Devils Announcers at the Olympics

Before I begin, I want to note that this may be an incomplete list, since I don't even have a complete list of Devils announcers.

With this Summer Olympics starting this weekend, I decided to take a look and see which past and present Devils broadcasters have worked at the Olympics. I found a few more than I had expected. It wouldn't surprise me if there was an omission from this list.

• Steve Cangialosi - Recently finished his first season as the primary TV voice of the Devils, and his 6th overall with the club, Cangialosi is calling his second Olympic games for NBC, having worked soccer (calling matches from New York) at the 2008 (Beijing) and 2012 (London) games. He will also be calling the Modern Pentathlon for the London games.
• Mike 'Doc' Emrick - Doc was the voice of the Devils for 21 of their 30 (or 29) seasons, and Doc's been the voice of Olympic hockey for 3 networks, calling Ice Hockey at the 1992 (Albertville), 1994 (Lillehammer), and 1998 (Nagano) games for CBS, the 1998 games also for TNT, the 2006 (Turino) and 2010 (Vancouver) games for NBC. Doc is calling his second Summer Olympics for NBC, reprising a role in 2012 (London) that he had in 2004 (Athens) calling Water Polo.
• John Davidson - Records are incomplete, but based on one or two very old Devils broadcasts seen on MSG Vault, J.D. called at least a partial schedule of Devils games for MSG back in the team's early days, along side Doc Emrick. J.D. is one of the best hockey TV analysts, and was the in the top spot in 1992 (Albertville), 1994 (Lillehammer), 1998 (Nagano) for CBS, 2002 (Salt Lake City), 2006 (Turino), and 2010 (Vancouver) for NBC.
• Gary Thorne - Gary Thorne was the TV voice of the Devils on SportsChannel from 1987 until 1993 and was also part of SportsChannel America's coverage of the NHL from 1988-1992 before joining ESPN as their lead NHL announcer in 1992. Thorne called Ice Hockey at the 2002 (Salt Lake City) games for NBC and called Speed Skating at the 1998 (Nagano) Winter Olympics for CBS and Rowing at the 2000 (Sydney) Summer Olympics for NBC.
• Peter McNab - Peter McNab was a Devils TV analyst for 8 seasons starting in 1987-88 on SportsChannel before moving on to the Colorado Avalanche. McNab covered Ice Hockey for TNT in 1998 (Nagano), 2002 (Salt Lake City) for TSN (as a studio analyst), and 2006 (Torino) for NBC.

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New coaches

I think I said in a prior blog post that I wasn't at all sad to see Larry Robinson and Adam Oates go. I thought it was time for Robinson to retire (again) from active coaching and Oates just sucked (good for Washington to get him now).

And today, we know who's replacing them. Scott Stevens (to use a Mets analogy, Stevens is the Mike Piazza to Martin Brodeur's Tom Seaver; the second most important figure in Devils history after the franchise goalie) and some other guy.

Stevens will run the Devils defense from behind the bench. This can only be good for the young kids like Adam Larsson and some of the prospects. But I think it's going to be good all around. Stevens was the franchise Captain for a reason, and if the league doesn't disband first, I really believe there will be another Stanley Cup with Stevens in this role.

Someone named Matt Shaw is the other new coach, running the power play from up above. Shaw comes from San Jose where the Sharks under his power play coaching were one of the best in the league. Heck, anyone has to be an improvement over the god-awful Adam Oates. Shaw also spent a year working for Jacques Lemaire in Minnesota, which can only be a good thing, and also worked for the Wild as a video coordinator. I like the idea of the power play coach a) having a video background, and b) working from above (which I read in a few official-looking tweets), rather than being behind the bench. You get a much better view of the game from up above (trust me, that's kind of where my seats are, though not at high as the press box).

Here is the story on the Devils' website.


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NHL Realignment Possibilities

Editor's Note: I wrote this back on my personal blog back in January in response to the NHL's best efforts to chalk out realignment in the league after Atlanta moved to Winnipeg and doesn't belong in the Southeast Division.

