Majority of Board Thinks We'll Get Crushed in SCF

[Inferno]

But in the play-offs LA has curbed their biggest issue: 3.42 G/G

That's why they are scary.

You look at who they have beat ? Those teams were pretty good and if they beat the defending champs on top, I think they faced tougher competition. I mean.. Tokarski ? Come on.

yeah, ive watched a lot of their games. they are scoring a lot, but they are getting some really good bounces, and are scoring at a nearly impossible shooting percentage to maintain. teams shooting at unsustainably high percentages, particularly when they are mostly doing it on the PP can be EASILY shut down.

The Canadiens are the prime example of that.

The Difference between Los Angeles' 5 on 5 Goals scored VS The Rangers 5 on 5 Goals for is...ready for this? 3 goals.

Granted the Rangers have played 1 more game, but I'd argue we've faced far superior goaltending. Regardless, its nowhere near enough of a difference to scare me at all. The major difference is in their PP, or more specifically, our PP that went ice cold for 9 games. Theyve also scored 6 empty net goals to our 2. 16 PP goals to our 10.

Big difference between these 2 teams offensively has been the Kings PP (or the Rangers ice cold PP for half the playoffs) and their ability to score into empty nets.

5 on 5, theyre essentially even. And for the least penalized team in the NHL, the Rangers, I like our chances.

 

[broadwayblue]

Kings in 2

 

[Inferno]

Staal sucked against the Habs because they are fast. Kings arent nearly as fast as that team. Rangers are an elite speed team, we're going to stretch the ice with that speed.

 

[FJB]

It should be some edge-of-the-seat hockey, but I thought LA scored more goals during the regular season.. I knew their GA was low though.. anyway..

The regular season GF/GA for NYR, LA, and CHI:

NYR: 218/193

LA: 206/174

CHI: 267/220


And the playoff stats:

NYR: 54/45

LA: 65/52

CHI: 50/47

Before I saw these numbers, I thought that please let it be Chicago... but now I'm starting to think LA... but then I'm like Crawford or Quick.. hmm

 

[Grifter3511]

I was in grade 8 during the 1995 Stanley Cup Playoffs.

I remember the unstoppable force that was the Detroit Red Wings going up against the far inferior New Jersey Devils. I, along with everyone I knew, was giving New Jersey no chance whatsoever. I'm sure we all know our history, but to finish the story, New Jersey swept the Red Wings.

I don't know who coined the phrase, but I remember hearing the saying 'Many things are thought impossible until they are done,' in reference to what the Devils did that year. I don't know why, but I wrote that quote down and put it up on my wall in my bedroom.

Let the haters hate. Let them count us out. Let them write us off. When we win, it will be that much sweeter.

Many things are thought impossible until they are done. Believe in blue.

Let's Go Rangers!

 

[grbennett]

I'm pretty sure the majority of the board get all of their opinions from the board, rather than from watching the actual games. That's why we have these "facts":

-West is better than East.

-In the East, only Pittsburgh and Boston can even come close to even thinking about being able to almost kind of compete against the West.

-Rangers are a boring, defensive team.

There are more but you get my drift. This stuff gets repeated so much that people who only read the boards, and don't watch the games, take it as the absolute truth. Right now the hfboards facts seem to be:

-Rangers haven't seen any NHL caliber goalies in the playoffs.

-Rangers would have lost to the teams LA and Chicago have already beaten.

-How the Rangers played LA and Chicago this season is irrelevant.

-How the 2012 Devils played LA is relevant.

I mean I know LA and Chicago are both very good teams, but so is this Rangers team. I think we can hang with anyone in the league, East or West. Looking forward to the Finals.

 

[Fletch]

I guess, grbennett, we will see if what everyone on those boards are saying is true. Honestly, without any analysis, data or facts, those are the easiest statements to make. What's difficult, especially for a non-Rangers fan, is to really go out on the limb and believe the Rangers will win. Heck, we all know it's going to be difficult and it's really tough to say how it would go, but this team has done pretty well these playoffs, played real teams, shutdown real NHL scorers, and dealt with a bit of adversity on the way. We shall see if the West is the Best (isn't that part of the Doors song, "The End"?).

 

[*Bob Richards*]

Good. Hope the boys play with that "Us Against the World" mentality.

 

[Bullseyes]

While the Rangers will definitely be underdogs regardless of who they play, they have a good chance to beat either team.

They also counted out the Rangers vs. Pittsburgh and Montreal.

They said Boston was going to be the SCF.

