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The Puckhead Mailbag By Ethan Calof The intentions of my
soon-to-become incessant posts are to educate those on facets of
hockey. Whether it's the game, the league, or the finer details, I
hope to enlighten my readers (and myself as well) on the greatest
game on ice. If this can consider one more person to start watching
hockey, then I'll consider it a success. Now, on to the
mailbag: What was the
Original Six? Before any of you
PUCKHEADS begin to giggle, you should realize that this is something
very few non-hockey fans have the slightest clue about. The Original Six is
the name given for the six teams that comprised the entire NHL
between 1942 and 1967: Montreal Canadiens, Toronto Maple Leafs,
Detroit Red Wings, Boston Bruins, New York Rangers, and Chicago
Blackhawks. The Original Six
period was formed when the New York Americans suspended
operations, and ended in the NHL's great expansion of 1967, when six
new teams entered the league. Of these teams, the
Montreal Canadiens were by far the most successful. During the
25-year period, they won 10 Stanley Cups. They also didn't miss the
playoffs once between 1949 and 1967, an impressive streak. The Original Six is
often hailed as having the "truest" form of hockey in NHL
history. The fact that there were so few roster spots available
around the league ensured that every game would be akin to an
All-Star game in terms of talent level. The game also had more rough
play in the Original Six era. All in all, it was a
very significant period in league history. Hockey legends such as
Gordie Howe, Maurice Richard, Doug Harvey, Red Kelly, Bobby Hull,
Terry Sawchuk, Ted Lindsay, and many more made their mark in the
Original Six. Now, moving on to
something more modern... Who would
you say is the best team in the NHL right now? Why? This was an
incredibly painful question for me to answer. As you can probably
tell, I am a huge Detroit Red Wings fan. Plus, they have an
incredible team, and I still consider them my favorite to win the
Stanley Cup. Sometimes, though, you just have to face the facts. And
the facts are saying that the best team in the NHL right now is the
San Jose Sharks. They have managed to
build an incredible team with a great blend of promising upstarts,
savvy veterans, and superstars in their prime (Joe
Thornton and Dan Boyle). Youngsters Devin Setoguchi and Ryane Clowe
are playing great so far this year, and Patrick Marleau and Marc-Edouard
Vlasic are bouncing back after less-than-stellar seasons. Everyone
seems to be working hard, and really buying in to head coach Todd
McLellan's system. Don't forget about their annual Vezina candidate
goaltender in Evgeni Nabokov. Then, there's the
fact that all their potential is translating to results on the ice.
So far this season, they are 23-3-2, which is absolutely
sensational. That's good enough for first in the league. I don't think
they'll end up with the Cup, though. Who has the
most penalty minutes in a single game? How about a single season? Randy Holt, formerly
of the Los Angeles Kings, holds the record for most penalty minutes
in one game. On March 11, 1979 against the Philadelphia Flyers, Holt
accumulated an astounding 67 penalty minutes, for one minor penalty,
three major penalties, two ten-minute misconducts, and three game
misconducts. The guilty act? After picking up a minor penalty, he
fought an enforcer, then instigated a bench-clearing brawl. The
oddest part about this achievement, though, is that all 67 of his
minutes were assessed in the first period. As for the full
season, that honour goes to Dave "The Hammer" Schultz, the
chief enforcer for the Philadelphia Flyers during their Broad Street
Bullies era of the 1970's. His record of 472 minutes in the 1974-75
season is 63 minutes ahead of the next-closest competitor, Paul
Baxter of the Pittsburgh Penguins in 1981-82. That leads me to my
final question, one that I needed to ponder for a while to find the
right words... Why are
penalty minutes often considered positive, by announcers, fans, and
on fantasy hockey sites? The simplest answer
is that penalty minutes are the only readily available measure of a
player's toughness. You can't find hitting and blocked shot stats
without going on a wild goose chase, so we're stuck with penalty
minutes as a measure. Logic dictates that
the more an individual hits others, the more penalties he will get.
You also get penalty minutes for very good things, such as getting
in a fight or preventing a goal. The intrusive one would say,
though, "Shouldn't not doing your job well enough not be a
cause celebre?" Has anyone
ever taken their skate off and tried to stab somebody during a
hockey game? I have not ever
heard of a case of this happening. However, if anybody has seen
something like this happen at any level of hockey, please do mention
it. The Captain is
demanding more air time, and he's got a series of questions for me
to answer. I will pick my three favourite ones to answer right
now. Who has the
most shut-outs in one season? Which NHL coach has won the most
games of all-time? Who has the most saves in one game? The answer to the
first question is a man very few have heard of, George Hainsworth.
