The NHL. What you Need to Know. Part 1 of 4

The NHL, voted by 3o million Canadians, 54 Swedes, and Danny Taylor of Plymouth, England as being THE #1 hockey league in the world stands to begin it's 94th year of play (give or take) next month.

Here is what you need to know about this year's teams, all anxious to try to relive the pace and glory of last year's shortened 48 game season by starting 4 months earlier and returning to an 82 game (give or take) schedule.

The NHL continues to make a mockery of consistent rules, divisions and Canadian hockey fans by continuing to allow teams to play in such tropical destinations as Florida, Texas and Arizona where one can see a professional hockey team for cheaper than attending a local high school's drama class production of Oklahoma.

where the hell is the Smythe area of North America?

Gone are the six divisions that meant nothing for the last 20 years replaced by four divisions that still mean nothing. The new structure still means each conference will have 8 teams that qualify for the playoffs but in keeping with it's unusual scoring system, the following method will be used to keep fans confused until the final days of the regular season when they learn if their team has qualified or not.

From NHL.com; 

The top three teams in each division will make up the first 12 teams in the playoffs. The remaining four spots will be filled by the next two highest-placed finishers in each conference -- regardless of division -- based on regular-season points. It will be possible for one division to send five teams to the postseason while the other sends three.

The seeding of the wild-card teams within each divisional playoff will be determined by regular-season points. The division winner with the most points in the conference will be matched against the wild-card team with the fewest points; the division winner with the second-most points in the conference will play the wild-card team with the second-fewest points.

Simple. And how does a team get these points to qualify for the playoffs?

Just nod and move on...

A team gets 2 points for a straight-up win. If both teams tie, they each get a point. They play a 5 minute overtime session, at which time each team is minus 1 player. If someone scores, the winning team gets 2 points and the losing team gets 1 point. If nobody scores in extra time, the teams go to a shoot out where players take turns trying to score on breakaways (much like a penalty kick). If they score, that goal doesn't count as a goal on their point totals but their team could win, as long as the other team doesn't score. Eventually, everyone gets bored and they all go home and wait for the NHL statisticians to tell us what happened.

As I said you don't really need to worry about it. Chances are your team will just make or just miss the playoffs thanks to the league's continual attempt to ensure team parity. Just pick a team then come back in April.

On to the teams!

THE (new) PACIFIC DIVISION;

In keeping with American's appalling lack of geography, the teams have been named by their liberal geographic locations. The Pacific Division does have four teams a short distance away from the Pacific Ocean and three teams nearly 1500 kms away from any whale-watching tours, so on average, this is pretty good.

The Los Angeles Kings won the Stanley Cup 2 years ago, making them the Dane Cook of Los Angeles for a short time before the LA sporting world returned to it's natural order the following Thursday. At which time the Kings returned to being the 5th most popular professional team in a city with technically only three professional sports teams, unless we include David Beckham's entourage which went around pretending to be a professional American football/soccer team for a few years.

Most interesting player; Jonathon Quick is their all-star goalie who somehow stops everything shot at him despite his head never been seen above an opposing player's kneecaps.

The Anaheim Ducks have the infamy of once being the worst-named professional team in sports when they were owned by Disney Corp. Once referred to as The Anaheim Mighty Ducks, an attempt to further publicize the last place Emilio Estevez was seen. And to ramp up the Mighty Ducks movie franchise and the accompanying cartoon which followed. The Ducks also have the glory, much like their baseball sister the Anaheim Angels, of actually being located in the Los Angeles. They once won the Stanley Cup back in 2007, although nobody noticed.

Most Interesting Player; Teemu Selanne, the ageless wonder has been in the league longer than the Phoenix Coyotes. He is on a continual retirement watch since 2008 but seeing as how he keeps scoring goals, there seems little reason for him to stop playing. He is Anaheim's number 3 most interesting person, behind Mickey Mouse and that crazy guy at Medieval Times.

The San Jose Sharks have been around for over 2o years and have been a perennial playoff favourite for the last decade. They are also the perennial favourite to be one of the earlier teams to be eliminated from the playoffs, following a decade long tradition of failing to live up to expectations.

Player to Watch; Joe Thornton, the franchise's all-time greatest player, which, seeing as how he's been there for 10 years and there has been nobody close to his potential during that time means he will continue to be their greatest player twenty years from now. Despite this greatness Thornton is a consistent league leader in assists, beard stubble, and failing to close the deal by winning the Stanley Cup.



The Phoenix Coyotes continue to surprise Canadian hockey fans year after year by continuing to exist in a climate that is more suited to growing crazy than growing a hockey fan base. While most fans appear to be Canadians avoiding winter, the Coyotes have one of the best moving companies in the nation always on standby, so they have that going for them.

Player to Watch; Shane Doan. Not saying this guy is old but he started with the franchise back when it was the Winnipeg Jets, which everybody thought was just a legend. The return of the Jets to Winnipeg without Shane Doan left many people confused, especially him. It will be hard to find a player anywhere that has wasted more winning potential with one team than Doan. Oh, well, except for this guy. Laces out Dan.

The Edmonton Oilers are absolutely packed with great young talent, so everyone tells us. Thanks to their consistent 'bottom of the pack' finishes, they have managed to draft the highest picks in the land for the last 5 years. This continual drafting of high-end talent will be sure to pay off dividends in the years to come, once they finish their entry-level contracts and go to legitimate contenders.

Player to Watch; Ryan Smyth was once called Captain Canada for a reason. He's well-known and relatively harmless but will always show up to the party. This year is another coming out party for the Oilers young guns; Justin Schulz, Taylor Hall, Jordan Eberle, Ryan Nugent-Hopkins and Nail Yapukov. Yes, it sounds like the line up for a Yuk Yuks comedy festival but trust me, this team will be fun to watch as their dreams get crushed under the continual heart-wrenching losses they suffer.

The Calgary Flames are where the Edmonton Oilers are five years ago. With the trading of their all-star heart and soul of the team Jarome Iginla at the Trade Deadline last year and the subsequent retirement of their other all-star, goalie Mikka Kipprusof, the Flames made waves by hiring the one person that can do nothing to help their team win games on the ice but always good for some media attention; unofficial league hardhead, Brian Burke.

Player to Watch; Their team mascot, Ralph the Dog, has more name recognition than all the rest of the Flames combined. So you may as well sit back, enjoy some of the superstar talent that comes through on the visiting side. You may never see some of them again (see Selanne, Teemu).



The Vancouver Canucks are Western Canada's answer to the Toronto Maple Leafs. They are a team that can exceed expectations, especially when it comes to hating their fan base. It's like they deliberately try to make you hate them with things such as this and this. It's impossible to throw a Starbuck's coffee and not hit somebody that has an opinion of how the team could be better. However Vancouver fans do compensate by having the best playoff hockey-related riots west of Montreal.

Player to Watch; If you are going to break the bank to watch a Canucks game, the Sedin twins offer double your money. However they are usually both on the ice at the same time and are pretty difficult to distinguish when one or the other doesn't have the puck. The best price of admission is just to follow bipolar-talented goaltender and all around cool guy Roberto Luongo on his twitter feed.