The Athletic Hockey Show - Connor McDavid can't be contained, Nazem Kadri looks to vault Colorado Avalanche into Western Final and is it back to the drawing board for the Florida Panthers?

Episode Date: May 25, 2022

Rob Pizzo from CBC Sports and Jesse Granger from the Athletic breakdown the battle of Alberta, the historic run by Connor McDavid and some suspect goaltending from Jacob Markstrom and Mike Smith as the Oilers lead that series 3 games to 1. The guys look at the Hurricanes/Rangers series which is tied at 2 games a piece with Carolina failing to register a road win thus far in the playoffs, the out of this word goaltending from Tampa's Andrei Vasilevskiy and the maturation of Nazem Kadri as the Colorado Avalanche look to eliminate St. Louis in 5 games tonight.Randy Moller, lead analyst for the Florida Panthers joins the boys to discuss what went wrong for the president trophy winning Panthers, if Andrew Brunette will return behind the bench and if we have seen the last of future hall of fame'r Joe Thornton on the ice, in the NHL? Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

What's going on, everybody? Welcome to the athletic hockey show, the Wednesday Roundtable Edition, just a little less round today. It's myself, Rapizo from CBC Sports, and Jesse Granger, who is in Vegas because Sarah Sivian is busy doing all that playoff stuff. So I'm going to give her the week off. How are you, Jesse?

Doing pretty good. It's still weird to be watching the playoffs from home, not on flights every day like Sarah has been, but getting to watch more of the playoff hockey than I usually get to when you're actually working it. It's been fun. It's funny because we've talked a lot about this on the podcast. You know, two months ago I told you that you would have said you're absolutely nuts.

Of course I'm planning for the playoffs. It's not as if you cover a team. You don't cover the Buffalo Sabres where you knew, you know, in December you're not going to be doing any playoff hockey. This had to have come as a bit of a punch in the face to you. I mean, you had to have had even story ideas and stuff that you were ready to go for the playoffs. And now, you know, we were talking about when we were going to record this podcast. And you're like, I'm kind of wide open guys. I don't have a team in the playoffs. Yeah. Yeah, I had multiple feature stories like ready for for big playoff stories. And it's, yeah,

it's just weird. I mean, and like you mentioned I'm not covered in Buffalo. Not only that, but this is the first time I've ever in my whole career covering hockey not had playoffs. It's it's very odd and and definitely was not expected. But like I said, when you're when you're covering the playoffs, you're flying so much. Obviously, Sarah's in the air right now. you're at the rink all day from morning skate to the game. You don't watch all the other series going on nearly as much. Now I have like, I don't know if I've missed a minute of the playoffs. So that is a bonus.

And you watch it so differently too, right? I mean, I remember one of the first times after I've been covering a lot of hockey and you're going, when you're doing that, you're working, you're running back and and forth, dressing from everything else. And then you go to a hockey game as just a regular old fan and you get a frosty beverage. And you're enjoying, and you're like, wait. This is how the other half lives. But yeah, so that's, you're wide open because of that, but it means we get to talk about everything else.

We're going to talk every series that's still on the go, even series that are not on the go. And one series that's no longer on the go, Tampa Bay, Florida, the Florida Panthers fizzling out in four games. I think a lot of that has to do with the guy who wears the pads. We'll talk about that in the second half of the show with Randy Mueller, who's a TV analyst for the Panthers. But for now, Jesse, let's start with last night's games. And we'll start with the Battle of Alberta. Last night, Edmonton, with a 5-3 win to take a 3-1 series lead. And when I was making my notes, I'm like, oh, it's Jesse co-hosting.

So we got to talk about the goaltenders because it is not very often where not one, but both goaltenders make a blooper real worthy mistake in the playoffs. Both goals, too, were crucial. I mean, it started with Marks from 21 seconds in, goes behind the net, misplays the puck, it's in the back of the net. You always talk about how important the first goal is in the playoffs. Man, 20 seconds in and you're making that mistake. The Oilers jump out to a 3-0 lead. Flames are battling back.

And to tie the game, Mike Smith allows a goal from precisely 131.5 feet away. Rasp was Anderson just trying to get the puck out of the zone. ends up in the back of the net. Have you ever seen anything like that in a playoff game? So like the Markstrom one, we see it all the time, right? Like, sure. It happens, I'd say, once a month in the NHL where a goalie passes the puck to somebody when he's still behind his net. The Mike Smith one is the one that I had to watch it like six times. I'm like, what's going on? He just, he didn't see it. He wasn't expecting it. And to me, my favorite part of the Mike Smith one is he immediately, without hesitation, less than a second after the puck is in the net,

throws his hands up and looks at his teammates like, what are you guys doing? It's like, Mike, I don't understand what we could have done differently. He took the shot from the other side of the ice. Dom Lushijian did a great job tweeting out. It was 0.00 expected goals on that scoring, on that shot attempt from that area. I don't understand. Did he expect them to like lay in front of that? in the, when he was shooting it from the other zone. I don't, I don't understand what Mike Smith was upset with his teammates for when he just let in a floater from 150 feet away. It was hilarious, though.

You took the words out of my mouth because I don't know if it was just reflex. You goalies. And I'm going to say you goleys because you're a goalie. You goalies just love blaming everybody but yourself. It wasn't a point shot with both of your defensemen just completely screening you. And you go, guys, we talked about this. Right. It was 131 feet away.

