The European hockey year started with tragedy in the form of the Lokomotiv Yaroslavl plane crash, and now two of the nations most affected by the tragedy will be playing for gold with the memories of those lost on their mind. Pavol Demitra is a hero for Slovak hockey, and the team has openly admitted they are trying to win for him. But first we've got a bronze medal game to take care of.

Bronze Medal Game: Finland vs. Czech Republic (3:00 PM CEST, 9:00 AM EST)

Saturday was a tough day for the host Finns, who scored first but then proceeded to be dominated by Evgeni Malkin and a Russian attack that scored six unanswered goals. The home ice curse may have waited a bit to claim Finland, but it hit them in pretty embarassing fashion. The Czechs, meanwhile, couldn't buy a goal against the Slovaks and found themselves victim of a few costly mistakes, from the goaltender on out. But both these nations have a proud tradition of bouncing back in order to win a medal, and so this should be a pretty good game. Will the Finns replicate what the Czechs did a year ago by defending their gold medal with a bronze performance? Or can the Czechs win a third straight medal?

Gold Medal Game: Russia vs. Slovakia (7:30 PM CEST, 1:30 PM EST)

Russia runs a perfect record into the Finals, and Evgeni Malkin continues to be the man leading the demolition of the tournament, posting another ho-hum hat trick performance against Finland in the semifinal. Russia has outscored their opponents 38-12 en route to again claiming the #1 ranking in the world. But it's not over yet, and the Slovaks present a tough challenge. The Slovaks are the best defensive team (outside of Russia) in terms of goals against in the tournament, and with Zdeno Chara on the ice for most of the game, Malkin and company will have their hands full. The Slovaks have also been getting offensive contributions from throughout the lineup, Miroslav Satan being the most recent hero in the semifinals.

So who reigns supreme in 2012? Discuss the games as they happen in the comments.

The medal round is upon us, with only four nations left in the 2012 IIHF World Championships. The entire event has moved to Helsinki, FInland, while Stockholm will have to wait until next year in order to host the medal rounds. The good news for Helsinki fans is that their beloved Leijonat are alive, facing one of their biggest rivals in Russia. Finland beat Russia a year ago in a spectacular semifinal on the strength of Mikael Granlund's iconic goal. In the other semifinal, the Czech Republic and Slovakia meet in a rare late meeting between the two countries that separated from each other two decades ago.

Semifinal 1: Russia vs. Finland (1:30 PM CEST, 7:30 AM EST)

The early game is giving the host nation a bit of home ice advantage, allowing for the maximum rest for Finland before Sunday's medal games. Russia comes into this game on a roll, without a blemish in their record to date, winning all of their games in regulation including some impressive wins over Sweden in the round robin and Norway in the quarterfinal. Evgeni Malkin didn't need to be dominant in that quarterfinal match, though he leads all remaining scorers with 15 points. Finland got late heroics on a pair of goals in the final minutes of their quarterfinal against the USA, with Jesse Jonesuu scoring the winner with just nine seconds remaining. As mentioned above, this is a rematch of last year's semifinal which produced the goal of the year from Mikael Granlund. Granlund has yet to hit the back of the net this tournament, and is in fact without a goal in three months of play.

Semifinal 2: Czech Republic vs. Slovakia (5:30 PM CEST, 11:30 AM EST)

This is hockey's fun rivalry, really a battle of big brother vs. little brother in a lot of cases. The Czechs are one of the elite nations of hockey and have been ever since 1993, while Slovakia has had to punch above its weight and has achieved success in spurts. It's never easy for Slovakia to take on the Czechs, but this year the teams look awfully even in a lot of respects. The Czechs have a lot of stars up front, but the Slovaks have stars on their blue line, led by Zdeno Chara, whose presence has brought Slovakia back from the fringes of the World Championships the past couple of years to the medal rounds. Both teams won with late game heroics against favoured rivals: the Czechs scored the winner with 29 seconds left after relinquishing a 3-1 lead to Sweden, while Slovakia blew a 2-0 lead to Canada, then came back from 3-2 down to win the game on a PP in the final minutes.

Watch the action on TV and talk about the games as they happen here.

There's a lot of news coming out of the IIHF's Annual Congress that is worthy of notation. First off, it's time to welcome the new additions to the official list of hockey playing nations: Qatar and Jamaica. Qatar has participated in a couple of tournaments in recent years, including sending a team to the Asian Winter Games in Kazakhstan in 2011. Jamaica, however, is a relatively recent phenomenon that has gained a lot of steam amongst Americans and Canadians of Jamaican descent. Qatar has two rinks, 70 players total and a five team national league, and apparently has a hockey school that had over 100 participants, according to the IIHF. The membership is conditional on the completion of an audit by the IIHF. Jamaica, only granted associate membership, has one rink with 20 registered players, not enough to form their own league as of yet. When they are able to form a national league, full membership and participation in IIHF sanctioned tournaments will be considered (upon completion of an IIHF audit). The Jamaican bid apparently has wealthy backers, and Puck Daddy has a good feature on the Jamaican program's rapid growth during the past year. Jamaica becomes just the fourth North American and first Caribbean nation admitted into the IIHF.

The second bit is a passionate speech on the role of sport in bridging political divides by IIHF President René Fasel, speaking about the mounting pressure from the European Congress and members of the United States government to take the World Championships away from Belarus in 2014. I tend to agree with Fasel here, although I'd make sure there was a contingency plan in place for 2014 should some of the internal violence in Belarus erupt into an outright revolt. There has been a lot of political upheaval in the country and if governments are advising their citizens not to go there for their own safety, one has to wonder how safe of an environment it would be for international athletes. Fasel worded the speech as part of a praise of human rights and democracy, so one has to wonder how some member nations perceived that view at the meeting.

Thirdly is the timetable for the 2012-13 IIHF Championship season, including the IIHF U18 & U20 World Championships, Men's World Championships, Women's World Championships, Women's World U18 Championships, and Olympic Qualification tournaments for both Men and Women. The preliminary schedule is available here.

Of note, Georgia will be entering a men's team in the World Championships next year for the first time, after becoming an IIHF member in 2009.

It's tough to find a single day in the hockey calendar as exciting and full of top quality play as the quarterfinals of the IIHF World Championships. Sure, the Stanley Cup Playoffs provides drama on a nightly basis, and the World Junior tournament kicks into high gear in the semifinals, but getting four back-to-back-to-back-to-back matches in a row that leaves you buzzing is hard to top. For all the valid criticisms about the World Championships' quality during the round robin, once the quarterfinals kick in you're treated to an unprecedented wave of top notch, gut wrenching action. It's too bad that the North American hockey world doesn't tune in to the degree that it should.

So for a third straight year, we're all in with a European Final Four. Canada losing to Slovakia was shocking on a lot of levels, but in a sixty minute contest, coming out of the gate flat and then taking costly penalties late are usually enough to take even the best put together clubs down. Whether you agree that Ryan Getzlaf deserved to be tossed from the game for his kneeing of Juraj Mikus or not, it's tough to argue against the fact that it was definitely knee to knee contact and worthy of a penalty. Even a two minute minor would have given Slovakia the 4-3 lead it needed, the only difference in that scenario would've been Canada getting to have a numerical advantage when they pulled Cam Ward in the final minute to tie it up. For yet another year, it wasn't Canada's tournament after all. The World Championships can be cruel, but in this case, it was pretty fair in how it unfolded.