Colorado was better than just about every team in the East according to them.

Etc.

They are wrong quite a lot.

 

[Pizza]

Kings in 2

Perfect.

I'm happy to be a solid underdog. Let's keep surprising them so they can come up with more silly reasons why we are where we are.

 

[eco's bones]

that's a lot of needs! Agreed, though. It is a series that will be winnable - for both teams. I don't know who said it, but while the Rangers would appear to be huge underdogs, they didn't get here by mistake, and a Vancouver team pushed the President Trophy Rangers to the brink in 1994, and seemed to have been gaining momentum. The Flyers, Pens and Montreal were damn good teams. Some may say the Rangers were lucky they didn't play the Bruins, but they played even better, a team that beat the Bruins in a series! Some may say the Rangers were lucky they didn't go against Price. The answer to that question we won't know, but his substitute played pretty well and I think the guys in front of him ran out of gas, as well as, of course, the Rangers played pretty well. We shall see against the next opponent. I will guarantee that it won't be easy. "On paper", I think both matchup better against the Rangers than the teams they faced. It may not show up on a stat sheet, but I think both teams left are better, which doesn't mean the Rangers' best played games won't beat either.

The Rangers got off to a horrible start this year--got back to even and then for the next several weeks--it was win one lose one. I think getting Klein steadied out our defense. McDonagh, Staal, Girardi, Stralman are all good in their own zone but before Klein came on board our third pairing was a nightmare almost every night waiting to happen. Getting the lines together--and rolling them--rolling the defense pairings. AV does not screw around with stuff that works. He doesn't shorten his bench much. It helps players understand their roles. It's also inclusive. Knowing your part is having a part. Sometimes the sum of parts approach overrides the we have more top end talent thing--like with Pittsburgh. Anyway I think we were a better team than the regular season standings suggested. From December on we were one of the better teams in the league. We were excellent on the road. Rangers started the season 3 wins 6 losses--all road games. After that the Rangers were 22 wins 8 losses and 2 overtime losses on the road. That's just about as good as any team in the league.

 

[eco's bones]

yeah, ive watched a lot of their games. they are scoring a lot, but they are getting some really good bounces, and are scoring at a nearly impossible shooting percentage to maintain. teams shooting at unsustainably high percentages, particularly when they are mostly doing it on the PP can be EASILY shut down.

The Canadiens are the prime example of that.

The Difference between Los Angeles' 5 on 5 Goals scored VS The Rangers 5 on 5 Goals for is...ready for this? 3 goals.

Granted the Rangers have played 1 more game, but I'd argue we've faced far superior goaltending. Regardless, its nowhere near enough of a difference to scare me at all. The major difference is in their PP, or more specifically, our PP that went ice cold for 9 games. Theyve also scored 6 empty net goals to our 2. 16 PP goals to our 10.

Big difference between these 2 teams offensively has been the Kings PP (or the Rangers ice cold PP for half the playoffs) and their ability to score into empty nets.

5 on 5, theyre essentially even. And for the least penalized team in the NHL, the Rangers, I like our chances.

Crawford has been really shaky against them in this series. Mediocre goaltending is inflating the Kings stats.

 

[Tawnos]

Rangers had more ROWs in the regular season than either team. Sensing some overconfidence.

 

[Xref]

Wait wait wait.....the Rangers are still in it????? Damn, I didn't bother to watch any of the playoffs because I was told that the Flyers were going to beat us in the first round. I missed the whole thing! Bring me up to speed, please.

 

[haohmaru]

I hope whoever comes out of the West feels the same way this "majority" does. It'll bite them in the ass.

 

[Fletch]

there has been some sloppiness on both sides, which seemed to even out here and there, and then tightness on both sides. Seems as both teams have been both stingy and vulnerable. I'll say again what my biggest fear is and that's the Rangers scoring. Sometimes I see them having difficulty around the net, especially against bigger teams, and their second chances just aren't there, the bounces do not go there way and a lot of shots are into the goalie's chest. Happened a lot last night. Seemed like the score should've been 6-0. But, you can still win games 1-0 and 2-1, I hear, but again, that's one of my main fears.

 

[Nickmo82]

i'd imagine a lot people posting that have rarely if ever watched any games involving the rangers, the hawks or the kings and are just basing their predictions off of regular season stats and dumb **** like that.

who cares what people think? It'll get decided on june 4th and beyond.

So they're the underdog... Come what may, the NYR won't make it easy on whoever they are playing.

