FanHouse The Ice Sheet

Late in Sunday night's 3-1 Detroit Red Wings victory over the Pittsburgh Penguins in Game 2 of the Stanley Cup Finals, Pittsburgh forward Maxime Talbot helped set off a melee that could have very well wound up costing him and his teammates dearly if NHL disciplinary czar Colin Campbell had followed the letter of the law when it comes to the infamous instigator penalty.

How did it happen? With only 19 seconds left and Pittsburgh pressing to score with an extra attacker, Evgeni Malkin let go with a slapshot from the right wing faceoff circle that was handled pretty easily by Detroit goaile Chris Osgood.

Then, after the whistle had blown, Talbot jabbed at the puck, hitting Osgood in the chest. Whether Osgood was actually hurt or not, he fell to the ice, and his teammates came to his aid. In all the confusion, a clearly agitated Malkin sought out Detroit center Henrik Zetterberg, perhaps to exact some payback for the way he has been shadowing Sidney Crosby throughout the first two games of the series. The video is after the jump.

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Just a few hours after the league announced its tentative schedule for the Stanley Cup Finals on May 22, it's safe to say a number of hockey fans weren't exactly happy.

Why? Thanks to the demands of television, specifically the requirements of the NHL's broadcast television partner, NBC, the league was looking at a Finals start date of as late as June 5 unless both respective conference finals were decided by four-game sweeps. Once the Blackhawks managed to win Game 3 of the Western Conference finals, that possibility was closed, and the prospect of a lengthy layoff after a lackluster third round had become a certainty.

It must be tough to be a Carolina Hurricanes fan. Consider this for a moment: twice in the last seven years the franchise formerly known as the Hartford Whalers has fought its way to the Stanley Cup Finals -- winning it all in the first year after the lockout in 2006 -- only to miss the playoffs the following two seasons.

In any other market, such a performance would be devastating. But in a non-traditional market like Raleigh, North Carolina, it very well could have been fatal. A Stanley Cup is supposed to cement a team's place in the heart of a community that it calls home, but runs like the team had in 2002 and 2006 were supposed to be performances to build on to fill the build, not memories to fall back on with failure just around the corner.

That a team with such a recent championship on its resume finished 21st overall in attendance this season has to be considered something of an embarrassment.

But here the Hurricanes are again, like the NHL's version of Hailey's comet, just four games from a third trip the Finals in the last six NHL seasons, with only the defending Eastern Conference champions, the Pittsburgh Penguins, in the way. Granted, that's one heck of an obstacle, but it still begs the question: how the heck did it happen?

Normally, I would have spent last Saturday afternoon sitting in the press box at Verizon Center to cover Game 1 of the semifinal series between the Capitals and the Penguins. To say this game has been eagerly awaited by most of the hockey world would be an incredible understatement, and as I outlined on Friday over at The Sporting Blog, I was as excited as anyone else to finally get to see these two teams have at it over the course of a seven-game series.

But alas, on this of all days, a family commitment would require me to travel to Long Island while Game 1 was being played 200+ miles away back in Washington. And from what I gathered from reading emails, Twitter feeds and just old fashioned talking with my friends on the phone (imagine that), I wasn't going to be the only one similarly indisposed on the first weekend in the month of May.

Then again, all I needed to do was hit the road on Friday night, and I'd still be able to watch significant chunks of the game on Saturday before a command performance with the family later on Saturday afternoon. In short, I had it all worked out, or so it seemed at the time.

All over North America this morning, hardcore hockey fans are saying a word or two of thanks to the Washington Capitals and the Carolina Hurricanes. Thanks to those two teams and the guts they displayed on Sunday by staving off elimination in their respective playoff series, we'll all get to enjoy the rare treat of a Tuesday night in April: not one, but two Games 7.

The Caps will host the beleaguered Rangers in Washington at 7:00 p.m., while the Devils and the Hurricanes will get things underway in Newark 30 minutes later. Needless to say, many of us will have our heads on a swivel most of the evening.

This year marks the 34th year in a row that I've watched the Stanley Cup Playoffs. And after all that time, you'd think I'd know better by now than to be surprised when a seed in the top half of the draw comes crashing to earth in the first round.

True to form, after just five days of action, the 2009 edition of the Stanley Cup Tournament hasn't disappointed when it comes to surprises. Sure, the higher seed is currently leading six of the eight series taking place in the first round. Then again, I'm sure nobody anticipated that two of the league's top four teams in the regular season -- San Jose and Washington -- would be grappling with the distinct possibility of being swept.

So much for the preliminaries. The 2008-09 NHL regular season is now history -- and, as I've written before, not a moment too soon. Beginning Wednesday night at 7:00 PM ET in Washington and Pittsburgh, the only hockey that really matters will finally take center stage: the Stanley Cup Playoffs.

To get an idea of what life is really like for a hockey fan this time of year, think of it this way: imagine the Sweet 16 of March Madness were all best-of-seven. It's the very simple reason why folks like us are completely giddy from now until sometime in June.

If your significant other is a fan of the NHL, Monday and Tuesday might very well represent the only real chance you'll have to say hello -- or, given the state of the relationship, goodbye -- for the balance of the next two months. It's a chance you shouldn't miss.

With that, I'd like to share a few thoughts on each of the eight playoff series that make up the first round. Safe to say, at first glance, it looks like the most compelling tournament in many years.

Watching the hockey news wires Sunday, it was clear that some important news coming out of Florida was being squelched.

Yes, I suppose it was exciting that Sidney Crosby stepped up to defend teammate Evgeni Malkin. Then again, I think just as much attention, if not more, should be paid to the perfectly executed hip check that Keith Ballard delivered to send Malkin tumbling through the air in the first place. In hockey, the hip check has become a lost art. Bravo to Ballard for fearlessly delivering it clean, hard and without fear against one of the game's biggest names. But we shouldn't ignore the fact that the Panthers actually managed to win the game, 4-2.

After watching Ballard wipe out Malkin -- go and watch it again now, I'll wait -- I couldn't help but feel a pang of sympathy for the Panthers. I'll freely admit that's a bit abnormal, as I live in the Washington suburbs and have gotten used to thinking of them as a surprisingly pesky division rival of the Capitals. But I'm feeling sympathy nonetheless, and part of it comes from the realization that this franchise -- one that endured a raft of layoffs in their business operations earlier this year -- needs to make the playoffs more than just about any other franchise in the NHL outside of Phoenix.

It was the great poet T.S. Eliot who wrote that "April is the cruelest month." With all due respect to Eliot, it's pretty clear he never watched NHL hockey in the month of March. Thank the hockey gods that the end is near.

It was back in September 2008 that we first heard the rumor that the Montreal Canadiens were planning on holding an outdoor game in Olympic Stadium as part of the franchise's centennial celebration. ESPN.com's Pierre LeBrun, appearing first on Hockey Night in Canada's Satellite Hot Stove segment and then in a blog post on Sunday, confirmed that the team has asked the league to host that game on November 28, 2009, two days after American Thanksgiving.

In isolation, it's easy to see the appeal. The last outdoor game held in Canada, 2003's Heritage Classic in Edmonton, was a true celebration of the game in every sense of the word. Given that nobody does hockey history quite like the Habs -- the closing of the Montreal Forum in 1996 was the showstopper to end all showstoppers -- there's every reason to believe that any event that they host be just as compelling.

And that's exactly why the league will probably say no.