Slovakia will face the Czech Republic, who yet again came up with their best performance with elimination being the alternative. Sweden carried the play for stretches, and looked to be ready for a full onslaught when they capitalized with a late 2nd period goal by Henrik Zetterberg followed by an early 3rd period goal from his Red Wings teammate Jonathan Ericsson. But the Czechs rebounded with incredible resolve after that shocking turn of events, thwarting any perceived momentum shifts with a strong third period in which they were rewarded with some late heroics of their own. Milan Michalek, who I called out as a player the Czechs needed to produce to move on in the preview, made a great play coming off the boards that was similar to Zetterberg's goal in how it unfolded to win it for the Czechs in the third. Your new top three in the World Rankings will be between the Czechs, Finland and Russia as a result.

Russia had the easiest task in the quarterfinals, but they were up against a Norwegian team that were playing probably the best hockey we've ever seen from that country at this tournament. A 2-0 first period lead evaporated but Russia never panicked, carrying the play and getting a soft goal to open the third period off the stick of tournament standout Alexei Yemelin. The Russians outhsot Norway 32-12 over the last forty, clearly showing their superiority in getting goals from players throughout their lineup (Ovechkin, Popov, Yemelin, Zherdev and Nikulin).

And then there was that Finland-USA game. Drama in hockey doesn't play out much better than this game did. A player that American coach Scott Gordon unsuccessfully couldn't make into a NHL regular made the difference with two goals, as Jesse Jonesuu found open space in the final ten seconds against a group of American players that probably shouldn't have been on the ice in such a key moment. Finland, who generally has to work incredibly hard for their offence, got a late gift by maintaining pressure and making one smart read from behind the goal to send the arena, city and country into a frenzy. Next up: Russia. Might as well get them out of the way now, right?

After the jump, a quick summary of the placements from 5-46 in this World Championship season:

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It's finally, mercifully, all about the gold now. The new tournament format really didn't do a lot for me, to be honest, with little momentum built throughout the tournament and the fans in the host cities didn't take to it for a variety of reasons, either. Unequal teams were playing each other in most games, and the final day of the tournament ended up serving only one match of any intrigue. If I had a vote at the IIHF Annual Meeting, I'd definitely be voting for a return of the progressive round robin system that served the Championships the past couple of years, which had the ability to raise the importance of each game in succession.

We're hear now, and for the most part, we're hear with little surprises. Canada and Russia won their groups, Norway won out amongst the world's mid-level powers to nab a quarterfinal spot, and Slovakia returns just in the nick of time to qualify for the Olympics. We're left with four matches that should be competitive, or in the very least a bit more than what we saw for most of the past couple of weeks.

Quarterfinal 1: Canada vs. Slovakia (12:00 PM CEST, 6:00 AM EST)

Putting Canada in an early game isn't really the most conducive to getting hockey's founding nation into this tournament, but that's the tradeoff with putting the host nations in prime time. Duncan Keith might be the tournament's best player so far, notching an astonishing 11 points to lead the Canadians while playing over 21 minutes a game, which is a bit of a breather for Keith compared to the NHL but quite a lot in an IIHF tournament with 7 or 8 defencemen dressed. John Tavares leads the Canadians up front as is becoming the custom each spring, but the Canadians' true strength is in its depth, with scoring coming from three lines and defending coming from three pairs. Which means it will take the customary 'total team effort' for Slovakia to stop Canada, which they are more than game for. Michal Handzus arrived late but has been a stabilizing force down the middle for Slovakia, who have been involved in close games each time they've stepped on the ice. After close losses to open the tournament to Canada (2-3) and Finland (0-1), Slovakia reeled off five straight wins with only a 5-1 win over Belarus that gave them breathing room. 30 year old netminder Jan Laco has been great in his IIHF debut, though it should be noted that great goaltending and having Zdeno Chara lead your team in icetime have had some sort of relationship to each other for a number of years now. Can they stop Canada, or will it be another hard fought loss like in Vancouver 2010?

Preliminary Round Result: Canada 3, Slovakia 2.

Quarterfinal 2: Russia vs. Norway (2:45 CEST, 9:45 AM EST)

Russia has been making fools out of everyone this tournament, and they keep getting stronger the further we go into the tournament. Adding Alexander Ovechkin and Alexander Semin on Pavel Datsyuk's wings for the last round robin game is downright criminal, but we're all better for it. Evgeni Malkin is keeping a firm grip on the 'Best Player in the World' status he earned this year in the NHL, with a ridiculous performance against Sweden topping anything we've seen in this tournament in the past couple of years. The team has been giving up a decent amount of shots (not surprising since they've been leading most games since puckdrop), over 31 per game on average, but their goaltending has been quite strong, led by Semyon Varlamov. That'll be important to stop the offensive juggernaut that has been Norway this tournament. It still feels weird saying that, but no team in Stockholm scored more goals than Norway and they boast the tournament's leading scorer in Patrick Thoresen. 35 year old defenseman Mats Trygg, a noted non-scorer, has been playing with the hammer of Thor himself with five goals this tournament. Jonas Holos is averaging 27 minutes a night on the blue line while Lars Haugen keeps building up a strong IIHF resumé with his second strong tournament in a row as Norway's #1 goalie.

Preliminary Round Result: Russia 4, Norway 2.

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Here's our last open thread of the preliminary round, with only one game that means a lot for the tournament going forward, but a few significant games to watch for Olympic qualification as well as tournament seeding. Let's break them down a bit more than usual:

Canada vs. Belarus (11:15 AM CEST, 5:15 AM EST)

Belarus is in really tough for a result here that will change their fate. With only three points earned in this tournament, Belarus has avoided relegation but is likely to see their World Ranking slip to 13th place, which would mean that they don't get to host one of the Olympic Qualification tournaments next year. Canada needs points here to secure top spot in the Helsinki Group, although we don't know how much of an advantage that really is with any of the United States, Finland, Slovakia, or possibly France as the team's quarterfinal opponent on Thursday.

Norway vs. Denmark (12:15 PM CEST, 6:15 AM EST)

Norway is in the quarterfinals, and will be facing either Sweden or Russia as a result. Pick your poison, Norway. The result is obviously a tremendous achievement, so it'll be interesting to see how the team reacts now that it knows this game is little more than academic. Denmark is also coming off a high, avoiding relegation after defeating Latvia yesterday for their first win of the tournament. A win here would clinch being the home team next February for the Olympic qualifiers, which would be significant especially since the NHL players Denmark relies on heavily at the World Championships won't be available for that event, so every advantage will be appreciated. A Denmark win could vault the team into 11th in the IIHF World Rankings, which would be a new high for the emerging hockey nation.

Slovakia vs. France (3:15 PM CEST, 9:15 AM EST)

Here's Tuesday's big show. Can France pull off the unthinkable and make the quarterfinal? France has had some flirtations with the best in the hockey world in the past but this would definitely be their best result in a generation if they could pull off the regulation win here. Slovakia won't be easy, with big Zdeno Chara's presence seemingly giving the fading power a much needed boost just in time to qualify for Sochi 2014. A point or three here would do just that, and then the team can focus on their potential quarterfinal opponents. Canada, Finland, or the USA await.

Czech Republic vs. Germany (4:15 PM CEST, 10:15 AM EST)

Martin Erat arrives just in time for this one for the Czechs, who might be able to choose their quarterfinal opponent if Norway beats Denmark. Russia is the top seed in their pool, while Sweden is the second seed, so we'll see if the Czechs have a preferred opponent or not. Germany has other concerns, though. The team will be looking to finish strong in order to qualify for the Olympics. It's been a poor showing for the team, particularly the 12-4 drubbing they took to Norway, and they should be looking to take something positive away from this experience which hasn't offered much of that to date.

