Standings- position

[AtomicMapleLeaf]

I so much want the Habs, for multiple reasons.  But methinks the Bruins want us after tonight's performance.

Careful what you wish for. I think we'll get a pretty good read on how a Habs-Leafs series could shake down when they meet on Saturday night. The way the Bruins are playing this year, I'm starting to wonder if they would be the weaker playoff opponent.

I'm very careful.  I want the Habs.  Regardless if it's a 4 or 7 game series our kids will learn what it's like to play for the cup.  Win or lose, I want the Habs.

 

[bustaheims]

Updated.

Number of points gained by Leafs or lost by an opponent to eliminate them from being able to pass the Leafs:

Florida
Carolina - 2
Buffalo - 3
Tampa - 4
Philly - 5
New Jersey - 7
Winnipeg - 8
Washington - 12
NYI - 12
NYR - 12
Ottawa - 14

 

[PG]

I want no part of the Caps. I'm too lazy to look it up but they have to be one of the hottest teams in the NHL over the last month.

 

[Beowulf]

I want no part of the Caps. I'm too lazy to look it up but they have to be one of the hottest teams in the NHL over the last month.

Yep, with a resurgent Ovie a huge part of it. 17 goals in his last 16 games going into tonight (24 points over that span)  .

 

[bustaheims]

I want no part of the Caps. I'm too lazy to look it up but they have to be one of the hottest teams in the NHL over the last month.

They're on an 8-1-1 run, which is right up there with the best over the last few weeks. That being said, there's still a couple weeks until the playoffs. They could easily cool off. They could also lose steam once the playoffs start - they certainly wouldn't be the first team to come into the playoffs red hot and fall in the 1st round.

 

[princedpw]

Boston & Montreal are ruining it tonight.

Oh, and every time we come close to the playoffs the Islanders seemingly can't lose.

I'm still coming to grips with the fact that they're in the playoffs right now. I mean, they're the Islanders, aren't they supposed to be perpetually bad?

Aren't we perpetually bad?  At least they did a "rebuild" and got a number 1 overall pick out of it ...

 

[cw]

Updated.

Number of points gained by Leafs or lost by an opponent to eliminate them from being able to pass the Leafs:

Florida
Carolina - 2
Buffalo - 3
Tampa - 4
Philly - 5
New Jersey - 7
Winnipeg - 8
=================
Washington - 12
NYI - 12
NYR - 12
Ottawa - 14

The line I inserted above separates those in playoff position from those who are not.

The bottom 5 teams have a 1% chance or less of making the playoffs = not a big threat to the Leafs chances.

New Jersey is in a free fall without Kovalchuk and now Volchenkov (4 game suspension) having only won 2 of their last 10 and they're down to a 6% chance of making it.

So the key threat left for the Leafs playoff chances from the bottom group is Winnipeg (38% chance of making the playoffs). Winnipeg has only two less ROWs than the Leafs and they won the head-to-head tie-breaker. So they're the key team from the bottom group to watch.

The Islanders are scheduled to play the Rangers and Winnipeg. Aside from the Islanders, the Rangers are scheduled to play the Devils twice. So some of these magic numbers will be consumed by the conflicting schedules.

The Leafs control their playoff destiny in part with upcoming games against the Devils and Islanders.

So the 99.7% chance of the Leafs making the playoffs calculated by sportsclubstats
http://www.sportsclubstats.com/NHL.html
probably isn't far off.

 

[ZBBM]

Updated.

Number of points gained by Leafs or lost by an opponent to eliminate them from being able to pass the Leafs:

Florida
Carolina - 2
Buffalo - 3
Tampa - 4
Philly - 5
New Jersey - 7
Winnipeg - 8
=================
Washington - 12
NYI - 12
NYR - 12
Ottawa - 14

The line I inserted above separates those in playoff position from those who are not.

The bottom 5 teams have a 1% chance or less of making the playoffs = not a big threat to the Leafs chances.

