ATD 12 Jim Robson Division Final: 1 Inglewood Jacks vs. 2 New Jersey Swamp Devils

[God Bless Canada]

INGLEWOOD JACKS

GM: arrbez

Coach: Jacques Demers
Assistant: Rudy Pilous

Frank Mahovlich - Frank Nighbor - Babe Dye
Doug Bentley - Vladimir Petrov - Danny Gare
Alf Smith - Bobby Holik - Floyd Curry
Eddie Shack - Ken Linseman - Wilf Paiement
Extra: Brian Rolston - Pierre Turgeon - Tony Granato
Daniel Sedin - Henrik Sedin

Doug Harvey - Jimmy Watson
Babe Siebert - Jim Schoenfeld
Jack Laviolette - Goldie Prodger
Extra: Yuri Fedorov - Jay Bouwmeester

Hap Holmes
Tom Barrasso
Extra: Olaf Kolzig


Special Teams
PP1: Mahovlich-Petrov-Dye-Harvey-Siebert
PP2: Bentley-Nighbor-Smith-Laviolette-Prodger
PK1: Nighbor-Gare-Harvey-Schoenfeld
PK2: Curry-Smith-Watson-Siebert


VS


NEW JERSEY SWAMP DEVILS

GM: TheDevilMadeMe
Coach:"Badger" Bob Johnson

Paul Kariya - Joe Malone (A) - Jarome Iginla
Markus Naslund - Aleksandr Maltsev - Ken Hodge, Sr.
Herbie Lewis - Ken Mosdell - Shane Doan
Ryan Walter - Clint Smith - John "Pie" McKenzie
Mel Bridgman - Vladimir Vikulov

Serge Savard (C) - Bobby Orr
Bob Goldham - Art Ross (A)
Viktor Kuzkin (A) - George McNamara
Robyn Regehr

Ed Belfour
Gerry McNeil

Powerplay 1: Paul Kariya - Joe Malone - Jarome Iginla - Aleksandr Maltsev - Bobby Orr
Powerplay 2: Markus Naslund - Clint Smith - John McKenzie - Viktor Kuzkin - Art Ross
Penalty Kill 1: Ken Mosdell - Herbie Lewis - Serge Savard - Bobby Orr
Penalty Kill 2: Ryan Walter - Shane Doan - Bob Goldham - George McNamara

Callups:
F: Sergei Brylin, Scott Gomez, Tony Amonte
D: Zinetula Bilyaletdinov, Jason Smith
G: Kirk McLean​

Click to read more...

 

[Reds4Life]

Orr vs Harvey .. this is gonna be awesome

 

[TheDevilMadeMe]

Here are links to my profiles:

Coach:
"Badger" Bob Johnson

Captain: Serge Savard
Alternate Captains: Joe Malone, Art Ross, Viktor Kuzkin

Paul Kariya - Joe Malone - Jarome Iginla
Markus Naslund - Aleksandr Maltsev - Ken Hodge, Sr.
Herbie Lewis - Ken Mosdell - Shane Doan
Ryan Walter - Clint Smith - John "Pie" McKenzie

Serge Savard - Bobby Orr
Bob Goldham - Art Ross
Viktor Kuzkin - George McNamara

Ed Belfour
Gerry McNeil

​

Extras: Mel Bridgman(C/LW), Vladimir Vikulov(RW), Robyn Regehr (D)

Powerplay 1: Paul Kariya - Joe Malone - Jarome Iginla - Aleksandr Maltsev - Bobby Orr
Powerplay 2: Markus Naslund - Clint Smith - John McKenzie - Viktor Kuzkin - Art Ross
Penalty Kill 1: Ken Mosdell - Herbie Lewis - Serge Savard - Bobby Orr
Penalty Kill 2: Ryan Walter - Shane Doan - Bob Goldham - George McNamara

Call Ups: Sergei Brylin, Scott Gomez, Tony Amonte, Zinetula Bilyaletdinov, Jason Smith, Kirk McLean

 

[TheDevilMadeMe]

I guess I'll get this one started.

First of all, I'd like to congratulate arrbez for getting this far. The Inglewood Jacks are a great team.

Now, time to try to tear apart that great team.

One thing that sticks out to me is a potential speed advantage for New Jersey. The Jacks have some really fast players - Mahovlich and Bentley in particular. But they also have some really slow skaters - Dye in particular, but also Holik. New Jersey, on the other hand, has numerous skaters who were either the fastest or among the fastest in their eras - Malone, Kariya, Maltsev, Lewis, Orr, Ross.

Now to Bobby Holik - he's a big center whose skating is rightfully described as "plodding." I'm not sure that he has the speed to stand up to guys like Orr. After failing as an offensive center for the Devils, Holik became one of the best checking centers in the league from 99-01, but he did this with size, and a skill and desire to mug the opposition centers (and in the dead puck era, the rules allowed such clutching and grabbing). But he was always slow - so slow that he was never used on the penalty kill, even as a 5th or 6th choice.