And I don't even think any of his teammates, it happens. I mean, shit happens, right? Like, if you watched it, I watched the angle from kind of behind the shot and it dips. It's kind of tricky. It does look tricky. And it, like, barely fit between two players. Like, I don't think he saw the puck until it was more than halfway to him. And it is hard to react to that.

Like, but still. Yeah. And you know what made me laugh to after the game? He kind of joked, oh, I can laugh about it now because they won the hockey game. But he said it was the only. time ever in his career where he completely lost track of the puck and didn't know where it was. Really, Mike Smith? There's been a few stretches of games this year where I'm watching it and you definitely

lost track of the puck. But either way, real quick, before we move on from this, that really could have been something that you don't laugh at had the Edmonton Oilers lost that game. I mean, absolutely. Dan Cluchier-esque type, you know. of a goal because like I said, this wasn't like, well, I made it five, two. You know what I mean? This was a tie a tying goal after they just blew a three nothing lead. This could have gone very differently. And and goaltenders have a tendency to not let something like that just let it go.

Right. And it's and it's, it was not only, not only was it an inflection point in the game in terms of what the score was, but in the series. When a series is two one, to me that game is is like other than a game seven, when a series is two one, that fourth game, it basically determines the series. It's going to be three one. Are you, now Calgary's got to win three games in a row. It feels like it's almost over. Like it's, you're right on the edge. Whereas if they win and it's two, two, two, I think most people feel like Calgary's going to win the series. So you, it's such a massive swing, not just in the game to make it three three, but in the series, um, it's, it's a crazy, crazy goal to let in. I, I honestly could not believe, like I, I've never seen anything like that where he didn't even.

react until it was in the net. It was, that's a wild goal. And blame this teammates. Right. Immediately. Um, what's your favorite word for when a goalie lets a really, really bad goal in? And I'll be, I'll go on the record and say, I've heard this all morning.

Is it a gath? Is it a whiff? Is it a flub? Is it a blunder? Or my favorite play by play guys love using this one. Oh, he'd love to have that one back. Well, thanks, tips. Right.

I mean, I've always been, I've always been a fan of, of a gaff. Oh, did you see the gaff? for me it's softy i like oh i didn't even think a softy when a goalie lets in a goal he shouldn't for me it's automatically oh that was a softy like like or me talking when i get home talking to my girlfriend when i get home from beer like yeah i let in three softies today it's that that's the word that always comes to mind for me i can guarantee none of them were from 131.5 feet uh we do have to talk about a couple other things in this game i mean it makes me laugh that everyone keeps talking about how the Calgary Flames kept Connor McDavid quote-unquote in check

or they what was the word, oh, contained him. That was the word I heard a lot. They kind of did. He still picked up a couple of points in this one. He's now one more game. If he can get multiple points in one more game, he ties Wayne Gretzky's record for most consecutive games in the playoffs in multiple points, which is bananas. But that top line, dry side own now 22 points, McDavid 25, Evander Kane with the Sy Young line of 12 goals and three assists. Just crazy. But you also have to look at this team. What's been one of their number one question marks throughout the years?

Yes, goaltending, but also depth. Hey, if you shut down Drysidal and you shut down McDavid, you're going to win the hockey game. Well, obviously picking up Kane was huge. But also, Ryan Nugent Hopkins had himself quite a game yesterday, scored that opening goal, scored the game winning goal. I know Zach Hyman's not necessarily secondary scoring, but I think when you watch this team, it's not a matter of shut down two guys. You automatically win the game anymore.

Am I wrong in thinking this? Yeah, I think it's a confidence thing. I think in the playoffs, like the Oilers have failed in the playoffs multiple times, right? Like we've seen what that looks like. And it usually the team can, the other team can shut down McDavid and Drys Idol. And I feel like when that happens, the rest of the players, the secondary scores, the defenseman. Everybody kind of, when you see your two big guns get shut down, it's hard to believe you're going to go out there and school. Like, I know they shut

McDavid down, but we've got this guy's our third line. Whereas I think it's the opposite. When McDavid is playing like he is and that line is just clicking, clicking, and the other team is sitting there saying, we have to shut these guys down. That's our number one focus. I think it gives the rest of the team confidence. And I think they see those guys scoring and they say, look at this. We've got this team on the ropes. Like, we can do this. And I just think, I think the play of that top line has freed up the rest of them. I think the confidence is there. Whereas I think in past playoffs, it was, they're all kind of just waiting for the bad thing to happen. This looks like a different

Oilers team. We talked about how like you kind of watch the playoffs differently when you're not covering a team in the playoffs. And for me, it's like I always root for storylines. I'm just here to say, I'm officially an Edmonton Oilers fan. I'm rooting for this team. I'm absolutely rooting for this team every night for the sole reason. I want to watch as much Connor McDavid as I can possibly watch because to me right now, what he's doing, look, I was born in 1990. I wasn't around for Gretzky's great years. I can't really compare eras, but I will say this. I have never watched a human being play hockey better than Connor McDavid has in the last couple weeks. He, even for him, and he's ridiculous. And we come on here and we say we're almost no.

to how good he is. He's taken it to a completely different level. To me, he's even on another level that he's ever been on, this is so much fun to watch. I want this team to win as much as they can can as I just want as much Connor McDavid on my TV as I can possibly get. First off, couldn't agree more. Secondly, you can understand why people, and I know you're on West Coast Times, so you don't need to worry about this, but that's true. People on the East Coast were really upset with some of the game times as far as a 1030 Eastern start because they want to watch Connor McDabe. Number three, quick story.

