Second Round Selections

Second Round Selections

Ok, so a 50% success rate was nice, kind of reminds me of my high school days. But in the scheme of things Calgary and Dallas really should have played much better hockey, my Montreal pick was a dark horse, though had they put the pressure on Carolina in game three it may have been a completely different story. And while I’m happy that Edmonton at least keeps some Canadian content alive in the West, I must admit I didn’t see the Red Wing collapse as it evolved.

So with trepidation I venture into the mugs game of picking round two finalists..

I see from a pervious note from Sarah Jayne (her blog by the way is well worth a visit), that the TSN Macaque Maggie has already spun that wheel again, her picks giving many a Canadian bar some conversation points to ponder over a Blue, Kokanee, Moosehead or an Ex, of course the more of the beverages consumed has a rather direct impact on this prognostication thing.

At any rate Maggie, who from all accounts was not in her cups, picked the Senators, Hurricanes, Oilers and Mighty Ducks to prevail in their Divisional semi final battles.

With the exception of the Hurricanes and Oilers, I think Maggie might be on to something.

For the record and my never ending embarrassment should things once again go awry, here are the HockeyNation Second round picks.

OTTAWA SENATORS will prevail over the Buffalo Sabres in Six Games, just keep Domenic away from the bench, dressing room, city of Kanata etc, he’s becoming a bit of a distraction for a team that needs to stay focused on the job at hand. Buffalo is fast and so are the Sens so this should be quite the shoot out. Emery has been quite solid in the Sens net as has Miller in the Sabres end of the rink. But I think that Ottawa is on a mission now, they realize the stakes are quite high and to my way of thinking they shall rise up to the challenge.

NEW JERSEY DEVILS will settle down that Carolina Breeze, winning their series in six games. The Devils looked masterful against the Rangers, now it’s a given that the Rangers were not a particularly challenging offering this time around, they seemed to have left it all in the regular season, but the Devils never seemed to break a sweat and so I think they’re more than ready to take on the Hurricanes. Their ace is Marty Brodeur, by far one of the best tenders in the game today; Cam Ward will be watching the master while he tries to hold off the Devils attack.

ANAHEIM MIGHTY DUCKS will continue their march deep into the 2006 playoffs, they’ve been on an upward swing since just after the Olympic break and both Scott Niedermayer and Teemu Selanne are playing some pretty impressive shinny these days. Colorado for some reason controlled the Stars with relative ease, a puzzling thing for sure. Was Colorado that good, or were the Stars really that bad. The proof will be in round two when the Avs run into the Hot Ducks. Anaheim will move on with a 4-2 series victory.

SAN JOSE SHARKS perhaps the most impressive team of the playoffs thus far, with Marleau, Thornton and Cheechoo on the attack the goals come rather frequently now. They have hit their stride at just the right time, they were amazing down the stretch and made rather easy work of the Nashville Predators. The Oilers were pretty impressive with their defeat of the league leading Red Wings, but they had some serious lapses in that series that the Red Wings couldn’t seem to capitalize on, if they have same power failures against the Sharks it will be a different story. We’ll keep with our theme of six game series and award the Sharks an advance after six games.

To recap, our second series winners shall be.

OTTAWA SENATORS
NEW JERSEY DEVILS
ANAHEIM MIGHTY DUCKS
SAN JOSE SHARKS

We’ll reserve our third round picks until the second round is complete, sometimes you learn your lessons you know!