Holik excelled at checking big, skilled centers who did not rely on their speed to score. The highlight of his career is probably the first 3 rounds of the 2001 playoffs, when he looked like a legit Smythe candidate. During this time, he totally shut down Mats Sundin and more or less shut down an older, slower (but still insanely skilled) Mario Lemieux. But then in the finals, he had to go head to head against the speed of Joe Sakic, and we all know what happened. Holik just couldn't match the skating of Joe, nor could he really get a hold (literally and figeratively) of the shifty center.

New Jersey's scoring centers (Malone and Maltsev) are both speed guys. So I'll be happy get them out there as often as possible against Holik. Orr is tough enough to stand up to Holik and fast enough to burn his lack of foot speed. Curry is a very good defensive forward. I was under the impression that Alf Smith was more of a bruiser than a good defensive player, but I could be wrong. If he's a slowish bruiser of the Holik variety, it could further hamper the line's ability to keep up. I'm also pretty sure that he played right wing on the Silver 7; how often did he play left wing?

I think Mosdell vs. Holik is a big mismatch at third line center. Holik's lack of speed is part of it, but not as big as the lack of offense. Holik played on a scoring line (sometimes the #1 scoring line) of the Devils from 96-99, and this was a big reason they continually disappointed in the playoffs. As a sometimes-first, sometimes-second line center, Holik averaged only 63 points in the regular season, and had 2 goals and 10 assists in 22 playoff games. Mosdell, on the other hand, proved that when given the chance, he could excel offensively (see his profile).

 

[TheDevilMadeMe]

As usual, Savard-Orr will be paired with the Malone line for offensive faceoffs, and with the Mosdell line for defensive faceoffs. The Maltsev line will once again be paired with the Goldham-Ross pair as much as possible.

Like in our first round, NJ's 4th line will take a few shifts against the opponent's first line (backed up by Savard-Orr to reduce any potential liablity), particularly early in the game. This allows Pie McKenzie to take shots at Frank Mahovlich, and I'm not sure Nighbor and Dye are really the guys to defend him.

NJ won't linematch much, but will be happy to get our scoring lines and Orr out there against Inglewood's slower bottom lines as much as possible.

 

[MXD]

I'm voting for the Hitchikers in this one.

 

[Reds4Life]

I'm voting for the Hitchikers in this one.

I doubt that
1 Inglewood Jacks vs. 2 New Jersey Swamp Devils

I think I like Devils slightly better, but it is very close!

 

[MadArcand]

I had the Devils ranked significantly higher initially, but this series I'm probably leaning towards the Jacks. Kariya, Iginla and Naslund are three players I have absolutely no faith in.

 

[TheDevilMadeMe]

I had the Devils ranked significantly higher initially, but this series I'm probably leaning towards the Jacks. Kariya, Iginla and Naslund are three players I have absolutely no faith in.

Why don't you have faith in them? Is it because they never won a Cup each? It's so much harder to do with 30 teams.

Especially Iginla. I don't see how anyone can doubt him in the playoffs - he's been great every single time he's been in the playoffs.

-PPG playoff player, even though his one long playoff run was at the height of the dead-puck era
-Lead his team in playoff scoring in 4 of 5 years (1 pt behind 1st in the 5th year)
-27 goals in 52 playoff games

Plus he was a shoo-in for the Smythe, if his team had won in 2004.
Plus, if international play counts, he was the first line winger for Canada's gold medal champion, and is a shoo-in to be first line winger in the upcoming Olympics.

______
Naslund does have that reputation, but as I pointed out in the last 2 series, he did lead his team in playoff scoring by a wide margin in 2 of 3 years in his prime, scoring at over a PPG, despite becoming effectively the only threat on his team.

Plus, as pointed out earlier, he's a second liner, so he has no pressure to lead. He just has to put up some points. I honestly wonder if Naslund's rep would have been nearly so bad if he hadn't been Vancouver's captain.

____
As for Paul Kariya, it's more a matter of a small sample size than of bad performance:

8 goals, 9 assists, 17 points in 14 playoff games in the 90s (during his prime). Those late 90s Ducks were terrible - they really were Kariya, Selanne, and a bunch of scrubs.

Then, on the super-defensive Ducks in 2003, he only scored 12 points in 21 playoff games as his team was a game away form winning the Cup. This isn't much different from aging superstars Andy Bathgate and Teemu Selanne playing lesser roles on the one long Cup run of each's career (only they were on much better teams than the 8th seeded Ducks and actually won the thing).

Not that impressive personally, but 2 things to keep in mind:
1) By that point, it's obvious he was a bit past his prime.
2) It does show that he was willing to play a more defensive game, if that was what it took to help his team.