You know, my wife, as you know, I worship at the altar of Wayne Gretzky because that's what I did as a kid. And my wife once asked me, are any of his records going to be broken? And I said, no. And she said, is it because, you know, they're just, he's the greatest of all time? I said, yeah, that's part of it. I said, but he also played in the highest scoring decade in hockey and we'll never see a scoring decade like that unless they dramatically change the rules. we're seeing Connor McDavid put up 80s numbers, okay? Through this many games, through 11 games in the playoffs,

only one other player has ever had more points than Connor McDavid does right now, and he wore number 99 on his back. He's putting up 80s video game type numbers in 2022. With against Markstrom, who's a phenomenal goalie against, he's making Evander Kane into an absolute. absolute superstar. I mean, the guy is just getting fed goal after goal after goal after goal. He's, it's unbelievable. And like, McDavid, it's not just the skill. Like, man, he's taking contact. Like, the way he turns his body on the rush with speed, turns his body to absorb the contact and then just

spins off the defender. I mean, he's just unbelievable. It's, it's unbelievable to watch what he's doing. It is like, I feel like basketball is the sport where you watch it for the star players. Like, I'm here to watch LeBron. I really don't give a crap what the other four players on the floor are. Like that's why I'm here to watch. McDavid is that for hockey. Like you don't get that in hockey very often where I just cannot take my eyes off of this performer. And it's unbelievable what he's doing.

And you can tell what the flames we're trying to do. Basically, don't let him get on the runway and take off last night. And they die again to an extent. We didn't see a highlight. I love the way the two assist game without a highlight real goal is containing the best player on planet earth. Yeah, I just don't foresee, and I'm going to go out on a limb here, I don't foresee a time in the future where we don't just look at the guy and say he is the most skilled hockey

player to ever put skates on. And I know it's tough to compare eras. It really is. But I've never seen anybody do it like this, do such a high level of speed and a high level of skill mashed together. and he just keeps improving his game. You talked about his ability to take contact now. He's improving his 200-foot game 10 years from now.

Man, if we're still doing this podcast together, Jesse, we're going to be talking about Connor McDavid. But we can't do the whole show on Connor McDavid, even though, I mean, I could. I can talk with him all day. Hurricanes and Rangers. It was all Rangers last night, four to one series now tied to two,

home teams won each game in this series. And I put this down to my notes, and I thought it was kind of a weird sentence, but Igor Shasturkin has rounded out into his regular season form, which is, you know, you're not supposed to say that in the second round of the playoffs, but the last few games, really, you know, since the end of last series,

he's starting to look like that guy people are going to vote for for the heart. Yeah, for sure. He's been phenomenal. They always say a series doesn't start until the home team loses. So I think that technically means. means Carolina is still in the regular season? Yeah. Oh, man.

They haven't lost at home and they haven't won on the road in the entire playoffs. That's unbelievable. Like six and oh at home, 22 goals for seven against, which is what you want to see from an elite team in hockey. Away. Oh, in five now, eight goals for, 21 goals against. And wasn't it you and I talking about before the playoffs started that home ice advantage isn't as big as it used to be in the playoffs?

Right. It's weird. Like, I wish we had Sarah on here. I wonder if Rod Rindamore has said anything about this. Like, if he's got the slightest idea as to what is going on. Like, is his, our matchups, our line matchups, that important for Carolina? Like, when they're getting last change and they're able to get the guys that they want out there, is that what it is? Or is it just, I mean, we know that arena is as good as it gets in the playoffs. Like, it's so loud in there. It's, it's one of the best buildings in the league. Maybe that's part of it. But like I said, like we said, home ice has not statistically meant a whole lot over the last few years.

I did a story on it a couple years ago and it was like, and I went back and looked at all the numbers. And the season where the home teams won the most in the last like 10 years was in Edmonton in the bubble when they actually weren't the home teams. Home team, yeah. That was the that was the playoffs where the home teams had the highest winning percentage and they weren't even the home team back. So it's like that that itself proves that it doesn't normally, but for whatever reason, Carolina, And I'm doing the pick-em on the athletic. I've been getting killed because I keep picking them to win on the road and they won't. Yeah.

I mean, and we talk about different advantages you get at home. Look, you do get last change. You do get everything else. But coaches are just so smart. And you see with line matchups what they're doing. They're not, you know, line matchups used to be a coach putting an entire line out, hoping it would be against the line he wants. That's what line matchup is.

Now we're seeing coaches put out like two-thirds of a line or one-third of a line, depending on what happens. And if they win the draw, the other two will come on, they lose the draw. Coaches are just geniuses now at manipulating home ice advantage. You mentioned Brindamore.

I don't know if he said anything about that, but I did read one quote where he said, this is starting to feel like the Tampa series last season. That's not good if you're a Carolina Hurricanes fan. Vaselowski held them a goal or less in three of their four wins. And that's what Shisterkin's starting to do to them. Yeah. This series, this series is interesting.

