FanHouse DanBoyle

After jumping out to a 1-0 series lead in the Western Conference Final, Red Wings head coach Mike Babcock held a press conference on Monday and fielded a variety of questions from the media. For the most part, it was your typical, run-of-the-mill press conference.

About half way through, a reporter started asking Babcock about how he once joked that he was ready for the salary cap to break up the young talent the Chicago Blackhawks have assembled over the years. In Babcock's mind, he wasn't joking.

Hostilities began when the puck dropped, and in a penalty-happy Game 6, the Ducks took better advantage of the man advantage and knocked the top-seeded Sharks out of the playoffs.

San Jose, which finished with a league-best 117 points, fell 4-1 at the Honda Center and became the fourth President's Trophy winning team to fall in the first round. Perennial disappointments who have yet to make it to the Stanley Cup Finals, the Sharks do not have a good relationship with sixth games in playoff series, and are now 2-13 overall and 1-7 on the road in those games.

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Patrick Marleau has borne the brunt of the criticism during San Jose's recent postseason disappointments, and that carried right into the first two games of the Sharks' first-round series against the Anaheim Ducks.

That is until the Sharks' captain came up with the game-deciding goal in Tuesday night's 4-3 victory over Anaheim at the Honda Center. Marleau's tip-in from the slot came with 10:33 left in the third period and the Sharks on a power play after Corey Perry was called for hooking San Jose's Dan Boyle.

That gave the Sharks their fourth one-goal lead of the night, and they held on as Bobby Ryan got off the only shot for Anaheim after the Ducks pulled goalie Jonas Hiller with 1:30 left. The eighth-seeded Ducks lead the series two games to one over the President's Cup winners.

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Thanks to the lottery on Tuesday night, we now know the order of selection for the draft. The Islanders will lead off from the pole position and, as I discussed earlier in the week, they've got an awful lot on their plate. But what about the other teams that sent representatives to TSN studios on Tuesday night?

Well, today we have an inside look at the war room of the Tampa Bay Lightning*. Since Oren Koules and Len Barrie took over the franchise last year, the Lightning have made some interesting personnel decisions. They hired and fired Barry Melrose as coach, shipped out Dan Boyle and Matt Carle, leaving the team almost devoid of defense, and had Lecavalier trade rumors swirl around them faster than a tornado. After the jump, I'll give you a little more insight into what is going on behind the scenes.

* - May not actually be the what the Lightning are planning.

It's been a rough couple of months for the Tampa Bay Lightning, as they're already on their second head coach of the season, the stud rookie is looking like somewhat of a dud, and the team is currently sitting with the fourth-worst record in the league. About the only way things could possibly get worse for the Lightning is if management did something completely crazy, off-the-wall and relatively insane, such as, oh, I don't know, trading team captain and franchise player Vincent Lecavalier.

Sounds crazy, sure, but earlier this week rumors began to surface that the Lightning may be shopping their captain before his new contract -- and no-trade clause -- kicks in this offseason.

Good news, however, as Bob McKenzie of TSN reports the Lightning have told Lecavalier the rumors are just that, and they have no intentions of trading him.

Thanks to a pair of goals from Matt Ellis, the Buffalo Sabres ended Boston's 10-game winning streak with a 4-2 victory at TD Banknorth Garden on Saturday afternoon. The loss not only snaps Boston's 10-game winning streak, it also ended a 14-game home winning streak, while also giving the Bruins their sixth regulation loss of the season.

Ellis opened the scoring for the Sabres just three minutes into regulation, while Thomas Vanek added his 26th goal of the season just two minutes later.

After Phil Kessel cut the deficit in half with his 24th goal of the season, Ellis added his second goal of the game early in the second period to score what proved to be the game-winner. Paul Gaustad added his fourth goal of the year for the Sabres, while Ryan Miller turned aside 29 shots in net.

The win for Buffalo, combined with Pittsburgh's loss to Florida, moved the Sabres into the eighth and final playoff spot in the Eastern Conference.

