Highlights of the NHL Western Conference Finals

The Detroit Red Wings in my mind was the only team in the NHL that could match up with the Anaheim Ducks. If they can't beat them, nobody can. Don't be fooled by the new uniforms and the altered nickname. Last season they stopped calling themselves the Mighty Ducks. Now this years Ducks team has proven to be the mightiest yet. For most of the series, this held true. Detroit dominated games one, three, most of four and all of game five of the Western Conference Finals. They made the Ducks look like ducklings without their mother. But because of Jean-Sebastien Giguere, Anaheim was leading the series three games to two.

This article won't go into many details about the offense, defense or goaltending. It will simply recall some memorable plays that other articles might not care about to mention.

Best check

Game 5 in the third period Joe Motzko hit Kyle Quincey into the Anaheim bench. Quincey grinded along the boards and stopped in the Red Wings bench. The fans in Joe Louis gasped in astonishment at Quincey's hidden talent: not pulling his groin while getting laid out.

Best goal

This is the goal that swung the momentum to Anaheim from Detroit. Scott Niedermayer's power play goal with 47.3 seconds remaining in regulation deflected off Nicklas Lidstrom's stick and fluttered over Dominik Hasek. A frustrated Johan Franzen threw his stick against the boards. It was his failed clearing attempt moments before that kept Anaheim in the offensive zone. Until that point, Detroit was outplaying Anaheim and they were looking to go up 3-2 in the series. Niedermayer has scored some key goals in the playoffs, such as the double overtime goal that eliminated Vancouver and the overtime goal in game two against Detroit. He is a clutch performer.

Best giveaway/ takeaway

Andy McDonald won't get the assist but he distracted Andreas Lilja long enough to make him whiff a pass. Teemu Selanne, who had just come from behind the next trying to steal it from Lilja ends up with the puck and a one-on-one mini breakaway on Hasek. If there is any player you don't want to meet on a breakaway, it is Teemu Selanne. With 540 career NHL goals he is the Ducks' top sniper and all time leading scorer (He has 309 goals. Paul Kariya has 300). Selanne deked forehand and Hasek did his patented flop on the ice. Selanne's backhand goes top shelf and hits the water bottle for dramatic effect. Game over.

Sibling rivalry

The Niedermayer brothers will be trying to get Rob's 1^st and Scott's 4^th Stanley Cup ring. But the brothers I am talking about now are the Miller brothers. Who thought Drew Miller would make it to the Finals before older brother Ryan? Drew was playing for Portland in the AHL but came up to play 2 minutes in game 5 against the Minnesota Wild. He was celebrating with Anaheim in a suit after they won game six against Detroit. If Drew can get a shift or two in the Finals, he will have his name on the Cup even though he did not play a single NHL regular season game.

Perseverance and dedication

This award should go to Giguere. His son was recently born with a deformed right eye. It caused him to miss the last 3 regular season and first 3 playoff games. He deserves a lot of credit and should Anaheim win the Stanley Cup, he should be named playoff MVP for the second time.

Baseball

Not only did Anaheim beat Detroit in hockey, the LA Angels of Anaheim beat the Detroit Tigers in baseball. I was at the game actually. When it was clear that the Angels were going to win this, about 10,000 fans left to go watch the hockey game. What they missed was the Tigers loading the bases in the bottom of the 9^th with no outs only to have Granderson strike out, Sheffield flied out to short center (infield warning track) and Carlos Guillen ends the game when Orlando Cabrera made a leaping catch on Guillen's soft line drive to left center.