Let’s watch some playoff hockey! Scroll down to the comments to discuss Thursday night’s Stanley Cup Playoff games.
Here’s the slate for this evening (all times CT):
Eastern Conference
Tampa Bay Lightning at Toronto Maple Leafs, 6 p.m. (TBS)
Toronto leads 3 games to 1.
Nothing bad has ever happened to the Leafs after being up 3-1, right? I’m a big fan of both victor Hedman and Mikhail Sergachev but after a few consecutive years of letting their defensive depth walk in order to keep their forward core intact it appears as though it’s finally starting to catch up to the Lightning. Toronto is scoring a lot of goals off screens and tips and Tampa, and Andrei Vasilevskiy, hasn’t been able to figure out how to stop them (yet). Definitely in the Leafs best interest to wrap this up ASAP before all that doubt starts creeping back in. It’s also in the Blackhawks’ best interest as the sooner the Lightning get bounced, the higher that the Hawks’ pick from the Hagel trade will be this summer (helllllllo, Gabe Perrault).
New York Rangers at New Jersey Devils, 6:30 p.m. (ESPN2)
Series is tied at 2-2.
The home team has yet to win a game in this series, can New Jersey finally break that trend tonight? Devils’ goalie Akira Schmid has been nailes since taking over the crease for Game Three (he has a 0.91 goals-against average to go with a sparkling .961 save percentage). Logic would dictate Blackhawks’ fans also want the Rangers to do well as the pick exchanged for Patrick Kane is contingent, but I don’t care about any of that. I’m pulling for New Jersey, all the way. When in doubt I always root for the best player(s) to move on and as much as I love me some K’Andre and Zibanejad, Jack Hughes is on a whole nother level. And he’s just getting started.
Western Conference
Winnipeg Jets at Vegas Golden Knights, 9 p.m. (ESPN2)
Vegas leads the series 3 games to 1.
Stop me if you’ve heard this one before but Winnipeg was already in big trouble in the series before losing a top end player they absolutely could not afford to lose. This time it’s their No. 1 center, Mark Scheifele, who was confirmed out for Game Five this morning. Better news for the Jets? Forward Nikolaj Ehlers is currently a game-time decision after being out of their lineup since April 11. Other news for Winnipeg? It’s not going to matter because the Golden Knights are going to win tonight.