changed the legacy of the player. One regular season match altered his course from being perceived as an all-time great to being remembered for a few words of honesty. Frankly, that is unfortunate and also unfair.