NHL 2016-17

[Sal]

With the baseball season ending for me last week, my sporting focus will now mainly turn to hockey as the NHL's 100th anniversary season is now well underway, having started on Oct. 12. A few thoughts on what has already happened and what might happen later on in the playoffs:


----In the first game of the season, one of Toronto's prized rookies, Auston Matthews, scored 4 goals in his NHL debut, which has never been done before. The Arizona-born 19 year old will be looking to restore pride to what has become a sad franchise as the Leafs team will also celebrate their own 100th anniversary, highlighted by an upcoming outdoor rematch with Detroit on New Year's Day.

----A few days after Matthews was picked first overall by the Leafs in the 2016 NHL Draft, the NHL was hit with one of the most shocking trades in many years. The Montreal Canadiens traded their very popular All-Star defenseman P K Subban to the Nashville Predators for their own superstar defenseman Shea Weber. Montreal fans are still understandably stunned and saddened by the trade, yet both players have fit in very well with their new teams so for now I would have to declare the results even.

---On the same day, less than 23 minutes later, the Edmonton Oilers traded one of their former first-overall draft picks Taylor Hall to New Jersey for defenseman Adam Larsson in what can only be described as a thorough fleecing by the Devils.

---In Sept., the NHL held the World Cup of Hockey at Toronto's Air Canada Centre. The end result was somewhat predictable as Team Canada rolled over their competition and were never seriously challenged. The main attraction for the fans at the games and watching on TV was the exciting play of Team North America, made up of the best NHL players born in Canada and the US that are age 23 and younger. This team, which included Matthews and other future stars like Connor McDavid, Johnny Gaudreau, Dylan Larkin, Matt Murray, and Aaron Ekblad, played their games at a high speed, high tempo, almost dizzying pace, leaving all the fans wanting more. So far, although this season is still early, they appear to be getting it. The newest trend is for NHL teams to get younger and faster and their best prospects are making their teams sooner than before and are having a bigger impact than before. There's no better example of that than McDavid, who was just named the Oilers' captain at the age of 19, the youngest captain in NHL history. The effect of all this has been immediate. Goal scoring is up---way up---to about a goal or goal and a half per game over last year, leading to many exciting games for the fans but many anxious moments for the team's coaches and their poor goalies. I don't expect these high scores to last for much longer, as contending teams will look to tighten up defensively just before the playoffs.


Speaking of the playoffs, I don't really know who could win the Stanley Cup this year because no one team stands out for me. If I were to go out on a limb, I would pick the San Jose Sharks to try to avenge last year's loss to Pittsburgh and be just a little bit better this year to finally go over the hump and take it all. But right now, that's only a guess. I'll know better by April.