Avalanche Melting, Hurricanes Gaining Strength (Show 8)

Sean is here to break down the first three games of each Conference Final series. What did the Avalanche in? How have the Hurricanes shown to be getting stronger? Then he discusses his top three goals of the week and his Doggy Bag predictions for how these two series will finish up. It's Biscuit Breakdown! Consider yourself served!

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Transcript

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It's time for biscuit breakdown, where hockey is the only thing on the menu. And welcome back, hockey fans, whoever you root for, wherever you live, whenever it is, it's hockey time. Thank you for tuning into Biscuit Breakdown. I'm your host Sean, and we are in the thick of the conference finals. Before we get into anything with that, be sure to follow me on Instagram. I am Biscuit Breakdown, Twitter, Biscuit Breakdown without the O, or Gmail Biscuit BreakdownPod at gmail.com. Be sure to follow the show wherever you get your podcasts, and if you are feeling extra nice today, then please give me a five-star rating and write a review. Thank you very much in advance to all the people who are going to go out there and do that. Alright, it's time for our fresh out the oven segment. We only have two series left to talk about here in the NHL playoffs. We're going to start with the Western Conference Final because that one started first. And at time of recording, both series have played three games. The Vegas Golden Knights are shockingly up three games to none on the Colorado Avalanche. Shit has really hit the fan for the Avalanche. And the Carolina Hurricanes are winning currently by a score of two to one in their series over the Montreal Canadiens. So in the West, basically the Avalanche have had um a bit of bad luck and a bit of uh underperformance, in my opinion. In game one and two of that series, the Colorado Avalanche did not have Kale McCarr, arguably the best defenseman in the world. Um he's hurt with a shoulder injury. Um so that is a major loss on the back end. He helps them in every facet of the game, shutting down opponents and contributing majorly to their offensive output. So not having him was hugely disappointing for the Avalanche and proved to be a real issue because the Vegas Golden Knights won the first two games quite easily. He returned in game three in Vegas, but it still did not help as the Vegas Golden Knights went on to win by a score of five to three after storming back from being down three nothing. Game three was definitely the most exciting game of this series so far because it had the most goals, and also in game one and two, they were a bit of a snooze fest, so you gotta give Vegas some credit. They've been controlling the middle of the ice, they've been really shutting down the avalanche, limiting their speed, not giving them a lot of chances or a lot of second chance opportunities off of rebounds and things like that. So they've made the game quite boring. Not great to watch as a viewer, but you know, they're doing what they do, and it's proving to be successful. But in game three of that series, the Avalanche suffered their most devastating loss so far because they were winning by a score of 3-0 after the end of the first period. They had come out and done everything that they needed to do to put themselves in a great position to win that game and get back into the series, but they got the worst lead in hockey, and yet again it proved to be true. Three-goal lead, they sat back a little bit, they went to sleep. Vegas used that as motivation. They came out, scored a goal early in the second period, and got rolling, and they just were a basically an army of knights that were relentless, and they ended up winning the game five to three, a devastating loss for Colorado, and basically ending the series. Um, in my opinion, the Avalanche are done. Most teams are toast once they're down three games to none. It is super challenging and very, very rare to be able to come back from a three-nothing hole. Only four teams have ever done it in the history of the NHL, and I do not suspect the Avalanche will be able to pull this off because Vegas is rolling. Their goalie Carter Hart is hot right now, and they also suffered another major injury to arguably their best player, Nathan McKinnon. He blocked a shot, I believe it was in the second period of game three, and it looked like it hit him on the outside of the knee where there isn't much padding or none at all. And so he was hobbled, he was on the bench trying to power through it. It looked brutal. He ended up going to the locker room, probably got a shot of painkiller, tried to come back out in the third period, and he clearly was not himself. He is one of the fastest players in the NHL. He uses his power and speed and his cutbacks to really generate offense for himself, and he couldn't do any of that. He was just standing around like some Joe Schmoe idiot, pain in the ass guy on a men's league team that um, you know, he's out there, he's loving it, but the team isn't. So he is more of a traffic cone. Um we'll see what Nathan McKinnon can do tonight. He is in for game four, and the game is about to start here shortly, so we'll see if his issue has been somewhat resolved so that he can be somewhat of a factor here tonight. Selfishly, I'm