15 Comments
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Kenneth Gardner's avatar

Just an awful game. And the Roope Hintz injury makes me sick. Injuries are part of the game, but that slash was deliberate and that goon should be suspended.

The Stars had 27 giveaways and only 5 takeaways. They didn’t take care of the puck. I read somewhere that they had more giveaways in the 2nd period than they had in an entire game all season. Can’t win that way. And also the 6 penalties that they took, against that team.

The effort was good, but not smart.

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John Araki's avatar

Looming is bad? What you got against weaving fabric Robert?😂

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HaoWei He's avatar

Who slots to top line C if Hintz is out? Wyatt? Does he have to get a Finnish work visa to get that spot?

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Robert Tiffin's avatar

Johnston is the easy answer here, I think. Steel up to 3C, and 10 centering the fourth line.

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PhilT's avatar

This teams biggest weaknesses reared their ugly head last night and will probably keep them from winning a cup.

1.) this team isn’t physical enough to beat a talented and physical team. They can’t get an easy pick clear out of their zone and it’s been that way for 3 years at least.

2.) They are the worst passing team in the playoffs. It’s maddening how many passes to nowhere they have each game.

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Robert Tiffin's avatar

They're capable of completely flummoxing the other guys with their passing when it goes right. It just goes badly when it goes wrong.

The Oilers aren't any more physical than Winnipeg. Dallas can win this series if they don't get into penalty trouble, but they'll need to be better about holding onto the puck, for sure.

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May 24
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Michael Strawn's avatar

How do you reconcile the fact this team isn’t physically and has a “horrendous” passing and transition game since PDB arrived and the fact they’ve advance to conf finals each of his years?

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May 24
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Michael Strawn's avatar

Yeah let's just say I think his achievements speak for themselves. You want to dismiss playoff series victories go ahead; I value them.

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May 24
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dcross0's avatar

Not a long time hockey guy and I know it's a rough sport. Regular checking and such is part of the game but that slash to the feet seems intentional for injury. Seems like long time hockey guys though don't think too much of it. Clean hard play to me is appropriate but taking out players seems over the line. But if's that game, shouldn't we then retaliate if they're going to allow it? Also I thought the Stars didn't look terrible but just need to score, A goal or something in the 2nd period would have been nice. I felt they outplayed them for 17 minutes of the quarter and then boom.

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Robert Tiffin's avatar

He doesn't wind up crazy big or anything, so in the moment, it looks like pretty standard tit-for-tat stuff. But the location is a sneaky painful one--there isn't much of any protection on the top of the foot, because pucks tend to come from the side or the front, not down onto it.

Yeah, it felt like Dallas just needed one to break the dam, but they couldn't find it. This should be a long series, I suspect.

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Michael Strawn's avatar

Again, I’m with deBoer, if that’s McDavid carried off the ice it’s a major penalty and entire hockey world is lamenting what a dirty shot it was.

The puck wasn’t near. If not an intent to injure what’s the purpose?

NHL guys who defend this stuff infuriate me bc it’s the difference between the NBA and the NHL….one league understands stars are the reasons fans show up and they protect those stars. The other waves away slashes, hits to the head and reward low talent goons while their superstars watch playoff games from the hospital room.

Which makes more sense to you?

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Robert Tiffin's avatar

I'm probably the wrong person for this, because I'm just not expecting the cultural problems with NHL discipline to change any time soon. Suspensions aren't consistent, and neither are penalties. So I mostly just try to predict what I think they'll do rather than what they should do. Because I tend to want much harsher punishments in almost every case than the offenders ever get.

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Michael Strawn's avatar

Feel you and many others around the NHL have been gaslit into believing "this is the way it has to be".

Too many coaches, GMs, journalists and even fans excuse this kind of behavior, saying "it's hockey".

It doesn't have to be. They could call the rule book as it's written. But they don't And then too many around the game act like there's nothing that can be done.

It's why the NHL is an amateurish bushleague compared to NFL, NBA, MLB. You don't have a rulebook; you have refs "evening the calls out".

If there's no real consequence to breaking a player's bone on an action that has nothing to do with playing hockey and isn't anywhere near the puck you don't actually have any rules.

Calls and punishments come down to "vibes" and how the officials are feeling at that given moment.

The NHL would rather send a superstar to the hospital than a goon to the penalty box.

Tells you all you need to know.

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Robert Tiffin's avatar

I mean, I pasted the rulebook excerpt in here. I'm not trying to accept anything or give people a pass. It's an ugly play that shouldn't be in the game, and the rules say as much. But it's more an issue of institutional tolerance of the behavior than of favoritism. I don't think we're disagreeing here.

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