SNES A 2nd ROUND Preview

[pokrchamp]

A couple of awesome series in the 1st round.....& it gets even better in the 2nd

The 2nd round will be hilghtlighted by 2 ultra heavyweight tilts

Pittsburgh vs Montreal -- Shakazuzu fresh off a thrilling 7th game O.T win over the #1 seed Nordiques gets

Pittsburgh as a reward. Not too many teams can handle Pittsburgh physically, but Montreal is one of them.

These 2 players are pretty evenly matched, & the 2 teams are pretty evenly matched.

I say flip a coin on this one, & expect a long series!!!

St. Louis vs Detroit -- Jota coming off a huge 7 game series win over Chicago will have his hands

full again vs the #1 seed Redwings. These 2 played a thrilling 7 game series last year that saw Jota advance

after being down 3-1. You have to give the team matchup edge to Detroit on this one. But in an interview with

Jota earlier, he didn't seemed concerned about the Redwing forwards, "The forwards are wussies he said, the Defense

are really the strenght of that team, I'm more worried about them"

I think its clear the Jota plans to play a physical game against Rudy.

Another one thats tough to call..... I say flip a coin once more!

Hartford vs Philadelphia -- Schwartz has been playin great lately. I expect him to come out in full force

vs the Flyers. I haven't seen or played McMarkis much, so I don't really have much to say on this one.

All I'll say is it will be the small finesse Whalers against the big rugged flyers.

Winninpeg vs L.A -- Well I don't like to comment to much on my own series. I've played more vs Fenty than

anyone else. He plays a hard hitting style & likes to score off the one timers. Its a great way to play with L.A as

there 2 wingers Robitaille & Sandstrom have rockets... and of course they have 99 to set them up.

Fenty has been known to knock out a player or 2 with a huge hit from Blake. So that could play a factor if Selanne

gets caught with his head down.

Seeing is how were both kinda new to the playoffs, I think whoever is able to put out there A game will win, its suprisingly

tougher to do that in the playoffs than I expected!

So there you have it!

I wish some of these series could be recorded. I think SNES A is the most competitive league out there.

No one being cocky in this league, & certaintly no one thinking they have no chance.

Once again I'll leave the predictions to someone else

[halifax]

great writeup....good luck in your series.

[The Deer]

That was an excellent write-up, pokerchamp.

You hit the nail on the head when you said that we have two super heavyweight series on our hands.

I've ALWAYS wanted to see a series between Biff and shakazuzu, and here we have it. You could seriously flip a coin. I'm going to say that it'll be about the same in terms of game play and back-and-forthedness as my series against shaka was, and the winner could be determined by one goal or one bounce....... like my series against him was. Seriously could flip a coin, but for the sake of predictions, I'm going to say that my Cape Breton friend will avenge me. Pitts in 7.

The heavyweight battle in the West might be the most intriguing in terms of storyline. These two met in the second round last year, only that time it was Jota who was the #1 seed (shows how much parity there is in this league). Rudy suffered a total heartbreaker last time, watching Jota come back from a 3-1 series deficit to take it in seven games. I know for sure that that loss stung him hard, never had seen him ever get upset after a loss in NHL 94 before but that one hurt for sure, and he's been flying all season waiting for this matchup to even the score. However, can anyone take down Jota in a playoff series? It's kind of hard to bet against a guy who's found pretty much every different kind of way to win a playoff series; he's won as the favourite, he's won as the underdog. He's won in sweeps, he's won in 7 games after trailing 3-1 and 3-2 (against Rudy and Mike respectively). Hard to bet against him, but I'm going to; Rudy in 7.

*Disclaimer: There may be some hometown bias playing a role in the above two predictions, I'll admit it, but when the two series are as close a call as those two are, when you can literally flip a coin, you might as well let hometown bias be the deciding factor, it's as good a way to make up your mind as any when it's that close to call.

Hartford-Philly; Schwartz is playing the best hockey I've yet to see him play, while I find that Philly just doesn't seem to be the best fit for McMarkis. Gonna call Hartford in 5.

LA-Winnipeg, a battle of two guys who play a ton of exhibition games against each other as pokerchamp said. Should be a close one, but I find pokerchamp to be a little more consistent a player, so I'm gonna go Winnipeg in 6.

Looks like a really good second round, eager to see how it plays out.