LG Playoff Round 1 Breakdown ( East )

As the regular season has finally concluded, we start to head into week one of the playoffs without much of any media or write-ups, so I figured I'd give it a shot. This is all my opinion and from what I've seen playing with and against certain players. Nothing personal to anyone! Enjoy.

#1 Tampa Bay v #8 Montreal

Sweet Lou has done it again, creating a great REGULAR SEASON team. What a tremendous season the bolts had with @Batman x 17 at it again just absolutely dominating the competition for yet another season. With Sweet Lou's boys doing what they do, they also have a #TBT duo with @Raynor28 and @x SMP 7 x. Making 2 extremely talented lines (Not sure if they play together) Rounding out the rest of the squad are some very formidable players that have performed very well for Lou. The regular season has been extremely nice to @SweeT 9 LoU 84 over the past couple seasons, but the playoffs have been a whole different animal for Lou. With personal career record of 94-53-21 in the regular season will he be able to get over the hump? He owns a very modest 7-8-2 playoff record thus far, but to be fair to him and his teams they have come across some very difficult first round match-ups over the past couple seasons. The tough match-ups seem to continue into season 22 as the Bolts host the Habs. Even as an 8 seed versus a 1 seed match-up this is a very tough match-up of Lou's #1 seeded Lighting.

The Lightning draw the Habs in the first round, owned by last seasons Stanley Cup Champion Co-Owner @Jay Rulez . Last Season Jay, with some help from Boz built a Stanley Cup Champion in Anaheim alongside @x Latourious , LG's Number one playoff goal scorer @I Anty Jemima I , Prolific forward @Bass l91l , myself and many other talented players. When I look down Jay's lineup this time around I do not see that type of talent. He has @Known as Dub and a couple other good players, but it doesn't seem they have the type of depth that he had a season ago in Anaheim. The one thing that Jay does have is playoff experience and a Stanley Cup under his belt, so he does have the advantage in this match-up in that regard. The one thing that was interesting about last season's run for Jay is that he knew that he was a sub par player at best and put the teams best lineups out there, which did not include himself as he owns a 7-10-2 playoff record. His knowledge of managing a playoff team and plugging in lineups and working match-ups is what could win the series for the Habs.

A very important aspect to this series will be the goalie battle. With goals going in from what seems just about anywhere, goaltending in every series will be huge. In my personal opinion @bakesssss is one of the best in the business. His regular season stats were not extremely impressive with a 77 save% and 2.6GAA, but this guy can steal a game when he wants too. He shut down LA's potent offense in the first ever 'Game of the Week' and is very capable of shutting down Tampa's great offense as well. He holds a 6-4-1 all-time playoff record with a 69 save% which is kind of scary from MTL's point of view. Hopefully Bakes can settle in and keep the jitters to a minimum, because his team is going to need him to perform great in order to win the series. On the other side of the coin we have @King Natzu who put up some pretty outstanding regular season stats and will get some Vezina consideration for sure. He was 28-13-3 with a 78.1 save% and a 2.1GAA. Again, REGULAR SEASON. Playoffs are a different animal, games are more tense and the palms get a bit sweaty. Natzu has little experience in the playoffs with a 0-4 record allowing a little over 4 goals a game in that span. Lou should hope that the regular season Natzu shows up or it could be a long series for Tampa.

Overall I believe that this will not be the typical 1 v 8 battle. Jay will have the Habs playing hard and will grease as much as he can to win this series and with his experience he may just pull off the upset. With the lack of 3 solid lines going against Tampa who has a boat load of talent, I do not see them pulling off the upset and I am going to say Tampa takes it in 6.

MVP- Batman

#2 Islanders v #7 Red Wings

With an unreal start to the season @I Beat Up Cakes team cooled down and came back down to earth to claim the #2 seed in the Eastern Conference. Cakes built this team much like he has in the past, he got his Windsor boys and grabbed @Devin l94l for the ride as well. I cannot say enough good things about this team. They do not have many holes in their line-up and on paper they look extremely dangerous. Not to mention how much playoff success Cakes has had in the league, with a 28-12-2 record in the playoffs he knows what he is doing come playoff time and is a great guy to lead a team into the playoffs. He has 2 cups to his credit in his long career in the internet hockey world and hopes to claim one more in season 22. GM Devin also has been successful in the attempt to claim a Stanley Cup winning one way back in season 15, but has had some rough playoffs as of late. Its hard to bet against these two who have such great records in the regular season and playoffs, not to mention the tremendous supporting cast they have this season with @x Kariya 9 x with an unreal 20-3-1 record and who is always in Selke contention. He also has the luxury of playing with longtime line-mate and brother @Jewell x 96 who also had a great season and put up some great numbers alongside his brother. The only real question seems to be defense as they do not have many big names on the defensive side of things. Of course they have @x Sakic 19 x who had a great season playing with the Jewells I assume with a 20-3-3 record. The one stand out defense-men for the Isles was @CadarianTV. What a season he had playing Brooklyn going 20-2-1 putting up 27 points in 23 games. He could find himself in the discussion for Norris for sure.