Post-lockout and well past his prime, he played well in a first round loss for Nashville (7 points in 5 games), and poorly in another (2 points in 5 games).

___
If we're going to punish people for having "incompletes" in the playoffs, we have to do the same for Doug Bentley - no Cups, 17 playoff points in 23 games. His only good playoffs (8 goals, 12 points in 9 playoff games) came at the height of the war years, and he still didn't win the Cup. In his other playoffs, he has 1 goal, 4 assists, in 14 playoff games.

 

[God Bless Canada]

Votes for the division finals in the ATD are due by 11:59 P.M. EST on Sunday, December 6. All votes are to be sent to me.

 

[TheDevilMadeMe]

Well, I wanted to do a line by line comparison, but it looks like I won't have time before votes are due.

So I'll just say one more thing - it looks to me like Inglewood only has one line that can handle Bobby Orr - the second line. Bentley and Gare are fantastic defensive forwards, despite the fact that Petrov is average over the course of his career.

I already covered the third line - Bobby Holik is slow, there's no evidence as to Smith's defense, and Curry can't carry the line by himself.

But the first line too. Nighbor is one of the best defensive players of all time. But Babe Dye is one of the worst. Babe Dye, with his lack of skating and lack of effort, is by far the worst defensive player in the series. Nighbor is good enough to cover for Dye 100%, but combined with Mahovlich (who i'd rate a zero on defense), that still makes the line a zero. Just for comparison, I'd rate NJ's first line a zero on defense too (Iginla is a slight positive, Kariya a slight negative, Malone an unknown).

Once again, NJ's shut down unit (Lewis-Mosdell-Doan-Savard-Orr) is better than our opponents.

 

[TheDevilMadeMe]

Goaltending.

I think most of us would agree that NJ has a slight edge in goaltending.

Belfour > Holmes. We got that. It's probably not a huge advantage, but it is an advantage for NJ.

But it's also the backup. With NJ's offensive weapons, there's a good chance that in a 7 game series, Inglewood will be blown out at least once. That isn't saying Inglewood is a bad team - I wouldn't be shocked if NJ was blown out once (though I do think NJ has more weapons throughout the lineup than Inglewood).

That's when the mentality of the backups might come into play. Gerry McNeil proved that he could be a starter in the NHL, but he spent most of his career as a backup, dutifully backing up all time greats like Plante and Durnan. He won't cause any problems at all. How will Barrasso react if Holmes loses in a blowout?

 

[seventieslord]

It is an interesting use of Nighbor/Dye, isn't it?

On one hand, there has to be major temptation to put Nighbor with a strong defensive player to make a shutdown 1st unit. On the other hand, Dye is so poor defensively that you want someone strong there to cover for him. I don't know what I think of this. It's not exactly a "waste" of Nighbor's defensive skills to make the line a net zero when it may have otherwise been very negative value.

 

[overpass]

Here's some detail on the play of Babe Dye from the 1922 Stanley Cup final, when he led Toronto to victory. He was at his best and worst at times, and the Toronto Star commented on his play in various games.

Game 3 (Vancouver 2-1)
"All Dye has was a bullet drive. If anybody had taken his catapult away he wouldn’t have been worth a pint of sardines."

Game 4 (Toronto 6-0)
"Dye, the lazy, acted like someone had sifted red pepper into his flannels and fed him everything but the drug clerk. He was absolutely a wild man. He checked like Cully Wilson. He was always up for passes yelling like a Comanche Indian full of (unclear), and he seared them at Lehman like he had a charge of T.N.T. behind his trusty catapult. Without a word of (unclear) he knocked the coast net guardian into the back of the nets half a dozen times and before the piece was over had the veteran diving into the shot for fear one would bowl him over and trickle by. Dye only got two, but he hammered so many on the target that Lehman probably wished he could borrow Goliath’s shield or a torpedo net or something."

Game 5 (Toronto 5-1)
"Dye laid that old black bun on the target with terrific speed all night and scored four of the five goals. When he whipped it in it almost whined like a ricocheting bullet. He had Lehman shivering around like a flock of (unclear) dancers every time “Dry Wood” grabbed a pass."

 

[seventieslord]

Interesting stuff. What really caught my eye was the mention of Cully Wilson, who wasn't even in this series. He was a very notorious player, evidently. He was an all-star in both western leagues and always decently high on the leaderboards, as he also was in the NHL. He is a very underrated player who was not only a star but has lots of anecdotes to back up his grit and toughness. I really hope to see him on an ATD 4th line next draft. He was far more significant in his time than many of the "usual suspects" down there such as Duane Sutter, Paul Henderson, Ron Stewart, Wilf Paiement, Jim Peplinski, Shane Doan, Mike Keane, Tomas Sandstrom, Murray Balfour, Gary Dornhoefer, and Kevin Dineen.

