Stanley Cup Parade

Each and every year after winning the Stanley Cup, the winning team brings the cup back to their city for a parade and celebratory ceremony. This year, Chicago held the ceremony at Soldier Field, home of the Chicago Bears football team. The stadium was packed to the roof with fans of the team that came out to support their citys win.

"Last time we did this, we were saying it was two in four years," forward Patrick Sharp told the crowd at Soldier Field. "Now we're proud to say it's three in six. Everybody wants to know which was the best Cup … 2010 was special, 2013 was special, but there's nothing like winning the Cup on home ice in front of your fans." Each player went up to the stand to say a few words about their win, Patrick Sharp, assistant captain, was very ecstatic about the win saying it was the best one to win for him. Winning three cups in a players career is an amazing achievement, now winning three cups in six years is incredible. In my opinion, the Chicago Blackhawks have been a part of a dynasty that will forever be remembered by all. 

Captain Jonathan Toews at Soldier Field

To continue, the parade lasted over 3 hours and ended up at the stadium. Over all, its estimated that there were over two million fans who went to either watch the parade or at the stadium. To me, this shows incredible support for the team, having a fan base of two million people just from your city who are willing to stand outside or pay to sit in a stadium to see the players is amazing. 

In conclusion, I think that the Stanley Cup parade is a really cool and a good way for teams to celebrate their win. I really enjoyed watching this years parade for many reasons, some being because it was my favourite team, seeing my favourite players hold the cup and because I could celebrate along with them.

http://www.nhl.com/ice/m_news.htm?id=771360

Draft Day

Each year the NHL and other sport organization like the NBA and NFL host a draft lottery. Some of you may be asking what that is. Well, the teams that don't make the playoffs are cut up into fractions, meaning; say Edmonton does the worst out of all the teams, they get a 10% chance of winning. Now that all the teams have a percentage of wining the lottery, team names are put into a bowl. Its most likely that the worst team gets the number one draft pick who this year is an unbelievable player.

Canadian eighteen year old Connor McDavid is set to go first overall in the draft. Throughout his OHL seasons with the Erie Otters, McDavid started his amazing career back in two thousand twelve when he obtained sixty six points in sixty three games. He has progressed a lot as a player because this season in only fourty seven games, he had one hundred and twenty points. To me, if you can get that many goals and assists, its time to get out of the minors and play with some real competition, its time for McDavid to play in the NHL. Connor is in my opinion, an amazing player and could compete with some top players. It's a shame that he'll most likely be going to a team in its rebuilding stages.

Connor McDavid

Edmonton, most likely McDavids future team, hasn't made the playoffs since I can remember. They come close to last place every year. Even with the last four first draft picks, Eberly, Hall, Nugenthopkins and Yakupov, they can't seem to find a way to win. In my opinion, the lottery isn't always fair because star players like Conner are stuck playing on a team that won't make him any better. 

To end, I think that the NHL should enforce a rule stating that you can't win the lottery more than two times in a row because if your team isn't winning with star players, maybe its not the players but the coachig staff. 

Stanley Cup Champions

Just last night, the Chicago Blackhawks won the greatest trophy in sports, the Stanley Cup. For certain members of the team, this is their third cup in the last six years. Players such as Jonathan Toews, Brent Seabrook, Ducan Keith and Patrick Kane and many more now have three rings to go along with their three cup wins. Winning the cup is a dream for many young players but what is it like to actually win it? Young Chicago player Andrew Desjardins won his fist cup with the Blackhawks. He later blogged about his experiance saying it was ''amazing feeling'' to win the cup. Playing his first season with Hawks, he was handed the cup fifth out of twenty six others players. I think that Chicago desereved the cup because, the players on this team have worked extremely hard all season and through the playoffs to win. Chicago played in 4 games that went to triple or double overtime. Some players playing almost a fifty minutes in a hour and fourty minute game. In the final game, he played thirty minutes and ninetine second, plpaying just over half of the game. In my opinion, a player that works that hard deserves to hold the cup above their head. I aslo believe that Chicago desereved the cup this season becuse of their history. Before the addition of the players that now make up the core of the team, Patrick Kane, Jonathan Toews and others, Chicago was not a good team. Tgey couldn't make the playoffs, had a hard time beating other teams in the regular season and were just plain garbage. But, after winning the draft lottery two years in a row, they picked up Kane and Towes, who have the most goals for the team the last few years. To me that is an incredible story, a team that went from dust to gold. 

Jordan Leopolds Heart Warming trade

March second of this year the Columbus Blue Jackets traded defensemen Jordan Leopold to the Minnesota Wild in a heart warming trade. Leopold, a Minnesota native played for the Jackets for a while before the general manager of the Wild received a letter from Jordan's eleven year old daughter Jordyn wrote to him. After reading the letter Jordan's wife Jamie started to cry. In the letter, little Jordyn writes : ''my dad is lonely without his family'' Leopold's family lives in Minnesota a 14 hour drive from where he was playing in Columbus. His daughter definitely change that.

The letter also reads "I'm lost without my dad, so is my mom, 2 sisters and my brother." To me this is really really sad because not growing up with my dad would have completely changed who I am. I couldn't imagine never seeing my father, it must be really tough. She goes on saying "the wild haven't been wining a lot of games lately, the team needs some D", this is not only true but  funny because this young girl is practically telling the Wild's GM that his team is doing bad. This part made me laugh because it was so true.

