Results- Week 15

1) A big day/night is complete. We had our second consecitive disapointing week, going 6-7 on the day. this brings our season total to 111-81 for a .578 winning %. How bad was it for us? We even lost our weekly 'lock' to bring that stat to 11-4 on the season.

2) We plan to be back at this for week 16 when another dozen games will be on the NHL docket

Week 15 Picks

1) Its the half way point in the long NHL season. Week 15 brings us a full slate of 13 tough games to pick. We bring our solid 105-74, or a .587 winning% into today/night's action

NY Rangers at Boston: Rangers

Colorado at Buffalo: Avalanche

New Jersey at Montreal: Devils

Florida at Ottawa: Senators

Tampa Bay at Philadelphia: Flyers

Pittsburgh at Toronto: Penguins

Washington at Atlanta: Thrashers

NY Islanders at Phoenix: Coyotes

Anaheim at Nashville: Predators

Chicago at Minnesota: Wild

Calgary at Vancouver: Canucks

St. Louis at Los Angeles: Kings (Lock of The Week)

Detroit at San Jose: Sharks

At The Half Way Point!

1) With most NHL teams having played close to half their 2009-10 schedule we decided to do what we did at-quarter-pole. Basically taking each teams record and project an 82 game season point total based upon each teams current point total/games played. As we wrote then, These are NOT Predictions, they are Projections! Also we will place teams in the order that is used for playoff seeding.

2) First in the East:

New Jersey- 121
Buffalo- 112
Washington- 108
Pittsburgh-101
Boston- 100
Ottawa- 94
NY Rangers- 86
Montreal- 84
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Atlanta- 84 ( Habs edge out by virtue of wins)
Tampa Bay- 84
Philadelphia- 82
NY Islanders- 80
Florida- 80
Toronto- 72
Carolina- 58

3) Next the West:

Chicago- 119
San Jose- 119
Calgary- 106
Phoenix- 103
Colorado- 103
Nashville- 103
Vancouver- 99
Los Angeles- 99
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Detroit- 96
Dallas- 94
Minnesota- 84
St. Louis- 80
Anaheim- 76
Columbus- 74
Edmonton- 70


4) Analysis:

• The first thing that struck us with these numbers is how few points (at this juncture) it will take to make the playoffs in the East, (84). That would be 8-10 points fewer than in the previous post Bettman lock out seasons, and a whopping 15 points less than what it may take out West. Yet another not so subtle reminder of where the best teams are!


• Year to year there really isn't a huge difference in the top 8 in the West (outside of Detroit's precipice fall. In the East the 'biggest losers from last year at this time are the Flyers, Panthers and Hurricanes.

5) Potential first round matchups based upon these PROJECTIONS:

East

• NJ-vs- Montreal


• Buffalo-NY Rangers


• Washington- vs Ottawa


• Pittsburgh-vs- Boston

West

• Chicago-vs-LA


• SJ- vs- Vancouver


• Calgary- Vs- Nashville


• Phoenix-vs- Colorado

Week 14- Results

1) Week 14 is in the books. Not a day/eve to remember for us. We went a piss-poor 5-7. This brings our 14 week total to 105-74, or a .587 winning %. We did manage to secure our 'Lock' to extend that record to 11-3.



2) We will be back here for picks in week 15 next Saturday when 13 games will be up for grabs. Between now and then this could be a busy week for FR. We plan on doing mid point posts on Power rankings, our final standing Projections, and possibly a post on those Devils. As always keep it here for all the latest!

Week 14 Picks

1) Its a new year, but somethings are not going to change here at Fauxrumors. Our wildly popular weekly picks will continue. There are a dozen contests scheduled this afternoon/evening after a slow Holiday Classic day in the NHL yesterday. We bring our 100-67, or a .599 winning % into the day.


Carolina at NY Rangers: Rangers

Vancouver at Dallas: Stars

Pittsburgh at Tampa: Penguins

Washington at Los Angeles: Capitals

Toronto at Calgary: Flames

Atlanta at NY Islanders: Islanders

Colorado at Columbus: Blue Jackets

Chicago at St. Louis: Blues

Detroit at Phoenix: Coyotes

Anaheim at Nashville: Predators

New Jersey at Minnesota: Devils

Edmonton at San Jose: Sharks (Lock of The Week)

Emphatically Stated:West Is Supreme!

1) Its been stated by many (including us here) - http://newfaux.blogspot.com/2009/10/west-still-best.html the past couple of seasons that there was a definite edge to the western conference with respect to overall depth of quality of teams. Sure, the East still wins its share of Cups- as witnessed last season in Pittsburgh, but overall the past few years its inescapable that the West is best!

2) Although they have a commanding edge overall in head to head match ups,(12 of the 15 West teams have winning records against the East!) it was 2 recent games that put a clear and indistinguishable stamp on that. The Sharks thumping of the Capitals and the Blackhawks manhandling the NJ Devils. With respect to the defending champs, the Caps and Devs have been the best overall teams in their conference. So it was with much anticipation that we watched them play two of the arguably 4 top teams out West. The others we'd consider there are Calgary and Vancouver (apologies to the good folks in Phoenix and Denver-that's how good the west is!).

3) In those two bell weather games the West out scored the East 10-3. Now, we do have to mention that in both games the Western team was at home, and in the case of NJ, they were playing the back end of consecutive games played. However, it can't be overlooked how dominating the Sharks and Blackhawks looked. In SJ they held the highest scoring East team to 2 goals (one was kinda fluky). In Chicago the Hawks were able to get 5 goals past Marty Brodeur, who just recently shut out the Penguins (for the 2nd consecutive time this season) as well as being the all time win/shut out leader. Yet the Hawks were able to dismantle the Lemaire/Brodeur defensive enigma with veritable ease.

4) The thing we can't answer is why. Its not like the West has superior players. There is too much player movement that would tend to negate that anyway. Such as a player like a Chris Pronger who started in the East, had some great seasons (Norris Trophy) out West and now is back East. Or Scott Niedermayer (the captain of team Canada) who is now out West after playing/winning Cups in the East. If anything you'd expect the reverse with the increased travel imposed on the West. This is unavoidable regardless of how you schedule games as its just a geographical fact that most of the population lives in the 2 Eastern time zones. This fact though hasn't seemed to matter in head to head play, but some like to use this excuse as to why the Cups are even (or swayed more to the East if you include Detroit (who reside in the Eastern time zone)

5) So going into the second half it will be most fascinating to watch the jockeying in the West where any of the top 8 teams could make it to the Finals. It is an unfortunate result of the way the NHL has its playoff format that 2-3 very good teams are eliminated out west on route to the Finals. These things do tend to be cyclical though. 20 years ago it was the east that had the majority of quality teams. We'd expect that in time the East will probably rebound, but the way things have gone thus far this season, its NOT going to be during the 09-10 season!