It feels like a very, very frustrated Carolina team that, like you said, great at home, but that road record, just so ugly. Yeah, the Rangers are, I mean, they just keep exceeding our expectations. Like, I didn't think they could be Pittsburgh. I didn't think they'd be good enough at even strength. And they did. And it wasn't even like Schisturkin, like stole the series for them. Like Schiserkin wasn't that good for a big portion of that series.

the Rangers pulled it off and now here they are playing again punching above their weight playing a really talented Carolina team that I thought would would handle them at five on five. Like I think the Rangers when it gets like I think their power play can score some goals. I think that because their goalie is so good, special teams that like if they can get the right circumstances, this team can win. But I'm impressed at their even strength play at how well they've handled these two teams that I thought would be superior. year. That series is one that is tough to predict. Another one that I think everyone on Planet Earth

picked one team on continues tonight. We got the blues in the avalanche and Colorado's got a three one series lead. And I hate to start with this, but I think we should start with it for very, very, very good reasons and very, very, very, very bad reasons. Now some cadre has been in the headlines this entire series. It all kind of started with. with that collision with Jordan Binnington. Then during an interview, it gets a water bottle thrown at him. He accused it of being Binnington. And then it got so much worse.

I mean, just an onslaught of racist attacks online, including death threats. And sometimes I think we just take for granted, we just say, you know, oh, Twitter and social media, they're just horrible places. And then his wife goes and puts some screenshots up online about some of the messages he's getting. repugnant, horrible, evil stuff. Maybe I'm just a little naive. I thought, okay, not that I didn't want to, I didn't want to discount it. But when I heard he was getting, you know, racist comments, I kind of just said, well, that sucks.

That's Twitter. And then I read them and I thought, this is so much worse. And he responds with a frigging hat trick in the playoffs. Just like I said, very, very good and very, very bad. reasons. Yeah, it's, I feel like social media, Twitter, Instagram, whatever, the direct messaging on those apps has given everyone in the world a direct line to everyone else. Like, you can just, which, which was, sounded like such a good thing when, right? Right. Social media started. There are good things. I've made friends. I've made connections in my life with people who just

DM'd me on Twitter, who I never met. They never would have been able to get my phone number, if in a normal, like in a world without social media, there's no way this person could directly contact me. And they do. And like you said, there are plenty of good things. But it's also these people with these horrible things in their head when something happens that they didn't like in a sporting event, they used to just yell it in their living room.

And that's still wrong. But now they can direct message the player, his wife, their family. It's just, we're seeing a. horrible side of people that shouldn't exist. It's freaking sports guys. It's like, I don't know. I feel like people get a little too worked up over sports and the fact that everyone can just directly contact whoever they feel like. When they're feeling that anger is not a good thing. And it's not, I don't even think, I, well, I agree with you. It's just sports. I don't think that's, These people are racist, horrible human beings, whether he's playing a sport or not,

whether he walks by them on the street or is playing in the Stanley Cup playoffs. He said he's, quote, getting really good at putting it in the rearview mirror, which I think is kind of a sad statement. Like, that's not something you want to do. But I get why he's doing it. He's in the playoffs. He's got to be. If Nazim Khadry focused on every statement he got on Twitter, every message he got on

Twitter, you know, he'd be a wreck. He'd be a wreck. That's, you're right. And look, I'm a straight white male. I can't pretend I have any kind of experience getting this kind of, you know, horrible venom spewed at me. But man, I commend him for being able to bounce back like that. That game was so much fun. It was like Cadre with, he scores the two goals early.

He and him and Peron were just going at each. other. And like we see and like they're both nuisances. So it's kind of nice. Like usually Cadry's getting under everybody else on the team's skin and then Peron's doing it. It's nice that those two are getting under each other's skin and just kind of leaving everyone else out of it. And those two are just so good at that role. And they're both going at it, going at it. And then they both score two goals. Cadry gets the hat trick. They get the win. That was fun. Like all the horrible things that have been said on directed to him aside, the fact that he came up with that performance and him and Perron were just like, you don't often see where two guys are going at it the way they

were. And they're also the big time scorers. Like they're the ones, they're the ones scoring the goals that swing in the game. It was for me, that was a really fun playoff. And Cadre showed so much restraint that we, we've seen him multiple times get spent it in the playoffs. And that's the kind of thing that is fair game. If you're a fan, you know what I mean?

You could say, that was a horrible hit. What are you doing? Right. And you saw on the bench, his teammates, his coaches, kind of, commending him like, yeah, guess what? Now you're not in the box. Guess what? Now you're not suspended.

Guess what? You have a hat trick in the playoffs and we've got a three games to one series lead. Excuse me. I was reading Peter Boss, 15 observations about the abs. And I kind of gasped at a couple things that were in there because this does not sound like a team that's up three games to one, which is scary because they're that good. Listen to a couple of these. If I read these to you, you would never think they have a three one series lead.

after scoring first in every game in round one, the avalanche have let in the opening tally in all four games in this series. Miko Ranton finally scored his first goal of playoffs on that empty netter in game four. And Rantin and McKinnon and Landisog as well as Kail Makar have combined for three goals in this series.

