Was It An Historic Upset Last Night?

I hate the fact that the Montreal Canadiens overcame a 3-1 deficit in their first round series against Washington this year and advanced to the 2nd round of the NHL playoffs. Absolutely hate it! Can't stand that team, period.

But, I have to admit that there's some small sense of satisfaction in seeing the Capitals suffer the same ignominious fate (losing a best-of-seven series in which they led 3-1) that they themselves inflicted upon my Rangers just one year ago. Ha! Looks good on you, Caps!

But there's more to it than that. Washington allowed the biggest playoff comeback in history (measured by team seeds), as someone pointed out to me this morning. This is the first time a # 8 team in the conference has been down 3-1 to a first-place seed and come back to win the series. So that's pretty embarrassing, if you happen to be a Washington Capital. (It's just so very sad that it had to happen to Montreal, of all teams, though.)

Even worse, however, is the possibility that this is the biggest playoff upset in NHL history. Now, it all depends on how you measure such things, I suppose. Point differential at the end of the regular season, between the favoured team and the underdog, for example, would be one way to go. Here, that differential was 33 points (Wash = 122 pts, Mtl = 88 pts), which might or might not be big enough to take the prize. However, another way to consider "upsets" is to look at where the teams finished the season in terms of overall seeding. Washington took the President's Trophy with the # 1 spot (best team in the league!), whereas Montreal finished nearly in the bottom third of the league with their 19th place season. (8th in the East, but 19th overall.) What are the chances of a 19th seed even making the playoffs each year? Well, somewhat long but nowhere near unheard of (it all comes down to how balanced the two conferences are). But then to knock off # 1? Has it ever happened... before last night, that is?

Anyway, I'm disgusted with the performance of Ovechkin and his teammates over the past week, because it failed to eliminate my most-hated team from the postseason. But it's possible that they feel even worse than I do right now, and that would at least be a little consolation!