The Wrong 'Marty'

At the Dallas end of the ice, goalie Marty Turco played just well enough to lose. 

As you see, the "right" Marty is none other than Martin Brodeur, he of the three Stanley Cup rings and current 1.00 GAA after the New Jersey Devils' sweep of the New York Rangers. 

We won't call it a "surprising sweep" because the Devils came in to the round of sixteen with an eleven game winning streak, while the Rangers skidded in on the heels of a five game losing skein that gave their Jersey cousins the Atlantic Division title. You could see this one coming. The Devils now enter the conference semis with an amazing fifteen game winning streak.

Back to the case of the two Martys. 

If there was ever evidence of how important experience in goal is in the playoffs, let the saga of these two netminders be Exhibit A. 

Both goalies were considered in the top five in the NHL this season and they both possess excellent stickhandling skills. Unfortunately for Turco, once the playoffs start, the commonality ends. 

Brodeur was cool, calm and collected in the Devil victories, never panicking in the spotlight and certainly aided by Jaromir Jagr's half hearted punch at Scott Gomez that injured his shoulder and rendered him ineffective for the balance of the series.

Turco, on the other hand, never settled in, never got in rhythm and at times looked like a rookie in his first Stanley Cup playoff. He surrendered massive momentum-changing goals throughout the series and never came up with a five star save to win a game. His failure to cover the right post on Jim Dowd's tap-in in late in period two during Game 5 gave Colorado life after being dominated throughout that stanza. 

Andrew Brunette caught Turco flopping around in his crease and potted a rebound late in the first overtime for the series winner. It seemed that Turco's reaction was more relief than despair that the series was over. It wasn't as if his counterpart Theodore had excelled in the series (Jose entered Game 5 with a save percentage below .900, not exactly Patrick Roy or even David Aebischer numbers) but Theodore did get in the way of 50 shots in the clincher. Many of those shots weren't dangerous and he did get a break when HIS failure to cover the right post at the end of period two dribbled harmlessly away, but that's how the series went. 

Turco must look at his performance, and failure, to understand that regular season accomplishments are great, but quickly forgotten on the Stanley Cup trail. 

We question if he should have taken off more games when Dallas clinched their division. They weren't seriously challenged after the Olympic break and while he may not have been physically weary at the season's end, perhaps more time to emotionally prepare for the playoffs would have helped. 

With his current failure, the Stars have to think that maybe Turco is good enough to be carried by this team but not good enough to carry THEM. He's never won a series for Dallas in a manner like aforementioned Brodeur, Mikka Kiprusoff or Dominik Hasek. He may have become a very good regular season goalie and nothing more. If one thinks otherwise, his 1-6 mark in overtime and 8-14 won-loss record overall, seals the deal. 

We close with a quote from the anti-hero, "Yeah, I've never won in the playoffs, that's the bottom line."

WHO ELSE IS MINDING THE NET

So here we stand 60 playing minutes or so from NHL history. If the Anaheim Mighty Ducks can summon the strength to win Game 7 in Calgary Wednesday night and we think it's a 50-50 proposition, all top four seeds in the Western Conference will suffer first round upsets (OK, the Predators were seeded higher than San Jose but certainly weren't favorites). 

The pressure to win got the best of not only Turco, but Manny Legace, as well. The Ducks staved off elimination not with J.S. Giguere in the net but with his backup Ilya Bryzgalov. 

With the rash of upsets, there may be a shift in the paradigm in goaltending around the league. 

In the National Football League, it's mandatory to have a strong #2 quarterback because the physicality of the game won't allow one man to go unscathed throughout an entire season. Perhaps we're seeing the mental aspect of the NHL game becoming too much of a burden for one man to handle through four rounds. Maybe the singular days of a Patrick Roy or the aforementioned Brodeur are lessening as the teams get closer in talent. 

The salary cap has significantly reduced the talent between the top and bottom of the league and league GMs may move to bring two strong goaltenders to strengthen a franchise. The Rangers had success in the 70's with Ed Giacomin and Gilles Villemeure as co-number ones and the Red Wings did it to some extent with Mike Vernon and Chris Osgood in the 90's but the ups and downs of the most difficult tournament in sports looks like it warrants more depth between the pipes for a championship run. 

RANDOM THOUGHTS

What's Kings' GM Dean Lombardi waiting for? The Canucks whacked Marc Crawford and he's exactly what LAK needs. You won't find a better resume of any candidate on the market. Leafs fans are clamoring for the Emilio Estevez look-a-like, but Paul Maurice will deservedly graduate from the Marlies and be behind the bench at the ACC in October...

Nice series by Devils' Patrik Elias makes him a free agent target for the vanquished Rangers. With a boatload of Czechs on the team already, expect Elias to get a beaucoup buck offer from the MSG coffers...

Guess Montreal's Cristobal Huet really wouldn't have been a Vezina contender had he played an entire season, eh?... What will John Grahame's future be in Tampa after Coach John Tortorella threw him under the bus after Game 4 in the Bolts-Sens series. After ripping his first stringer in the Game 4 post game press conference, the fiery coach went with veteran Sean Burke in the series eliminator. What was once a primary strength of the team with Nik Khabibulin in net, is now its greatest weakness. What a difference a season makes... 

Despite the presence of Dany Heatley, Daniel Alfredsson and Jason Spezza on the Ottawa roster, the real difference maker in the Tampa series was Martin Havlat. The big Czech winger, who missed 58 games with a shoulder injury, stands to make a nice payday with his playoff production. Havlat, who is a restricted free agent at season's end, signed a one-year deal for $2.6 million coming into this season. His youth, size and skill stands to net him a $ 1 million per raise in the off season...

Interesting San Jose-Nashville series just concluded. With the spotlight burning on Predators' backup goalie Chris Mason, the former fifth round pick of New Jersey in 1995 acquitted himself better than most skeptics thought. Although he surrendered a fraction under 3.5 goals a game, his save percentage was north of .900. The Sharks were the better team in all facets of the game and extends our theory that teams who lock in playoff positions early don't really have an advantage. San Jose was in playoff mode since the Olympic break and their first round play was just an extension of how they finished the regular season. Scary thing about the Sharks were that they won in 5 with little contribution from Joe Thornton, as Patrick Marleau emerged from the shadows to dominate. If Thornton ever gets it going, and there are some doubters based on his prior playoff performances, the Sharks can emerge from the West...

Broadcasters like Brian Hayward needs to stop whining that players are diving to get calls in the playoffs. We've seen Hayward's homer act as the color man from the Anaheim Mighty Ducks, where not a game goes by where he criticizes the referees. Hayward goaded NBC broadcast partner Dave Strader into stating that diving and such could affect the integrity of the game. Please, spare me. The embellishment that players do is part of the game, something called gamesmanship. It's up to the referees to do their job and let play continue when there's no infraction...

When Kirk Maltby outcores Pavel Datsyuk in a playoff series, you know there's trouble for the Winged Wheel. When Fernando Pisani outscores Brendan Shanahan, there's even more concern. And when Ales Hemsky scores two against you in the final four minutes of an elimination game, there's something rotten in Detroit. Chris Chelios showed that as his season approached 90 games played, the rigors of the season is wore on his 44 year old body. He's wasn't a force against Edmonton, his play was mediocre at best, but you could go down the roster and say that about most Wings. And suffice to say that you should keep those memories stored in your brain because that was the last you saw of Steve Yzerman. Well done, Captain Y, your kind have vanished.
 

Dennis Bernstein, the man behind SCORE! Media, is a columnist for TheFourthPeriod.com and the Los Angeles Correspondent for The Fourth Period Magazine.