If I told you all of that, you're like, whoa, what's going on with the abs? They're so good, they have a 3-1 series lead. This team is scary. I mean, it's scary. Yeah, they're so deep. I think, I think McKinnon and Alamoscog had zero points in that last game and they scored six goals. Yeah. That's not a good sign if you're the blues. I mean, they just, they have so much depth. And Cadry adds to that. And I remember last season, I covered the series against the Golden Knights. The Golden Knights were able to shut McKinnon and Rattan and down. And they did with Mark Stone and the Aves had no answer. And remember, Cadry was suspended for almost that entire series. now all of a sudden they've got the secondary scoring.

They've got a third wave of scoring. They've got Kail McCar is playing on a level he wasn't playing at even last year. This team is if Darcy Kemper can hold it together back here. He's had some shaky moments. And I always say with this team, it comes down to goaltending. I didn't think Philip Grubauer was good enough. I think Kemper is a step up from him, but he still has not like, he's been in situations where he hasn't had a ton of playoff.

like games to prove that he can do it at this at this time of year. He's, he's had some games that make me feel good. He's had some games, some moments in these playoffs that have made me kind of shaky on him. As long as he is solid back there, this team is going to be tough to beat. And if they do win tonight, believe it or not, as good as this team has been recently over the last, God knows how many years, it'll be the first trip to the conference final in 20 years. And I hate saying this, it's theirs to lose. It really is, in my opinion, Yeah, the West is theirs to lose and Tampa is, it's theirs to lose. If it's not Tampa, Colorado at this point, I'll be pretty shocked.

Right. When's the last time? So on that note, because I was having this conversation yesterday, Colorado and Tampa are clearly the two best teams, like the two most talented teams. And I think most hockey fans have felt that for a lot of the year. And obviously, Florida was really good. But I think because Tampa's the two-time champs, we kind of assumed they're the guys in the east to beat.

if we get that matchup, like, when's the last time that happened where the two unanimous best teams played each other in the cup final? Because you look at the last few cup finals and it's like Montreal got slaughtered by Tampa Bay. Yeah. Dallas got slotted. And nobody expected Dallas to be there. It just, it seems like, and like St. Louis and Boston, that wasn't the, nobody thought those were the two best teams going into that year.

Vegas and Washington, nobody thought was going to be. Like, when's the last time we, we had? the two teams that everybody felt, those, that should be the cup final and were a step away from getting it. With, you know, history on the line, going for a three-pe, you've got Colorado, you know, there's the storylines would be on list. The hockey would be great. I mean, you mentioned last three finals. How many of those finals did you really see as a genuine hockey fan? Ooh, can't wait to watch seven games of that. Yeah, it was, we figured Tampa would slaughter them and they did. Yeah, it lacked drama. It lacked all drama. The last two finals have had

zero drama. And that sucks because that's the best part. Speaking of maybe not the drama, a lot of people were expecting the Florida Panthers out in four games courtesy of those Tampa Bay Lightning. We're going to talk to Randy Mueller, TV analyst for the Florida Panthers about what the hell happened right after the break. Well, when people were filling out their brackets, I don't think too many of them had the Florida Panthers being swept out of the playoffs in the second round and to maybe help us figure out just what went wrong. TV analysts for the Florida Panthers.

Randy Mueller joining us now. Randy, thanks so much for doing this. Hey, great to be on with you guys again. Appreciate it. And yeah, I guess we'll start there. Obviously, we know this team ran into, arguably the best goalie of a bit of a generation, let's say. But you look at this series, you've had a little bit of time to decompress.

You've heard from the team. Just what went wrong? I think there's a number of things. You can't just point your finger at one major issue. You mentioned Andre Vasselisky. He's the best goaltender in the world. And until he's proven wrong, he is. And he's proven over the last number of years.

Go back to the series that the Panthers had with the lightning last year. If it wasn't for Andre Vasselowski, the Panthers would have won that series. And all the Tampa fans would agree with that as well. I mean, he was just, and then the clinic that he put on in this, you know, we were just batting around some numbers that 106 attempted shots by the Florida Panthers in the four game sweep were either blocked or missed the net. I give, I was so impressed with Tampa Bay, McDonough, Headman, Stamcoast, Coutrop, you name it, they were sacrificing their bodies and blocking shots.

shots all over the ice. And that seemed to really put the Panthers on tilt. And that started, that trend really kind of started in the Washington series where the capitals blocked a lot of the shots and forced the Panthers to shoot wide because they didn't want to drill it for another block shot. The Panthers hadn't faced that type of adversity throughout the regular season. They were scoring at will. The Panthers, and it's not a negative, but they.

They were able to in the regular season score their way out of issues, out of trouble. Look at all the comebacks. They had 29 comebacks in the regular season. They had six by four or more goals. That's never happened in the National High League, the history of the NHL. Was that kind of maybe something that they had to come back so many times and we're successful at it because of the high octane? obviously it caught up to them in the playoffs. And especially in the Tampa series,

besides getting that one goal to start the first goal of the game, the Panthers never led or they were tied the whole time or behind. And this team, they just didn't handle it well. And I think there was frustration. We can talk all day about the lack of success on the power play, but that's a big issue as well, the Panthers were best best on the power play. and throughout the regular season,

they seem to find a way for some of those games to either get a game tied on the power play or a key goal-ahead goal and then take off from there. Guys, it just didn't materialize. Sergei Bobroski was outstanding.