 

[silverfish]

Let them. Most thought we'd be eliminated by the Pens and Canadiens, too.

I have no issues being the underdog in this series.

 

[TheTakedown]

According to the main boards, Doughty is 1 trillion times the player McDonagh is. Gotta love hfboards.

I'm not even sure if half of them watch hockey... I mean, Doughty is a beast, but to say he is so much better than McD... I mean, I think they're both top 5-10 elite talent guys.

i'm telling you, these "hockey" fans... god help them :p

 

[TheTakedown]

who cares. what I've observed is that we play better defense than any of the Western Conference teams. They're out there having a field day in goals because no one freakin' knows how to cover a man out there. It's gonna be a battle but we definitely have a legit chance. Hank will surely steal 2 games for us like he always does. Then we just need the boys to come through and win two games on their own.

This. Chicago's defense is top 10, but no way is it top 5... Rangers defense is by far the best in the league as far as I am concenred (sans game 5 when everyone was color blind and nobody could find the red jerseys :p)

 

[Zucc36]

Rangers swept the Hawks in RS. Tied 1-1 with Kings in RS.

No matter who will face the Rangers, the west team will be favorites, but will Rangers be crushed? Don´t think so. It will be extremely important to steal one of the first two games away. Then anything can happen. If behind 0-2 before coming back to the Garden its gonna be tough.

Hopefully the WCF will go to 7 games with many OT periods, and hopefully with the Hawks as winners

 

[TheTakedown]

I agree with your post here. I have nothing to really argue on your general points of view.

I think the main board has a ludicrous opinion saying, the Rangers are going to get manhandled and they're woefully mismatched. That's borderline Down's Syndrome stuff.

Kings:

I think adding Gabby has made their mix of forwards much stronger the sum greater than the part kind of thing. It strengthened their entire forward group. Sutter can now spread the scoring out.

Carter's line is going to make Staal/Stralman more important because I am pretty sure McD is getting Kopitar's line. I am not worried about that line (Kopitar) because pretty much every top line going against McD/Girardi has been neutralized. It's no different than what Doughty presents against Stepan, Kreider and Nash.

I would definitely take the Kings forward group over the Flyers. I don't think the Rangers are going to deter that group like they did with the Flyers.

Staal, is a key, he really has to pick up his game this series, he was terrible at times against Montreal. I am not sure if it was a strict match up problem or injury/fatigue but Staal has to be way better.

I don't think LA has seen a team with the speed of the Rangers so it should be interesting how LA's defense handles Hagelin and Kreider who can back the D up, and prevent them (Doughty) from jumping into the play.

For the first Bold text, it's possible MTL got into Staal's head, because he ****ing ragdolled Pitt offense with no issue, and was incredibly solid against Philly (could be wrong on this, I'm fried from work right now).

FOr the second Bold text, CHicago is probably the fastest they've handled, and I'd say we are faster than them. I think our D pinching for offensive pressure, followed by better defense in general will also make a difference. LA's defense is VERY good, but they are not backstopped with a great goalie like Hank does for NYR

 

[TheTakedown]

It should be some edge-of-the-seat hockey, but I thought LA scored more goals during the regular season.. I knew their GA was low though.. anyway..

The regular season GF/GA for NYR, LA, and CHI:

NYR: 218/193

LA: 206/174

CHI: 267/220


And the playoff stats:

NYR: 54/45

LA: 65/52

CHI: 50/47

Before I saw these numbers, I thought that please let it be Chicago... but now I'm starting to think LA... but then I'm like Crawford or Quick.. hmm

We're a bit more capable of shutting down top offensive lines, so I would still rather take Chicago, but whatever happens happens. Tonight will be a good game. I think Chicago wins personally.

 

[LeetchisGod]

It will make it that much sweeter if we win.

 

[blue425]

I was in grade 8 during the 1995 Stanley Cup Playoffs.

I remember the unstoppable force that was the Detroit Red Wings going up against the far inferior New Jersey Devils. I, along with everyone I knew, was giving New Jersey no chance whatsoever. I'm sure we all know our history, but to finish the story, New Jersey swept the Red Wings.

I don't know who coined the phrase, but I remember hearing the saying 'Many things are thought impossible until they are done,' in reference to what the Devils did that year. I don't know why, but I wrote that quote down and put it up on my wall in my bedroom.

Let the haters hate. Let them count us out. Let them write us off. When we win, it will be that much sweeter.

Many things are thought impossible until they are done. Believe in blue.

Let's Go Rangers!

I've been thinking about that series all week.