How About Those Blueshirts?
I’ve spent a lot of time recently covering the Yanks, and I’ll admit that baseball has and always will dominate this blog, but it’s time to give a shout out to those Broadway Blueshirts. It’s nice to see a team that plays in the Garden win some games.
As of April 17, the Rangers have a commanding lead over the Devils 3-1 in the first round of the 2008 NHL playoffs. If you’re that big a fan, check out this cool assortment of NHL jerseys. The Rangers have rebounded nicely from having a team earlier this decade that was truly Isiah-esque in its awfulness. (As I write this, I’ve just seen that the Knicks fired Isiah Thomas). In three straight seasons, the Rangers have managed to make the playoffs. Each year the team seems to get a little better. This year they are led by Jaromir Jagr and Scott Gomez (71 and 70 points respectively), and the acquisition of Jagr in 2003-2004 was a major turning point for the team. If only the Knicks had such management.
So how far can the Rangers go this year? My feeling is that they’re a good team that can win it all if they get hot enough, but Montreal, Detroit and San Jose are pretty stacked and any of these three can and should be considered heavy favorites.
I remember going to the Garden as a kid with my best friend, Jesse and seeing some classic Rangers vs. Flyers games–penalty shots, OT wins. We even went down to Philly to see the Rangers play in the old Spectrum. Man, was that place a dump. Obviously, the Rangers winning it all in ‘94 was a great moment and never having to hear those Devils and Isles fans chant “1940″ is probably like what Sawks fans today feel knowing they’ll never have to hear “1918″ again.
It seemed like in the mid-90’s, the NHL was poised to break through to the mainstream (remember those NHL games on Fox with the puck tracker that never worked). Perhaps this is no coincidence seeing as the Rangers were the last big-market team win the Stanley Cup. Since then, I think the NHL was resigned itself to growing fanbases in more middle-market cities (Columbus, Charlotte), and this has not done well for the sport’s cross-over potential. The NHL needs strong support for legacy, big-market teams as much as it needs expansion across tier-2 cities in the US. But with Montreal, Detroit and the Rangers in it this year, perhaps things will change.
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3 comments
I don’t know much about hockey, but shouldn’t you also be rooting for the NY Islanders? They’re in the NHL too, right?
I’ve been saying for the longest time that the actually timing of a hockey game is what hurts it the most as far as fan appeal goes. The hurry-up face off, eliminaiton of the two-line pass rule, and the new touch up off-sides rule is a major breakthrough to make this game as exciting as it can potentially be. One more major move is needed, and this is it:
three 20-minute periods has got to go. 17 minute intermissions sucks the life out of fans AND therefore potential TV revenue. I’m sorry, but NBC will never get top dollar from an advertiser looking to run a 30 second spot midway between a 17 minute intermission.
Follow the NBA model with four 15 minute quarters to make a 60 minute game. Half-time can be 17 minutes and the quarter breaks can be…oh, I don’t know….let’s go with five minutes. That should be enough.
As someone who plays hockey, I also understand that the training model for hockey will need to be adapted as this change in the game would obviously have a major impact on rest and recovery time, but enough is enough already. The three-period structure of a hockey game needs to be altered. That’s the next step to take this sport to the next level as far as developing fans goes.
But the three major rule changes along with the emergence young stars like Crosby and Ovechkin is a great start…
The Rangers will have their work cut out for them in the next round against either Pittsburgh or Montreal. Pittsburgh will only get better as Hossa continues to get used to playing with Malkin and Crosby. Better to play them now and get it over with, as their road to the cup will probably go through them eventually.
Regarding the first comment, the Uniondale Islanders are NOT in the playoffs and are as much a “New York City” hockey team as the Buffalo Sabres.
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