New Jersey is in a free fall without Kovalchuk and now Volchenkov (4 game suspension) having only won 2 of their last 10 and they're down to a 6% chance of making it.

So the key threat left for the Leafs playoff chances from the bottom group is Winnipeg (38% chance of making the playoffs). Winnipeg has only two less ROWs than the Leafs and they won the head-to-head tie-breaker. So they're the key team from the bottom group to watch.

The Islanders are scheduled to play the Rangers and Winnipeg. Aside from the Islanders, the Rangers are scheduled to play the Devils twice. So some of these magic numbers will be consumed by the conflicting schedules.

The Leafs control their playoff destiny in part with upcoming games against the Devils and Islanders.

So the 99.7% chance of the Leafs making the playoffs calculated by sportsclubstats
http://www.sportsclubstats.com/NHL.html
probably isn't far off.

Good analysis re the Jets being the primary threat.  But 1 or 2 more wins really ought to assure a spot no matter what.

 

[GhostofPotvin29]

Luckily we have 2 games in hand on the Jets.

 

[Boston Leaf]

I want no part of the Caps. I'm too lazy to look it up but they have to be one of the hottest teams in the NHL over the last month.

They have only beat one team (Montreal) that is in the top 8 in the east druing stretch. THey have done a great job beating up the bottom three (Carolina, TB and Florida) over and over. I would gladly play them.. It would be time for Leo K to drive Ovi insane. The only thing that scares me about them is Holtby is darn good

 

[cw]

Updated.

Number of points gained by Leafs or lost by an opponent to eliminate them from being able to pass the Leafs:

Florida
Carolina - 2
Buffalo - 3
Tampa - 4
Philly - 5
New Jersey - 7
Winnipeg - 8
=================
Washington - 12
NYI - 12
NYR - 12
Ottawa - 14

The line I inserted above separates those in playoff position from those who are not.

The bottom 5 teams have a 1% chance or less of making the playoffs = not a big threat to the Leafs chances.

New Jersey is in a free fall without Kovalchuk and now Volchenkov (4 game suspension) having only won 2 of their last 10 and they're down to a 6% chance of making it.

So the key threat left for the Leafs playoff chances from the bottom group is Winnipeg (38% chance of making the playoffs). Winnipeg has only two less ROWs than the Leafs and they won the head-to-head tie-breaker. So they're the key team from the bottom group to watch.

The Islanders are scheduled to play the Rangers and Winnipeg. Aside from the Islanders, the Rangers are scheduled to play the Devils twice. So some of these magic numbers will be consumed by the conflicting schedules.

The Leafs control their playoff destiny in part with upcoming games against the Devils and Islanders.

So the 99.7% chance of the Leafs making the playoffs calculated by sportsclubstats
http://www.sportsclubstats.com/NHL.html
probably isn't far off.

Good analysis re the Jets being the primary threat.  But 1 or 2 more wins really ought to assure a spot no matter what.

If the Leafs win 6 points out of the 16 possible that remain (.375 hockey), the Jets would have to do better than winning 5 of their 6 remaining games to beat the Leafs for a playoff spot. So there's a reasonable chance a couple of wins by the Leafs would be enough. Only winning one game of their last 8  would be pretty dicey for the Leafs unless they had a string of OTL/SOL points to go with that win.

 

[Bullfrog]

Boston & Montreal are ruining it tonight.

Oh, and every time we come close to the playoffs the Islanders seemingly can't lose.

I'm still coming to grips with the fact that they're in the playoffs right now. I mean, they're the Islanders, aren't they supposed to be perpetually bad?

Aren't we perpetually bad?  At least they did a "rebuild" and got a number 1 overall pick out of it ...

I'm still coming to grips with the fact that we're in the playoffs right now. I mean, we're the Leafs, aren't we supposed to be perpetually bad?

 

[Redleaf]

Updated.