Also, Jordyn is solely the reason why her father was traded, most fans and people that aren't even fans like to believe she convinced the Wild to get him. "Trading Jordan Leopold was about doing the right thing for a guy who was a great pro for us," the Blue Jackets GM Jarmo Kekalainen said. "He's done everything we asked him to do the right way". Kekalainen also tweeted "it's not always just about business" with a picture of the letter from Jordyn. In my opinion, this whole story is really heart warming and the Minnesota Wild association is very classy for doing such a thing.

NHL Playoff Bracket Challenge

For many years now, the National Hockey League has started a NHL playoff bracket challenge. As a fan, you can choose what you expect to happen during the playoffs. This is a way for fans to interact with each other and have fun with making their own bracket. Also, NHL.com gives away prizes to the people with the top three brackets. The way it works is by points, if you guess the winner of a series in the first round you get ten points, if you also guess how many games out of the seven game series you get an extra 3 points.

Link to make your own bracket

If you guess the whole bracket or the closest you could win two tickets to the NHL awards in Las Vegas and a brand new Samsung S6 Edge. To the person who comes in second place, they would win a Samsung Curved SUHD 55' TV and a Samsung S6 Edge and for third place a Samsung S6 Edge. In my opinion, the winners of the bracket challenge are very lucky people because those prizes are pretty expensive for guessing a bracket for a sport.

The way the bracket works is that the eight teams from the west are on the left side and the eight from the est are on the right. The first round matches for the west are St Louis vs. Minnesota, Nashville vs. Chicago, Anaheim vs. Winnipeg, and Vancouver vs. Calgary. On the est the matches are Montreal vs. Ottawa, Tampa vs. Detroit, New York Rangers vs. Pittsburg and Washington vs. New York Islanders. In the first round yo must also pick the number of games the series will finish at out of seven games. From there you choose 4 teams that move on to the second round of the playoffs, you then pick just what team moves on the the third round and so on for the two teams that play in the finals. For the Stanley cup finals you pick how many goals will be scored in that series as well as a winner of the cup. 

In my bracket you can see I've chosen the Chicago Blackhawks to win the cup against the Tampa Bay Lightning with 19 goals scored in the series. I believe the when Kane returns for Chicago in the second round of the playoff, they'll have an unstoppable team. 

The NHL Introduces GoPro's

Recently, the National Hockey League has introduced the use of GoPros's on referee helmets. I think this is a really cool idea because fans can now watch from a camera view never used before.  As a big fan of the game, being able to watch highlights from my favourite games from the view of an official is really cool to me. Also, this can help referees make tough decisions as in if a goal counts or not. The adition of GoPro's on NHL officials could change the outcome of many games.

The players have also been enjoying themselves with this new technology. Many of the leagues best have been sent to New Jersey to have GoPro's mounted to their helmets to showcase their skills. Sidney Crosby, PK Subban,  Alex Ovechkin, Patrick Kane, Jonathan Towes and more stared in the very first GoPro; On the Ice with the NHL video. From watching the video many times, I believe that the players are having a lot of fun with the GoPros. The video showcases them goofing off and laughing with trainers and other players. For me, this is fun and cool because players can have fun while demonstrating what the GoPro can do. I think that GoPro has chosen the right sport to show off their product, the angles in the videos are spot on and really show the stick handling, skating and shooting of the players. As a big fan of the game, I can learn from the videos, I can see how some of my favourite players do moves and handle the puck.
GoPro; On the Ice with the NHL video
Also, in the recent NHL Allstar game, the referees wore GoPros on their helmets for one of the first times. During the game, you could watch the view from the view of the refs. As a fan, I watched the game from an angle I've never seen it from before. I love the new technology, it makes the life of a fan a lot better. To conclude, GoPros are a really good idea to be added into the NHL.

Detroit Keeping the Playoff Streak Alive?

Will the Detroit Red Wings keep their unbelievable playoff streak of 23 straight seasons alive? With the second highest playoff streak in NHL history, the Wings could make 24 straight playoff appearances. Boston had a streak of 29 straight appearances from the 1967 season to the 1995 season. Detroit is currently at the bottom of the list of teams to make the playoffs.

Every season, 16 teams (8 from the west and 8 from the east) battle for in my opinion, the best trophy in the world of professional sports. At this moment in time, Detroit has 97 points in 6th place, but places 7 (Pittsburg), 8 (Boston) and 9 (Ottawa) are not far behind. One win can put Ottawa tied with Detroit and Boston ahead of them all. In my opinion, this is what makes the NHL playoffs so exiting. Seeing your favourite team make the playoffs is the best feeling as a fan. Detroit is currently in the wildcard position, the scariest place to be at the end of the regular season. For those who don't speak hockey terminology, the wildcard is 8th place or the last team to make the playoffs. Detroit was in this place just a few days ago but they won against Carolina to move up to 6th place.

NHL standings as of today

Being a Chicago fan, I hope Detroit doesn't make the playoffs because they could be a potential threat in the finals if both teams make it that far. In the playoffs, both teams have a pretty close record. Detroit has won the cup many more times than Chicago, being 11 to Chicago's 6. With both teams being part of the original six teams, they have a history starting back in 1917 when the league was founded. Also, with the experience of going to a Blackhawks vs. Wings game that went to shootout, and Chicago ended up losing, I think that these two teams in the finals would be a tough series.

In my opinion, the two of the best hockey players in the world play  on each team. For Detroit, Pavel Datsyuk who has two cups to his name and my personal favourite player Patrick Kane on Chicago with only one. Let's remember, Kane is only twenty-six years old and Datsyuk  is thirty-six so in Kane's defence he's a much younger player. I hope Detroit doesn't make the playoffs because they could be a potential threat to Chicago.

Patrick Kane on the left and Pavel Datsyuk on the right.