So much for the 'Sh-t Northern Division' narrative.

[Byrddog]

The North catches hell for two reasons Edmonton and Toronto. I am a Bolts fan and look forward to Shea Weber meeting a Norris cup winner in Tampa. He he he just had too.

 

[Jeremy2020]

Price leaves his dormant state and gets hot doesn't mean an entire division of hockey is good.

 

[Danrs112]

The North and the West battle to see who has the shiniest turd

 

[Frank Drebin]

Senators would have been a playoff team in the west

 

[Lshap]

Price leaves his dormant state and gets hot doesn't mean an entire division of hockey is good.

Correct. There's no evidence the East, West, or Central were good divisions. Same with the North.

People are placing faith in their memories of teams from 2019. Those old stats and rosters have no relevance to the teams and divisions here in mid-2021.

 

[drktmplr12]

a division's strength is determined by the best teams, not the worst. most don't consider a single team in the north a contender. therefore the division is weak.

make a list of the top 10 contending teams. i promise the best team in the north barely makes it.

other divisions each have at least 1:
central: TBL CAR
west: VGK COL
east: BOS WSH/PIT

 

[WetcoastOrca]

Fans of Canadian Division teams that were eliminated:
'Whew! Montreal playing well for 4 games against Vegas proves we were really not that bad!'

 

[Bluto]

*team from the North makes the conference finals*
Everyone in canada "see we dont suck!"

Its almost as if there wasnt a 100% chance that thered be a canadian team in the conference finals. The north is the NFC East of the NHL. Someones going to make it by default even though nobody deserves it.

 

[drktmplr12]

Correct. There's no evidence the East, West, or Central were good divisions. Same with the North.

People are placing faith in their memories of teams from 2019. Those old stats and rosters have no relevance to the teams and divisions here in mid-2021.

it's not like the best team rosters have changed drastically since 2019 considering they have established cores. to say they have "no relevance" is silly

 

[Danrs112]

Of these 5 teams which 2 are most likely to miss the playoffs next year

Tampa
Boston
Toronto
Florida
Montreal

 

[AwesomePanthers]

How is this proved? They’ve only eliminated northern division teams.

 

[WATTAGE4451]

But they are up 2-1

Yeah. And the Golden Knights lost some games to the ducks kings and coyotes this year. Doesn't mean those teams are up to par with them.

2019 blue jackets swept lightning but they weren't up to par with them or a better team.

Playoffs are short sample sizes. Upsets can happen in small series and the worse team can win.

 

[Lshap]

it's not like the best team rosters have changed drastically since 2019 considering they have established cores. to say they have "no relevance" is silly

Montreal's roster has changed drastically. Comparisons with their 2019/20 roster are irrelevant.

Last season started in October 2019. Players from every team have aged and developed more than they ever have between seasons.

 

[Chips]

Yeah. And the Golden Knights lost some games to the ducks kings and coyotes this year. Doesn't mean those teams are up to par with them.

2019 blue jackets swept lightning but they weren't up to par with them or a better team.

Playoffs are short sample sizes. Upsets can happen in small series and the worse team can win.

Everybody conveniently forgets sample size and therefore context matters. There’s a difference between having a better playoffs (one year, not a few in a row ie a pattern) and being a better team.

The Bolts were not a bad team because they got swept in the first round. They were easily a better team than the Jackets, but they had a worse week. There’s a lot of parity in this league, we’ve had surprise teams deep in the playoffs before. I still do think the North was the weakest division based on their top teams, but always felt “bad” division was overblown. Just least good.

Goalies being disproportionately important, also factors people’s perception. If people are saying the Habs were a worse team (before last game) it was because the Knights skaters had longer stretches of controlling play. A better goalie with good defense (best synergy imo vs anything + forwards) against a team that already had shallow C depth who lost their top C (and who have a huge under acknowledged history of choking, at least Fleury. I’m not saying this to discredit the Habs so much as I’ve always enjoyed pointing out the Knights shortcomings. Check the old Sharks-Knights threads , I have like 100 posts defending the Sharks team then as legitimately clutch, that 99% of teams would have failed to come back even with the power play. I’ve always said Vegas choked and people over blamed the ref there )


I agree with a prior post saying the divisions strength can most reasonably be determined by the top teams than the bottom. Edmonton being #2 by a fairly solid margin looks pretty bad with that lack of depth.

a 5/10 team in a division full of 5-6/10 teams will have a better record than the 5/10 team in a division with a few 5/10 teams and a few 9-10/10 teams. Ive never understood every single season people trying to discredit teams on top of the standing by pointing at their division “see!? Their division has worse teams than ours, they’re fake!”

 

[Grumpy2112]

a division's strength is determined by the best teams, not the worst. most don't consider a single team in the north a contender. therefore the division is weak.

make a list of the top 10 contending teams. i promise the best team in the north barely makes it.

other divisions each have at least 1:
central: TBL CAR
west: VGK COL
east: BOS WSH/PIT

pittsburgh has been over rated for a few seasons now, bounced early the last few seasons, the habs have had more playoff success the last 2 seasons than all teams listed except Tampa, plus the habs beat the pens last year head to head and knocked them out

 

[Oblivion Beckons]

The irony is that if we really "closed the borders", summoned all Canucks back to the homeland, and then built our teams from all Canadian players, the NHLs 7 top contenders come playoff time would all be from the oh so loathed North division .

This is the confirmation that the North division stinks.

 

[drktmplr12]

so i guess we put MTL in the contender category now?

don't get me wrong they are doing well in the playoffs but they barely made it in both years

 

[DFF]

Yeah. And the Golden Knights lost some games to the ducks kings and coyotes this year. Doesn't mean those teams are up to par with them.

2019 blue jackets swept lightning but they weren't up to par with them or a better team.

Playoffs are short sample sizes. Upsets can happen in small series and the worse team can win.

So the Stanley Cup is a fraud?

 

[topshelf15]

Again enough with the chest thumping ,of course the North sucked... Every team in it knew this,doesnt take away that it did obviously have some decent teams in it that could win

 

[RyCanadian]

Senators would have been a playoff team in the west

They should move to the west then.

 

[DearDiary]

tied 2-2 against the power house Vegas that everyone said would easily sweep us

we're fine buddy

Source?

According to the series poll...
1. Vegas 5
2. Habs 6
3. Habs 7
4. Vegas 6
5. Vegas 4

Vegas in 4 was 11% of votes

 

[The90]

it's not like the best team rosters have changed drastically since 2019 considering they have established cores. to say they have "no relevance" is silly

Florida has had an established core as well. Have they improved any since 2019?

 

[DearDiary]

The Habs could win their next 6 games and the Cup and the same crowd will still say they and the North division suck lol. Sad group of people.

How does 1 team from a division winning prove the rest of the division is good? Montreal winning the cup means the Oilers have top players aside from 2 forwards? Winnipeg's crappy D automatically has #1D and some actual top 4 defenseman?

 

[HabbyGuy]

How does 1 team from a division winning prove the rest of the division is good? Montreal winning the cup means the Oilers have top players aside from 2 forwards? Winnipeg's crappy D automatically has #1D and some actual top 4 defenseman?

You're right ofcourse, but I think the pushback of this thread is more about how everyone was saying whoever came out of the north was going to be crushed by another team out of it's division. I think this is what they're trying to say, not very well, but, yeah....

 

[WATTAGE4451]

So the Stanley Cup is a fraud?

Define what you mean?
I wouldn't call jt a fraud
But if you mean the best team doesn't win it each year?. Umm... yeah, this is common knowledge.