Western Conference     St.Louis Dallas Colorado Detroit Los Angeles Phoenix Edmonton San Jose

Eastern Conference Philadelphia Washington Toronto New Jersey Florida Ottawa Pittsburgh Buffalo

Each conference's top seed (1) plays against the bottom seed (8) and so forth, in a best-of-seven series.

(Before I continue, let me introduce you to the Bobo Hoho Holistic Scheme for Analyzing Sporting Events. The critical factor in this analysis is that no use of supposedly relevant statistics, such as season records, makes any bearing on the outcome; nevertheless it has proven to be 100% accurate. For example, the Bobo Hoho Holistic Figure Skating Analysis Mechanism divides the number of seconds of performance in which the undergarments are fully exposed by the length of the dance for an Exposure Average. This number is then multiplied by 10 to scale it to the judges. Then 0.1 is subtracted for every 2000 miles between the dancer's hometown and the judge's capital city, although this is nullified in the rare chance that the music chosen comes from the judge's home country. In addition, if the music is from a Hollywood movie soundtrack, the skater pays a 0.5 point penalty, unless it is a Disney movie, in which case the skater will make disastrous mistakes which cost her no less than 2 full points, ending her chances anyway. Which is why using "The Lion King" is a mistake whereas using "Theme from Potemkin" can be worth a few points, particularly with the Russian judge.)

THE EASTERN CONFERENCE

PHILADELPHIA v. BUFFALO

Without further ado, lets look at Philadelphia versus last year's Eastern champions, Buffalo. The quality of anagrams of Flyer's names is pretty good. Mark "Chic Remark" Recchi, John "IRA Cell" LeClair (referring to his violent hatred of British occupation in Ulster), and Eric Lindros, whose "Clod is in Err" surely refers to his criticism of Flyers' doctors. The Buffalo goalie, however, is the "Hike Ski Nomad", who cryptically told PCM: "Hi Kim, on a Desk." The anagram potential of Philadelphia's scorers will be neutralized by Hasek's verbal versatility; his name successfully generated 3135 anagrams (though few made any sense).

The kicker in this match-up will not be the anagrams, which are well-met, but the simple fact that Satan plays for Buffalo. The games are on TV. Evil always wins the first round on TV, because it heightens the drama. Hence Buffalo must win the first round.

The scoop: Buffalo upsets in 6.

WASHINGTON v. PITTSBURGH

Pittsburgh's goalie is auspiciously named Tugnutt and the team is led by supersonic pilot Chuck Jagr, plus his servant, Igor Kovalev. Washington boasts pass genius Adam Oates, [potentially crippled] speed skater Peter Bondra, master goaltender Olaf Kolzig, and a host of pretty good scorers like Joe "Guitar" Murphy, Terry "Less Than" Yake, and of course Chris Simon, whose last name means "Checks Like Mad Bison" to his native tribesmen.

Among other things, Pittsburgh is home to some of the most neo-brutal architecture in American history. Despite its three grand rivers, the city looks like a dump. Hoho predictions expect the psychologically damaging effects of this atmosphere will set in during game one, when Pittsburgh players witness Washington's architectural grandeur and fall into shame and depression, if not outright suicide. Scrambling helplessly on the ice, Pittsburgh will reach such depths of misery that passing the puck will be an indomitable chore. Their yellow uniforms will be ochre to these morose stalwarts, and the ice black, as they desperately struggle to keep from bashing their own heads in with their sharpened skates. This negative attitude will keep Pittsburgh from winning any games.

The skinny: Washington in 4.

TORONTO v. OTTAWA

Toronto, home to Steve "Switchyard" Sullivan, Tie "Chromie" Domi, and goalie Curtis Joseph, will easily overcome Ottawa. Despite the postmodern feminist power found in Ottawa's Marian Hossa, it all comes down to one simple thing. Ottawa is in Frenchie Quebec, and Toronto is in Limey Ontario, and the French haven't won anything since Napoleon Bonaparte got routed at Waterloo.

ALERT! Revision: PCM reader/cartographer Kelly Schubert has announced that Ottawa is actually in Ontario as well—making it just as Limey as Toronto. This ingenious surprise move by the Canadian capitol makes the victor much less predictable; it also greatly INCREASES the chance of a provincial invasion and occupation by the Quebecois! We urge the fine citizens of Ontario to be on their guard and carry handguns at all times, as do we U.S. folk!

To determine the winner of the series we must take into account factors such as the moon's gravitational pull, water viscosity in the Saint Lawrence Seaway, separatist activity in Alberta and Quebec provinces, GATT, and the US' embargo with Cuba. According to our factor-taking-into-account computer, Toronto suffers for being mere Maple Leafs, essentially useless outside of syrup production, but Ottawa's Senators are, in fact, slaves to the syrup industry just as Washington's Senators are slaves to the insurance, oil, auto, medical, and crack industries. Hence, Toronto will always subjugate Ottawa, and our pick remains the same.

The juice: Toronto in 4.

