A few days ago we took an inside look at players who have performed significantly better at home over the season and have more home games left on the season than road games. This information could set expectations for your playoff run and reveal who is worth playing or benching, depending on which town they're skating in. To build on that logic, I will now look into the road warrior, a player who has performed better on the road than at home this season.
The stretch drive is on in both North American major junior and pro hockey. What- and who- will the NHL's playoffless teams have to look forward to in June should they fail to find that extra gear in time?
In three successive seasons, future #1 NHL draft picks John Tavares, Patrick Kane and Taylor Hall were named CHL rookie of the year. The following season, the winner was Brett Connolly. So the Tampa Lightning product certainly has the pedigree to become a major stud in the NHL.
Greetings Hockey Fans! After a rough Saturday night two columns ago where my streak of continually improving on my prior week’s record ended, I rebounded quite nicely choosing four of six winners two weeks ago. (Although I went five for six (83%), if you count my selection of the Bruins in SO, despite them getting the job done in regulation.) I also wanted to give Marty a standing O for his dead-on call last weekend of the Oilers impending repeat whipping of the Avs. He even nailed the score! Anyhow, here’s to a 3rd straight impressive week from the Dobber 6-Pack Saturday night crew!
I wanted to take a look back at the spread done during Week 19 that outlines team’ matchups during the fantasy playoffs this year. Keep an eye out for the teams that are only playing two game weeks throughout these playoffs as some of them are fairly big fantasy performers (they’re in bold). Here is a quick rundown of the two and four game weeks throughout the playoffs for the Monday – Sunday week:
I was going to title this article Flight of the Condra as we might be witnessing Erik Condra's career starting to take off, but when I heard that some are calling him AnaCondra, well that's golden.
There are a few players in the league who are dominant no matter where they are playing. Jarome Iginla is a good example. He has 66 points in 68 games this season and of those, 33 have been recorded both at home and on the road. Another example is Rick Nash, who has 29 points at home and on the road, but not every player is wired this way. Many perform either better on the road or better at home and in this two part series, I'll look at both.
We’re turning the final corner of the fantasy season and depending on your league settings you could be heading down a few different paths. Let’s look at those who are gunning for a money spot in Roto leagues, or those entering the playoffs in H2H leagues. If you are in a tight league where every little stat matters, making the smart adds/drops could determine whether you are the league champion or just another one of the 10 or 12 disappointed losers. At this point of the season it’s not about what your players have done for you all season long, it’s all about what your player will do for you in the next four weeks that will determine your fantasy fate.
Regardless of age, experience, or skill level, an NHL goaltender must always prove themselves on a nightly basis. Failure to do so results in an open door or an extra start for their counterpart. From there, the potential for a goalie to collect rust or lose their rhythm and confidence grows. Such is the life of a goaltender, where every minute matters.
Like the kickback on a gun, Charlie Coyle has gone and smacked the hockey world right in its face. Coyle didn't receive much hype leading up to last summer's draft coming out of the relatively unknown EJHL but he showed enough promise for the San Jose Sharks to pick him up in the first round (28th overall).