What can I say about Big Jay that has not already been said? He has built yet another playoff team here in season 22. With some of the usual suspects, @Th3 l AnD 0n1y in net, @xW 4 R D , and my boy @cj142 . This has a bit of a different feel than teams past as they have finished in 7th in the East. Most of Big Jay's teams in the past couple seasons have been top 3 in the conference but this team seemed to have struggled a but, but was also in a very difficult Atlantic Division. Looking down the line-up there aren't too many spectacular records besides that of @x Crusty Jar x who was 20-5-1 and put up 65 points for the wings. It doesn't seem as though Jay's time has a high powered line but they do have 3 very very solid lines that will be tough to play against. This is the one series I am most intrigued in because the 2 owners have so much experience and have been in the league forever. As always The Lord had a great season between in pipes as he still remains a top tier goalie despite the difference in the next gen controls. He has a gaudy 28-7-6 record in the playoffs with a 2.1 GAA. This guy is lights out come playoff time and could send the Cakes and the boys packing early in the playoffs. He has a Vezina to his credit, but he does not own a cup, will this be the year?

After talking up the Red Wings net-minder we take a look at the other side of the ice in the Islanders net. There stands the duo of @Mindhunter114 and @urnewstepd4d . Both very solid goalies in their own rights and could be the main focus of this series. Like I previous stated the goalies will be very important in the playoffs and this series is not exception. Both goalies come in with positive playoff records and some experience, but will they be able to out battle The One and Only? We shall find out. But for the prediction, I have to choose the Islanders because of there complete roster and great game 7 lineup. Islanders in 7
MVP - Kariya

Atlantic (2) Buffalo v Atlantic (3) Toronto

Coming into season 22 I was not sure what to expect from the Toronto Maple Leafs, but week after week I was still looking up at them in the standings up until the very last where we past them. @TheLastRecluse5 and company built a very strong team from top to bottom with GM @MafiaMan15 having an amazing season going 21-4 with 33 points to go along with the great record. This team is dangerous and has changed a great deal over the course of the season where they only got better by adding guys like Hayes along the way to create a very good challenge for Buffalo in the first round match-up. The most shocking thing has to be the play of the top line with @Trevelyan and @Oo TheMVP oO both surpassing 100 points on the season and having great records as well. With that duo plus Hayes playing on the second line with the likes of frost should make for a good 1-2 punch for Toronto. The defense looks solid as well with Mafia and Sloshy holding it down on the back-end and last but not least we have the goalie. @zBernatchez This guy was not someone who worried me at the start of the week after never really seeing him play. After seeing him play, I would put him in the top 10 goalies in game for sure. Bernatchez played unreal and nearly stole a game that Toronto had no business being in, which come playoff time is very scary for the opposition. Although the regular season was a success, @TheLastRecluse5 holds a playoff record of 1-3. Showing his lack of playoff experience, this may or may not play a role in the series with the Buffalo Sabres.

Well well, what a roller-coaster of a season it has been for my Buffalo Sabres. At the beginning of the season it was looking as though we were going to be watching Twitch broadcasts of the playoffs and now here we are in the top of the Eastern Conference. I would like to give a huge thanks for @AK l91l and @xFIOx TENDY 29 for helping run the team and I could not have done it without you guys. What is there to say about my own team? I think we have a really solid squad going into the match-up with Toronto and I think we have guys that have been here before and know how to win. @Odieeeeee holds an all-time playoff record of 16-2 including one playoff run of 11-0 and a Conn Smythe. I have had several deep playoff runs myself, so there experience is there. But will it matter? Who knows, but looking down the line-up there are several stand out players such as @Chelios l24l @mgordongecko and AHL call up @II BURSEY II on defense who came up huge playing unreal for their contracts along with a lot of cheap forwards who performed very well. The lineup is very bottom heavy with most of the cap sitting on defense so, the real key to this series will be scoring for my Sabres.