He gave them an opportunity to win every game. And that, just when you see a stat where Corey Perry and Pat Marrott, Roon combined for five goals in the series and Barkoff, Hubertow, Bennett, and Reinhardt and Ekblad with no goals combined. That really tells the story about what happened in that round. Randy, you brought up the power play. And I thought that was interesting, especially watching

Andrew Burnett's post-game press conference. He took a lot of the blame of the power play. And I cover a team in Vegas that they went 0 for 15 against the Canadians in the semifinal. they lost. And I thought the way that Burnett handled that was very different. And just he took a lot of the blame on there. Did you think it was coaching? Or did, did you think they needed to try something different on the power play? Well, the way I'll answer, just the way I'll answer that is, Andrew Burnett has mentioned a lot during the season, where because of the success that this team has had and the highest scoring team in the last, you know, 28 years, whatever it is, averaging a 4.11 goals a game, that there is a lot of trust.

Hey, I trusted these guys. They've proven it. They've succeeded. They've executed all season long. You know, it's like your paper boy. You trust your paper boy to deliver the paper and he does it every day for 363 days. And then all of a sudden, you trust him. And then he doesn't deliver the paper.

And you're giving him the benefit of the doubt. So hopefully I answered it that way that maybe his comments, Andrew Burnett, was that maybe he waited too long before he really made some. He thought that they would work their way out of it and continue because they did it all season long. Right. And I don't criticize that at all. I think when you have such a recipe for success in whatever area, same thing with Bobroski or whatever, you know, somebody was asking before game four, well, are you going to put in Spencer? night. I mean, Bob's done the job. Why would you even consider it in that? But, you know, obviously people will ask them that question. So I think it was, he trusted and thought that they

would work their way out of the funk that they're in on the power play. And again, full marks to Tampa Bay. They're positioning. They, you know, it's all about trying to pull the penalty killers out of position, take a chance and then move the puck quick and the guys wide open. We see those goals happen on a nightly basis. Tampa Bay, they're going to. Tampa Bay, that veteran team, they just sat back and, and when you've got the best goaltender in the world behind you, you could say to the guys, go ahead, guys, blast away. You can blast all you want. You're not going to beat this guy. And so when you add all that up together, that's hopefully I was able to answer what my thoughts were on what went wrong. Well, Randy, you're kind of alluding to

my next question because this feels eerily similar to Tampa Bay three years ago. I mean, they stomped all over the league. They were just filling the net every single, game and everyone thought this high octane, amazing offense is just going to stomp all over the playoffs and they get swept by Columbus. And it's not even necessarily, hey, did that loss really necessarily show them how to lose, but they seem to have figured the playoffs out over the next two years where they don't need to go and do what they did in the regular season. They don't need to go into a position where they're one of the overwhelming favorites and

they figured out how to win with the block shots and everything else you're talking. We saw it in the Leaf Series as well. I mean, they don't just have one guy in front of the shot. They have almost like a straight line of three players blocking the shots. Do you think this Florida Panthers team just hasn't figured out the playoffs? And are we looking to this team in the next two years to figure out this second season? I think we all agree that it's totally different regular season and then you get in the playoffs. every shift, there's a magnified and that.

I, you know, had a chance to sit back. The way that the Tampa Bay Lightning, there was a lot of of that series where the Panthers were dominating in areas and then in shifts and the zone time and circling the puck and getting chances and that. But it just seemed like this veteran Tampa team, when they needed to make one play, clear the puck out, win a key draw, kill a penalty, block a shot, make the right decision, get the puck in deep when your teammates are tired and you know you need a change. They just hit it.

And you saw in game four, the Panthers outshot the lightning 18 to 3 in the first period. You know, Tampa was sitting back in their locker room going, okay, all right, boys, we'll wait for them to make a mistake. and then we'll take advantage of it. They get it all series long. They just were so patient that veteran, they have so much confidence in themselves and in their goaltender.

The way that they executed and didn't put themselves, they were very disciplined. I thought Sergachev, usually Sergachev, you know, you can get under his skin and he'll start taking crazy penalties. Just stayed calm, went about their business, rode out the waves at the Panthers through at him a number of times, and then waited for those to get those key goals.

And then, you know, their power play, Kuthorov and Stamco's and that had been back on the point or whatever. I mean, you could have, you could have nine, ten superstars Hall of Famers out there. A lot of times, you're not going to be successful. To kind of continue along those lines, you mentioned that they, their scoring kind of covered up some deficiencies during the regular season. And you hear coaches say all the time, like it's easier to teach after a loss after wins. maybe the players aren't as receptive to to change and improvement because it's like we're winning, we're winning all these games. Do you think that maybe this is the second playoffs in a row where the scoring hasn't come?

Do you think that some valuable lessons can be learned that, hey, these deficiencies that we're covering up in the regular season by coming back from four goals? If we can clean those up during the regular season, we can be more prepared for a playoff run. Well, you'd hope so. You'd hope so. I mean, it's always about a learning curve. I mean, I was just in a room where exit interviews were come out to meet the press and that.

Anton Lundell, the guy's only 21 years old or 20 years old. He hasn't turned 21. He's 20 years old. My shoes are 18 years old. And so, and they were asking him questions, you know, what did you learn this year? And how is that going to prepare you for next year and that? So the way I answer that is you hope that this and seeing the way, way the Tampa Bay Lightning conducted themselves and did the small detailed things to win a series,

a lot of times it's not just a work ethic and, okay, we're going to dump the puck in and we're going to just forecheck them and we're going to, because all it takes then is a guy like headman to realize that there's going to be pressure and he makes one quick pass and all of a sudden the lightning come out. Go back to that game number three when they, Lightning had the 2-1 lead. But the Panthers get this power play. And they did everything but score. Everything but score.

