FROM THE STANDS

 

Hi and welcome to another installment….In FTS 2, I touched on

coaching changes in the league…Since then, there have been some

changes and Mike Keenan was right in the middle of it…..I guess the fans in Vancouver finally had enough of him but look where he ends up. Looks like art imitates life or is it the other way around?…

 

Florida fires Dave Lewis and hires Alain Vigneault…Then Vancouver fires Mike Keenan and hires Dave Lewis…Then Florida fires Alain Vigneault and hires Mike Keenan….Why didn’t the Canucks and Panthers just trade coaches and leave poor A.V. alone……He must feel like piggy in the middle. So now who is left to be fired?…..Anything is possible but I have a feeling the coaches musical chairs is over for this season………

 

THIS AND THAT…..At the halfway mark of the season the Rangers lead the league and the Eastern Conference in points with the Stars leading in the Western Conference..

In the East, where it gets interesting is that from the 4th to 8th spots are only 3 points apart, while in the West, 6th to 9th are 5 points apart….In the “Will they make it to the playoffs”,

In the East, there are 4 teams that still have a shot at making the playoffs but they will need to put together a strong 2nd half and will need help from other teams..the 3 teams are Thrashers, Penguins, Devils and Hurricanes….In the West, its still wide open although the Coyotes and Wild have the best chances to move up…The Wild are still leading the power play special teams with a 21.5% rating  while the Devils still lead the penalty kill special teams with a 90.9% rating…In the star points(MVP) there are 8 goalies in the

top 10..The 2 skaters are Danny Heatley(NYI) 7th and  Super Mario(NYR) 9th….Currently Mike Dunham(EDM) leads with 64 points with Mark Denis(TBL) next

at  58 points and Jocelyn Thibault(NJD) at 57 points…and whatever happened to

Don Ashby?

 

Well that’s the way I see it

From the Stands,

Steve Simmons