Stars - best of Wednesday 27th November

Stars is our daily look at the previous night's action in the NHL and who stood out amongst the rest.

First, Happy Thanksgiving to all Americans. Enjoy the day whilst the rest of the world go to work.

Back to a full program in the NHL last night with 13 games played, and for the joy of fans, after the last few days of dominant goaltending it was literally raining goals last night.

And it was an emotional night in Florida, as the Philadelphia Flyers visited the Tampa Bay Lightning with Bolts legend Vinny Lecavalier and another former Bolts favourite in Steve Downie on the team.

FIRST STAR

 

Evgeni Malkin - PITTSBURGH PENGUINS vs Toronto Maple Leafs

Another two goal, one assist performance here. Malkin's effort came as the Pens fought back from 4-1 and 5-3 down to beat the Leafs 6-5 in a shootout. His assist and 2nd goal were the Pens 4th and 5th goals. He also scored the game sealing goal in the shootout.



SECOND STAR

 

Victor Hedman - TAMPA BAY LIGHTNING vs Philadelphia Flyers

Hedman had a point on each of Tampa's first three goals, scorer of the 1st & 3rd, plus an assist on the 2nd.

Here's his first goal. Ray Emery and goalie's everywhere, watch with caution. This may cause harm to your health.



THIRD STAR

Patrick Kane - CHICAGO BLACKHAWKS vs Calgary Flames

Kane played the hero with the game winner on a clever backhand shot. He scored the first Blackhawks goal in what turned out to be a two goal night for him.




Honourable Mentions

Tomas Tatar did this.....



Sean Monahan continues to impress and had a nice goal on a wrist shot.......



Brendan Gallagher is now one goal short of hitting double digits for the 2nd consecutive season. This ripper on the PP, the number one PP on the road, was his 9th of the campaign....



Brad Richards scored a long range goal for the Rangers on Tim Thomas.....




MY PICKS

3-2 for me last night. Pittsburgh, St Louis and San Jose with the wins.


NOTE: Yesterday's "The Night Ahead" will be the last one for the foreseeable future. Unless somebody else would like to write it everyday.

Podcast - November 26th Edition

Between The Pipes - November 26th Edition

LISTEN HERE


or you can subscribe on itunes!

In this edition Nick, Ross and Junaid go over the weeks headlines, our picks for goals and saves of the week, and make our prediction league picks for this week. In "Four Teams" we talk about Calgary, Nashville, New Jersey and San Jose. Ross gives us his "Things that happened since the Red Wings last missed the playoffs" stat.

Saves of the week

Nick: Martin Brodeur vs San Jose on Logan Couture - 23/11/13



Ross: Reto Berra vs Columbus on Jack Johnson - 20/11/13



Junaid: Cam Ward vs Ottawa on Colin Greening - 24/11/13



Goals of the week

Nick: Max Pacioretty vs Minnesota (2nd goal) on Josh Harding - 20/11/13



Ross: Jonathan Toews SHG vs Edmonton on Devan Dubnyk - 25/11/13



Junaid: Alex Ovechkin vs Montreal on Peter Budaj- 23/11/13



Prediction League

TABLE

Nick - 2/6
Ross - 2/6
Junaid - 0/6

This weeks games/picks:

Anaheim @ Dallas
Boston @ Detroit
Toronto @ Pittsburgh
St Louis @ Colorado
Toronto @ Montreal
Vancouver @ New York Rangers

Nick: ANA, BOS, PIT, STL, MTL, NYR
Ross: DAL, BOS, PIT, STL, TOR, NYR
Junaid: ANA, BOS, TOR, STL, MTL, NYR

THINGS THAT HAPPENED SINCE DETROIT LAST MISSED THE PLAYOFFS
by Ross Chaplin

The Berlin Wall wasn't officially finished being pulled down until Detroit had already started the first season of their run of consecutive playoff seasons.


And finally, Nashville's ode to all things American........





Email us any questions you'd like us to answer at betweenthepipespodcast@hotmail.com and we will answer them during recording. Also you can direct anything our way on twitter, @NickVarney90, @j_hussain & @MasonCooper4.

Stars - best of Monday 25th November

Stars is our daily look at the previous night's action in the NHL and who stood out amongst the rest.

