News

So here is how it shapes up for Canada's three playoff contenders, now that the NHL regular season is finally over:

The Montreal Canadiens emerged from the Eastern Conference pack on the final weekend of the season, earning their first conference title in 19 years and the right to play their perennial punching bag, the Boston Bruins, in the opening playoff round.

See the Playoff schedule

One year after missing the playoffs altogether, the Canadiens loom as Canada's best hope to end a 15-year Stanley Cup drought — or since the Habs last won the championship back in 1993.

Thanks to their unexpected 2-0 shutout over the Pittsburgh Penguins Sunday, the Philadelphia Flyers leapfrogged the Ottawa Senators and moved into sixth spot, where they'll play the hottest team in the East, the Washington Capitals, and their all-world left-winger Alex Ovechkin.

Ovechkin won the Art Ross Trophy as the NHL's scoring champion and the Maurice (Rocket) Richard Trophy as the goal-scoring leader, He will also be favoured to win both the Hart Memorial (league MVP) and Lady Byng Memorial Trophies (sportsmanship, gentlemanly conduct, high standard of play).

This will mark Ovechkin's first NHL playoff appearance and if the seedings hold, his Capitals will face Sidney Crosby and the Penguins in what would be a highly-anticipated second-round match-up.

Naturally, the Senators will try to spoil that scenario. Without injured captain Daniel Alfredsson and Mike Fisher, two key elements of its leadership group, Ottawa will go into the series with the Penguins as the underdogs, after being heavy favourites a year ago.

Even though Crosby received the day off yesterday to rest his problematic ankle, the Penguins did get the veteran forward Gary Roberts back for that game after a lengthy injury absence. After adding former Senators star Marian Hossa at the trade deadline, the Penguins have a potent attack, featuring Evgeni Malkin (the NHL's No. 2 scorer). Ovechkin and Malkin, drafted with back-to-back picks in the 2004 entry draft, also became the first Russians to finish one-two in the NHL scoring race.

Only a three-point performance from the Calgary Flames forward Jarome Iginla in Saturday's 7-1 laugher over the Vancouver Canucks, which lifted him past Detroit Red Wings centre Pavel Datsyuk, prevented Russian-born players from nailing down the top three spots in the standings.

The Flames were the only one of the three Canadian-based Western Conference teams to qualify for the playoffs. They will play the hottest team in the league over the final one-third of the season, the San Jose Sharks, in the opening round — a reprise of their thrilling 2004 conference championship series, which sent Calgary to the Stanley Cup final that season.

The Flames finished with a nearly identical record compared to 2004 — 42 wins, 94 points — and will play a Sharks team they defeated three out of four times this season, twice thanks to exceptional performances from goaltender Miikka Kiprusoff.

There is no end to compelling story lines in the San Jose-Calgary series.

Calgary general manager Darryl Sutter is a former Sharks head coach and GM; forward Owen Nolan is a former Sharks captain; and Mark Smith and Wayne Primeau are both former Sharks players as is Kiprusoff, who will be front and centre against the team that traded him away 4 1/2 years ago.

In the two games they won in San Jose, the Flames were outshot badly (79-38 overall), but Kiprusoff kept them close and Iginla eventually scored the winner both times in overtime.

Iginla's third-period goal against the Canucks gave him 50 for the year, making him only the third player to reach that plateau in another goal-starved year for the NHL. The victory demonstrated how much a nothing game can mean after all.

Calgary was noticeably more relaxed against the Canucks, after the pressure of their 11th-hour playoff drive was finally lifted. There were a lot of feel-good moments in the victory, which mattered only because the Flames desperately needed a few feel-good moments after stumbling down the stretch.

Coach Mike Keenan played Iginla virtually every other shift, on a handful of different lines; his teammates constantly fed him passes, trying to get him to 50 goals for the second time in his career.

Afterwards, Iginla talked about the palpable relief in the dressing room that came from securing a playoff berth.

"Our last 10 [games], honestly, we were in a complete battle," he said. "We were playing teams that were fighting for their lives and we made it. We feel good about making it. It was tough.

"There were games where we didn't play very well, there were games that we did play well, and it was something where, probably in the last five besides tonight, it felt like it was Game 7, so … it's something we're going to be able to draw on. We kind of feel like we've truly been through a series — and made it through."

If so, the next round begins later this week in San Jose.

The normally mild-mannered Sharks await them there, following a brawl-filled date with the Dallas Stars yesterday that meant nothing except to signal that the NHL's second season is finally upon us — and not a moment too soon.