The NHLPA shot down the league's proposal for a 4 "conference" alignment stemming from the Atlanta franchise's move to Winnipeg for the 2011-2012 season. I didn't like that alignment either, and the NHLPA gave some very good reasons.

I had originally came up with a 5 division alignment. Now I'm going to throw out all possibilities.

Simple Realignment
Atlanta moved to Winnipeg, but Winnipeg has remained in the Southeast Division. Move Winnipeg to the Northwest Division to be with Minnesota (435 miles away), Edmonton (817 miles), and Calgary (825 miles). Colorado can then move to the Pacific Division, and Dallas to the Central Division, and Nashville to the Southeast Division. That's easier than it sounds.


5 Division Alignment
6 teams in each division. It's a little different from my original plan.

Smythe (West)	Norris (Central)	Campbell (Southeast)	Patrick (Atlantic)	Adams (North)
Los Angeles	Chicago	Dallas	Washington	Columbus
Anaheim	Detroit	Nashville	Philadelphia	Toronto
Phoenix	Minnesota	St. Louis	New Jersey	Ottawa
San Jose	Winnipeg	Florida	NY Rangers	Montreal
Colorado	Edmonton	Tampa Bay	NY Islanders	Buffalo
Vancouver	Calgary	Carolina	Boston	Pittsburgh

Schedule
Play 3 home-and-home series with each team in your division (30 games). Play 1 home-and-home series with each other team (48 games). Play 1 additional game against 1 team from each other conference. Do it based on prior season's standings, so the five 4th place teams each play one another one additional time. Let a formula and rotation dictate which teams host which other teams. Similar to the NFL's schedule formula. For example, let's say that the table above is the standings. Colorado would play an extra game against Edmonton, Tampa Bay, NY Islanders, and Buffalo; In addition to Colorado, Edmonton would also play Tampa Bay, NY Islanders, and Buffalo. And so on. That's a total of 82 games.

Playoffs
Since there's 5 divisions, there is no longer the concept of 2 Conferences (you can't split 5 divisions in half). So have a super-playoff of 16 teams, with 5 division winners being ranked among themselves 1-5 and 11 wild cards being ranked 6-16 (similar to each Conference's playoffs with 3 division winners and 5 wild cards).


Super-Conferences
Hear me out. Forget divisions. Just have 2 conferences of 15 teams each or 3 conferences of 10 teams each. Now, there are some possibilities here. You can go East/West. You can go North/Mid-America/South. You can go random/mixed and call it Wales/Campbell.

East/West

East		West
Montreal	Toronto	Anaheim	Los Angeles
Ottawa	Boston	San Jose	Vancouver
NY Islanders	NY Rangers	Phoenix	Colorado
New Jersey	Philadelphia	Calgary	Edmonton
Washington	Carolina	Winnipeg	Minnesota
Florida	Tampa Bay	Chicago	Detroit
Buffalo	Pittsburgh	St. Louis	Nashville
Columbus		Dallas

Schedule
2 home-and-home series with each team in your conference (56 games). 1 home-and-home series with each team in the other conference (30 games). And either expand the season by 4 games (and probably 1 week in the calendar), or cut 4 non-conference games off the schedule.

Playoffs
Top 8 teams in each conference in the playoffs. From there, it's the same as it is today.


North/Mid-America/South

North	Mid-America	South
Montreal	Boston	Florida
Ottawa	NY Islanders	Tampa Bay
Toronto	NY Rangers	Nashville
Buffalo	New Jersey	Dallas
Detroit	Philadelphia	Phoenix
Minnesota	Washington	Los Angeles
Winnipeg	Chicago	Anaheim
Calgary	Columbus	Colorado
Edmonton	Pittsburgh	St. Louis
Vancouver	San Jose	Carolina

Schedule
3 home-and-home series within your conference (54 games). 1 home-and-home series outside your conference (20 games). 8 additional non-conference games to be split 2 home and 2 road in each of the other 2 divisions. 82 games total.

Playoffs
3 Conference winners and 13 wild card teams.



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