SNN Predicts: 2017 NHL Division Semi-Finals

Welcome to the...ah, crap, I can't use that intro anymore. Not really, anyway. I mean, I am still calling it "SNN Predicts," even though there is no more Still No Name, and I'm on a space I created specifically for this purpose, but...whatever. I was getting bored of that joke, anyway. Um...holy shit what's that over there?!

Right. Predictions. Let's do that thing!

[Note: "Possession", in this case, refers to shot attempt percentage, adjusted for zone starts, venue, and score, courtesy of Corsica.Hockey. I'm not sure I get zone starts, because those are already a factor of possession, but whatever, I'm sure the stats guys have their reasons, because it's default, almost unavoidable, on all the surviving stats sites. This is what I get for being off Hockey Twitter for two and a half years, I guess.]

Adams Division Semifinals

(1) Montreal Canadiens vs. (WC) New York Rangers

Playoff History: A lot of historical matchups, if not a hell of a lot of history, really. The last series, three years ago, was just the second in the last 30 years, but prominently featured Chris Kreider murdering Carey Price early, which exposed the Not Very Good Montreal Canadiens for who they were. Poor Dustin Tokarski; he did play well, but he was no Carey Price.

1930 SF	1932 SF	1933 QF	1935 QF	1950 SF	1956 SF	1957 SF	1967 SF
2-0	3-1	8-5*	6-5*	4-1	4-1	4-1	4-0
1969 QF	1972 QF	1974 QF	1979 SCF	1986 CF	1996 CQF	2014 CF
4-0	4-2	4-2	4-1	4-1	4-2	4-2

* - Denotes two-game, total-goals series.

Previously On...Survivor: The Habs joined the other six Canadian squads in deciding to collectively sit out the 2016 playoffs, in protest of Brexit, the American election, and the NHL's decision not to go to South Korea. Yes, a year early. Anyway, in 2015, they beat the Hamburglar's Senators before getting bounced by the eventual Eastern champion Lightning. The Rangers, meanwhile, did make the playoffs last year, and looked kind of awful as they got steamrolled by the eventual champs from Pittsburgh.

Season Series: Team Records: 3-0-0 (MTL), 0-2-1 (NYR); Goals: 11-7 (MTL); Possession: 55.5% (MTL)

Gratuitous YouTube Embed: Some skinny French kid making the Rangers look silly way back in 1986. Could be the next Steve Penney; who knows?

Doogie Says: The Rangers banked a lot of points early in the season on a major hot streak, but have never really looked like all that and a bag of potato chips in any of the games I've watched. More to the point, their possession is the worst amongst the 16 playoff teams (just behind Ottawa), Lundqvist is getting old (he was outplayed rather handily by Antti Raanta), and their shooting luck ran out halfway through the season. While I think the Habs made themselves worse at the deadline, and have done little to improve a fairly putrid power play, they have good possession and good goaltending, and barring injury, that could carry them straight to the conference finals. Habs in five.

	0	4	3	1	2	1	2
	2	3	1	2	3	3	4

(2) Ottawa Senators vs. (3) Boston Bruins

Playoff History: The modern Sens have never played the Bruins, however I do enjoy whenever Ottawa meets an Original Six team because it usually means I get to clown them again for Cleveland Browns-ing the old Sens' history back when they first (re?)joined the League in 1992. I mean, they hung this very Stanley Cup banner during the opening ceremonies for their inaugural season. Who does that? (Says the man who includes the California Golden Seals in the Sharks' lineage on a technicality.)

1927 SCF
2-0

Previously On...Survivor: The Sens were also part of the Great Canadian Playoff Boycott of 2016; in 2015, they made a historic rally just to make the playoffs, only to promptly drop three straight to Montreal en route to a six-game defeat. The Bruins' last trip to the playoffs came three years ago, when they won the President's Trophy, and saw them brush aside the Red Wings before falling to the Habs in their mostly-customary fashion. Funny pattern here.

Season Series: Team Records: 4-0-0 (OTT), 0-3-1 (BOS); Goals: 11-6 (OTT); Possession: 50.3% (OTT)

Gratuitous YouTube Embed: Surprisingly, there's not really much footage from 90-year-old sporting events on YouTube, so...goalie fight? Goalie fight.