They hit the post. They crashed the net. They had five shots. I think they had six attempted shots. Headman gets out of the penalty box. We still have the Panthers still haven't pinned in their zone. He gets the puck. One pass and out they come.

And here comes Kuturoff. And the Panthers defense back in a bit, slides it over to the one-timer for Stamco's, it's now three to one. And basically the game's over and that these are the little things that the Panthers, they talk about it, they're going to need to learn from experience how hard it is. But the bottom line is the Panthers have all this talent and they can score and they've got good defense and they've got great goal tenning in Sergey Bobrowski and in Spencer

Knight and that they just have to figure out how they're going to do it because the game changes once you get into the postseason. Randy, we talked a lot this year on this podcast about Jonathan Hubertow. And looking towards the future, I know we got John to figure out what went wrong in that first series, but just how good is he? And maybe this is a two-part question. Just how good is he? And are some of the people who like to point out as defensive deficiencies, are they overblown? I think so. I think Jonathan Huberto, we all talk about his record-breaking left-wing points and shattered the NHL history record. I was very impressed with Jonathan Hoover-O's overall game.

For the first time in his career, he was killing penalties. I think it helped him keep in the game. He had a magical season and the confidence, the strength, the lower body strength. I'm sure that if you ask him, he was very frustrated in the play. And I'll go back to the Tampa Bay Lightning. And so many times when Huberto gets control that puck and you know he tries to buy time and then, you know, teammates, linemates are coming in in those passing lanes or whatever, that completely dried up. Tampa Bay, they're positioning and their structure.

They were, and their awareness when Huberto had that puck really, uh, took a lot of his effectiveness away. Uh, and especially on the power play, they were. expecting Huberto to try and tread those passes through the high slot, and they were getting sticks and bodies in front of it. And it just was not a factor. It just wasn't a factor in that series. The effort was there, the determination, but you look at the score sheet and the stats, and obviously he's such a big part of the team that they just snuffed out

a lot of his offensive capabilities to win hockey games. And because of all of that, they're watching the rest of the playoffs on TV. But like I said, this feels like that Tampa team. This feels like a team with all that offensive power that has a little bit of learning to do come playoff time. And I think, Randy, you just kind of emphasize that. Thanks so much for doing this. I know you got a crazy day. You're actually, I know people can't see this.

You're in the press room and all the exit interviews. So I appreciate you taking the time to do this. We'll talk to you soon. Yeah. Thanks, guys, for having me on. Anytime. Love talking hockey. and love being on your show.

Thank you. Randy Baller, TV analyst for the Florida Panthers. All right, rapid fire time. Maybe a few things we didn't get to in segment number one. And Jesse were making athletic Wednesday roundtable history by doing our very first audio rapid fire topic. Fire away, Jeff. There's a lot of extracurriculars at the end of last game.

We were led to believe that there could be carryover to begin this game. Why hasn't there been? Just hockey, you know, forget about it. Take care of it when it's there. But at the end of the day, we're focused on. two points. Thanks, Frank. And trust me, that wasn't the only cliche we heard from Frank Petrano in that interview.

That was in between the first and second. Jesse, I love cliches. I think they're hilarious. But he's spouting out so many cliches that he says two points in the point. All we can focus on is two points. That made me almost spit out my drink. Yeah, two points. I do not love cliches.

I absolutely hate them. When I say love cliches, I just mean they're part of the. the game. I get it. Yes. Are they good for interviews? Of course, but I hate them too. My favorite players to talk to are generally players who English is their second language. And the reason is because they don't have cliches. They didn't learn the cliches growing up when they were playing junior hockey. And they just say exactly like Pierre-I-Dward Belmar, great example. And he was in Vegas. The guy did not know a cliche. He would just say exactly what he was thinking. And he was my favorite player to talk to. I loved it. I hate cliches. And that was absolutely.

brutal. Two points in the play. We're just focused on two points. Man, that made me laugh. Rapid fire topic number two, Brian Russ, re-signing with Pittsburgh. What do you think this means for Malkin and Latang, who of course, you know, they both say they want to stay in Pittsburgh, but six-year deal for Rust, where's that money going to come from? It definitely doesn't bode well for that. Like, I'm not saying that those two won't stay, but I feel less likely that they'll stay after this contract was signed than I did before. I don't know what Pittsburgh should do. They're in such an interesting situation because it doesn't feel like this core is going to be good enough to win.

Like without a major change, like without a major influx of some other kind of talent, right? Because I thought they'd beat the Rangers and they didn't. But would they have gone past Carolina. Right. And then Tampa and then Colorado, like Calgary or Edmonton or whoever it is. Like, they feel not close. They don't feel close. And I don't know what they're going to be able to do with, if you sign Malikin and you sign all these guys,

I don't know what change is going to happen and what salary cap space they have to get close. So I don't, as weird as it sounds, maybe a rebuild is what is the right way to go. And they're all a year older. We're talking about players in their 30s. We're not talking about, you know, a young core. Speaking of money, Mark Giordano, talk about a hometown discount to stay with the Leafs. Two years, $1.6 million. That's easy math.