Bizarre game in Philadelphia on Saturday afternoon, as the Capitals fired 48 shots at Flyers goaltender Antero Niittymaki -- including 25 in the first period -- only to get their lunches handed to them on the scoreboard in the form of a 7-1 dismantling at the hands of Philadelphia.

The Capitals went into the third period with a 39-13 edge in the shots department, yet trailed on the scoreboard 3-0. Perhaps their spirit was crushed, or something, because they allowed the Flyers to strike four more times in the final frame.

Scott Hartnell recorded a hat trick for Philadelphia in the win, which was its sixth victory in the past seven games. Jeff Carter added two goals, giving him 24 on the season, while Simon Gagne and Joffrey Lupul also joined in the goal-scoring fun, tormenting the Washington goaltending duo of Brent Johnson and Jose Theodore.

Brooks Laich scored the only goal for Washington, as Niittymaki made 47 saves for the Flyers.

Typically in sports, coaches get way too much credit and way too much blame.

In the end, the good ones are going to have large egos. They're shown on camera a lot, they get tons of credit in the media, and fans eat that kind of stuff up. The coaches parlay the positive attention into lucrative contract extensions, often even before they've proven their long-term worth.

It's likely that Todd McLellan will someday be fired from a coaching job in the NHL. Coaches are, after all, hired to be fired. But having watched the Sharks a few times in the last couple weeks, I have a hard time believing it will happen anytime soon, with the Sharks setting a record last night for most points in a 30-game start (52).

After some up-and-down times in recent years under current Toronto boss Ron Wilson, the Sharks appear to be firing on all cylinders right now. From a distance, it's hard not to give a ton of credit for that to McLellan.

Another night, another win for the San Jose Sharks. What else is new? The Kings jumped out to an early 2-0 lead thanks to goals by Matt Greene and Ted Purcell, but because they refuse to lose in regulation (or at any point, really) the Sharks managed to tie the game with tallies from Ryane Clowe and Patrick Marleau.

The game remained tied throughout the third period and overtime, leading to a shootout where the Sharks picked up goals from Clowe and Dan Boyle, while Brian Boucher turned aside two of the three Los Angeles shots, giving San Jose a 3-2 win.

The Sharks win, combined with Detroit's loss (more on this in a bit) gives San Jose an eight point lead for the top spot in the Western Conference. The victory also gives San Jose the best record in NHL history through the first 30 games of the season, as the Sharks currently boast a 25-3-2 mark. They haven't lost a game in regulation since November 9, which is a 15-game streak where San Jose has picked up at least a point.

Boucher made 26 saves in the win, while Los Angeles snapped its modest two-game winning streak.

As of right now, the NHL is the San Jose Sharks -- and everybody else. It remains to be seen how long they can keep playing at such a pace, and who knows, it may hurt them in the long-run that they're playing their best hockey in November and December as opposed to, say, May and June. But none of that changes the fact this is quite an incredible stretch of hockey. Kudos, San Jose.

There were plenty of wonderful sound bites during Barry Melrose's marvelous appearance on Toronto's Fan590 this week, chief among them was Melrose, essentially, saying that he hated co-owner Len Barrie's guts, without actually saying it. If you'll recall, when the former Tampa Bay coach was asked how he felt about Barrie, he rambled on about how Oren Koules (Tampa Bay's other co-owner) was a great guy, great for the NHL, and that he hoped he did well, never mentioning Barrie, the guy he was asked about. It's not hard to figure out what Melrose was doing there.

Well, prior to Wednesday's game in Buffalo -- which the Lightning lost, of course -- Barrie decided to fire back in what is a strong contender for hockey cat fight of the year. Damian Cristodero of the St. Petersburg Times has all of Barrie's verbal punches, including an allegation that Melrose was "negligent" in his preparation for the season.

"I knew we were in trouble when we went to Prague," Barrie said Wednesday of the season-opening trip with the Rangers, "and Barry wanted to play the (defensive) left wing lock.