Could this be the year the Bruins finally miss the playoffs?

[NyQuil]

I don't know if it's an Ottawa thing or a Boston thing, but Boston was completely dominated in their barn last night.

Not getting a shot on net in the 3rd period. Wow. I'm sure the Boston papers have dug up an answer on how long it's been since that happened.

Edit: gotta love AI engines. December 21, 2006.

Apparently it was 24 minutes of game time without a shot on goal.

Naturally Ottawa gave up two goals in 15 seconds earlier in the game to make it interesting.

 

[bobmottoutica]

Looking at their cap real quick. Why isn’t the possibility of Marchand not re-signing/being moved a bigger topic?

They don’t have much coming off the books next season and I can’t see them moving a bunch of guys they just signed/have NMC.

They really need some futures considering their prospect pool is basically bottom of the league. Moving on from him would net something.

 

[LEAFANFORLIFE23]

They are leaving the door open but so far nobody wants to walk through, they have been a 500 team all year up to this point but they are still hanging in there.

That speaks to their resiliency but it also speaks to how mediocre most of the east has been up to this point.

Boston
Buffalo
Philadelphia
Ottawa
NYI
Pittsburgh

All 500 or below, hell Pittsburgh is 3 games below 500 and somehow they are 2 points out of a wildcard spot.

I don't know that I've ever seen the east be quite this mediocre

 

[TheBeastCoast]

They are leaving the door open but so far nobody wants to walk through, they have been a 500 team all year up to this point but they are still hanging in there.

That speaks to their resiliency but it also speaks to how mediocre most of the east has been up to this point.

Boston
Buffalo
Philadelphia
Ottawa
NYI
Pittsburgh

All 500 or below, hell Pittsburgh is 3 games below 500 and somehow they are 2 points out of a wildcard spot.

I don't know that I've ever seen the east be quite this mediocre

Feel like you can almost confidently lock in 6 maybe even 7 playoff spots in the East already. Florida, Toronto, Jersey, New York, Carolina, and Washington feel like locks. Tampa probably should be included as well which leaves one wildcard spot for the group of teams sitting in and around .500 that you listed.

 

[LEAFANFORLIFE23]

Feel like you can almost confidently lock in 6 maybe even 7 playoff spots in the East already. Florida, Toronto, Jersey, New York, Carolina, and Washington feel like locks. Tampa probably should be included as well which leaves one wildcard spot for the group of teams sitting in and around .500 that you listed.

I agree I think 6 spots are spoken for.

I'm not quite ready to call Tampa a lock yet because it wasn't that long ago they were in that group.

But they are close if they can come out of their next 7 games 4-3 or better I think they are in.

The next 7 are

Pittsburgh
Columbus
Dallas
Colorado
Washington
Nashville
Toronto

I'm never going to say a team with Crosby on it can't win because It's Crosby and even at 37 he can go off on any given night. But Tampa should win that.

Then It's Columbus and again Tampa should win that.

Then you get to Dallas they are really good that's going to be tough.

Washington has been good all season.

Colorado is starting to get healthy It SHOULD be harder to beat them this time.

Nashville for some reasons sucks but they are loaded with talent.

Toronto and Tampa are almost ALWAYS good games.

As long as they don't stumble in the next 7 I think they get in.

Although last time I checked Point was injured, not sure if he's back yet or not