idahophilly Posted October 2, 2014 Share Posted October 2, 2014 the west being decided the best?... I pose a strait forward question: Is the East weaker because the teams grind way harder, are more even matched and the west has elite teams and more bottom dwellers making the elite looking more elite? The East beats up each other so bad they got not much left for the playoffs. Compliments to the NY Rangers for making it that far but the REGULAR season whipped them and hence the compliments. I'm just posing the question and I'm open to changing my mind if good points are made. Just seems if some of the elite teams from the west played in the east they would be equally worn down by the 82 game schedule. I would love to see Chicago play in the east. It wouldn't be the same for them. Just ask the Penguins and Detroit.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
yave1964 Posted October 2, 2014 Share Posted October 2, 2014 The West is better because of talent, pure and simple. Of the top ten talented teams in the NHL, 8 are in the West, possibly more. Blackhawks, Kings, Ducks, Sharks, Blues, Avalanche, Wild and Stars are all better than any except for the Penguins and the Bruins in the East. The truth is the Canucks, with a healthy Sedins due and the Predators with a healthy Rinne and a rebuilt offense would both qualify for the playoffs in the East. The West is deep, the East is top heavy, a few teams at the top, two or three at the very bottom and ten in the middle. The Wings could finish third or fourth, they could just as easily finish twelfth in the East. Out West, it pains me to admit it but the Wings would have zero chance. The record of Eastern conference teams versus Western conference last year was 202-276. The only area that the East is better than the Wet is top tier netminding. Price Rask, Lundqvist, Bishop, BobRovsky and even Fleury stand above the Western conference netminders, save Quick. Other than that, in every way the west is superior. I used to feel smug about it when the Wings were in the East, but not anymore. I hope we catch up soon. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
B21 Posted October 2, 2014 Share Posted October 2, 2014 @idahophilly Short answer? No. It's merely coincidence and nothing really to do with geography. Things like this come and go. 10 years from now maybe the East is dominant. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MadDevil Posted October 2, 2014 Share Posted October 2, 2014 I think the top teams in the West are better, which forces everybody else to be better to beat them. Everybody is trying to beat the Kings and Hawks, which has resulted in kind of an arms race. That's why teams like St. Louis and Anaheim went out and got centers. To win in the West you have to be strong down the middle (although Chicago isn't really that deep at center). And before Chicago and LA, it was Detroit that was the measuring stick team. It just seems like the West has had stronger top teams more consistently than the East over the last 15-20 years. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ihabs1993 Posted October 2, 2014 Share Posted October 2, 2014 Personally, I think the East is more equally competitive than the West. Look at the stnadings from last year: In each of the Western Divisions, the divisional leaders ran away with the top three spots, and the fourth place team is nowhere close. 3rd place Chicago finished 9 points ahead of 4th place Minnesota. 3rd place Los Angeles finished 11 ponts ahead of 4th place Phoenix (Arizona). It would be silly to sit here and say that the West doesn't produce amazing teams. I think one Eastern team has won the cup in the last 5 years. This isn't because the West is SO much better than the East; the East is just much closer as far as competition is concerned.Plus with the West being as bad as it was for years, those teams got great draft picks. Look at Los Angeles for example. From 2002-2009, the Kings didn't even qualify for the playoffs. This gets them a ton of quality picks, as long as they hire a great scouting staff to make the right picks. Same goes for the Blackhawks, as from 1998-2008 they qualified for the playoffs only once. The spoils of their failure included Kane, Toews, Sharp and so many others that make them and elite team. Could this happen with Buffalo? Sure. Reinhart and the tantilizing idea of McDavid next year makes Buffalo a threat in the future for sure. So what you see with the East now is what happened with the west years ago. With Detroit having lost nearly all of the players from their recent success, they're having a rebuild of sorts. Buffalo, who had some success, is suffering from an inability to adapt without quality draft picks for years, although they'll be getting a few good ones in the future. So short answer, kind of... But it's not as bad as it looks, and the East is getting better. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TropicalFruitGirl26 Posted October 3, 2014 Share Posted October 3, 2014 I agree with @B21 , it's all about the ebbs and flows.All pro sports leagues are kinda like that though....NFL had a time when the NFC was dominant over the AFC, then vice versa, MLB has this whole AL is better thing followed by NL is better thing, and the NBA...well, the West has been dominant there too (MUCH more pronounced than in the NHL, btw), but yes, there WAS a time when certain teams in the Eastern Conference were referred to as "Beasts from the East" due to their dominance, which of course, led others in the East to 'arm up' to compete with them. And yes, having good teams in the NHL, such as the Cali teams, Chicago, St. Louis, etc, DOES improve the quality of the opposition...well, it SHOULD anyways, if said opposition has any designs on fielding a reasonably competitive team against them. I've said that in other threads in other forums about the whole 'competition makes divisions/conferences better' idea.Some thought it was bunk, but if you think about it, not really.It's one of the reasons I was one of the few TB Lightning fans who actually LIKED having the SouthEast division dissolved and moved into one with the NorthEast teams. The South East was terrible. And there was no incentive really, for teams to go out of their way to be real good, real fast...they felt they could just take their time, just win your weak division, and you were guaranteed in the playoffs due to your division win, no matter how bad your record actually was (see: Florida Panthers division win of not so long ago).Move to a division with the Bruins, Leafs, Candiens, Red Wings, or in the case of the Caps and Canes, the Pens, Flyers, Rangers, Devils, and you BEST get your crap together quickly or you will find yourself at the bottom of a much deeper division regularly with ZERO shot of making the playoffs. So yeah, the West has some real top notch teams, and the have-nots from before like the Wild, Predators, Coyotes realize, they need to keep up and keep up fast, and thus it helped further their developments. Then THAT has the side effect of elite free agent players, seeing top clubs in the West going, "Hey, I wanna win a Cup...let me sign with one of those really good ones over there...they got a real good shot". As soon as the East begins to arm up faster as well....whether it's teams wanting to keep up with the Bruins and Pens (whom I still believe, such as it is, are still the top two rung teams over in the East), or simply wanting to be that one team that gets a guaranteed playoff top three spot in the division, it will help the Eastern teams develop into much better teams faster.And I think we are seeing that now with the Lightning, Rangers and Canadiens for instance in the East, and even teams like the Panthers, Sabres and Islanders seem to have a fire lit under them that says "We best get better fast...or else..." I never really let the whole 'West is better than East' thing bug me too much, @idahophilly .The media needs stuff to talk about, they need to have their 'goliaths' with some 'davids' to slay them.But really, the fact is, the West right NOW, overall, has more contenders....that may change in a few years time.Just the way it is. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jammer2 Posted October 3, 2014 Share Posted October 3, 2014 I think the West is so much better than the East that the Western Conference final is *really* the Stanley Cup. The Rangers kept it close, but honestly, the end result was never in doubt. The Hawks or the Kings were gonna walk all over the Eastern Conf champs, I suspect the same this time around. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MadDevil Posted October 3, 2014 Share Posted October 3, 2014 Boston is the only team in the East that I think could really challenge Chicago or LA in a 7 game series. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ruxpin Posted October 3, 2014 Share Posted October 3, 2014 I think the West is so much better than the East that the Western Conference final is *really* the Stanley Cup. The Rangers kept it close, but honestly, the end result was never in doubt. The Hawks or the Kings were gonna walk all over the Eastern Conf champs, I suspect the same this time around.This. I really don't think it's even close. Yeah, it is definitely an ebb and flow kind of thing, but it's been clearly (and begrudgingly) the west for awhile now. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
yave1964 Posted October 3, 2014 Share Posted October 3, 2014 To me, proof that the West is miles ahead of the East from top to bottom and not just a few teams is the fact that the Red Wings and Blue Jackets came to the East. Both the Wings and the CBJ were average teams and would not have made the postseason in the West but they made it in back East. Neither would have much of a chance this year either but both are as likely in the East as anyone else. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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