hoping that the Avalanche can win this game tonight, and then win game five in Denver, force a game six, bring it to seven, who knows? I don't know. I don't want a short series, I don't want Vegas to sweep this because I love watching hockey, it's great action, and if we get another sweep, it's just less hockey for us all, so I am rooting for the avalanche here tonight. Alright, moving on into the Eastern Conference Final, we have the Carolina Hurricanes up against the Montreal Canadiens. Currently that series is two to one in favor of the Hurricanes. They won last night in overtime at time of recording on a nice shot by Andre Svetnikov, who used the screen to score the goal and propel the Hurricanes to victory. But quickly back to game one of that series, which happened on Thursday night, I was thoroughly enjoying it, laughing, just fully soaking it in, how the Montreal Canadians just came into Raleigh and blew the doors off the Hurricanes and won 6-2. Now everyone will say, oh, it's because the Hurricanes were rusty, they hadn't played in literally 12 days, the longest break that any team has ever had in the playoffs. True. You know, you could make an argument for that. Montreal was coming off a game seven win in overtime against the Buffalo Sabres. They were feeling good, they were just riding on vibes, they were in a rhythm of playing every other day, and they kept that rolling right into game one, and they really let it show. And the Hurricanes were left wondering whether they should shitter wind their watch. I was laughing at the speed at which the Montreal Canadians made that game four to one, and also the defensive mishaps that the Hurricanes were doing. They looked like they hadn't played hockey in the last seven years, some of them. So it was a bit surprising. I expected them to be rusty, but I didn't expect them to be that rusty. And then game two, the Hurricanes got back to form, and they made it a boring game. They controlled the center of the ice, they played great defense, uh, they limited the Montreal Canadian shots, and the game went to overtime two to two, and then Nicolaj Ehlers scored an awesome shot in overtime to send the series even at 1-1, heading to Montreal. Game three with a was another pretty boring game. Montreal was just dominated in terms of shots again, and they really need to figure out what's going on and how to get more shots and more second chances, otherwise, they are going to be toast in this series. So Game 3 went to overtime, Svechnikov wins it, and Carolina is up two games to one. And now that you are listening to these series breakdowns, you might be able to notice similarities between the Vegas Golden Knights and the Carolina Hurricanes in that they both do a great job of playing defensive hockey, controlling the middle of the ice, limiting the other team's speed and their shots, and obviously it proves successful. So we might be heading towards a Vegas, Carolina, Stanley Cup final that will basically be the equivalent of taking seven Ambience and then trying to watch television. So I'm hoping that I'm wrong and we get some exciting final matchup, and even if that is the matchup, I'm hoping it's exciting hockey because every game might end 2-1. Some people love that, some people don't. I'm okay with that every once in a while, but I don't want every game ending two to one. I'd like, you know, a four-three, a five-two, a four-to-two, a four, you know, give me something here. We'll see. Time will tell. For now, Vegas with a three-nothing lead over the Avalanche, and Carolina with a two-to-one lead over the Canadians. Which reminds me, um, the Canadians are now two and five at home in the playoffs. That is completely unacceptable and very strange considering the fact that they have, I would say, one of the top three arenas and atmospheres to play in in the NHL. They've got the largest arena for an NHL game, over 21,000 fans who are basically all wearing Montreal Canadians jerseys, waving their towels, going nuts, singing Ole, Ole, Ole, Ole. I mean, these passionate hockey fans react to everything happening on the ice. As a player, it's gotta completely fire you up and get your adrenaline going, and for some reason, the Canadians are just wasting this opportunity and letting all of these fans down like a drugged up DJ who's pressing a button and putting on a shitty ass performance. So things to look for as we move forward in this series. Can the Avalanche score some goals and get some goaltending? Because Scott Wedgwood for the Avalanche was not playing up to par. He was more like Scott Wedgeywood with his panties up in a bunch, just stuck in there, really having issues, not comfortable, and letting in goals that he should not, and you can't have that in the playoffs. And then as far as the Montreal Canadiens, similar to the Avalanche, can they generate some offense, some sustained pressure, get more than fifteen shots on net, whatever they had in game three, because that is not going to cut it. You're not gonna beat the Hurricanes with only fifteen shots on net. You're not gonna beat many teams with only fifteen shots on net. I'm not sure you're winning men's league like that. Um so we'll see what happens moving forward with both of these series. Alright, it's time to change it up and move into our top goals of the week, our top buttery biscuits. Everyone loves