United States vs. Switzerland (7:15 PM CEST, 1:15 PM EST)

The Americans have had a fairly positive tournament to date, beating the two favourites in their pool in Canada and Finland, although they lost to Slovakia and were the only team to not get a full three points against Kazakhstan, who finished 16th. They've been an exciting team to watch with a lot of young stars like Max Pacioretty and Justin Faulk leading the way. The Swiss' tournament has been dreadful, and now the team faces the very realistic prospect of not earning automatic qualification to the Olympics. A win here would do a lot to help their cause, but the highest they can finish is 10th in this tournament and a win today may not even ensure that.

Sweden vs. Latvia (8:15 PM CEST, 2:15 PM EST)

Why not close out this round with a packed house full of exuberant home fans with a lot of hard-partying Latvian fans who have made the ferry ride from Riga? Yeah, those Latvian fans are making headlines for their antics, but this is their last chance to see their team and let's hope they aren't too upset about that fact. The game is meaningless for Sweden, but for Latvia it's about a chance at hosting an Olympic qualifier, which I'm sure will be well attended.

Stay up to date in the comments section throughout the day.

You've got to hand it to the Norwegian hockey program, they've built a good team despite some long odds against it.

There is only one Norwegian player who saw NHL action this past year: Mats Zuccarello of the New York Rangers, who was limited to 10 games. Yet after qualifying for the 2010 Olympics as the 12th seed (finishing 10th), Norway has reeled off three consecutive quarterfinal appearances at the World Championships to vault themselves into the top 8 in the IIHF World Rankings, and as a result will be given an automatic berth in the 2014 Olympics. Head Coach Roy Johansen has managed to find a balance between playing what internationally renowed players the country does have (Patrick Thoresen, Jonas Holøs, Ole-Kristian Tollefsen, Per-Åge Skrøder) and lesser known quantities like Mads Hansen and Morten Ask into a consistent performer, even at times an overachiever. 35 year old defender Mats Trygg has four goals this tournament after having two goals during the entire Elitserien campaign, for example, while the team's starting goaltender Lars Haugen has played all of one game in a top league in his career (for Dynamo Minsk of the KHL).

The Polar Bears are a bit of a rag-tag collection that is hanging just outside the elite of the international hockey scene, and in fact has been outperfroming Slovakia in recent years. So congratulations to an under the radar program on a tremendous achievement... I know I wasn't exactly expecting this. They also became the first non-traditional power to score over ten goals in a World Championship game this century, defeating Germany 12-4 on the weekend.

Tuesday's games wrap up the preliminary round of the World Championships, and there's only one game that matters in terms of determining who will keep playing on Thursday, as France has surprised observers by making their final game against Slovakia matter. A French upset in regulation would vault one of the IIHF's founding nations into the quarterfinals for the first time since 1995. The more probable results of a Slovakia win or OT loss would send Slovakia to the quarterfinals with an Olympic berth secured. Here's a breakdown of where things stand Olympic wise:

Qualified: Finland, Sweden, Russia, Czech Republic, Canada, United States, Norway.

Could Still Qualify (2 of these teams): Slovakia, Germany, Switzerland, France*

Potential Qualification Tournament Hosts (2 of these, plus last place of above group): Latvia, Denmark, Belarus, France*.

Anyone in the bottom two groups has a lot at stake on Tuesday, as does France, although France would require more than just making the quarterfinals in order to leapfrog anybody, and would need to win gold in order to have a chance at a Top 9 World Ranking and automatic qualification. A French gold medal (as hard as that would be to believe) would tie them in rankings points with Slovakia, with France getting the tiebreaker due to a better result in the most recent tournament. Final qualification for the 2014 Olympics would be determined next February in three separate tournaments.

Norway avoids that scenario, and that's a great accomplishment for a nation that wasn't in much of a position to dream of such a thing four years ago.

We're into the final two days of the IIHF World Championships, and there isn't a lot left to settle (but how about those Norwegians). Perhaps the biggest story in the games remaining is not who is going to make the quarterfinals, as there are only two teams outside the top four in their group that have a slight chance of making it, but whether Denmark can avoid being relegated with two games to play. Denmark has been in the top group of the IIHF World Championships since 2003, but a shocking OT loss to Italy in the tournament's second game has put the emerging hockey nation (and potential 2017 host nation) in a state of peril for now. They definitely aren't giving off the impression of a team that deserves the fate (they haven't lost a game by more than two goals) but without a win against either Latvia or Norway today or tomorrow the country would find itself skipping the top level for at least a year. And Norway just put a 12 spot up against Germany yesterday, who Denmark lost 2-1 to on Saturday.

Frederik Andersen, Denmark's star young goaltender, had an off week at the worst time for his country, but can redeem himself with a win if he gets that opportunity (backup Simon Nielsen looked good in his one appearance). The team is heavily reliant on their NHL talent, and one wonders how much energy players like Philip Larsen, Lars Eller and Frans Nielsen will have tomorrow if the team can't get a win against Latvia on Monday.

France and Latvia are the two countries currently outside the Top 4 in their group that still have a shot of reaching there. Latvia sits at 6 points, and has two games to play with Norway and the Czech Republic sitting at 10 and 11 points each, both within reach. France sits at 6 points with two games to play and Slovakia, their opponent tomorrow, is the team they are trying to catch at 12 points. If France were to win today against Belarus in regulation, they could reach the quarterfinals by beating Slovakia in regulation as well, which would be a tremendous feat for the country.

So Denmark faces the prospect of avoiding relegation playing two highly motivated teams that are similar in ability to them. Latvia can still reach the quarterfinals, and if Latvia were to beat Denmark, Norway would need points against Denmark tomorrow to make sure Latvia couldn't catch them (Latvia's final game is the preliminary round closer against Sweden tomorrow).

From Game 49 and on, we enter the final games of the preliminary round for each team. Kazakhstan will try and avoid relegation with a win against Finland, who have clinched a quarterfinal berth, while Italy will try and do what no one else has been able to: get a point off of Russia. Italy is, of course, currently in 7th place, but if Denmark were to beat Latvia today they would need to at least get points off of Russia in order to have a chance of staying in the top group (I won't outline every scenario here). Russia has already clinched the first seed in the Stockholm group.

Join us in the comments during the day for updates.

This will be a double-up post, acting as both a refresher and a look ahead at the rest of the tournament. It'll also serve as Friday's Open Thread for today's action.

With four games in the books, it's time to start looking at the possibilities for the tournament that's left. Here's your standings:

In general, the favourites are doing as expected this tournament, with a bit of a dogfight going on in the Helsinki Group and an open battle for the final quarterfinal spot emerging in the Stockholm Group with Latvia currently ahead. It's far from over for Denmark, who have been facing the possibility of relegation since their shocking OT loss to Italy in Game 2, but they'll need to get a win quickly. Here's what the schedule is for each team remaining, after the jump:

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Analytic minds of the blogosphere are starting to converge on a new frontier: analyzing goaltending. We at Eyes on the Prize have been blessed to have Chris Boyle give us incredibly in depth analysis on the position that is seen nowhere else on the internet, but something came up recently in his piece on Marc-Andre Fleury that got me thinking... what exactly is replacement level goaltending?

Now, I'm not the only blogger out there that is trying to answer this question. Cam Charron earlier this year used it to try and give comparables to Winnipeg Jets starter Ondrej Pavelec, using other metrics other than league save percentage like measuring quality starts and blow-ups. I didn't go this route with my own analysis, but it'd be worthwhile to build a database of these over time. Scott Reynolds of The Copper & Blue earlier this month decided to calculate a replacement level save percentage using all NHL goalies that had 15 or fewer games in a season. He split up even strength and shorthanded save percentages and found these goalies had a much lower threshold than the league average. It makes a lot more sense than just using the league average: clearly there are different expectation levels for goalies who are called up from the minors than those that have guaranteed NHL jobs, and largely the NHL does a decent job of picking who their best goalie is.