The key will be if the Sabres can put pucks by Bernie consistently or will he continue his hot streak and steal the series? The Toronto Maple Leafs undoubtedly have the fire power upfront to put pucks in the net , but will they be able to against the top Buffalo Defense. Not to mention the hot play of AK? There are a lot of question marks in this series, but I do know one thing and that is that this will be a great series and I can't wait to take part in it. Good luck to Toronto and let the best team win.

Metro (2) Devils v Metro (3) Penguins

This series has a lot of familiar faces from my stand point, but I will start with the Penguins. Owner @x S m ii R k Y and GM @Easy Mac 92 built a contender in Pittsburgh, but it seemed to be by way of trade as they have a lot of new faces that were not there weeks ago. They have a long list of talented forwards with former teammates of mine and dynamic duo @TheTightSpliff and @NukeBomb81 playing together on a line I would guess, plus Smirky and Mac on a line would create 2 great lines for PIT to roll out against New Jersey. From Experience, Spliff + Nuke = Cups. These 2 guys have not been around too long but yet both have 2 cups So the experience will be there for sure for Pittsburgh, but the question marks for this team seem to be on the defensive side of things and in net. They have top D man @Primetimme and AGM @Kbsmith37 who held the best record of 17-10-2 but other than that someone will have to step up and I belive @bc bud024 is capable of doing that, but the goaltedning in the PIT looks like it could pose an issue in this match-up. With @Rapter0621 getting 42 starts he had a very solid record of 23-14-5, but as a rookie he has yet to play a playoff game at this level and it could very well send the penguins out of the playoffs early. With solid defense in front of him and a ton of fire power up front he does not have to be dominant but just good enough. If he plays his game and doesn't let the big stage get to him I think Pittsburgh should be okay.

Speaking of Dynamic duos, this team not only has one but they have two. @Blobss and @Girgss play together frequently and @Chislett 19 may be attached to @The Gr8 Haxby s hip..not sure. But I am sure that these two duo's create to amazing lines and it could be hard to counter for any team. They have a fairly good supporting cast alongside them with a weak third line, but they do have a tremendous talent on defense in @Rammered who has chemistry with both Girgs and Trobby. Other than Rammered and @ReplayChr1s I do not see that much talent on the back end for NJ, but I do see @l V a s l who is a top tier goalie and can save the defense of any blunders they make in front of him. Vas can be a game changer and had a solid season getting traded around, but still went 20-9-1. As far as playoff experience goes, Vas is only 4-2, but has played some big 6s games in his day so he should be fine. @Blobss holds a 10-2-3 playoff record and has hoisted the Stanley Cup once before so he and Girgs should not be fazed by this playoff match-up.

The real question is if Vas and Crabby Crawfish can bail out the Devils on occasion and be good enough to win high scoring games. As these two teams battle, I see a lot of high scoring affairs and I think the team that can limit mistakes in breaking the puck out will have the most success. The light is on the goalies in this one though, as these two high-powered teams face off the goalies will have to be on their games not not get embarrassed. Another big factor is the play of both teams defenses. These teams are built very similar with 2 great forward lines and a top D man, with some solid supporting cast. I have to give New Jersey the nod in this one in 7 games, because I believe NJ has the better game 7 lineup.

MVP- Vas

Thanks for reading and goodluck to all playoffs teams!

 

Good write up.
Appreciate your grasp of the English language and punctuation.

 

Good read, Keep em coming

 

Shoutout to the Canadian Diabetes Association from the overweight LG Detroit Redwings whom would easily outweigh any other team in the history books.

 

Good stuff.

 

Wanna play 2s on PS4?

 

Yes

 

WEST?

 

Ill write up a West one tomorrow

 

You're welcome. Sometimes I think of you when I'm sitting in McDonald's at 2am eating an ice cream cone.

 

@StamToast thx for the love good comedic relief. See ya Sunday

 

good write up, toast but were aids in NYI, wings in 5.

 

@Scary Jews just came

 

9.5

 

good write up

 

I wonder how @MafiaMan15 will play vs. a Playoff team for the first time this season.

 

He won't be calling a forfeit pussy.

 

You don't know Mafia very well, do you?

 

7-2 this year... I'll be fine