It’s that time of the year where the NHL playoffs are about to start. Of course, that means that the Leafs are preparing to hit the links soon. But being a hockey fan, I’m still excited about a couple of the playoff races as the season winds down.

The fates of Toronto and Calgary seem to be linked this year. After this season’s biggest blockbuster trade between the two teams, it seemed like both teams would be improved. Toronto has seemed to play with more life with the addition of Phaneuf (now we lose in OT/SO instead of in regulation). While Calgary has a lot of spare parts lying around but seemed to have improved their overall scoring. Calgary were in playoff position earlier in the season, but fell lower in the standings and have been trying to claw their way back in ever since. They won a pivotal game against the Colorado on Friday but still need a couple of more wins to secure 8^th spot.

The Eastern conference also has a couple of interesting races. The Flyers are single-handedly removing themselves from the playoff race. I think they were as high as 6^th but with something like 7 goalies on their roster they are in total freefall. Their story is interesting just to see a team not named the NYR implode.

Both the Bruins and Montreal were struggling to make the playoffs earlier in the season, but it seems like they both will make it in now. The Bruins are another team which are linked with the Leafs due to the Kessel trade. We’ve had a few opportunities to play Boston in the recent weeks and (outright) wins would have been a setback to Boston’s playoff hopes, and decreased their chance of getting the #1 pick in this year’s draft. Unfortunately the Leafs haven’t taken full advantage of their opportunities.

There are only a few more games before the story unfolds, but it’s exciting and I want to see the conclusion. The only drawback is when the season ends, my Leafs Twitter account will become dormant until next winter.

Posted by Kevin in Blogs Tags: hockey