I'm a Canucks fan who admittedly hates the Oilers (and I'm sure many of you hate the Canucks. If you were a fan in the 90's, you hate the other western Canadian teams), but at the end of the day we're all hockey fans, right?
I'm not going to vote because I feel like this poll is for Oiler fans and I want to respect that. I hope it's okay if I give my 2 cents.
1. I think the Blues will catch Dallas for the 3rd spot in the Central. The Blues have figured something out and I think there is still something wrong with Dallas. Whenever I see them, or watch the condensed games on game centre, they just look boring and soulless. I think Dallas misses.
2.Anaheim would scare me if they had fired Carlyle earlier. In fact, if they had even come up with a credible replacement coach at this time I would suggest they might have an inside track due to their pedigree and history. They also have one of the best top 4 D units of the group. But I think they let the rot fester for too long, and the GM behind the bench is going to waste another 5-7 games while they dither around and choose a coach.
3. Edmonton, I'm not going to pile on but I don't see it. They look listless and like there is something rotten there as well. The existential frustration on McDavid's face is almost heartbreaking to watch. Hitchcock seems to be proving that the game has passed him by, and nobody has answers. The OBC has to go to lift the Oiler curse.
4. Chicago wouldn't shock me. Kane has gone supernova and they seem to be playing with a certain degree of freedom. With that said, they had to go streaking just to get back into the race. They are due a slump and I can see that occurring.
5. Minnesota, While Koivu's importance has diminished in recent years, that's still a capable and fairly important centre that they have lost. They are such a dull team. If they make it, I predict them being the easiest out of all of the listed teams. Yet they have a decent chance.
6. Colorado just can't get off the toilet. It's weird, they were hanging with Nashville and Winnipeg for the first couple of months but their goaltending has gone into the tank. One has to think that they will find a way to sort it out, but it's been a couple of months and they still find ways to lose in fairly pathetic fashion.
7. Vancouver, my team so I'm biased but here goes.
The Canucks have one of the best coaches of the group. I'm a firm believer that Green is a brilliant coach. The game has changed a lot in the last 5 years and Green is one of the new-edition type coaches. He gets it and the players play for him. The Canucks have incredible centre depth and are playing a fairly cohesive game.
However, the third D pairing might be the worst in the league (when Gudbranson and Pouliot are together). I believe the other day they had a corsi of like 8%. We also put a lot of pressure on Horvat, Boeser, and Pettersson to score our goals.
I'm going to wimp out and choose 3. I will say that the Blues finish 3rd and the 2 Wildcard spots will be occupied by some combination of Colorado, Vancouver, and Dallas.
Colorado will make it if their goaltending shores itself even a little bit.
Dallas will make it if they ever get their heads out of their asses, or if nobody else goes on any kind of run.
Vancouver will make it if Edler comes back soon, Baertschi comes back relatively soon, and they get lucky and stay healthy for the rest of the year.
Thanks for reading, look forward to hearing thoughts and opinions.
Again, if this is an unwelcome trespass onto your board than I apologize, but quite frankly the hfcanucks page has been terrible for a couple of years and it's nice to discuss hockey with fans of all teams.