FIRST STAR

 

Martin St Louis - TAMPA BAY LIGHTNING vs New York Rangers

It was a big night for Marty. It was his 1000th game in the NHL and he celebrated the best way he knows. By scoring twice and assisting on another.

SECOND STAR

 

Ben Bishop - TAMPA BAY LIGHTNING vs New York Rangers

Bishop had a 37 save shutout on a night when the skaters in front of him put goals passed two Rangers goaltenders.


THIRD STAR

 

James Neal - PITTSBURGH PENGUINS vs Boston Bruins

Neal had a huge night in the Pens 4-3 OT defeat. He picked up two goals and as assist. His goals bought the Penguins back from a 2-0 deficit to tie the game. His assist came with a couple of seconds left as he threw the puck to the front of the net and watched on as Kunitz moved it on to Crosby, who scored with 0.3 seconds left to send it to OT.

 

Honourable Mentions

Ryan Johansen had two goals (5th and 6th) in the Blue Jackets 6-0 win in Toronto...... Tim Thomas went 38/39 for a .974 SV%...... Loui Eriksson had a goal and two assists in the Bruins win, including a secondary assist on the game winner..... Andrew Shaw had two goals and an assist as the Blackhawks overcame Edmonton....... Corey Crawford had a .960 SV% in the game, stopping 24 shots from 25...... Ben Scrivens gave up two goals off of 39 shots faced for a .949 SV% and had this four save effort to help the team to victory.

Daniel Sedin received a high stick to the face in Vancouver's loss at home to LA. He responded by pulling out his tooth

 

 

 

MY PICKS

2-3 on the night with St Louis and LA winning.

The Night Ahead - Monday 25th November 2013

In "The Night Ahead" we take a look at a selection (well, five) of the upcoming games for the evening (early hours here in the UK) and add a preview and opinion on the match ups.
Back to a nice full plate of games tonight after a lazy Sunday. So without further ado.....

PITTSBURGH PENGUINS @ BOSTON BRUINS

The cream of the Eastern conference do battle at the Gaaaahden! This is a rematch of last seasons Conference final in which the B's swept the Pens away in four games, only giving up TWO goals in the process. This is the second meeting between the two since, the other a 3-2 home win for Pittsburgh.

The Penguins come into this game 5-5-0 in their last 10, including a 3 win streak that was halted on Saturday night in Montreal. The large majority of points being scored by Crosby, Malkin, Kunitz and Neal. The run also saw the emergence of Brian Gibbons who had a goal and an assist in the recent 3-1 win over the Anaheim Ducks.

Boston went 7-1-2 in their last 10, the regulation loss coming to the Jekyll and Hyde style Ottawa Senators. They needed a David Krejci OT winner to fend off Carolina on Saturday, and have relied on the great form of Reilly Smith, Carl Soderberg, Torey Krug, and Gregory Campbell in their last five outings.

This is going to be a heavy hitting, great watch for neutrals. I'm going with Pittsburgh on this one.

MINNESOTA WILD @ ST LOUIS BLUES

Despite the showdown above this is the big game NBCSN have plumped for tonight. Oh, and it's going to be just as epic!

A home win make St Louis the belle of the ball, the star on the tree, 1st overall in the NHL. Minnesota aim to tie Chicago as 2nd best in the league.

8-1-1 in their last 10, Minnesota's only regulation loss was a 6-2 humbling away to the Montreal Canadiens. Parise, Koivu and Pominville have been the offensive stars for the Wild with a steady helping of blue line attack from Ryan Suter. This team, bar that one ugly game, is on a roll right now and should be feared by all.

8-1-1 in their last 10, Minnesota, St Louis have found themselves with one of the leagues shiniest diamonds, polished from the rough. Alex Steen. Second in goals, third in points. Steen is slowly becoming a player that the opposition have to plan around, and with that new found attention he'll be jumping at the bit to ride this momentum so long as he has air in his lungs. But if the flame does start to flicker there's a great supporting cast in David Backes, T.J. Oshie, Alex Pietrangelo, plus 2nd year winger Vladimir Tarasenko to pick up the slack. Despite being routed by the Caps 4-1 recently, the Blues have beaten Colorado, Boston and crushed Dallas in their last game.

This game is the Western conference equivalent of the Pens @ Bruins.

I can't decide so will plump for home advantage.