$800K a year. That's unbelievable. It's a great contract for Toronto. I mean, when you're a cap team, you are constantly looking for contracts that will be, the player will outplay his contract. Like, we've got all these top guys, Matthews and everybody making all this money. like we need cheap contracts that the player will outplay. Giordano, there's like, if he's on the ice, he's outplaying this contract.

Yeah, that's what I said, done. It's like, I don't know, barring, you know, yeah, no, he's going to outplay this contract. And he said this is a team that he thinks can win a Stanley Cup. So you leave money on the table. But wow, did not think something like that 800K. As we mentioned, the Florida Panthers done. Have we seen the last of Joe Thornton? I hope not. I like seeing Joe out there. I mean, I think we probably have. He didn't play a lot. I think that's usually the sign. I think I think that was what he was waiting for. He'd been playing for so long. It's like, well, I'm still playing every night. I'm playing however many minutes. Like, I'm good enough to play in this league and I like it. Maybe I'll keep going. But I think this year was the first time we really saw him, him kind of not be able to get on the ice as much. So maybe that is it. What do you think? Yeah. No, I know. I wanted to see him win a Stanley Cup so bad.

Not that I'm, I really, I'm not one of those people that, you know, you bring up basketball a lot. Someone in the NBA doesn't win a title. I think it means so much more than someone in the NHL. I'm not going to look at Joe Thornton's career any differently if you want a Stanley Cup or not. Right. And I think it's because in basketball, one guy can win you a title. Like in hockey, sometimes you're just not on the right teams. Like Charles Barkley not winning a title in the NBA is a black mark on his,

his resume. I don't think Joe Thornt not winning it. And I've enjoyed watching him since I was in high school. Like, think about that. So, you know what, Joe, I mean, but he enjoys playing the game.

Who knows? John Tortorella confirms that he did interview in Philadelphia for the Flyers coaching position. You know, we talked earlier about cliches. He gives you anything but cliches. Do you think we're going to see an NHO with John Torto. as head coach again? It sounds like it. I mean, the fact that he's interviewing and he's getting

interviews, for me, I feel like he fits in Philly. Like, I feel like he fits what that city like, like he just fits the city. He fits what kind of team that city likes to have play for it. I don't know. There's something about the Flyers and their history and the way they're, and like right now, they're kind of in, I feel like they went all in and made all these trades when they weren't close. So I don't know if they're in a rebuild or if they're in when now. I'm not really sure what the Flyers are doing. But I feel like Tortorella is a fit there. What do you think?

I think I agree with you that Philadelphia feels to me as like the most Tortorella city ever. Yeah. I'm just wondering if the Tortorella style without some sort of morphing, which he does, and never to me seems to be willing to do is successful anymore. I just don't know. The intimidation, we saw what happened with him in line A and the benching. And I just feel like that's such a, such an outdated style of coaching. And like, you know, as a member of the media, I love his sound bites.

I love his scrums sometimes. Then there are times where he gives you a 30 second scrum because he doesn't want to get fined and he just goes out there and says nothing. And that can be frustrating too. So I think John Tortorella comes with a lot of good and a lot of bad. I've seen other coaches be able to adapt. I hope he can at least adapt because the same old John Tortorella trying to intimidate people just don't think it works anymore.

Yeah. And I also think it depends on where the flyers, like if the flyers are going to rebuild and get a bunch of young pieces and try to develop them, I don't think John Tortorale is the guy to develop a young team into like and bring those guys up. I think if you've got veterans who you want to try to eke into the playoffs, and maybe win some series you're not supposed to, that's probably the guy you want. Unless remember, he said that Trevor Zegro's goal was bad for the game.

Right, that's what I mean. Never going to forget that. Don't let him near my young players, anyone under the age of 23. Do not let him near them. That wraps up another show. Sarah should be back next week, but between now and then, Jesse, anything you're plugging? Just working on.

I just published a mailbag, answered a bunch of questions for Golden Knights, head coaching search today. You're going to publish the second half of that. I got so many questions I had to break it into two. We're talking free agency. And it should be an interesting offseason for the Golden Knights. They've got to unload a bunch of contracts.

They're already over the cap. They only have 13 skaters signed. And they are already over the salary cap with four RFAs still not signed. So it's going to be interesting. You're going to be like a registered capologist by the time this off season is done. So don't tell me you got nothing to do. You've got plenty to do. We'll talk to you next week, Jesse.

want to let everybody else know we got on tap here at the athletic. Bruce Boudreau, going to be joining Thomas Trance and Farhand Lulgi this week on the VanCast. And we've got Bill Garen joining Michael Russo on straight from the source this week at the Athletic. Remember, I tell you this each and every week and telling you this for a reason. We want you to follow us on your favorite podcast platform. Don't forget, leave us a rating and review. You could subscribe to the Athletic Audio Plus on Apple Podcast to get all the bonus content from the entire entire network. You start with a 30-day free trial. Then it's just 99 cents a month after that.

And right now, you get an annual subscription to the athletic for just a dollar a month for six months when you visit theathletic.com slash hockey show. The athletic hockey show returns on Thursday with Ian Mendez and down goes brown for Jesse and Sarah, who's somewhere on an airplane in the sky as we do this. I'm Rob. We'll talk to you next week.