Why lidstrom and staal




















It brought Eric Staal's younger brother Marc, a Rangers defenseman, onto his team for the first time in their lives, but it split up identical twins Henrik and Daniel Sedin of the Vancouver Canucks for the first time, too.

Alex Ovechkin had his own stick-throwing ceremony in the third period when he tossed his in the path of Team Lidstrom's Matt Duchene as the Colorado forward raced in on a breakaway. That move drew the only penalty of the game — the first All-Star penalty shot — given to Duchene against New York Rangers goalie Henrik Lundqvist, who made the stop.

Ovechkin also scored a goal. Staal's top choice of Ward looked more genius than sentimental early on when the players in white jumped out to a lead, with Ward standing tall behind them. Team Staal scored all its goals on the first nine shots against Fleury, while Ward was perfect on the first four he faced.

It wasn't the start we wanted, but it was the end we wanted. The tide turned when Lidstrom's team connected for four goals on its final 10 shots of the first. Fleury went 5 for 5 to close out the period. Notes: The previous largest All-Star comeback victory was three goals, set by the North American team in Four other goalies have earned two consecutive All-Star wins.

Lidstrom leads active players with a career plus rating in 19 years. Only five non-goalies failed to record a point, including Toronto forward Phil Kessel — the last pick in the All-Star draft. Twenty players had at least two points. Obviously, you keep the Sedin twins together, and if you put Kessel's release on that line with Henrik's playmaking ability? I've always dreamed of seeing Briere play with St.

Louis or Vinny Lecavalier, and this line is full of magic. These guys will dangle all over the place. I lose out on keeping Eriksson with from Brad Richards, but that's okay. I'm obviously going to keep the teammates together as much possible, and one would be silly to separate Toews and Kane. I almost thought about putting Briere with them just because, but I think Perry's ability to hang on to the puck and use his size is probably a better fit here.

I like Richards and Havlat together, and I really like Backes all the time, but really, this line is just the leftovers. Still, not half bad for a fourth line, right? Two possibilities here. I did take a lot of big men, which could hurt me in an All-Star Game. That's okay, though. Shea Weber isn't a pylon or anything, and neither is Zdeno Chara, really.

I could put two big men on the ice at the same time, but you just know they'd get burned by some of the speedy forwards on Team Staal. So I decided to break them up. I'll put Lidstrom with Byfuglien since I think he's the lesser of the bunch defensively and could use Lidstrom's help. I think each pairing has a nice balance of size, speed and defensive smarts.

As for the goaltenders, Tim Thomas is having the year of his life and Henrik Lundqvist is the only hope the Rangers ever have. Carey Price was the throw-away pick at the position, and I'm just fine with that.

And realistically, they're all going to allow at least two goals anyway, right? Now, looking over at Team Staal, I'm not terribly concerned here. I have faith in my boys.

Sure, Stamkos is always a threat and Ovechkin's scary too. And then there's Nash and Giroux and Staal, of course. They have weapons. Not a subscriber? Sign up today to get the best features and analysis from the NHL and beyond. And this is just the start for them as they ascend the Pacific Division ranks. There is still a lot of hockey to play, but our prospect expert is weighing in on the initial field for a class that promises to keep scouts intrigued.

Home The Hockey News News. The draft experiment seemed to go well. Newsletter Sign Up. By Adam Proteau. By Ryan Kennedy. My prediction of the three replacements will be Taylor Hall and Tyler Seguin. Louis, Steven Stamkos, Jonathan Toews. Since the alternate captains will have a say in the draft picks of each team, you'll notice the influence this has on some of my mock draft choices. Enjoy our content? Join our newsletter to get the latest in sports news delivered straight to your inbox!



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