Number of points gained by Leafs or lost by an opponent to eliminate them from being able to pass the Leafs:

Florida
Carolina - 2
Buffalo - 3
Tampa - 4
Philly - 5
New Jersey - 7
Winnipeg - 8
=================
Washington - 12
NYI - 12
NYR - 12
Ottawa - 14

The line I inserted above separates those in playoff position from those who are not.

The bottom 5 teams have a 1% chance or less of making the playoffs = not a big threat to the Leafs chances.

New Jersey is in a free fall without Kovalchuk and now Volchenkov (4 game suspension) having only won 2 of their last 10 and they're down to a 6% chance of making it.

So the key threat left for the Leafs playoff chances from the bottom group is Winnipeg (38% chance of making the playoffs). Winnipeg has only two less ROWs than the Leafs and they won the head-to-head tie-breaker. So they're the key team from the bottom group to watch.

The Islanders are scheduled to play the Rangers and Winnipeg. Aside from the Islanders, the Rangers are scheduled to play the Devils twice. So some of these magic numbers will be consumed by the conflicting schedules.

The Leafs control their playoff destiny in part with upcoming games against the Devils and Islanders.

So the 99.7% chance of the Leafs making the playoffs calculated by sportsclubstats
http://www.sportsclubstats.com/NHL.html
probably isn't far off.

Good analysis re the Jets being the primary threat.  But 1 or 2 more wins really ought to assure a spot no matter what.

If the Leafs win 6 points out of the 16 possible that remain (.375 hockey), the Jets would have to do better than winning 5 of their 6 remaining games to beat the Leafs for a playoff spot. So there's a reasonable chance a couple of wins by the Leafs would be enough. Only winning one game of their last 8  would be pretty dicey for the Leafs unless they had a string of OTL/SOL points to go with that win.

If the Leafs hobble into the playoffs with a 1-7 record for the remaining games, I'd hate to see their playoff performance anyways. Looking at their record so far, one has to believe they will do much better than that, and we won't have to hold our breath until the last game this year. I'm guessing .500 (at worst) the rest of the way.

 

[Derk]

I actually was wanting to run upstairs and check this thread last night to see how much closer the Leafs were getting. I didn't realize how excited I was getting for the playoffs!

 

[Stickytape]

Saturday's game against Montreal will be pretty interesting, standings-wise:  Not only are points on the line as usual, but if the Leafs win, it increases the chances of playing Montreal again in the first round; if they lose, well then maybe they don't want to play Montreal in the first round anyway.

 

[leafplasma]

Saturday's game against Montreal will be pretty interesting, standings-wise:  Not only are points on the line as usual, but if the Leafs win, it increases the chances of playing Montreal again in the first round; if they lose, well then maybe they don't want to play Montreal in the first round anyway.

Yes with two games left against the Habs and one of those being the final game of the season, the Leafs can pretty much play a huge part in who they want to play in the post season.

 

[Zee]

Saturday's game against Montreal will be pretty interesting, standings-wise:  Not only are points on the line as usual, but if the Leafs win, it increases the chances of playing Montreal again in the first round; if they lose, well then maybe they don't want to play Montreal in the first round anyway.

Yes with two games left against the Habs and one of those being the final game of the season, the Leafs can pretty much play a huge part in who they want to play in the post season.

How crazy would it be if that final game of the season leads into a series between Leafs/Habs.  Could be 8 straight games against the Habs.

 

[leafplasma]

Saturday's game against Montreal will be pretty interesting, standings-wise:  Not only are points on the line as usual, but if the Leafs win, it increases the chances of playing Montreal again in the first round; if they lose, well then maybe they don't want to play Montreal in the first round anyway.

Yes with two games left against the Habs and one of those being the final game of the season, the Leafs can pretty much play a huge part in who they want to play in the post season.

How crazy would it be if that final game of the season leads into a series between Leafs/Habs.  Could be 8 straight games against the Habs.

I still think that is how it is going to play out, should be a media frenzy for sure.

 

[nutman]

And what if that last game is for home ice.

 

[bustaheims]

A .500 record in their final 8 games would guarantee the Leafs a playoff spot, regardless of what the other teams do.