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Playoff Preview 2018

Playoff Preview 2018

It’s our Playoff Preview, with full-page breakdowns on each team headed to the post-season: how they win, how they lose, depth charts, the stats you need to know and the inside scoop on who to take in your fantasy draft. Plus features on Sidney Crosby, Alex Ovechkin, Andrei Vasilevskiy and John Klingberg. Also, we pit our picks for the final - Tampa and Nashville - head to head in an analysis breakdown. Who comes out on top?

NHL

LOS ANGELES KINGS

THN's POWER RANKING: 12th STATS CRUNCH 1-4 PLAYOFF RECORD PAST 3 SEASONS11 PLAYERS WITH STANLEY CUP RINGS928 TOTAL GAMES OF PLAYOFF EXPERIENCE.478 COACH'S WIN PERCENTAGE (11-12)17TH RANK IN ADJUSTED 5V5 CORSI (49.9%) LEFT WING 19 Alex Iafallo 70 Tanner Pearson 9 Adrian Kempe 13 Kyle Clifford 44 Nate Thompson DEFENSE 24 Derek Forbort 27 Alec Martinez 6 Jake Muzzin 53 Kevin Gravel CENTER 11 Anze Kopitar 77 Jeff Carter 52 Mike Amadio 15 Andy Andreoff 47 Andrew Crescenzi DEFENSE 8 Drew Doughty 3 Dion Phaneuf 5 Christian Folin 38 Paul Dadue RIGHT WING 23 Dustin Brown 73 Tyler Toffoli 22 Trevor Lewis 10 Tobias Rieder 71 Torrey Mitchell GOALIE 32 Jonathan Quick 1 Jack Campbell 31 Scott Wedgewood HOW THEY WIN: Even with John Stevens replacing Darryl Sutter behind the bench, the Kings still play a heavy game – they’re second in the league in hits – but they aren’t quite the Corsi darlings they had been for such a long time. The Kings now…

BUZZ

CONN SMYTHE SURPRISE-O-METER

BACKUP GOES BEAST MODE CAM WARD, 2006 Martin Gerber set a franchise record for wins in the regular season, but he got the hook in favor of rookie Ward after the first-place Canes dropped two straight home games to start the post-season. Ward posted a .920 save percentage and became the fourth rookie goalie to win playoff MVP. Unlike the others, he wasn’t even a starter when the post-season began. REVIVING A DYNASTY BILL RANFORD, 1990 It was supposed to be Grant Fuhr’s team, but a shoulder injury ended his season, putting immense pressure on relative unknown Ranford to help the Oilers prove they could win The Big One without The Great One. Ranford’s crusade of acrobatic saves in the 1990 playoffs is the stuff of legend. RON VERSUS THE WORLD RON HEXTALL, 1987 The Conn Smythe wasn’t…

FEATURE

CATCH ME IF YOU CAN

YOU OBVIOUSLY CAN’T see it under his helmet and it’s not detectable on television, but if you look closely enough, the flecks of white are there on the side of Sidney Crosby’s head. This keeps up and he’s bound at some point soon to get two minutes for lookin’ so good. With Alex Ovechkin sporting the full-on salt-and-pepper look, it dawns on you that these guys have fewer years left in the NHL than they’ve played. Crosby is not a kid, or even The Kid anymore. In fact, his off-again, onagain line with Jake Guentzel on the left and Conor Sheary on the right goes by the moniker of ‘Sid and the Kids.’ They grow up so fast. Crosby hit one of those crossroads birthdays this past summer, even if they…

NHL

ST. LOUIS BLUES

THN's POWER RANKING: 16th STATS CRUNCH 18-19 PLAYOFF RECORD PAST 3 SEASONS1 PLAYERS WITH STANLEY CUP RINGS634 TOTAL GAMES OF PLAYOFF EXPERIENCE.436 COACH'S WIN PERCENTAGE (17-22)12TH RANK IN ADJUSTED 5V5 CORSI (51.4%) LEFT WING 17 Jaden Schwartz 20 Alex Steen 23 Dmitrij Jaskin 90 Nikita Soshnikov 9 Scottie Upshall +DEFENSE 29 Vince Dunn 4 Carl Gunnarsson 43 Jordan Schmaltz 6 Joel Edmundson + CENTER 10 Brayden Schenn 28 Kyle Brodziak 71 Vladimir Sobotka 49 Ivan Barbashev 70 Oskar Sundqvist DEFENSE 27 Alex Pietrangelo 55 Colton Parayko 41 Robert Bortuzzo 46 Jake Walman RIGHT WING 91 Vladimir Tarasenko 21 Patrik Berglund 32 Tage Thompson 22 Chris Thorburn 64 Sammy Blais GOALIE 34 Jake Allen 40 Carter Hutton 35 Ville Husso + INJURED HOW THEY WIN: When the Blues were winning games at the beginning of the year –…