Doogie Says: The B's seem to be every fancystatter's stealth Cup pick, and it's easy to see why, with a big, sexy possession number and a goalie with a track record for excellence. Also, Ottawa seems low-key really bad, and not just because of the possession stat I referenced above. Remember that time they got scored on first ten games in a row, but came out with an above-.500 record? You know how Erik Karlsson is getting praise for blocking a shitload of shots this year, with no one stopping to wonder how, even with an increased focus on blocking shots, that probably means he's spending more time in the D-zone? Also, you notice how the Sens are the only minus team in the playoffs, which is generally a Very Bad Sign? It is concerning that Tuukka Rask has been having an off-year, while Craig Anderson has been on fire when he's been available, but the shooting slump that got Claude Julien fired (thanks, guys!) has turned around under Bruce Cassidy (if I were less lazy/busy, I'd dig into shooting-area charts and see why that is), and Ottawa paid through the nose for the corpse of Alex Burrows at the deadline. That last one barely enters into the analysis, I just thought it was funny. Anyway, something something Bruins in five.

	1	4	4	1	2	3	4
	2	3	3	0	3	2	2

Patrick Division Semifinals

(1) Washington Capitals vs. (WC) Toronto Maple Leafs

Playoff History: The Leafs and Caps are meeting for the first time in the playoffs. Fun fact: this is the deepest alphabetical combination of two teams to ever meet in the playoffs, surpassing Toronto-Vancouver (1994 Western Final). Yes, I do keep track of a lot of dumb shit.

Previously On...Survivor: It wouldn't have been the playoffs without Washington failing to live up to expectations, but in their defence, they did lose to what we all thought was the only meaningful threat before them, the Penguins, in the division final. The Leafs, meanwhile, last made the playoffs in 2013. It was 4-1.

Season Series: Team Records: 2-1-0 (WSH), 1-1-1 (TOR); Goals: 12-10 (WSH); Possession: 52.7% (WSH)

Gratuitous YouTube Embed: It was 4-1.

Doogie Says: Oh, Toronto. If only you hadn't hocked up 15 two-goal leads this year. If you'd even held on to just one, you'd be facing a very winnable matchup with the Senators instead of a very losable matchup with the loaded-for-bear Caps. This will be a fun series to watch, but ultimately a short one; file it under the "get your asses kicked to earn experience" young-team narrative and give me Caps in five.

	3	3	3	5	2	2	4
	2	4	4	4	1	1	2

(2) Pittsburgh Penguins vs. (3) Columbus Blue Jackets

Playoff History: Three years ago, Columbus finally won their first playoff game in franchise history. They were overmatched and didn't get much further than that. It did, however, cement Brandon Dubinsky as Sidney Crosby's true mortal enemy, a fact that has held to this day.

2014 DSF
4-2

Previously On...Survivor: That above series was Columbus's last bit of playoff experience, as the Eastern Conference iteration of the team hasn't really fared much better than the Western one so far. Pittsburgh, meanwhile, won the Stanley Cup last year. You may have heard.

Season Series: Team Records: 2-1-1 (PIT), 2-1-1 (CBJ); Goals: 13-10 (CBJ); Possession: 52.8% (CBJ)

Gratuitous YouTube Embed: Remember that thing I said about Dubinsky and Crosby? Yup.

Doogie Says: So I came into this thing ready to write off Columbus and move on, but...eh, maybe not so fast. Sure, the 16-game win streak was built off all the sort of unsustainable nonsense you'd expect (30+% PP? That's a typo, isn't it?), but the defending champs look kind of vulnerable here, if we're being honest. They got outpossessed by the Jackets both within their matchups and across the season (51.1% vs. 49.8%), and the PDO's pretty even. The difference seems to be mostly down to special teams, particularly the power play, where despite an early high conversion rate, the Jackets produce a good 15 fewer shot attempts per hour than the Pens, while scoring on basically the same amount of attempts across the year (~8%, near the top of the League). That's the difference between a top-five and a mid-pack PP, but that advantage normally dies after about Game 3 of the first round. Having said all of that, I can't bring myself to fully trust the Jackets. Maybe I'm biased against a team that's never done it, and in favour of the (injury-riddled) defending champs, but I'm just gonna say, possession only predicts 75% of all series, and of the eight, this is one I'm willing to cast into the wind. Also, the Caps are probably gonna own them in round two. Penguins in six.