My methodology started with a similar threshold. Reynolds posted that on May 1, while I had been working on the charts in April, so they were come up with independently. I wanted to separate goalies by their usage: starters, platoons, backups, and replacements. I came up with my own cut-offs to determine this: anyone who played more than 60% of the minutes in an 82 game regulation schedule would be considered a starter, platoon goaltenders played between 40 and 60%, backups played in over 10 GP a year and up to 40% of a team's minutes, and the rest were replacements. I broke out every year since 2003-04, since I was doing this for a project I'm working on about the 2003 Entry Draft that I'll be posting on throughout June. I looked at save percentage only, but broke it between regular save percentage (all situations) and even strength only.

If you're wondering why splitting up the situations is important, team effects can greatly contribute to a goalie's save percentage on the Penalty Kill. While it is often said that your goaltender has to be your best penalty killer, teams with good penalty kills have to be better at preventing shots and prime scoring chances in order to succeed over the whole season. Therefore, a goalie's save percentage on the penalty kill is less of a factor of his individual skill level than at even strength, although I do agree with Chris Boyle in that teams can design systems that make it a little easier on a goaltender to stop the puck at a higher rate at even strength. However, those fluctuations won't be to the same level a good PK unit can effect a goalie's save percentage. Even strength is a better indicator of a goalie's skill level over time, but we'll include both measures here.

After the jump are some of the results.

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We're a week into action at the IIHF World Championships, with teams wrapping up their fourth of seven games in the preliminary round today. What have we learned thus far?

The host nations of Finland and Sweden are doing their part... they're both undefeated and could both be leading their groups as a result so far. Traditional powers Russia and Canada are right there with them, and after that, it's a bit of a free for all. Despite this, the crowds are remaining dismal for the early games, but hopefully the final weekend and the quarterfinals will see more sellouts.

Kazakhstan looks to be on the road to relegation while in the Stockholm group, right now last place is occupied by Denmark, but there is a ways to go for that to change. Latvia and the Czech Republic play today with a quarterfinal berth possibly at stake, while the Americans, Slovaks, and Swiss are in a tight battle for the final two spots in the quarterfinals in the Helsinki pool. Here are today's games:

Unfortunately, the IIHF has stopped streaming the games live on YouTube, and the streams will now air on a 30 minute delay. This experiment is running into issues with the countries that have exclusive broadcast rights awarded and is ridiculously unfortunate... I can't imagine why anyone would want to watch it on YouTube if they had access to the game on their TV at the time. Hopefully in future tournaments these issues are resolved and live streaming becomes normal for those of us that want to watch as many games as possible, particularly the ones that aren't being broadcast by the rights holders.

Join us for updates of the action as it happens, even if we can't catch it on YouTube live.

Hey look, we got some photos from this tournament! Hooray!

After some interesting results on Monday, Tuesday went to the favourites. Belarus got their first win as expected over Kazakhstan, who will be lucky to get a point let alone a win with a schedule coming up that seems them play the four top teams in their group. Latvia took down Italy 5-0 for their second win, continuing their strong tournament which will see them in the mix for a playoff spot by the looks of things. Finland is proving a worthy tournament host and defending champion, going to 3-0 with a convincing 5-2 win over Switzerland, although that game had some tense moments for the home side. Russia shutout Germany 2-0 to remain undefeated.

Today's games should produce a bit more drama. Canada and Switzerland are known to have very tight games decided through special teams at this tournament, while Sweden has largely been untested and will face a desperate German team, looking for a big win as they try and qualify for a playoff spot. If Italy is going to surprise us all and make a bit of a playoff push, they'll need a win today against Norway, who have looked strong this tournament. Slovakia and Kazakhstan meet in the opener, which shouldn't be much of a contest, but I suppose you never know in this sport...

With the Nashville Predators and the Philadelphia Flyers out of the playoffs, there could be some reinforcements coming soon. Switzerland has already added defenceman Roman Josi to their team, while Belarus awaits word on the Kostitsyn brothers. Could Russia be adding Alexander Radulov, or one of the Philadelphia goaltenders? Canada and the USA have a lot of new options as well as we head into the preliminary round's final week.

The games can be watched on YouTube if you live in Canada, Germany, Switzerland or most non-represented countries in this tournament. We'll try and keep you updated on the action as it happens here. Also, you can follow my Twitter feed to see if I've checked in from there.

Today's games lack a bit in terms of highly anticipated match-ups, but does feature a good Finland-Switzerland match-up for top of the Helsinki Group. Kazakhstan and Belarus try and get their first win of the tournament in the opener, while Latvia and Italy try and start a win streak after strong wins their last time out. The action closes out with Germany trying to rebound from their loss to Latvia by taking on undefeated Russia.

You can watch the games live on YouTube (or you know, maybe you can't).

Injury updates: Simon Moser of Switzerland (knee) is out for the tournament, as is Joel Lundqvist of Sweden (fractured orbital bone). The Swiss have replaced Moser with ZSC Lions forward Thibaut Monnet.

Each team has played 2 games, so perhaps it's a good time to look at the current standings after the first weekend of action:

Helsinki Group

Rank	Team	Record	Pts	GD
1		2-0-0-0	6	+5
2		2-0-0-0	6	+2
3		1-1-0-0	5	+6
4		1-0-1-0	4	E
5		1-0-0-1	3	-2
6		0-0-0-2	0	-2
7		0-0-0-2	0	-2
8		0-0-0-2	0	-7

Stockholm Group

Rank	Team	Record	Pts	GD
1		2-0-0-0	6	+5
2		2-0-0-0	6	+5
3		1-0-0-1	3	+2
4		1-0-0-1	3	-1
5		1-0-0-1	3	-2
6		0-1-0-1	2	-2
7		0-0-1-1	1	-3
8		0-0-0-2	0	-4

Italy's OT win over Denmark makes things interesting right now for the bottom part of the Stockholm pool, but there are still five games to play and a lot can change. Latvia defeating Germany was another result of interest from yesterday, and France did me a solid by easily defeating Kazakhstan, justifying my faith in them as a team. Switzerland has an early lead right now but when the two teams you play are sitting currently in 7th and 8th, it shows the standings as they currently sit aren't really to be trusted just yet. There are eight days left in the preliminary round to change things up, but even now we're seeing a lot of the expected teams in the top half.

Here is today's action:

Canada's got the early game, and I don't expect too much difficulty in this one, despite this being a French team that is amongst the strongest we've seen from that nation. The team will welcome Kyle Quincey, who arrives in time to replace Marc-Edouard Vlasic who is done for the tournament. Similarly, I have a hard time seeing Norway being able to counterpunch effectively enough to overtake the Czechs, but yesterday saw 19 year old goaltender Lars Volden do a heck of a job against the Russians. Combine that goaltending with a good PP and the Czechs can't take them too lightly. The game of the day features the undefeated USA against a desperate Slovakian team. This is a huge swing game in the standings for both sides, but much moreso for Slovakia, who could use the boost heading into the easier part of their schedule (Kazakhstan, Belarus, Switzerland, and France) and set them up well for a playoff run. Denmark will get Jannik Hansen back from suspension and will be looking to rebound from a poor showing against Italy with a big game against their much more formidable neighbours and host nation, Sweden.

Join us after the jump and throughout the day for updates, commentary, and the like.

The prices are cheaper in Stockholm, so we'll see if there is an immediate boost in the amount of fans taking in the action on this Sunday full of games. Here's a list of the action today, with six games total:

It's a big first game for potential relegation as France and Kazakhstan play each other early. Denmark shouldn't have to fear that fate, but without Jannik Hansen (suspension) they'll have to dig a bit deeper to take out Italy and get their first win. Finland had a tough first game trying to solve a hot goaltender in Vitali Koval of Belarus, and hope to get a sold out crowd to help them past a tougher Slovakian team led by Zdeno Chara on defence. Russia will try and match Sweden's perfect start by taking on Norway, while Switzerland and Germany will look to put some distance between themselves and Belarus and Latvia with wins in the late games. Those are key playoff spot battles, and if Belarus or Latvia can pull of a victory there those pools get much more competitive.

