0 comments by Steve Lepore on 11/19/2014
International hockey has long had a bit of a problem when it comes to staging international tournaments: at any given time, there have only been at best, seven great hockey playing nations that could reasonably contend for a medal. Slovakia and the Czech Republic’s dropping off the world map in recent years in terms of […]
0 comments by Steve Lepore on 10/29/2014
Mike Babcock and NBC’s Pierre McGuire often have a contentious relationship with their in-game banter. Whenever McGuire talks to Babcock, his disdain for the process can’t be hidden. However, after a terrible call on his team when Braden Holtby slipped and fell untouched in the first period… enemies united together to become friends. (
0 comments by Steve Lepore on 10/22/2014
Justin Bieber, like a lot of celebrities, loves sports. He doesn’t really lay his loyalty with any particular team, but then again, neither do Kenny Chesney, Drake or Rihanna. His two favorite pastimes seem to be basketball and hockey, since its where we see him turn up most often. His Canadian roots, of course, mean […]
0 comments by Steve Lepore on 10/15/2014
The NHL All-Star Game is often maligned for its lack of competitive nature and how its almost transparently only held so the NHL can have another big event for its corporate partners nowadays. However, there are a few reasons to justify holding the game, even in 2014. One such motivation is the ability to showcase […]
0 comments by Steve Lepore on 10/8/2014
Here on the internet, we are prone to cynicism, snark, and general outrage at the world we see around us. Sometimes that’s in direct conflict with the world of sports, which should be about wish fulfillment, entertainment, and the mix of beauty and brutality of athletic pursuits. Sometimes that direct conflict is because of sports. The fact […]
0 comments by Steve Lepore on 10/6/2014
You’ll be getting a lot more bang for your (nonexistent) buck on the NHL’s mobile platform this year. Starting today, the NHL has rebranded their iOS/Android app, NHL GameCenter as just the NHL app. NHL GameCenter (which comes with a bit of an update on desktop platforms this season) will maintain a presence within the […]
0 comments by Steve Lepore on 6/11/2014
“Thank god for soft ice,” said Alain Vigneault, with the truest words spoken on Wednesday night at Madison Square Garden. In this space on Wednesday, I proclaimed that if the Rangers merely kept playing as they had been on Monday in the unjustly lopsided 3-0 beating they took in Game 3, they would win Game […]
0 comments by Steve Lepore on 6/10/2014
You could certainly argue this hasn’t been the postseason that Jonathan Quick would be most proud of. He’s at a mere .910 save percentage after a 32-save shutout in Game 3 of the Stanley Cup Final over the Rangers at Madison Square Garden. That said… he’s one win away from his second Stanley Cup, and […]
0 comments by Steve Lepore on 5/31/2014
The Stanley Cup Playoffs are always the best playoff tournament in any of the major sports. Obviously you’re not coming to this site to hear that point debated. This year has been no exception, as both rounds one and two have featured multiple seven-game series, as they almost always do. However, 2014 has seen round […]
0 comments by Steve Lepore on 4/13/2014
In what was as perfect an advertisement for college hockey as you could imagine, Union College — a small, liberal arts school in Schenectady, New York — defeated the mighty University of Minnesota 7-4 in the NCAA title game at the Wells Fargo Center in Philadelphia. Often championship games take a turn toward the more […]
0 comments by Steve Lepore on 3/30/2014
The lore of the Stanley Cup is often used to promote the NHL, sometimes to the detriment of the stars of the game themselves. However, this year NBC has chosen to go the comedy route with its playoff spots. The effect is pretty solid. A 90-second trailer for the campaign, starring multiple NBC News staffers […]
Photo by: Brianne Bowen, Forbes
0 comments by Steve Lepore on 3/23/2014
Time for hockey to get in on its piece of March Madness. The NCAA Tournament is here. Brackets were announced by ESPN on Sunday afternoon, as the networks of The Worldwide Leader broadcast the entire tournament. Minnesota, Boston College, Union and Wisconsin were named the top four seeds in the tourney, as well as the […]
0 comments by Steve Lepore on 3/7/2014
Hockey is a game that breeds addiction. Chris Rock once joked about the sport, "Hockey is like heroin. Only drug addicts do heroin. It's not like a recreational drug. It's never like, No, that's O.K., I'm not going to have heroin. You guys go right ahead. Hockey is kind of the same way. Only hockey […]
0 comments by Steve Lepore on 2/22/2014
The loss by the ladies of team USA was worse, to me as an American fan. It wasn't necessarily that women's hockey means more to me than men's hockey. It doesn't, though I do enjoy the U.S. women's team whenever I see them play. It's that I know that, for the two teams involved, this […]
0 comments by Steve Lepore on 2/17/2014
Pool play is over at the 2014 Winter Olympic men's hockey tournament and it gave us some surprisingly competitive games. While the rise of the Swiss as a death-trap of defensive hockey was somewhat expected, who saw Latvia putting three goals by Henrik Lundqvist? Or the Czechs going through a ton of drama before getting […]