He set the record in the 1928-1929 season, when he was playing with
the Montreal Canadiens. His astounding 22 shutouts are only
scratching the surface, though. What's even more incredible is that
he recorded them in only 44 games, and accumulated an absurd 0.98
Goals against Average. The winningest NHL
coach of all time is Scotty Bowman. He earned his 1,244 career
victories coaching the St. Louis Blues (1967-1971), Montreal
Canadiens (1971-1979), Buffalo Sabres (1979-1987), Pittsburgh
Penguins (1991-1993), and Detroit Red Wings (1993-2002). Some other
accolades he has to his name are the most Stanley Cup victories by a
coach (9) and, interestingly, most career losses. As for the
most saves in one game, that honour goes to another unknown: Sam
LoPresti. On March 4, 1941, the Chicago Blackhawks 'tender faced 83
shots from the Boston Bruins, saving 80 of them in a record that
still stands. Interestingly enough, he made all his saves in
regulation time, as Speaking of
Blackhawks... G'day, mate!
Do you think These are two
totally different questions. For
However, one must
take a closer look at the team. The 'Hawks are extremely balanced,
with seven players already with 20 points or more in only 29 games.
They have one of the best defensive corps in the NHL, with
puck-moving superstar Brian Campbell, reliable defender Duncan
Keith, physical Brent Seabrook, and upcoming Cam Barker. But, most
importantly, this team is improving with every game. They are
playing with confidence, which is why they are deservedly attracting
buzz. Well, somebody asked
the question that I was seemingly begging for last week... Why don't
you think I'm so glad you
asked that question. I have three reasons for you: 1) Lack of playoff
success in recent memory The first one may be
mainly conjecture. However, several key members of the San Jose
Sharks have been known to wilt under pressure in the playoff; in
particular, Joe Thornton. Big Joe is the cog that the entire club
revolves around; he is their best player, their leader, and the
linchpin of their scoring line. He scores notably less points when
in the playoffs (last year, he only had 2 goals in 13 games, and in
2007 he had only The second one is
more significant. Todd McLellan may have been a part of last year's
Stanley Cup-winning team, but his duties as an assistant coach pale
in comparison to what he will have to do this year. Bottom line,
this is his first time being the head coach of an NHL team, and the
playoffs are a whole different animal. Very few rookie head coaches
have success in their first playoff run. Plus, they have a
towering obstacle standing in their way. The Detroit Red Wings won
the Stanley Cup this year, and despite being in second, have a more
talented team than they did last year thanks to the addition of
Marian Hossa. They play their system perfectly, and more importantly
have eons more recent playoff experience than the Sharks. They can
put out any of their four lines and expect a goal from them, a
luxury that is extremely rare in the NHL. They also have the best
coach in the NHL, Mike Babcock. They can clearly perform better than
the Sharks in a pressurized situation. Why do so
many fans in other cities like to bash the Maple Leafs when they
haven't won a I think one of the
main reasons that fans enjoy bashing the Leafs is because they
haven't won a Stanley Cup for so many years. However, the Blackhawks
haven't won a Cup since 1961, which is longer. The reason the Leafs
get so much more flak is because of the fundamental differences
between them and the rest of the NHL. You can blame Harold
Ballard for planting those seeds in the minds of the rest of the
league. Ballard took over the executive vice-president position
for the Leafs in 1961, and quickly proved to be an arrogant jerk.
Some of his stunts included threatening to cut a cable carrying
CBC's broadcast of a Leafs game if they didn't pay for his upgrades,
removing a portrait of Queen Elizabeth II from Maple Leaf Gardens to
add extra seating and saying "What the hell position can a
Queen play?", and turning up the heat in the Gardens and
breaking the water fountains during a concert so that fans would buy
triple-priced soft drinks from the concession stands. Then he was
charged with tax evasion, came back after serving his sentence,
drove Leafs captain Dave Keon away from the team and blocked him
from signing with any other team, and forced star Darryl Sittler to
demand a trade. Ballard may have
been dead for 18 years, but fans of other teams have been
subconsciously applying traits of his tyranny to other Leafs through
history. Tie Domi. Darcy Tucker. Pat Quinn. During the Ballard
years, fans instantly began to despise the Maple Leafs and
everything they stood for, and old hate never dissipates. Plus, most
Canadians outside of Now, we move onto a
new feature of this mailbag: THE HOCKEY
GLOSSARY! Freezing the
puck: when
a goaltender covers up the puck and holds onto it, resulting in a
whistle and a face-off. Thank you for
reading this mailbag. If you have any questions you want to submit,
please E-Mail
them to me!
Submitted 25 February 2009 Comment on this article to Comments@informativesports.com
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