For a recap of the first two days of action, read this from last night. Join up in the comments to keep up with the action, and if you can, catch the games on YouTube.

Editor's Note: There are perfectly legal products out there that can make your IP Address appear to be from a country that isn't geo-blocked by the YouTube feed. I'm not advertising or advocating any specific ones, just making you consumers aware that there are ways to access the feeds.

Well, this wasn't exactly the idea the organizers had in mind when they decided to have Stockholm and Helsinki split he hosting duties for the next two World Championships. There were two traditional European powers, who both wowed the audience in Slovakia last year, meeting in the Finals. It was a great advertisement for the next two years, a way to shift the focus away from the likes of the Czechs and Russians and onto the new hosts. But ticket packages proved a tough sell, and when the individual game prices finally came out in the final lead-up to the tournament, fans were shocked by the high prices. Average ticket prices were set at €145, which is over $190 US by current conversion rates. Stockholm is a fairly wealthy city, but the hockey fans weren't buying that these early tournament games were worth that. And neither was Pavel Datsyuk, who asked this Hockey Sverige reporter point blank about the ticket prices after Russia opened with a 5-2 win over Latvia on Saturday in front of a reported 5219 fans (in an arena that has nearly 14,000 seats):

The organizers have responded to the low turnout in Stockholm with a massive price reduction of 70%. Blogger Janne Virtanen had this report on Live It, Eat It, Breathe It:

Organiser Christer Eglund said, "We could have made more of a profit if we would've kept the prices as they were, as the World Championships boom would grow as the games progress. However, we have one of the greatest brands to protect and therefore we are eager to offer all supporters the opportunity to enjoy the games."

The reaction comes after the first four games at Globen were watched only by an audience of 8000.

The IIHF's official numbers show a higher number than the 8000, but it could be a difference of tickets sold and actual butts in seats. The crowds in Helsinki have been criticized as well, but organizers there are not dropping the prices just yet. After a jump, a summary of the action so far as well as the game by game attendance figures.

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I'll get more of a recap of the action so far after today, but for now let's focus on the games going on for Day 2:

Games are available on Youtube, barring restrictions by country.

The first two games are the first games for the respective four countries, with particular interest for the Latvia-Russia game, featuring the two former Soviet Republics that always seems to be spirited, if one-sided in the outcomes. Switzerland-Kazakhstan marks the return of the Kazakhs to the elite group, so we'll see how they handle a strong Swiss side that has had issues in the past playing the role of favourites. The late games are gems, though. Canada-USA will be broadcast on TV across North America, TSN for Canada and NBC Sports Network on tape delay due to Kentucky Derby coverage. Both teams won their openers yesterday, Canada barely getting by Slovakia 3-2 and the USA easily defeating France 7-2. Sweden and the Czech Republic top off the games with what appears to be the most competitive game of the tournament so far. Sweden had some issues with Norway, but won 3-1, while the Czechs outlasted Denmark in a 2-0 shutout win.

Join in the conversation and get updates on the action as it happens. I'll be around for most of the day catching the action online. uu

We've got a full slate of six games today to kick of the 2012 IIHF World Championships. Here's a quick list of games to use as a guide. For North Americans, the games start bright and early... so the early games, including the debut of the United States, might be over by the time you read this. I've shown times as Central European Standard Time and in North American Eastern Standard Time.

Here's a list of broadcasters by country/region from the IIHF. For the United States, NBC Sports Network will provide coverage of the American games, while in Canada games will be covered by TSN, including all games involving Team Canada.

The IIHF is streaming the games for free online via YouTube, but there are a lot of countries that are being blocked from the coverage. The countries blocked include the USA, Russia, Sweden, Finland, Belarus, Denmark, Estonia, Kazakhstan, Latvia, Lithuania, Norway, and Ukraine. Basically this is great for Canadians, central and western Europeans, and the rest of the world.

Here's where you can find the rosters of the teams (PDF files), courtesy of the IIHF. You can also check out the club stats of the players at Elite Prospects. My previews are linked below:

Part 1: The Longshots

Part 2: The Pretenders

Part 3: The Contenders

Stay updated and discuss the action in the comments. Enjoy!

OK, here we go. My NHL playoffs predictions this year have been so bad, and my World Junior ones were pretty dismal (USA for gold, they end up in the relegation round), so I guess this is my chance to redeem myself. Or continue making hilariously awful predictions to close out my season. First, let's rank the preliminary round:

Preliminary Round Predictions

Rank	Stockholm Group	Helsinki Group
1	Sverige	Canada
2	Россия	Suomi
3	Deutschland	Slovensko
4	Ceska republika	USA
5	Danmark	Svizra
6	Norge	France
7	Latvija	Беларусь
8	Italia	Қазақстан

I'm predicting strong tournaments for Slovakia and Germany, poor ones for Latvia, Belarus and a disappointment for the Swiss. Top four in each group advance to the quarterfinals, and last in the group means you're relegated. I'm not being entirely original putting the two teams that were promoted from Division 1A last year to go back down. I'm not entirely sold on Finland's team this year, but in front of a home crowd I think it's good enough to claim the 2nd spot in their group. But in seven games, I can't see Canada not having the best record there. In Stockholm, Sweden is loaded and motivated, I can't see a crash landing for them, this should be a great team. That said, they won't like my predicted quarterfinal opponent, a somewhat mediocre Czech entry that is still very tough to play against and with plenty of offensive weapons. I'm also somewhat hopeful for the Americans this time around, getting them into the quarterfinals ahead of the Swiss on the strength of some strong offensive weapons, particularly on the PP. Denmark, Norway and Latvia could all be mixed around in a blender, I'm just going on what I feel about their rosters to be honest. The disciplined Germans should find their way into the quarterfinals, and I'm giving them the 3rd spot just for kicks.

Playoffs

The quarterfinals play out as 1 vs 4 and 2 vs 3 in each group before they mix the teams up for the semifinals in Helsinki. I'll take Sweden and Russia (shocking) to move out of Stockholm, and Canada and Finland (another shocker) to continue on in Helsinki. I can't forsee much different given the results I gave, but I'm sure the Sweden vs. Czech Republic and Canada vs. USA games would be very good games.

In the end, that leaves a semifinals that is tough to read who would play who, I'm going to rank the teams as follows:

1. Sweden, 2. Canada, 3. Russia, 4. Finland

So Sweden and Finland meet in a rematch of last year's Championship in one semifinal, and Canada plays Russia. Here's my medal prediction:

I'll continue to make predictions as the tournament progresses and these results turn out to look really silly.

And now, for part three of the special: the top five world ranked teams in the tournament. It's this group of teams that have walked away with the title most often in recent years, although for some of them it's starting to be a real drought again. Canada last won in 2007, Sweden in 2006, and Russia in 2009, which is surprising since these are the three teams most commonly picked to win the tournament by the experts. As a result, the pre-tournament World Rankings might look a bit whacky. In reality, those rankings points don't mean a whole lot as a predictive measure, although they will mean something for how the groups are divided for the 2014 Olympics.

