NASHVILLE – The NHL must fee an investigation to find out if Cale Makar is human.
My principle? He’s a hockey god, imbued with greatness instantly by the hand of Bobby Orr, placed on this earth to toy with muggles just like the Nashville Predators.
“He might be the best player in the league right now. The way he dominates from the back end is amazing,” teammate Nathan MacKinnon mentioned Monday, after Makar led the Avs to a 5-3 victory over Nashville and a four-game sweep of their opening-round playoff collection. “This playoffs, he’s taken another step.”
In 4 video games in opposition to the poor, pathetic pussycats from Nashvegas, Makar produced 10 factors. In the complete historical past of the NHL, no defenseman, from Orr to Paul Coffey, has ever began the postseason on a warmer four-game tear.
When the Predators threw every thing and the kitchen sink at Makar, none of it stopped him from being probably the most dominant participant on the ice. The low-rent, low-brow followers of Nashvegas pelted the 23-year-old Avalanche star with one thing else within the closing minutes of the third interval of Sport 4.
“People were throwing Skittles at me during play,” Makar mentioned. “I’m not too sure why.”
Skittles? Was sweet speculated to be an providing to this younger hockey god?
“It was just like in the last minute of the game. A couple Skittles were hitting me. They don’t have Smarties in the States, I don’t think,” mentioned Makar, a local of Calgary. “So it must have been Skittles.”
There are dangerous songs about beer and pick-up vans written in Music Metropolis day by day of the week that drone on longer than the Predators led on this playoff collection. Whereas being swept away in 4 video games, Nashville was forward on the scoreboard for a grand complete of 4 minutes, 57 seconds.
“Any time you get a chance to end a team’s season, you take it and run,” mentioned Makar, who crushed a shot from the blue line for a objective within the second interval and assisted on two different Colorado scores.
Filip Forsberg staked the Preds to a short 3-2 lead early within the third interval. Then Avalanche captain Gabe Landeskog informed his teammates on the bench it was time to get going and depart Nashvegas crying in its fried okra.
“Adversity is never a bad thing if you overcome it,” mentioned Colorado coach Jared Bednar, who famous his crew surrendered two targets as a direct results of gradual, poor adjustments of personnel off the bench.
In the course of the course of the ultimate 16 minutes of Nashville’s season, the Avs scored thrice, together with the game-winner by Valeri Nichushkin, arrange by a nifty piece of skating alongside the boards and a good niftier cross by Makar.
OK, let’s not get carried away. The Predators have been nothing greater than visitors cones on the lengthy and winding street to the Stanley Cup. As Calgary coach Darryl Sutter warned means again on March 15, no matter poor souls confronted the inevitable activity of assembly the Avs within the first spherical have been wanting squarely at fast elimination that will show to be “a waste of eight days.”
There are a dozen victories to go earlier than Colorado can declare its first championship since 2001, when Makar was nonetheless sporting diapers. Thus far sterner checks, to not point out a lot increased nervousness, await this crew.
However Makar has taken huge first steps towards the Conn Smythe as probably the most invaluable participant on a Cup-worthy squad. He’s Bobby Makar, with greater than slightly Orr magic in his stick. If he doesn’t win the Norris Trophy this season as the most effective defenseman within the league, we should always all demand a recount.
“The wins are what matters. And that’s all we care about,” mentioned Makar, insisting he hasn’t cleared even an inch in his thoughts, a lot much less house on his hearth mantle, for a spot to place a person award.
All of us hail Cale.
However this dude wants a nickname extra befitting his otherworldly hockey powers.
He’s Cale McKizzy fo shizzy.