NEW YORK RANGERS @ TAMPA BAY LIGHTNING

The Rangers are on a two game win streak and are 6-4-0 in their last 10. The losses coming in no shame to Anaheim, Boston, LA and rivals New Jersey. Richards, Stepan, Kreider and Zuccarello have been on top form for the Blueshirts, and have been buoyed on by the return of Rick Nash who already has a goal in his three games back.

Tampa Bay have been without captain, and leading scorer Steven Stamkos for six games since he broke his leg on a backcheck in Boston. They sit level on points with Detroit and Toronto, 3rd in the division and 4th in the conference, despite going 0-3-1 in their last 4. only winning the first two games after Stamkos' injury. They beat Anaheim 5-1 with three points for Valtteri Filppula, who many said had to up his game to fill the void left. Their last 4 games were at Phoenix (6-3), at LA (5-2), at San Jose (5-1), and at Anaheim (1-0 OT).

I haven't mentioned the Rangers goaltending but that's the reason I'll take them. Whether it's Lundqvist or Talbot in nets.

WINNIPEG JETS @ NEW JERSEY DEVILS

This is a perfect game for the Devils to continue their attempt to crash the East conference playoff battle. Having gone 6-3-1 in the last 10. The losses coming to hot teams in, Minnesota, LA, San Jose and Toronto in a shootout. The six wins include a 4-1 rout over the Penguins, plus two OT wins in LA and Anaheim. Jaromir Jagr has been rolling back the years and finds himself as the teams top scorer. Followed by Elias, Zidlicky, Zubrus, Henrique and Ryder.

Winnipeg have gone 5-3-2 recently, but after their last three wins came in a bunch and were in shootouts they have lost four in a row. Two regulation, two shootouts.

New Jersey sit 4th in the Metropolitan and are outside the playoffs by a point. Winnipeg would be in that position but only behind the Rangers on the fact they've played more games. But being in the West they find themselves 3rd bottom of the conference. Little, Ladd, Wheeler, Kane and Byfuglien lead the Jets in scoring, Little and Wheeler putting down some doubters after the big contracts they signed in the offseason.

I've gotta go Devils on this. Whose fans, despite management changing the goal song, found a new way to chant "You suck!"

LOS ANGELES KIGNS @ VANCOUVER CANUCKS

LA come into tonight 6-1-3 over the previous ten outings, having lost their last two at home in OT to New Jersey and Colorado. Vancouver on the over hand are a little less steady in their form, going 3-4-3 in the last 10, six losses in their last seven games at the hands of LA, Anaheim, San Jose, Dallas, Florida and Chicago.

I've written a fair amount about these teams in the last few days. So won't bore you with re-written information. But, will send you in the direction of these posts - The Night Ahead - Friday 22nd, Stars of Friday 22nd & The Night Ahead - Saturday 23rd.

LA are my pick.


Tonight's picks: Pittsburgh, St Louis, New York Rangers, New Jersey, LA.

Stars - the best of Friday 22nd November

Stars is our daily look at the previous night's action in the NHL and who stood out amongst the rest.

FIRST STAR

 

Chris Kunitz - PITTSBURGH PENGUINS vs New York Islanders

Kunitz had a brilliant night at the Consol Energy Center last night. Picking up two goals and an assist. He had his hat trick goal waived off for a high stick penalty on Evgeni Malkin that shouldn't have been called a penalty. He went on to continually harass the Isles D and with 1:16 left in the game, tied at 3-3, he crashed Radek Martinek into the boards behind the Isles goal, tapped it off to Pascal Dupuis who slid it to Sidney Crosby for the game winner. Also Crosby's 250th NHL goal.

SECOND STAR

Daniel Sedin - VANCOUVER CANUCKS vs Columbus Blue Jackets

Daniel picked up three points in this 6-2 Canucks win, one goal and two assists. His goal tied the game at 1-1 after some nice work behind the net he skated to the front and let rip towards Bobrovsky. He had his shot saved and brother Henrik put in the rebound for 3-1. Then midway through the 3rd he had a shot from the blue line tipped in for Henrik's 2nd of the night.

THIRD STAR

 

Sidney Crosby - PITTSBURGH PENGUINS vs New York Islanders

As mentioned above, Sid had the game winner which was also his 250th NHL goal. He also assisted on Kunitz's first goal and would have had the primary assist on Kunitz's hat trick goal if the refs didn't make the "high stick" call on Malkin.