 

[MadArcand]

Why don't you have faith in them? Is it because they never won a Cup each? It's so much harder to do with 30 teams.

Especially Iginla. I don't see how anyone can doubt him in the playoffs - he's been great every single time he's been in the playoffs.



Plus he was a shoo-in for the Smythe, if his team had won in 2004.
Plus, if international play counts, he was the first line winger for Canada's gold medal champion, and is a shoo-in to be first line winger in the upcoming Olympics.

______
Naslund does have that reputation, but as I pointed out in the last 2 series, he did lead his team in playoff scoring by a wide margin in 2 of 3 years in his prime, scoring at over a PPG, despite becoming effectively the only threat on his team.

Plus, as pointed out earlier, he's a second liner, so he has no pressure to lead. He just has to put up some points. I honestly wonder if Naslund's rep would have been nearly so bad if he hadn't been Vancouver's captain.

____
As for Paul Kariya, it's more a matter of a small sample size than of bad performance:

8 goals, 9 assists, 17 points in 14 playoff games in the 90s (during his prime). Those late 90s Ducks were terrible - they really were Kariya, Selanne, and a bunch of scrubs.

Then, on the super-defensive Ducks in 2003, he only scored 12 points in 21 playoff games as his team was a game away form winning the Cup. This isn't much different from aging superstars Andy Bathgate and Teemu Selanne playing lesser roles on the one long Cup run of each's career (only they were on much better teams than the 8th seeded Ducks and actually won the thing).

Not that impressive personally, but 2 things to keep in mind:
1) By that point, it's obvious he was a bit past his prime.
2) It does show that he was willing to play a more defensive game, if that was what it took to help his team.

Post-lockout and well past his prime, he played well in a first round loss for Nashville (7 points in 5 games), and poorly in another (2 points in 5 games).

___
If we're going to punish people for having "incompletes" in the playoffs, we have to do the same for Doug Bentley - no Cups, 17 playoff points in 23 games. His only good playoffs (8 goals, 12 points in 9 playoff games) came at the height of the war years, and he still didn't win the Cup. In his other playoffs, he has 1 goal, 4 assists, in 14 playoff games.

Mhm. I guess you have convinced me on Kariya and Iginla not being liabilities. Naslund is a player I wouldn't want in my top 6 regardless. Guess that made this series the hardest to decide on (honorable mention Kimberley vs. Cairo).

 

[TheDevilMadeMe]

Why NJ should win:

1. Better top defensive pairing (by a good margin), and better defense overall (by a smaller margin).

Harvey is probably the closest guy to Orr in terms of a guy who can do everything, but he isn't Orr. Savard complements Orr perfectly, whereas Watson is pretty unspectacular on the top pair. Both teams have fairly strong bottom 4s. Seibert is probably the best overall guy in the bottom 4, but he's not good enough to make up the difference between the top pairs, especially considering NJ's top pair will play half the game.

2. Much better 3rd line.

Even with Doan a potential weak spot, I think NJ's 3rd line is much better than Inglewoods. Lewis and Mosdell are the two best third liners in the series IMO.

3. Better goaltending.


Why Inglewood might win:

1. Better first line.

Malone = Nighbor, though they have difference strengths. Mahovlich is the best winger on either team. Iginla is a better all-round player than Dye, but the difference between Mahovlich and Kariya is definitely larger.

Basically, I see it as (Mahovlich = Malone = Nighbor) > Iginla > (Dye = Kariya). Dye was probably a bit better than Kariya offensively, but his laziness and lack of defense makes them more or less equal IMO.

Once again, keep in mind Orr's abillity to elevate the offense of the forwards who play in front of him.

2. Better second line, at least defensively.

Honestly, I think the second lines are pretty equal offensively. Roughly, Maltsev = Bentley, Petrov > Hodge, Naslund > Gare at the offensive end. But Bentley and Gare are much stronger defensive presences than anyone on NJ's second line. I think it's quite likely that Maltsev was pretty good defensively, but I don't have proof of it.

 

[God Bless Canada]

New Jersey wins the best-of-seven series in seven games.

Three stars:
Bobby Orr
Doug Harvey
Frank Nighbor

 

[arrbez]

Sorry I went AWOL in this series guys, getting reamed with schoolwork at the moment.

Good series brother, the right team won. Good luck going forward.

 

[TheDevilMadeMe]

Sorry I went AWOL in this series guys, getting reamed with schoolwork at the moment.

Good series brother, the right team won. Good luck going forward.

Thanks. I'm actually a little surprised that I won this one. Your team was probably my favorite one in the entire draft.

 

[arrbez]

Thanks. I'm actually a little surprised that I won this one. Your team was probably my favorite one in the entire draft.

Yeah? Cool. I thought we were pretty even in most areas, with you having an edge in net, and the Orr factor.