Beyond Center Ice

 As heavily predicted, this Pacific showdown is going to occur. Vegas trumped the Jets in 5 games, while the Oilers defeated the Kings in a close series in 6. Winner moves on to the West Finals.  It would have been disappointing if this were not the Round Two Matchup. Connor McDavid and his Oilers take on the unit that is the Vegas Golden Knights. How did they get through Round One, though? Vegas had probably the easiest matchup of the first round, as they took on the Winnipeg Jets. I correctly predicted this series to go easily in favor of Vegas, but after game 1, things didn't look to great. The Jets looked better, looked like they wanted it more, and they won. Vegas though, rebounded and took a really good game 2. Then, they go back to Winnipeg and takes two close games facing the whiteout. And then, in Game Five, they dominated. Winnipeg looked like they lost all desire to move on, and so Vegas took it handily. As of now, they lead all playoff teams in G%, and this makes sense

 This is it. Our final First Round Playoff Preview. And this is my 2nd rated series to watch, as this one will be great. It's the Dallas Stars (2 seed central) vs Minnesota Wild (3 seed central).  The Stars narrowly missed out on the Central Division title after having it for most of the season. The Wild were doing great too, but trailed off of a bit once they clinched the playoffs, seemingly not taking games as seriously. This series though, will have a little bit of everything. Explosive offense, lockdown defense, stellar goaltending, physicality, everything. It's a matchup between rivals, and it's going to be an exciting one. And, for this final preview, I am going to format things a bit differently. Instead of talking individually about each team, how they got here, and top performers, I feel it more fitting in this serious to compare and contrast the teams as I go through the team play, forward core, defensive core, and goaltending. It will show you just how evenly mat

 Our 3rd Preview from the West will see the 2 seed in the West Colorado Avalanche take on the WC1 Seattle Kraken.  The defending champ Avs will look to start their train towards a repeat, and their first test is going to be against the Seattle Kraken. The Avs have dealt with a lot of injuries this season, but they came back and fought it anyway to get the top spot in the Central. Meanwhile, the Kraken are just about to play their first playoff series ever, after missing it badly last season. Both of these teams look optimisitic about their chances, while the Avs are going to have to deal with the playoffs without their captain, who is injured for the rest of the playoffs. The Kraken have gotten the best out of each of their playoffs, and now let's take a look at these teams. The Avalanche came into their season looking to repeat, and they had a slow start and a lot of injuries, but ramped everything up after the break. They've fought hard and clinched the division in the last g

 Our 2nd Western Conference preview pits the LA Kings vs the Edmonton Oilers! This series is a rematch of last season, where the Oilers won. The Kings will look to revenge, and they have a solid team to do it. On the other hand, the Oilers come into the playoffs on a 9 game win streak, have the best player in the world, and look unstoppable. They're the hottest team in hockey and some people's pick to win the Stanley Cup. This series should be an exciting one, and let's take a look at the teams.  The Edmonton Oilers are, as I said, the hottest team in the NHL going into these playoffs. They're on a 9 game win streak and are 22-5-5 since the All-Star Break. They lead the NHL in Goals For (325), and are 2nd to the Bruins with a 69 GD. They're 4th in the NHL with 55.94 G% and 3rd with 56.07 xG%. Their Corsi% is 52.07, top 10 in the NHL, so consistently offensively they are top 10. Their Shooting% is top of the NHL, above even the Bruins. The reason why they're not

 Here we go starting the Western Conference! Our first matchup: the Vegas Golden Knights vs the Winnipeg Jets! Vegas is the 1 seed in the West and widely considered one of the better teams in the entire NHL, while Winnipeg started out fantastic, then faltered down to almost falling out of the playoffs, before steadying the ship and clinching that WC spot with a few days to spare. This series is a rematch of the West Finals back in 2018, which the VGK took home en route to their Finals loss to the Capitals. The Jets would love to seek revenge - and as the underdog, it would be certainly something, but this may be the best possible matchup for Winnipeg. Certainly better than the Avs or Oilers... We'll start with the Underdog Jets this time. At a 52.35 G%, the Jets finish just 4 spots below Vegas, while they come in middle of the pack in xG%, again just 4 spots below VGK. They just miss out on a top 10 Corsi% at 11th with a 51.49, which is actually far ahead of Vegas. They've scor

