|
 With a $5.2 billion Canadian television-rights deal and
guaranteed labor peace through the 2021-22 season, it seems as if
NHL Commissioner Gary Bettman is looking forward to the 2014-15
campaign with a smile.
"The game on the ice has never been more exciting, more
entertaining, more competitive," Bettman told the Canadian Club of
Toronto last month. "We're coming off our best season ever and we
think this year is going to be even better.
"The fact is this is the most stable our franchises have ever been,
the healthiest we have been ... we're feeling good about where we
are, we're feeling good about the future."
With the 2018 Olympics nearly four years away the debate on whether
to send NHL players has been pushed to the back burner along with
any threat of a labor dispute as players and owners agreed to a
10-year collective bargaining agreement in 2013.
The NHL will stage two outdoor contests, four less than last season,
starting with the Winter Classic on New Year's Day between
Washington Capitals and visiting Chicago Blackhawks. In late
February, the San Jose Sharks play the Los Angeles Kings at the home
of the NFL's San Francisco 49ers.
 Certainly the NHL's problems have not all suddenly vanished in a
blur of billion-dollar rights deals, record revenues and soaring
attendance.
There is still the troubling issue of concussions and threat of a
costly lawsuit as well as the debate over fighting which is sure to
resurface the next time a player is left bloodied and unconscious on
the ice.
The Canadian dollar has taken a pounding in recent months and the
NHL will surely keep a close watch since the seven teams in the
game's spiritual home and financial engine earn revenue in Canadian
dollars but pay players in U.S. currency.
The big concern for hockey-mad Canadians, however, is not how well
their currency is performing but how well their teams will play
since no Canadian team has captured the Stanley Cup since 1993.
Nowhere are expectations higher than in Toronto where the Maple
Leafs, who have not won a Stanley Cup since 1967, will try to end
the NHL's longest active championship drought.
The Maple Leafs, who are the only NHL franchise valued at $1 billion
by Forbes, have been a massive success everywhere but on the ice
having made the playoffs once in the last nine years.
While Leafs supporters have suffered, fans of the Blackhawks and Los
Angeles Kings have celebrated with the two teams having captured
four of the last five Stanley Cups.
No franchise has successfully defended the Cup since the Detroit Red
Wings won back-to-back titles in 1997 and 1998 and the Kings will
have an opportunity to establish themselves a true hockey dynasty if
they can skate away with the trophy for a third time in four
seasons.
[to top of second column] |
The Blackhawks, led by captain Jonathan Toews and the Kings,
anchored by defenceman Drew Doughty, start the season as the teams
to beats in a Western Conference packed with contenders.
The Boston Bruins, the only team other than Chicago or Los Angeles
to lift the Cup since 2010, again look the class of the East but
will have to fill the void left by Jarome Iginla, who tied for the
team lead in goals with 30 last season but has signed with Colorado.
Pittsburgh Penguins forward Sidney Crosby and Capitals sniper Alex
Ovechkin remain the NHL's marquee names piling up individual honors
but the two captains have had not had the same success leading their
teams to championships.
Ovechkin, a three-time league most valuable players, has yet to have
his name engraved on the Stanley Cup while Crosby, the reigning
league MVP, hoisted his only Cup in 2009.
Now 27-years-old and about to enter his 10th NHL season, Crosby, who
led the league in scoring last season, is no longer 'Sid the Kid'
and, like Ovechkin, is a player in his prime under pressure to
deliver a championship.
Detroit have made it the playoffs for 23 consecutive years and there
is no reason that run should end this season with Mike Babcock, who
piloted Canada to gold medals at the 2010 and 2014 Olympics, behind
the bench.
With an Olympic gold medal winning netminder in Carey Price, one of
the top defenceman in P.K. Subban and a crop of solid forwards, the
Montreal Canadiens remain the best bet to end Canada's Cup drought
while the New York Rangers could make to the finals for a second
consecutive year.
(Editing by Frank Pingue)
[© 2014 Thomson Reuters. All rights
reserved.]
Copyright 2014 Reuters. All rights reserved. This material may not be published,
broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
 |