(5) Canada - Helsinki Group

This is a very deep Canadian team. Unfortunately for Canada, it won't feature emerging top defender P.K. Subban of the Montreal Canadiens as they had hoped, as he had to return to Canada with a knee injury suffered in a pre-tournament game. Canada features stars at every position, though: the top four defenders will feature Duncan Keith, Dion Phaneuf, Jay Bouwmeester and Marc-Édouard Vlasic, better than any such group in the tournament. Up front, the team is loaded with both established stars like Ryan Getzlaf and Corey Perry of the Anaheim Ducks, as well as young stars like John Tavares, Ryan Nugent-Hopkins, Jeff Skinner and Jordan Eberle. To compliment them, they only have high end players like Patrick Sharp, Ryan O`Rielly, Jamie Benn, Alexandre Burrows and Andrew Ladd. It's tough to know who will emerge as a star for the team, but John Tavares has twelve goals and four assists the last two years, making him a likely focal point for the team's offence.

In goal, the team boasts a potential starter for their 2014 Olympic squad in Cam Ward of the Carolina Hurricanes. This is Ward's third World Championships, having been one of Canada's goalies for their last gold medal win in 2007. Recently unemployed NHL coach Brent Sutter will be tasked to lead the team back to glory, and he has a stellar international record from the World Juniors in 2005 and 2006, never losing a single game. There's always a few players that say no to representing Canada, and while Sidney Crosby and Jonathan Toews would've put this team over the top, there's so much depth here in both experience and talent that it's hard to think of Canada as anything but the favourites. 2012 Draft Eligible defenceman Ryan Murray is with the squad, although it is uncertain if the team will put him on their official roster or hope that some other NHL talent comes available when the second round of the NHL playoffs winds down.

Key Players: Ryan Getzlaf, C; John Tavares, C/LW; Duncan Keith, D; Cam Ward, G; Corey Perry, RW.

(4) Czech Republic - Stockholm Group

The 2010 Champions boast a very strong group of forwards but lack a single current NHL defenceman or goaltender on their roster. KHLers Miroslav Blatak, Lukas Krajicek, Petr Caslava, Ondrej Nemec and Jakub Nakladal will be relied on to help lead what could be a very balanced group in terms of ice time. Tomas Mojzis is another one to look for in a key role offensively, while the team might be breaking in 20 year old Jakub Krejcik this tournament, too, though that has yet to be confirmed. Krejcik has not ever represented the Czech Republic at an U20 or U18 event, so his inclusion is an indication of a strong growth in his play this season with Slavia Prague. In goal, it looks like Jakub Stepanek will again be the go to guy, and at 25 the SKA St. Petersburg starter is the team's oldest goalie... World Junior sensation Petr Mrazek joins the team along with 23 year old Jakub Kovar, a former Philadelphia Flyers draft pick who posted a .926 SV% for Ceske Budejovice of the Extraliga.

The forwards, as mentioned, are the team's true strength. They're led by NHL stars Tomas Plekanec, Ales Hemsky, Milan Michalek and David Krejci. A lot of the other names are familiar to international hockey fans, be they NHL regulars like Michael Frolik and Dallas Stars rookie Tomas Vincour, former NHLers Petr Prucha, Petr Tenkrat and Lukas Kaspar, or the 40 year old Petr Nedved, making his IIHF debut for the Czechs. Nedved, of course, famously defected to Canada and represented Canada internationally at the 1994 Olympics, but he did represent the Czechs at the NHL run 1996 World Cup. This is Nedved's first, and almost certainly his last, World Championship. He's still a top scorer in the Extraliga, captaining the White Tigers of Liberec. There are some notable Czech players still playing in the NHL playoffs, so we'll see how their initial roster looks to see if the team is holding out hopes for reinforcements from there as the quarterfinals approach.

Key Players: Milan Michalek, LW; Ales Hemsky, RW; Tomas Plekanec, C; David Krejci, C; Jakub Stepanek, G.

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Like I said in the first preview, the IIHF World Championships are the biggest international hockey tournament there is in terms of number of teams, and while the competition level is high, that doesn't necessarily mean there's a ton of parity. Sure, a lower ranked team can take down a top nation, but in the long run the damage is pretty limited. The first group, the longshots, are the teams that have virtually no shot at earning a medal. This second group, in a good year, might do so. But winning gold is generally the territory of a select few nations, and it would be an absolute stunner if any of the following five nations pulled that off... in the last decade, this group has won it one time: Sloavkia, in 2002. So, with that decade now out of the way, maybe it is time for one of the 6-10 ranked teams to do it again. But if they do, I will be very shocked.

(10) Slovakia - Helsinki Group

Last year was a disaster for the hosts. They finished 10th with a very deep, but aging roster and the future doesn't look too bright for this small, hockey mad nation. Then the year got even worse: Pavol Demitra was one of the victims of the Lokomotiv plane crash in September, and the national team has retired his #38 as a result. Replacing what he meant to the team, and the offence he provided will be very tough indeed, but perhaps his memory will provide an inspiration to this squad, which is badly in need of a good result. They haven't made the playoffs in the past four years, and their 2010 Olympic performance is the lone shining result... a 4th place finish. The strength of this year's team will undoubtedly be the presence of Zdeno Chara, who is arguably the top player at the tournament. Andrej Sekera will also play a big role on the blueline, while up front the group is decidedly less glamorous. Tomas Kopecky is the lone NHL forward, but there are former NHLers that will be counted on like the aging Miroslav Satan, Branko Radivojevic, Marcel Hossa and Milan Bartovic. Also present is a rare promising youngster: 21 year old winger Tomas Tatar, a Detroit Red Wings prospect who played for Grand Rapids of the American Hockey League. Tatar had 16 points in 13 games at the U20s in 2009 and 2010, and made his World Championships debut in 2010 as well. In goal, a trio of goalies from three different European leagues will battle for time, likely led by Czech league standout Peter Hamerlik (.928 SV% for HC Trinec). Slovakia had a KHL team this past year, Lev Poprad, and their starter Jan Laco is on the roster as well as 23 year old Julius Hudacek, who posted a .926 SV% for Södertälje in the Swedish Allsvenskan.

Slovakia is ranked 10th heading into the tournament, and will need to do better than that in order to earn automatic qualification to the 2014 Olympics. In order to do this, they will have to finish ahead of the team ranked just ahead of them, Norway. The only way to really ensure that result is to make the playoffs by finishing in the top 4, but they are in a group that features Finland, Canada, Switzerland and the USA, so it won't be easy.

Key Players: Zdeno Chara, D; Andrej Sekera, D; Tomas Kopecky, LW; Peter Hamerlik, G.

(9) Norway - Stockholm Group

Norway is set up quite nicely this year in their quest to earn Olympic qualification for 2014. Their group isn't necessarily easy, but there is a more obvious spot available to them in the playoffs then in the Helsinki Group. It's an interesting team, with zero NHLers and few prospects coming up that could challenge that. But they do have a decent amount of good European league players, led by Patrick Thoresen, Mathis Olimb and Per-Åge Skrøder up front. Former NHLers Ole-Kristian Tollefsen and Jonas Holøs anchor the blueline, and expect to play a lot of minutes. 13 of Norway's players play in Sweden's Elitserien, with a couple more playing in the Allsvenskan. Only Thoresen plays in the KHL, by far the most accomplished of the players. Young, physical centre Andreas Martinsen could have an impact as well, coming off a strong campaign in Norway's top league. Lars Haugen seems to have inherited the starting role from the lovable but aging Pål Grotnes, while Boston Bruins prospect Lars Volden occupies the #3 spot, offering the best hope for Norway's future in the crease. Haugen had a strong year in Belarus, and got a one game callup to the KHL's Dynamo Minsk as a reward, while Volden is in the Espoo Blues system in Finland preparing for what is hoped to be a strong professional career.