Our final series out east: The Hurricanes vs the Wild Card New York Islanders! The Canes and Isles are going to have a fun series. The Canes barely, and I mean BARELY, held on to the top spot in the Metro, and their reward is a date with the Isles. The Isles snuck in to WC1 on the last game of the season, saving them from the terror that would be a Round One series versus the Boston Bruins. This series is probably not as hyped as any other series out east, but I think it should be. The Islanders have a top 3 goalie while the Hurricanes have a top 3 offense. It's a matchup as old as time. And I think this series really could go the distance.  The Hurricanes this season were really, really good. They were top 10 with a 55.5 G%, while their xG% was best in the NHL by a lot, at 58.2. Their Corsi% was 59.87, best in the NHL, and it wasn't close on that either. This Hurricanes team boasted some of the best numbers under the hood, but their main issue has always been converting that d

The Devils and the Rangers are understandably one of the most highly touted playoff matchups of this first round. They're located just 30 miles apart and are huge rivals, so this series will be a blast. The Devils landed home-ice advantage and just barely missed out on the top spot in the Metro, while the Rangers have been locked in 3rd for a while now. The Devils are currently the slim favorites, but let's take a look at both teams and then make our decision on who will move on to Round 2 between this fierce matchup. The Devils have been one of the best teams in hockey as of late. They finished 3rd in the NHL with a 56.56 Goals%, and 2nd to the Canes with a 56.5 xG%. They've played right up to what they're supposed to. Their Corsi% is similarly top 5 in the NHL and they look electric every single time they play. There's nothing you can adjust these stats for that say that the Devils are anything but a top 5 NHL team. If they were in the west, they would've easi

The President's Trophy winning, history making Boston Bruins start their playoff journey with the hot and ready Florida Panthers. The Bruins and Panthers are going to fight it out. As you probably know, the Boston Bruins were the best team in hockey and put up the best regular season in NHL history. They were clinched for the President's Trophy and the playoffs since March, and yet still dominated teams even when they were seemingly not putting 100% effort. The Panthers have been playing playoff hockey all season, as they have needed every bit of those 92 points with the Sabres and Pens finishing right on their tail. They were not clinched until after Game 81, which gave them just one game to get rested for this series. And man is it going to be a tough series. The Bruins are understandably heavy, HEAVY favorites to win this series, and it's up to Florida to prove them wrong. But before we get into all of that, let's see some stats for these teams: The Bruins had the be

 THE PLAYOFFS ARE HEREEEEEEEE! Here at Beyond Center Ice, we will be looking at every single playoff series to preview it, and review it when each series is done. Our first series will be one that has been decided for a while: the Toronto Maple Leafs vs Tampa Bay Lightning.  Last season, we got this matchup too. The Tampa Bay Lightning came back down 3-2 in the series and won in 7 in their eventual run to a Stanley Cup Finals appearance for their 3rd straight season. As for their Leafs, as you likely know, they have lost in the first round for 7 straight seasons and haven't made it to Round 2 or farther since 2004. For the Leafs, this is do or die. Let's take a look at some key stats/players from each team and then reach a verdict on who will be the winner and in how many games it will take.  The Maple Leafs finished the season 50-21-11, tallying 111 points and finishing 4th in the entire NHL. They were expected to be in the playoffs from the start, and they delivered with anot

 The Pittsburgh Penguins, after losing to Chicago and seeing the Islanders beat the Habs, have missed the playoffs. The last time they missed the playoffs was in 2006. Sidney Crosby was 18 years old.  For the Penguins, this might just mark an end of an era. Before I get into the rest of this post, I will say that this will not be a what's next for Pittsburgh post, like I've done for Vancouver and St. Louis in the past. Check those out, by the way. I simply want to highlight Sidney Crosby and the Penguins impressive 16 year playoff streak and marvel at how this may truly be the end of an era for the Pens.  Sidney Crosby is the epitome of superstardom in the NHL. With 1500 points in 1150 games, Crosby is by far the best player of his generation, and if not for McDavid, he would certainly still be the best player of the last 5-7 years. He's led this Penguins team to three Stanley Cups, and to the playoffs in 16 of his 17 completed NHL seasons. Now that number is 16 of 18, as t

This season hasn't gone too well for Vancouver. They're currently 35-36-7, already eliminated from contention and once again asking themselves the question: are we really a contending team? Today, we look at the Vancouver Canucks in the 2022-23 NHL season: why they didn't perform up to expectations, key performers, both good and bad, and what they can do next to make the playoffs for the first time since the COVID shortened 19-20 season.  Going into the 22-23 season, expectations were high for Vancouver. They missed out on the 21-22 playoffs but things were looking better, and the core was coming together. Thatcher Demko was expected to take a major step up, and the Canucks should have made the playoffs and perhaps done something in them. But that's not what happened. The 22-23 Canucks were riddled with issues, including an extremely public and emotional coach turnover, some hope for Connor Bedard, dashed by the Nucks decent play as of late. What went wrong? What took t