	3	4	5	4	5	4
	1	1	4	5	2	1

Smythe Division Semifinals

(1) Anaheim Ducks vs. (WC) Calgary Flames

Playoff History: The Ducks and Flames have two meetings in their playoff history, the last one coming two years ago. It's weird seeing a modern Ducks team not playing a Game 7, but they did have a pretty weak field that year. I swear, I thought the Jets had a chance.

2006 CQF	2015 DF
4-3	4-1

Previously On...Survivor: Last year, the Ducks continued their recent annual tradition of hilariously eating shit in a Game 7, usually in a series they should have won already. On this occasion, they fell to the wild-card Nashville Predators in the first round. The Flames' last playoff appearance came in 2015, when they beat the similarly-dreadful Vancouver Canucks before getting steamrolled by Anaheim in five.

Season Series: Team Records: 4-1-0 (ANA), 1-4-0 (CGY); Goals: 17-14 (ANA); Possession: 51.4% (ANA)

Gratuitous YouTube Embed: The last time a Ducks-Flames series sat in the way of a Battle of Alberta in the second round was 2006. The then-Mighty Ducks silenced the C of Red pretty effectively by the end of the second period; this clip doesn't quite capture just how quiet the building was in the third period, but you could hear a pin drop even through an SDTV. It was schadenfreude-tastic on levels.

Doogie Says: Even with the Oilers ceasing to be hot garbage, I'm still not as familiar with the West as I once was: East Coast Bias is a thing, at least in the Atlantic Time zone, because dude, the second Hockey Night game starts at 11 PM. I can't be staying up until 2 AM like that on the regular. I mean, I will for the playoffs, but I digress. Anyway, a crucial piece of information is that the Flames haven't won at the Pond since Biblical times, and while these are not the hilaribad Flames of a couple of years ago, "curses" like this tend to self-perpetuate more than you might think. I'm intrigued by Micah Blake McCurdy's model having Anaheim as 57% favourites, given the evenness of possession, the marginal value of the admittedly large gap in shot attempt generation on the power play, the good underlying numbers for Calgary's renaissance, and the injury to Cam Fowler. I wonder what I've missed on Twitter in the last couple of years. Let's go with Calgary's inconsistent goaltending. Sure. Why not. Plus, it'd be funny to see the Ducks win in six, with both Calgary wins coming at the Saddledome (Games 3 and 4, necessarily).

	3	3	5	3	4
	2	2	4	1	0

(2) Edmonton Oilers vs. (3) San Jose Sharks

Playoff History: Whoh-oh-oh-oh, whoh-oh-oh-OH-oh-oh-oh-oh, oh-OH-oh!

2006 CSF
4-2

Previously On...Survivor: As you may have heard, the Oilers last made the playoffs in 2006, a time not only before I was 30 but before I was even 20, a time when the Red Wings were still Goliath, and defeating them was still a monumental achievement. Following that up by beating San Jose and Anaheim, and then having a series happen that I definitely blacked out for sometime between Chris Pronger's penalty shot goal and the end of Game 1, save for the end of Game 5 and all of Game 6...yeah. Good times. Great memories. Anyway, last season, the Sharks finally broke through after 20 years of disappointment and made the Stanley Cup Finals. They lost, but hey, progress.

Season Series: Team Records: 3-1-1 (EDM), 2-3-0 (SJS); Goals: 16-13 (EDM); Possession: 55.1% (SJS)

Gratuitous YouTube Embed: What else? Smytty loses half his mouth earlier in the game, then sets up Horcoff's 3OT winner in Game 3. That started a seven-game winning streak that would all but clinch a spot in the Stanley Cup Finals.

Doogie Says: I have read in recent days that the Oilers have the best intra-divisional and intra-conference record in the Smythe/Campbell, respectively. I don't know what to do with that information; I've already decided I'm thoroughly uninterested in objective measures for the Oilers, though. This is their best season by points percentage, their first home-ice playoff series, their first home-ice playoff start, since the Dynasty. They've proven they can play with anyone they're likely to run into for at least the first couple of rounds, Connor McDavid is a beast, and the second line has finally shown a pulse after months of mediocrity. No more self-deprecation, no more snide jabs at my hockey team. They're finally good again; time to embrace it. Blatant homer pick or not, Oilers in seven.