Honourable Mentions

Henrik Sedin had a two goal night off his brother Daniel's rebound and then tipped in one of Daniel's shots.

Thomas Vanek also had two goals in the Islanders loss to Pittsburgh. With Kyle Okposo picking up as assist on each.

Alex Ovechkin scored two against the Canadiens. He isn't amongst the stars as he routinely scores on the Habs. He now has 34 points in 32 games against them.

Josh Gorges had two assists in the Habs 3-2 win at the Verizon Center, including on Briere's game winner and on the Habs 2nd which was David Desharnais' first goal in 26 regular season and playoff games.

Ben Bishop. 41 saves for the Tampa Bay Lightning against the Anaheim Ducks remarkably wasn't enough for the toothless Bolts. He unfortunately had a big gaff too. Letting a Ryan Getzlaf shot sneak under his glove and bounce goalwards. No thanks to defenseman Richard Panik who lived up to his name and in the heat of the moment used his stick and inadvertently stopped Bishop making a routine goal line glove grab and giving Anaheim the win with 5 seconds left in OT.

MY PICKS

Last night I went 3-2 in my picks with Calgary and Montreal pulling out wins.

The Night Ahead - Friday 22nd November 2013

In "The Night Ahead" we take a look at a selection of the upcoming games for the evening (early hours here in the UK) and add a preview and opinion on the match ups.

NEW YORK ISLANDERS @ PITTSBURGH PENGUINS

The recently tumbling Isles face the Penguins for the second time this season. They won the first meeting, in Pittsburgh, 4-3 in regulation. Frans Nielsen, 1 goal & 2 assists, including an assist on the game winner, and Radek Martinek, 2 assists, had a big hand that night. They also had a large contribution from Evgeni Nabakov, who recorded 39 saves. The win put the Islanders comfortably in the Metropolitan top three places (a guaranteed playoff berth), but since then the Isles have accumulated just EIGHT points in the twelve games since and dropped to bottom in the division.

Pittsburgh on the other hand were top of the division back then and that loss didn't do much to halt their season. They've gone 6-5-0 since and are joint second in the conference at the quarter way point of the season. In no surprise it's yet again Crosby, Malkin, Kunitz and Dupuis who are amongst the Pens top scorers this year combining for 24 of the teams 55 goals, and 48 of the teams 97 assists. Marc Andre Fleury is also back to his regular season best. Posting a .924 save percentage and a 1.90 GAA.

I'm taking the Penguins in this one. There's been a lot of shocks recently with Vancouver, Colorado and other early leaders falling to bottom feeders, but this one has to be a home win for one of the East's perennial best teams.

MONTREAL CANADIENS @ WASHINGTON CAPITALS

The Montreal Canadiens march in to the Verizon Center tonight to face a side who were blown away by the Penguins on home ice Wednesday night, so expect some sort of response from the Caps.

After a difficult October, the Capitals entered the second month of the season 5-7-0. In November they've won all but three games and currently sit 12-9-1 in second in the Metro behind Pittsburgh. Alex Ovechkin has continued his hot form from last term notching up 17 of the teams 69 goals. They also have Backstrom, Grabovski and Johansson putting up 19, 11 and 16 assists respectively.

Montreal come into tonight on a somewhat opposite track to Washington. They enjoyed a very successful October but haven't kept it up this month only recording 3 wins so far. But might have once again pushed up a gear after beating Minnesota 6-2 in their last outing. Carey Price, like Fleury, has returned to form after a playoff meltdown last spring and has a .935 save percentage and a 2.05 GAA. It's hard to pinpoint a true dangerman in the Habs ranks as none of their 13 goal scorers have scored more than eight.

This is probably the toughest game of the night to call as the case for both teams is that you never which version will turn up.

I'll go for a narrow Caps win.

FLORIDA PANTHERS @ CALGARY FLAMES

This is one of those games that will probably get ignored by the casual fan. To put it in Premier League terms this would be like watching Reading vs QPR last season.

