Since we're down to the final moments of postseason life for teams in contention, Puck Daddy solemnly begins a daily countdown to annihilation.
Noble effort. Great rally. More than a few jobs saved, one assumes. But, alas, the end has arrived for the Calgary Flames.
The Flames defeated the Edmonton Oilers last night at the same time the Blackhawks and Ducks both won their games, making it mathematically impossible for Calgary to finish in the top eight.
As Brent Sutter told the Globe & Mail, the Flames needed help and didn't get it. Alex Tanguay on being eliminated:
"It sucks," said left winger Alex Tanguay, in a downcast dressing room afterward. "I feel if we started that run a week or 10 days earlier, we'd be in the playoffs now and the way we've been playing since Christmas, we would have given ourselves a chance of being one of those teams that did like Philly did last year.
"But unfortunately, it's not going to pan out for us. It sucks. It sucks right now."
We're getting the subtle feeling that this sucks for the Flames.
Meanwhile, the fate of the Eastern Conference playoff bubble is in the hands of … the Atlanta Thrashers?
The Thrash are in MSG tonight to take on the Rangers, who are two points up on the Hurricanes, whom the Thrash play at home on Friday night.
The Hurricanes and Rangers both have 34 non-shootout wins; if they end up tied in points and that figure holds, Carolina would win the tiebreaker because they earned more points in their season series with the Rangers than New York did.
Will the Thrashers help a Southeast brother out? Hey, at least it's something for Atlanta fans to care about beyond seeing Dustin Byfuglien break Ilya Kovalchuk's record for shots in a season.
Coming up, the playoff pictures for the East and West, as we shift the focus to playoff seeding. The full NHL standings and schedules can be found on Y! Sports.
All playoff percentages are from Sports Club Stats; the Tragic Number is from NHL Standings and Magic Numbers. The former is an industry standard; the latter is a site we discovered this week, and are hopeful that the figures are as accurate as those from NHL Playoff Race. Also: For the Percentage Chance of Making the Playoffs, we've included the figures from Hockey-Reference.com (HR), which is crunching its own numbers. It's listed with the percentage from Sports Club Stats (SCS).
Head here for an explanation of the Tragic Numbers.
Here's the playoff picture for the Eastern Conference:
| Team (Games) | Place/Record/Pts. | Tragic # | % Chance of Playoffs | % Chance of 7th | % Chance of 8th |
| Montreal Canadiens
(80) |
6th/43-30-7/93 | -- | IN (SCS)
100 (HR) |
19 | 6 |
| Buffalo Sabres
(80) |
7th/41-29-10/92 | -- | 96.6 (SCS)
95.4 (HR) |
47 | 30 |
| New York Rangers
(80) |
8th/43-32-5/91 | -- | 87.6 (SCS)
95.6 (HR) |
33 | 49 |
| Carolina Hurricanes
(80) |
9th/39-30-11/89 | 3 | 15.8 (SCS)
9.0 (HR) |
1 | 14 |
The Canadiens are in Ottawa tonight with a chance to solidify their first-round blood feud matchup with the Bruins.
Here's the Western Conference:
| Team (Games) | Place/Record/Pts. | Tragic # | % Chance of Playoffs | % Chance of 7th | % Chance of 8th |
| Los Angeles Kings
(80) |
4th/46-28-6/98 | -- | IN (SCS)
100 (HR) |
11 | 5 |
| Nashville Predators
(80) |
5th/43-26-11/97 | -- | 99.1 (SCS)
99.6 (HR) |
10 | 5 |
| Phoenix Coyotes
(80) |
6th/42-25-13/97 | -- | 98.7 (SCS)
99.0 (HR) |
18 | 11 |
| Anaheim Ducks
(80) |
7th/45-30-5/95 | -- | 94.2 (SCS)
95.4 (HR) |
32 | 32 |
| Chicago Blackhawks
(80) |
8th/43-28-9/95 | -- | 88.2 (SCS)
96.5 (HR) |
25 | 33 |
| Dallas Stars
(79) |
10th/40-28-11/91 | 3 | 19.8 (SCS)
9.5 (HR) |
4 | 15 |
Dallas takes on the Colorado Avalanche for their game in-hand and the start of a home-and-home against the Avs. A loss, and their playoff probability drops to 2.9 percent. Which isn't good.
If the playoffs started today, they'd look like this. The West is all scrambled up, but that Sharks vs. Ducks series is still on the board, to the joy of any hockey fan that loves a bitter rivalry.