NHL Playoffs 2011: 10 Bold Predictions for the Eastern Conference Finals
It's the veteran Tampa Bay Lightning squad with Vincent Lecavalier, Martin St. Louis, and Dwayne Roloson taking on the scrappy Boston Bruins with Zdeno Chara, Milan Lucic, and David Krejci.
Who will prevail?
Here are a few bold predictions regarding this year's rendition of the Eastern Conference Finals.
1. Rest Will Favor the Lightning
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Both teams are coming off a long layoff. This layoff will benefit the Lightning more.
They have older legs in Martin St. Louis and Vincent Lecavalier. Their goalie Dwayne Roloson is 41 years of age and will use the time off to relax after two tough series against the Penguins and Capitals.
The Lightning will also continue to rely on Martin St. Louis' offense and he will enter TD Garden Saturday night with fresh legs. Expect St. Louis to have a multi-point game in Game 1 in a Lightning win.
The extra time off will also benefit Steven Stamkos.
The long layoff will give him more time to introspectively look at his game, calm down, and start producing at the rate he was producing in the regular season.
On the other hand, after sweeping Philadelphia it seems like Boston wanted to continue playing they were so hot. The long layoff takes away some of their momentum and they will struggle early.
2. Rest Will Hurt Sean Bergenheim
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Sean Bergenheim has had an unbelievable postseason thus far.
After scoring the game winning goal in Game 7 against the Penguins, Bergenheim scored four goals in four games against Washington, including two in the series clincher.
After pretty much dominating opponents though, he was faced with a long layoff.
The same way how the Bruins probably wanted to keep playing while they were hot after sweeping the Flyers, Sean Bergenheim probably wants to keep playing after being on a hot streak.
The layoff will take away some of the momentum Bergenheim had in the first two rounds. So here's a bold prediction: Sean Bergenheim will not score in this series.
3. Road Teams Will Dominate the Series
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Both of these teams play styles that can take the home crowd out of games.
The Lightning play the 1-3-1 defensive scheme which has been very difficult to penetrate.
The Bruins have shutdown forwards like Shawn Thornton and David Paille and shutdown defensemen like Zdeno Chara.
Watching defensive hockey is not the most exciting brand of hockey and both of these teams play it well. This means they will try to take the home crowd out of games.
With the home crowd silent, the home team will try to get out of their way to generate crowd noise by making plays that they would not otherwise make if they were on the road.
These risky plays will become turnovers and will turn into odd-man rushes for the road team. Because of this, the road teams will be more successful than the home teams in this series.
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4. Teams That Score First Will Dominate the Series
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As mentioned in the previous slide, both of teams play shutdown defensive hockey that prevents opponents from coming back from deficits.
In the Eastern Conference Semifinals teams that scored first went 7-1 in games.
The Lightning scored first in all four wins against the Capitals. The Bruins scored first in three of their four wins.
In fact, in all Bruins playoff games the team to score first has been 9-2. In all Lightning playoff games, the team to score first has been 10-1.
See a trend?
This exemplifies the lack of ability in coming back from deficits for both of these teams. It also shows that when they get a lead it's very hard for them to relinquish it.
So who will score first in games generally?
5. Bruins Will Use Home Crowd for Energy to Score First Often
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It was mentioned before that road teams will dominate the series because of both teams' ability to play shut down defense.
Road teams can take out the crowd if they don't allow a goal early in the game. Early on, crowds are generally very rowdy.
The Bruins play in Boston, one of the greatest sports towns in America. Their crowd will be rowdy.
The Bruins will use the crowd's energy to their advantage and score early, especially in games later in the series. Once up, they will clamp down and shut down the Lightning.
They have the goaltending to play this brand of hockey. But the key is to convert on chances early in the game to keep the crowd loud in Boston.
6. Bruins Will Get More Secondary Scoring
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As mentioned before, Sean Bergenheim will cool down in this series. This puts a lot of pressure on Tampa's secondary scoring.
Tampa generally relies on St. Louis, Lecavalier, Malone, and Stamkos. They have plenty of big name scorers but teams need secondary scoring in order to win series in the playoffs.
Boston has a balanced scoring attack. They have three players with five goals in the playoffs. They have depth on their third and fourth lines that can also score.
Guys like Daniel Paille, Michael Ryder, and veteran Mark Recchi will contribute and score in this series.
The Bruins had 10-plus goals from 12 players in the regular season. The Lightning had 10 players with 10-plus goals.
The Lightning also had 41 percent of their goals come from three players (Lecavalier, Stamkos, St. Louis) and most of those came from Stamkos, who is struggling. The Bruins had 40 percent of their goals come from four players.
They have more depth from their scoring and this will help them a lot.
The Lightning have to deal with great goaltending in Tim Thomas and a tough defensive corps. It will be very difficult for them to rely on just scoring from Stamkos and St. Louis.
With Bergenheim having peaked in the playoffs, they need someone else to step up. Will it happen? Most likely not because of Boston's defense.
They only allowed 195 goals in the regular season which was the least in the Eastern Conference. They also have a hot goalie in Tim Thomas.
7. Roloson Will Crack Before Thomas Does
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Speaking of goaltending, there are two veteran goalies playing unbelievable hockey right now.
The veteran Dwayne Roloson has been in this position before previously in 2006 with Edmonton. Tim Thomas enters uncharted territory. However, he has a better defense in front of him.
After a stellar first round performance against an anemic Penguins offense that would not get quality shots off Roloson and struggled on the powerplay, Roloson allowed three goals on two seperate occasions against the Capitals.
His offense bailed him out in those games against a shaky Michal Neuvirth.
The offense won't have such an easy time against Tim Thomas and Boston's defense, which is far superior to Washington's despite having similar goals allowed stats. Roloson will also do a great job becasue of experience.
He had two great series against the Penguins and Capitals where he had numerous 30-plus save games. He will steal a game or two for his team but in the end, he's 41 years old. It's already mid-May.
His age will catch up to him quicker than it catches up with Thomas does and he will not be bailed out by the Lightning offense this time around.
8. TV Ratings Will Increase from Last Year's Eastern Conference Finals
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Versus and NBC continue to a great job in their 2011 playoff coverage.
The first round was the most watched on cable in 17 years and the most watched on network TV in seven years.
Expect these trends to continue especially with a big market team in the Conference Finals.
One would think having a non-traditional team will lower the ratings, but let's go out on a limb and say that the Bruins/Lightning series will produce higher ratings than last season's Flyers/Habs series.
Hockey TV ratings are growing and this series has stars on Tampa's squad and an Original Six team involved. Expect a smile on Bettman's face when this one's through.
9. No Overtime Games in This Series
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A whopping 20 games have gone to overtime this playoff season. That's 29 percent of all games played. Last year in the whole playoffs 18 games went to overtime.
Law of averages have to kick in right?
Bold prediction: No games will go to overtime in this series.
10. Bruins in 6
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With all that said, the Bruins will take the series in six games.
After losing the first game at home because of rusty play, they will bounce back with two straight wins. They will get up on top of the Lightning early in Game 2 and take out the Tampa crowd in Game 3.
The Lightning will respond in Game 4 with a great performance by Roloson before losing in Game 5 to an upstart and rowdy Boston crowd.
The Bruins will rely on secondary scoring and tough physical play to make Roloson and the Lightning uncomfortable and take the series in six.
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