The battle for 9th in the World Ranking will be spirited between Norway and Slovakia, but it's really unfortunate that with the new format those two nations won't be able to play each other to decide this once and for all... it's best for both teams to take matters into their own hands by making the playoffs. With Sweden, Russia, and the Czech Republic likely occupying three of the four spots, it'll be between Norway, Germany, Denmark and Latvia to claim that coveted final spot.

Key Players: Patrick Thoresen, LW; Per-Åge Skrøder, LW; Jonas Holøs, D; Ole-Kristian Tollefsen, D.

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The IIHF World Championships is the largest international tournament in terms of amount of national teams involved, which makes it a fun party atmosphere but also gives us a clear group of contenders, pretenders and also-rans to deal with. Of course, with this being a tournament composed of players from almost exclusively professional leagues, the results don't tend to be as much of eyesores as they do in other international tournaments, but there is little chance for the lower seeds to gain much traction. The IIHF is introducing a new format this year, splitting the tournament into two groups of eight teams instead of four groups of four teams, which will almost certainly make it more difficult for the lower end teams to go on a run as the effect of one surprising result is diminished significantly... if Kazakhstan shocks Sweden it's just one game of seven instead of one game of three as it was in the old format.

So why the change? Well, the World Championships has long been hosted in two different cities for the preliminary rounds, but 2012 is the first year that it will be hosted in two different countries as well. To ease up the logistical issues that can cause, this means there will be no paring of Teams from 16 to 12 as there was in the past after the first six days, teams will stay in the same city for their first seven games before the playoffs bring the number of teams down to 8. It's also easier for organizers to market the games: they can sell games for the first twelve days of the tournament knowing the match-ups for each of the games.

So the potential for Cindarella teams is reduced. Also gone is the relegation round: the two teams that finish 8th in their pools in the Round Robin will play in Division 1A next year.

(17) Kazakhstan - Helsinki Group

Kazakhstan won promotion through winning their Division 1A Group last year, and will be in tough to stay up with the big boys this year. Like the other teams in this profile, they stand no chance of finishing in the Top 9 in the World Ranking and earning automatic qualification into the Olympics as a result. To succeed, 36 year old goaltender Vitali Yeremeyev is going to have to be spectacular, building off a very strong KHL campaign for Barys Astana, Kazakhstan's lone entry in the KHL. Most of the rest of the team will be composed of players from that team, but Yeremeyev is the only significant contributor from that team on the national team. Most of Astana's top players are foreigners like Kevin Dallman (who has hoped to become naturalized and compete for Kazakhstan for the 2014 Olympic qualification tournaments*), Brandon Bochenski and Nigel Dawes. Offensively, the load is expected to be carried by KHL journeymen like Dmitri Upper and Kazakh league star Dmitri Dudarev. Unfortunately, NHL centre Nik Antropov will not be joining the team yet again this year. Antropov hasn't participated in a World Championships since he was 18, and last competed for the country internationally at the 2006 Olympics in Turin.

*EDIT: So much for that, as per Adam Nowek and Doogie2K in the comments. I missed this story.

Key Players: Vitali Yeremeyev, G; Dmitri Dudarev, RW; Dmitri Upper, LW; Roman Starchenko, C.

(16) Italy - Stockholm Group

Italy boasts a roster full of dual citizens, a lot of North American trained players who weren't strong enough to compete for Canada or USA internationally and chose to take advantage of Italy's liberal nationality requirements to play at these elite tournaments. Leading scorer Giulio Scandella, brother of NHLer Marco Scandella and nephew of Sergio Momesso, played major junior hockey in Halifax and will be counted on for offence along with former WHLer Pat Iannone. On defence, they boast a NHL prospect in Colgate University captain Thomas Larkin (a 6'5" defender drafted by the Columbus Blue Jackets), as well as Matt DeMarchi, an Italian-American playing for Vasteras of Sweden's Allsvenskan. In goal, Italian born and trained Andreas Bernard will challenge longtime starter Daniel Bellisimo. Bellisimo is from Toronto and has represented Italy quite well for the last three years, but Bernard is a 21 year old goaltending prospect of SaiPa of the SM-Liiga in Finland. Italy has youth on their side when compared to Kazakhstan, most of the team is on the good side of 30 and the program is showing signs of improvement.

Key Players: Daniel Bellisimo, G; Matt DeMarchi, D; Giulio Scandella, RW; Thomas Larkin, D.

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It absolutely figures that the first year I do this in a very public manner is my worst year for predictions yet. I went2-6 in Round 1, with a spectacular 0-3 in the Game 7s to close it out. The team I picked to win it all (Pittsburgh) was almost swept, but I'm quite pleased with that one (me no likely the Penguins). I got one upset right in picking the Kings over the Canucks, but that one seemed obvious to me. The St. Louis Blues were the other team that pulled through for me. My adopted team, the Chicago Blackhawks, thoroughly dominated their series but came up against a top notch goaltender and were done in by their own awful special teams and two overtime goals that were amongst the worst of all time. To top it all off, the Coyotes got production out of a line made up of first round draft busts from 7-9 years ago: Gilbert Brule, our own Kyle Chipchura, and Marc-Antoine Pouliot.

The first round blew up in my face badly. I've gone 7-1 before, but 6-2 and 5-3 is pretty normal for me. The worst I've ever remembered doing before was 4-4. Well, I'm 2-6 this year. A new low. I went 0-4 in the East, the Conference I'm more familiar with as a Habs fan. One thing you've got to give me: this was an impressive failure.

Goaltending was a huge factor in Round 1, be it good or awful. Each team that advanced had a better 5 on 5 SV% than the other team, sometimes significantly so (Phoenix and Nashville over Chicago and Detroit, respectively). This isn't surprising that it is a huge factor in the results, but it's just so hard to predict which goalies will flame out from round to round.

I'm hoping this year that means my luck turns around for Round 2, which I usually am terrible at. I've lost my confidence, so maybe that's a good thing. Feel free to openly mock my abilities after the jump.

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First of all, today should be an exciting day for hockey fans, but with the way this year has gone for Canadiens fans, I'm more than a little bummed out about it. Yesterday was the draft lottery and with that bit of Canadiens news out of the way, seeing the first round of the Stanley Cup Playoffs begin is just even more depressing. There was a lot of promise early on in the season for the Canadiens from the staff here at Eyes on the Prize, but unfortunately that promise was ignored and we are here today with nothing but watching 16 other teams compete for club hockey's ultimate glory.

With the Habs out, I become a supporter of the Chicago Blackhawks. They are a very distant second on my list of favourite NHL teams, for the longest time the anti-Canadiens: a long history with none of the glory. Today they are run by Bowmans, have a star bilingual captain with a goaltender from Montreal and compete for the Stanley Cup every year. I like their chances in the Western Conference again this year, provided Jonathan Toews comes back from his concussion successfully.

Here's a brief summary of the advanced metrics we like so much around here and how they relate to the teams involved, teams sorted by Fenwick Close (ratio of shots towards the net when score is within two goals):

Guide:

FenClose: Fenwick is the measurement of shots on goal and shots that missed the net, the most accurate predictor of puck possession skill readily available for every team, and therefore of wins. Scoring chance data is better, but is not available for every team. FenClose measures the +/- in percentage form (50% being as many events for as against), when the score of the game is within 2 goals and the result is very much in doubt.

FenTied: Same as FenClose, but only when the score is tied. The difference between this and FenClose is it eliminates any score effects/strategy a team might deploy: if a team likes to sit back and defend a one goal lead it can effect their FenClose number, for example.

Special Teams %: Simply taking PP% and PK% and combining them; the league average is therefore 100. The higher the number, the better the team is at special teams.

PDO (5 on 5): Combining a team's collective shooting percentage and save percentage during 5 on 5 situations. The league average is 1000. Teams with higher PDO's tend to have better goaltending, and possibly better shooting luck (though over the course of a full season and including the whole team, shooting luck isn't a major factor).

