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Sorry about my further hiatus but my dad died so I was elsewhere of course. It's good. He lived a wonderful life & he touched hundreds of people. He was 85. A good run for him. I'm not upset about it anymore. It was time. I've watched most of the playoffs. The whole Flyers-Pittsburgh series. Not much of Florida-New Jersey...too boring. 5 games of Washington-Boston which too was boring....tight checking by Washington & tight by Boston but a confused tired Boston team also. I watched 2 LA-Vancouver games. Exciting hockey. I watched all of the Detroit-Nashville series. Detroit needs a retool. Nashville played Detroit's game & capitalized. Rinne! Watched 5 games of the Rangers-Ottawa series. Nice try Sens...almost. I totally missed the St. Louis-San Jose series. I saw 1 Phoenix-Chicago game. Ironic that's the one I watched. Torres put Hossa out that game. I obviously preach to the choir. Quick and Smith will be an ultimate goalie battle of the titans. I'm really confused by Philly. It was as if beating the Pens was good enough, yawn...& keep gooning while the Devil's just skate away. The Devil's are everywhere with speed. It's getting to the point where Philly has to make the perfect play tic-tac-goal to score. Can the Rangers defeat the Caps 4-2? I figure that Holtby can get them to a game 7. I wonder about the Rangers. They are pegged as contenders but Ottawa & Washington have been a test in spite of King Lundy. Do the Rangers want to attempt this type of hockey versus the winner of the west?

If we go with Roy, I'd live with that and cross my fingers. I loved Roy the goalie and will never forget the image of him raising the Cup in front of us in 1993 as we roared from standing room in the old Forum. I have a photo of myself bowing before his statute outside the Bell Centre. However, he is not qualified for the job, outside a mystical belief in his Roy-ness. I know we all want the great champion back in the fold, but I've said it before - he has ZERO experience coaching professionals and any rational analysis suggests this makes him a high-risk choice. Some people seem to take a 'what the hell' attitude about it. But I guarantee you they will not say 'what the hell' if things go spectacularly wrong - and they might well do. I saw Therrien bungle a magical playoff run against Carolina, I saw Tremblay destroy the franchise by going to war with Roy, I saw Carbo's team implode as it quit on him and immolate the centennial season. Think about it for a minute. What if his ego clashes with Price, or Cole, or Subban, or Patches? Do you really want us to have to ship any of those guys out of town just to appease Rookie Coach Roy? People still fume that JM shipped out Sergei Kostitsyn. The costs of a mistake on this front are potentially massive. People are gonna flame me for this, but the more I think about it, the more I think that Marc Crawford is the best available candidate from among the obvious choices. He did a good job in Dallas, coaching a bubble team to within a game of the playoffs, and was fired, not for cause, but because he was never Nieuwendyck's man. He's bilingual and has been through all the wars - a Cup, Nagano, the Bertuzzi incident - and has coached great teams, bad teams, and middling teams; I can't recall any case of him facing player revolts or going to war with his guys. He has seen and done it all such that the insanity of Montreal will not phase him. He has a good media personality and tends to coach that up-tempo style that people want. Unlike say, Hartley or Savard, he has not spent years outside the game. I'm not saying he's the saviour, but he is certain to offer us good, high-quality coaching and matches most of the boxes that both fans and the organization have said they want in a coach. Absent Quennville or Vigneault, he'd be my pick.

I think I remember hearing that they went 1-7 when scoring first.

Dalton Thrower http://lastwordonsports.com/2012/05/09/nhl-draft-prospect-profile-34-dalton-thrower/

obviously, but I never would think that would happen. If Edmonton takes Murray... then Columbus will draft Yakupov or will trade it to someone who will and then pick the guy they want.

If Edmonton and Columbus skip on Yakupov, Montreal will draft him no questions asked.

That's true. I was thinking about it more from the Habs's point of view. They may or may not want him as coach, but if they don't, they will no doubt be relieved that the Quebec City thing is out of the equation. Two interesting candidates I failed to mention earlier: Jacques Martin and Jacques Lemaire. Both long shots, for obvious reasons... I dunno, my gut says it's going to be Crawford, or else somebody that noone sees coming.