	2	2	1	0	4	3	4
	3	0	0	7	3	1	2

Norris Division Semifinals

(1) Chicago Blackhawks vs. (WC) Nashville Predators

Playoff History: The Hawks and Predators have met twice, both in the first round, both within recent memory. The 2010 series was notably controversial, with Marian Hossa scoring an OT winner after taking a five-minute major while the Preds were still up by one late in Game 5.

2010 CQF	2015 DSF
4-2	4-2

Previously On...Survivor: The Blackhawks surprised everyone by not coming back and defeating the St. Louis Blues in the first round last year. The Preds, meanwhile, upset the Ducks in seven before falling to San Jose in a less-close-than-it-looked seven-gamer.

Season Series: Team Records: 4-1-0 (CHI), 1-4-0 (NSH); Goals: 20-13 (CHI); Possession: 51.5% (NSH)

Gratuitous YouTube Embed: Let's see that Marian Hossa goal again!

Doogie Says: I want Nashville to go far. I love P.K. Subban in an unhealthy way and Chicago are so full of dicks who've had their day. The Hawks also aren't as deep as they once were, and their underlying numbers show some worrying trends. And yet...sigh, Nashville has spent the back half of the year since getting back into the playoff picture being frustratingly inconsistent, never really putting a run together that would've assured them a spot ahead of St. Louis in the standings. And Chicago is Chicago, and despite the irrationality of this notion, until proven otherwise, I feel like it's as good a year as any to expect them to make a run to the Finals, because LA's fallen off the cliff and I'm don't know if Edmonton's ready to assume the mantle just yet. They could be, and I'd be happy if I were wrong, but it's not something I'm willing to let my five Canadian dollars ride on just yet. Anyway, Hawks in six.

	0	0	2	1	0
	1	5	3	4	4

(2) Minnesota Wild vs. (3) St. Louis Blues

Playoff History: I'm told by reliable sources that this is a thing that happened. Yup, I've got nothing. I can totally believe that St. Louis lost in the first round that year, though.

2015 DSF
4-2

Previously On...Survivor: In a battle of deeply flawed teams, the Wild lost to the Dallas Stars in six games in last year's opening round. The Blues, meanwhile, defeated the Blackhawks and Stars before losing to San Jose in the conference finals.

Season Series: Team Records: 2-2-1 (MIN), 3-2-0 (STL); Goals: 14-10 (MIN); Possession: 50.6% (STL)

Gratuitous YouTube Embed: Given these teams' relative lack of history, I'm gonna reach back into the depths of history for some classic Minnesota North Stars action. Someone's posted a bunch of old Super 8 footage they shot at the Met Center when they were a kid, including three clips from the 1971 quarter-final between the North Stars and Blues. This first one mostly features Gump Worsley milling about beside his net while a line brawl occurs, followed by the Blues trying to get into the stands for some damned reason. Was this just more of a thing in the '70s? I've seen a few clips from this era now where guys try to attack fans being jackasses in the stands and just like...why? How was this ever a thing? Were guys not suspended harshly enough for this back then? Were fans that much rowdier back then? Anyway, the other two clips feature more actual hockey. Check out the sweet display of scoring information on the scoreboard in the third clip, too.

Doogie Says: Look, I don't know jack shit about either of these teams, but I do know that St. Louis traded away Kevin Shattenkirk at the deadline right before they got magically hot, and that Vladimir Sobotka is back, for whatever that's worth. I also know they left Jake Allen at home to get his head right. I also know that Devan Dubnyk has been God mode for the Wild for most of the last couple of years, save the last month or two, and is more likely than not to at least be better than average going forward, and the Wild did lead the division for most of the season. Okay, maybe I know slightly more than jack shit, but still. All the fancystats guys are taking Minny to go deep, even though they've basically been even with St. Louis by possession all year, so what the hell. Wild in seven.

	1	1	1	2	3	1
	2	2	3	0	4	4

Stanley Cup Final Pick

Capitals over Blackhawks in seven games. I use NHL.com's "goals scored" as a proxy for games, assuming 5 goals per game, and said 35 goals, so...yeah. Seven games. Washington finally slays the dragon, Ovechkin gets his ring, Holtby is MVP, and then all the Russian free agents go home because they want to play in the Olympics next year.

Happy playoffs, everyone!