The Panthers changed coach after going 3-9-4 in their first 16 games and have limped to 6-13-4 since, although those three wins did come against Anaheim, Colorado and Vancouver. The latter two on the road. Similar to the Canadiens, none of their goal scorers have topped the 8 mark but it's the back end that suffers the most. They have Stanley Cup winner Tim Thomas between the pipes, ahem, and despite him being in better form than most expected it's still not his Boston Bruins cup winning form. He could be playing that well but with the players in front of him they'd still be in a similar position because with Thomas, Markstrom and Clemmenson combined the Panthers have shipped 76 goals in 23 games this season.

It's fair to say that Calgary are the Western conference equivalent to the Panthers. Both sit 2nd bottom in their respective conferences, and at 7-11-4 Calgary have given up 81 goals, 2nd to Provincial neighbours Edmonton on 84. In a hard to watch season for Flames fans they do have hope in the form of Jiri Hudler and rookie Sean Monahan. The teams top contributors with 21 and 14 points.

There's not much to say about these teams. They are terrible. I would usually go for the home team in this scenario but as mentioned above Florida have beaten Colorado and Vancouver on the road already.

I'm going for a Panthers win.

COLUMBUS BLUE JACKETS @ VANCOUVER CANUCKS

This season has been a coming down to Earth with a bump for Columbus. Last season's surprise package they nearly made the playoffs for the first time in their history, on the back of some excellent goalie play from Sergei Bobrovsky. Now in the Eastern conference and, like many suggested towards the end of the last season, they are having rather a hard time. The player they made a huge "win now" trade for, Marian Gaborik, is out for the foreseeable future and big free agent acquisition Nathan Horton has yet to even play after having shoulder surgery in July. They currently sit on a 8-11-3 record that puts them four points off of a playoff place. With Gaborik out they still have four skaters who are ahead of him on the scorers list. Wisniewski, Dubinsky, Johansen and Umberger on 16. 15. 13 and 12 points.

The "struggle after realignment" tag was also lumped on the Vancouver Canucks. Coming out of a Northwest Division that they yearly won at a canter, and entering the fiercely contested Pacific Division. A bigger change some might say has been adapting to the style of John Totorella, and his more defensive game plan compared to previous coach Alain Vigneault. The Sedin twins have racked up huge minutes this year and have struggled immensely in the last couple of weeks. Daniel more than Henrik. One positive from the new style is the resurgence of Ryan Kesler who has 9 goals and 6 assists, but like the Sedins is playing an awful lot of minutes. At 11-8-4 they have dropped out of the playoff spots in the significantly stronger West.

The Jackets beat the Canucks on home ice a month ago, in a 3-1 win with goals coming from Gaborik, Johansen and Umberger. With backup netminder Curtis McElhinney putting up 38 saves. The Canucks goal was scored by Henrik Sedin and an assist awarded to Kesler.

Despite the recent struggles I'll go for a Canucks win.

TAMPA BAY LIGHTNING @ ANAHEIM DUCKS

This is another potentially great match up tonight. Both have very similar records. Tampa 14-8-0, Anaheim 15-6-3, and both are amongst the top scorers in their conferences.

A big moment came when Tampa's star and leading scorer, Steven Stamkos, broke his leg in Boston 11 days ago. But Tampa have pressed on unfazed and one of the seasons big surprises are continuing to go on well despite fears the Stamkos injury would derail the team. Martin St Louis continues to put up good numbers season after season, and the void left by Stamkos has been filled nicely by free agent signing Valtteri Filppula adding 9 goals and 7 assists to the teams totals.

Anaheim are coached by perennial regular season great Bruce Boudreau. They won the Pacific last year and looked good in a seven game series lost to Detroit. As of now they're tied for the divison lead with California rivals the San Jose Sharks. You wouldn't be shocked to see Corey Perry and Ryan Getzlaf lead the way for the Ducks, and despite trading away 30 goal a year man Bobby Ryan, they have enjoyed excellent play from Dustin Penner, Nick Bonino, Matthie Perreault and Andrew Cogliano.

Tampa beat Anaheim 5-1 in Florida last week but on their current West road trip have suffered three straight losses. Anaheim have also lost their three games since these sides last met but once in a shootout to Carolina, once in OT after scoring an own goal to win it for the Devils, and only once in regulation to the brilliant Penguins.

I'll go for a high scoring tight home win.



Tonight's picks: Pittsburgh, Washington, Florida, Vancouver, Anaheim.