Rankings for the final 3 categories are in brackets. Fenwick and PDO information was taken from Behind the Net, Special Teams % was taken from NHL.com.


After the jump, I'll make my picks.

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It was inevitable. The Habs are in the midst of their worst season since the NHL expanded to Los Angeles. And Pierre Gauthier, who got off to a good start as GM, seemingly lost all bits of common sense once this team started to lose a few hockey games to start the 2011-12 season. For the moves since the start of this season, Pierre Gauthier deserved his fate. He was fired today as General Manager of the Montreal Canadiens.

Instead of looking at the process, he looked at the results. Instead of noticing the team was playing very well, outshooting and carrying the play in the vast majority of games, he panicked. He fired an assistant coach for a PP that was one of the league's best in shot production but the worst in shooting percentage, a notoriously fickle stat. At this point, he notoriously claimed that the team had to start "thinking outside the box." It was a statement that would become a haunting one for Canadiens fans, as it changed the direction of the team from one of patience and discipline to one of impulse decisions based on emotion.

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This past weekend marked a new low for me as a Canadiens fan: the team I support were officially eliminated from the post-season, with two full weeks left to play. They've been unofficially eliminated for a long time, but two weeks out and having no mathematical shot is something else.

Also, the Canadiens reached 29th in the 30 team standings. It is impossible for them to fall lower than 29th thanks to Columbus' horrid start of the year, but now the only standings that matter are the draft lottery ones. Which means hoping the team stays bad for six more games. The NHL sucks, ladies and gentlemen... we should be hoping for wins to avoid relegation to the minor leagues, and never hoping for losses.

Here are the odds we're looking at. The draft lottery works by not allowing teams to move down more than one spot in the selection process than their final standings, and allow one team to move up a maximum of four spots. It is weighted so that the lower you finish, the greater your odds are at winning the lottery. Here is scenario one, the Canadiens finishing in 29th place, their current standing:

• Chances of Drafting 1st overall: 18.8%
• Chances of Drafting 2nd overall: 42.0%
• Chances of Drafting 3rd overall: 39.2%

This would be the 'best case' scenario. There is a combined 39.2% chance that one of the teams sitting 3rd-6th in the draft lotto would leapfrog the Canadiens to push them to the #3 spot in the order, with slightly better odds of either Columbus winning the lotto or a team 7th or lower winning for the Canadiens to select 2nd. The chances of the Canadiens moving up are significant, but the nature of random chance in the lotto has revealed one oddity since the system was adopted in 1995: no team who finished 2nd last in the NHL has ever won the lottery and moved up to select 1st.

Basically, your odds of maintaining your draft position rise with each spot further down you are. The potential to draft at the top of the board lowers, but your chances of losing a spot diminish as well. For the 30th place team, the chances of Drafting 1st are 48.2% (combine winning lotto and someone 25th or lower winning) vs. 51.8% for dropping to 2nd. This means that finishing 29th (at 42.0%) is actually the place where you are least likely to hold your draft position. Moving up or down a spot is the most likely scenario when you finish 29th.

This piece by Ed Willes of the Vancouver Province was brought up in our comments section on Tuesday, and it sparked some debate amongst us. I decided to breakdown how Willes came up with his exact numbers for how he came up with the Habs totals, which ranked first in the NHL in terms of selecting NHL talent and selecting effective talent. He used a simple baseball methodology: any player that reached the NHL for a prolonged period of time was scored as getting a hit. The Canadiens picked 80 players from 2000-09, the time period in focus, and they have so far picked up 27 hits for a drafting 'batting' average of .338. In addition to that, Willes assigned subjective criteria to the following 'extra base hit' categories: a long time NHL regular was given a double, an impact NHL player was given a triple, and a superstar talent was given a home run. At the end of it all, a draft table 'slugging' percentage was assigned for each team, and by his categorization the Canadiens had reached 49 'total bases' in the 80 selections for a league-leading .613 percentage. Here's what he had to say about Le Club de Hockey Canadien:

Sorry, can't explain this but the numbers don't lie. The Habs have the highest rating in the study. In 2003, they took six players who made the NHL. In 2005, they selected four more NHLers. In 2007, four more including Max Pacioretty and P.K. Subban. The high-end talent hasn't been there but the Habs have consistently found players.

Willes express shock at this, and it's somewhat understandable to a casual follower of the team why this might be... the team sucks right now and has only won one division title in this time frame, making the playoffs in this time frame (2001-2010) a respectable but not dominant six of nine, soon to be ten seasons. Still the team Willes covers, the Vancouver Canucks, acquired two former Montreal draft picks last year (Lapierre and Higgins) without making a trade with Montreal, which might have tipped him off, but anyways....

So, being the kind of guy I am, I decided to see how he came up with these figures. First off, he's wrong in his paragraph: six players from the 2003 draft have indeed played a NHL game, but I can't see him counting Corey Locke's nine career NHL games as one of his 27 singles. 24 players picked by the Canadiens in this time frame have played in 40 or more NHL games, which means three with less than that are counting... and I'm going to assume they are Mark Flood (37), Louis Leblanc (33) and J.T. Wyman (33) since all three are currently in the NHL. Sorry, Andre Deveaux (31), despite your 9 NHL games this season for the league's top team (Rangers) you are apparently the cutoff point. Greg Stewart's 26 games are also not enough even though he did make an opening day roster once.

After the jump, a breakdown by player type.

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I suppose it's time I waded in on the latest chapter in the Alexander Radulov saga.

Here's what we know: Alexander Radulov is a rarity, an elite hockey player who is not playing in the world's best league. There are only a select few players who are better than him in the world, everyone of whom is in the NHL. He has won two straight regular season MVP awards in the KHL, and very likely will win again this year for the three-peat. He's the darling of the league, so much so that he can seemingly get away with anything... as this famous clip of a frustrated Radulov attacking his coach illustrates.

Both the NHL and the KHL want him. The NHL wants him not just because he's a talent, but because he is legally contracted to one of their franchises. In the murky first few weeks of the KHL's existence, Radulov jumped ship on the final year of his Entry Level Contract with the Nashville Predators to sign for a much larger contract with Salavat Yulaev Ufa, the last champions of the Russian Super League. The Nashville Predators, in particular, want him badly. Even though he left the team high and dry in 2007, this is a team short on top offensive talent, and trying to compete in the highly competitive Western Conference and specifically the Central Division for the Stanley Cup. Nashville has elite defenders in Shea Weber and Ryan Suter, plus an elite goaltender in Pekka Rinne. Their current forward group is best known for being a collection of solid two-way talent, but has no players who will finish in the top 20 in league scoring currently or in the future. Radulov would fit the bill for them, and his return would be perfect timing: they want to win now and don't care that he won't fulfill the full final season on his contract anymore.

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Well, it's been a brutal year for Montreal's winter passion, and while there isn't the prospect of playoffs on the horizon for the Canadiens, Montreal area fans have something to get excited about this spring: the arrival of Major League Soccer. The Impact are now in the big leagues of North American soccer, and their season starts this weekend on the road against the Vancouver Whitecaps. The home field action begins next week at Olympic Stadium vs. the Chicago Fire, which promises to be an event to be at for sure. The atmosphere should be exciting as the team hopes to draw a similar crowd to what Toronto FC drew for this week's Champions League game against the LA Galaxy at Rogers Centre in Toronto.

We at SB Nation are even more pleased to be able to welcome a second blog for the Montreal area on our network with the arrival of Mount Royal Soccer. Go say 'Bienvenue' over here and join up for discussion on all things Impact. Follow them on Twitter here @MtRoyalSoccer as well.

Get excited, Montreal.