NHL Playoff Blog

Don’t Count the Kids Out

May 29th, 2008 by Jason Chen

The Pens are 9-0 at home, completely outplayed Detroit, and will push for at least a Game 5 back in Detroit, avoiding a sweep, which would’ve made it 3 in 11 seasons for Detroit in the finals. I only caught a bit of the game on radio before I left for the airport, but it sounded like Marc-Andre Fleury really stepped up his game and the Wings were getting too fancy with the puck. James Duthie noted on TSN that there has been virtually no lead changes in this year’s Stanley Cup playoffs, and so I understood Mike Babcock’s urgency to get Pavel Datsyuk and Henrik Zetterberg out there on the ice as much as they can early to pounce on a lead, but only to have that plan completely backfire as the Wings lost the extra step to keep up with the Pens youth and ended up losing the game. Neither Zetterberg nor Datsyuk hit the scoresheet.

Michel Therrien also benefited greatly from the home-ice advantage, and with the last change was easily able to keep Sidney Crosby off the ice when Babcock sent out Zetterberg. The result was immediate as Crosby scored two goals to lead the Pens while Adam Hall netted the game-winner.

With the Pens’ comeback it has fully rejuvenated the series, as blowouts in Games 1 and 2 turned off some viewers, but a Pens win means TV viewers are back again. Versus’ TV ratings featured an astonishing 273% total increase over last year’s opener between Anaheim and Ottawa, and a 181% increase from the Carolina-Edmonton series. This comes as no surprise, as Detroit and Pittsburgh are considered fairly viable American hockey markets, not to mention that the NHL’s poster boy is in the big showdown for the first time in his young career. The NHL’s marketable future depends much on Crosby, whose ubiquitous Gatorade and RBK ads will be a major promoter of hockey in the US.

Key stat: In 2003, the Ducks failed to score a goal in the first two games against New Jersey, and went on to lose the series in 7 games. The other time before that occurred in 1945 when the Wings failed to score against the Leafs, and that ended in the same result, as the Wings lost in 7 games. The Pens will be hoping to change that trend this year.

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