a top cheddar biscuit, and the theme of this week are bar down biscuits. We've had some excellent goals this week, and we're here to break it all down. Once again, you can head on over to the NHL app or NHL's Instagram or Twitter. A lot of different avenues where you can find the actual video replay of these breakdowns, but I'm going to describe them here as if you have no access to video. I am your only window into these goals. Alright, we gotta do two honorable mentions before we get into our top three goals of the week. First honorable mention goes to Montreal Canadiens winger Cole Caulfield, who scored a beautiful goal in game one of that series, which helped propel them to victory. He basically was in tight on the goalie and ripped it high over his right shoulder into the top left corner of the net. It was in and out before you could say Jack Rabbit Chimichanga. And the Canadians route was on in game one. Our next honorable mention goes to Defenseman for the Canadians, Michael Matheson, who scored a nice top trader goal in game three of that series, right over the glove of Frederick Anderson for the Carolina Hurricanes. And this was um an honorable mention because it helped make the game closer, but also it was a nice goal over the glove. And he basically walked right down Main Street. It was shooter on goalie, and this case the shooter won. So it's always impressive when the shooter can score a goal right past the goalie when the goalie has a clear view of it, because sometimes the goalie is screened, and in that case it's not really their fault. Alright, in the number three slot this week we have Eric Robinson of the Carolina Hurricanes, who in game one of that series went bar down on Jakob Dobesh for the Montreal Canadiens, and going bar down means you hit the top crossbar and it goes down right into the net. Totally top cheddar. There's no more top cheddar than you can get than that. Um the reason it's in the number three spot is because it was a beautiful goal, a real dazzler, but it did not help the Hurricanes win the game that night. It was all just for show, basically. But either way, it was an enjoyable goal to watch. In the number two spot we have Ivan Barbishev of the Vegas Golden Knights, who also went bar down in game two of that series. And the reason that this is the number two spot is because that goal did help the Vegas Golden Knights win that game. So we're putting a little bit of emphasis on that. And Scott Wedgwood was screened, and so it wasn't exactly his fault. Ivan Barbashev was out at distance and ripped the puck bar down over Scott Wedgwood's right shoulder, which was leaky. And the Vegas Golden Knights were off and celebrating on to a game two victory. And the number one goal of the week goes to Colorado forward Valerie Nechuskin, who scored an amazing goal by putting his stick in between his legs and deflecting the puck to the far side of the net for a goal to make the deficit for the Colorado Avalanche to only two in game one, but it did not prove to be fruitful as they ended up losing. But either way, it was a tremendous display of hand eye coordination, talent, and just a little bit of creativity to allow himself the upper edge on the goalie in that situation. Alright, it's time to change it up and move into our doggy bag prediction segment. We only have two series left to talk about. I am going to predict that the Avalanche win tonight. Somehow, some way. They take a page out of a Vegas magician's book and pull a rabbit out of the hat and get a victory, despite how hobbled they are. They somehow, some way get this series back to Denver for a game five, and then they win game five, and then they go on to lose game six at the fortress in Vegas. That is my prediction for that series. I think it's only a matter of time before the Knights are marching to the Stanley Cup final. In the other series, I'm going to predict that the Montreal Canadiens will finally write the ship and win a game at home after a while. It'll only be their third victory in eight tries at home, but I think they will get the game four victory. They'll study the tape, they'll get more shots on net, they'll take a page at a little John's book shots, shots, shots, shots, shots, shots, shots, shots, shots, shots, shots, everybody shots, and they will win the game, sending it back to Carolina at a score of 2-2 in the series. Carolina will then thomp them in Carolina, and then Carolina will go on to beat them once again in Montreal and move on to face the Golden Knights after defeating the Canadians in game six. Those are my predictions for the two remaining series. That's the doggy bag. That's what you can take with you. And that is our show for today. Thank you for tuning in to Biscuit Breakdown. If you would like to follow me on Instagram, I am Biscuit Breakdown. Twitter, Biscuit Breakdown without the O. Gmail, Biscuit Breakdown Pod at gmail.com. Please be sure to follow wherever you get your podcasts. I would really appreciate it if you could give me a five-star rating and review. And send this to a hockey friend in need. Send it to a family member, send it to a friend, send it to a coworker, anyone in your life that enjoys hockey, that needs a little more hockey in their life, send it to them, and I would really appreciate it. Thank you. This has been Biscuit Breakdown. Consider yourself served.