I don't understand how some people could say this team is better then the 07-08 edition team. That team had the perfect balance between great vet players and talented young future nhl star players. Just because a lot of things went wrong afterward we can't ignore how close we where to the cup. Looking back we looked set for many years to come.
Alexei Kovalev was a superstar in the league and other team actually feared for once one of our player
Saku Koivu was getting some decent teammates and getting the job done outside the spotlight mentoring young Kostitsyn and feeding Higgins.
Andrei Markov was a top 5 D in the league
Tomas Plekanec was still young and was getting better then Kovalev
Both Andrei and Sergei Kostitsyn were dominant players and would contribute like the Sedin's for years to come with 80 points per season each
Chris Higgins was going to be a 40 goal per season player, he probably would have gotten 40 goals if he could score half of the perfect passes Koivu was giving him every night.
We had a 60 + point player in Mark Streit, he really helped us make us dangerous during the PP
Komisarek was a absolute monster, still young and maybe team captain one day
Roman Hamrlik was a ice time eating D and could easily fill the void for Markov
Latendresse was going to be our future star and rack up 80 points soon it was just a matter of time.
Huet was a all-star and a dominant #1 goalie
Carey Price was the second coming to Patrick Roy
Jaroslav Halak was a legit NHL caliber #1 goalie chilling in the AHL
This team was so good that we didn't even need or have space for players like Michael Ryder and Grabovski how crazy is that?
We had 7 players with over 50 points...not 2 or 3 but 7!
Looking back these predictions might be funny but it was very real during that time, our veterans had credibility around the league and we had talented young players ready to fill the void once they get older. Everybody was playing to it's potential!
If only we had kept Huet for the playoffs and won the Hossa derby