NEW JERSEY v. FLORIDA

Florida, whose home ice can only be described as "runny", has a prayer, thanks to the "Russian Rocket," Igor Bure. But New Jersey of course is not without ethnicity, featuring prominent rookies Raffi "The Polish Piranha" Rafalski and Scott "Speedy Gonzalez" Gomez. New Jersey also has Jason "Score? You" Arnott and Scott "Niedermeyer" Niedermeyer.

All of Florida's players were recruited from condos in Daytona Beach and suffer osteoporosis and arthritis, literally crippling their potential. Meanwhile, a generation of birth defects from New Jersey's toxic wasteland is a wildcard--some players suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous stupidity, whereas others take their strength from the very ooze from which they crawled, such as Bobby "Toxic Avenger" Holik.

It comes down simply to this: after losing the game, Florida's players can relax with some warm milk on the beaches of Miami. They want to get back there as soon as possible. But there is nowhere to relax in New Jersey. While the Panthers will try to throw their away games, the Devils will want to prolong the Florida ice time as much as possible, to prevent themselves from having to return to their miserable filthy lives in the foul-smelling disgusting industrial cesspit that commands the New York suburbs of northern New Jersey. To live in such an environment could only produce insanity, depravity, sterility. The Devils will toy with the Panthers until the referees complain, merely to avoid stepping back on the streets of East Rutherford. After both teams try to force their opponents to win, New Jersey will give up and win at home ice in game 7. Both teams will go home more or less as happy as their chemically-addled brains can be. Expect a lot of overtime games.

The word: Devils in 7 or possibly more.

THE WESTERN CONFERENCE

ST. LOUIS v. SAN JOSE

It's a simple matter of multi-tiered hagiographical analysis. St. Louis, also known as King Louis IX of France, established the Sorbonne in 1252, as well as three prominent monasteries. He led two fairly unsuccessful crusades: the Sixth, in which he was captured, and the Seventh, during which he died of dysentery. He was canonized 27 years later by Boniface VIII.

San Jose, aka Joey de la Vaca, was an auto mechanic in Sheboygan who found a brown oil stain after accidentally spilling a used oil filter. The stain was in the shape of Saint Artemius, who was a prominent healer of testicles to 7th-century Byzantines after having been crushed under a giant rock in Egypt. San Jose was canonized by Pope Leo X, known for his lavish 15th century wild sex orgies. This canonization was then reinstated during the Vatican reign of Pius XII, remembered for feline narcissism and his concessions to Fascists during World War II, and who has recently been nominated for canonization as well.

But San Jose is a suburb of San Francisco, and everyone knows the story of Saint Francis, who was a drunken social gadfly who later turned to a life of celibacy and boredom and founded an order of Friars. He's basically a top dog among saints, with undeniable power to influence the outcome of a hockey game.

Taken with the knowledge of Igor Demitra's recent injury, and the beatific rise of Owen Nolan to stardom, it all adds up to one thing: Saint Louis will win three of the first five and then lose during unlucky six and seven, for a spectacular upset that will result in a "Mass" of people getting fired (get it?).

The in: San Jose upsets in 7.

DALLAS v. EDMONTON

Dallas, though hampered by the loss of J.R. Ewing, looks pretty strong after winning last year's Stanley Cup and a spattering of Emmys. Edmonton, which boasts the largest shopping mall in the world, has a fair amount of potential thanks to an up-and-coming rookie by the name of Wayne Gretzky (source: The Hockey News, March 1979). This is a tough one to call, because both teams are from the last places on Earth that anyone with four functional cranial lobes would ever want to visit. One is a freezing ice hell where the streets are paved with frozen crude oil, and the other is a burning fire hell where the streets are paved with slick crude oil. But Dallas is full of--ulch--Texans, and that's enough for Edmonton to clinch it against all statistical odds. Because Bobo Hoho hates everything that ever came out of Texas, with the exception of the TI-88 computer, the chalupa, and the movie Dazed and Confused. If you'll kindly forget last year, you'll be as certain as Bobo that a team from as far south as Dallas has no business getting anywhere near the Stanley @%&*@! Cup.

Hard copy: Edmonton upsets in 7, assisted in the last four games by the floating spirit of a dead hockey-playing samurai. Sorry I didn't mention that before.

COLORADO v. PHOENIX

In a comparison of logos, we witness a town of hockey-playing Coyotes squaring off against Bigfoot (or his footprint anyway, Colorado's secondary logo). Now, Bigfoot has the brawn, but coyotes play as a team, leaping forth in unpredictable order to rip out the jugular of their opponent, in a frenzy of the spurting blood and the biting. The question here is, can the Coyotes see the neck of something as hairy as Mr. Abominable? Will this be a quick kill, or a long and protracted battle?

The answer is in the weather. Because Coyotes wouldn't survive an Avalanche, were they so foolish as to travel into the Rockies to begin with. Coyotes have no place in the snow. But according to "The Journal of Unexplained Sightings," (May 1994), Bigfoot can survive in the desert conditions habitable by coyotes.

The Coyotes will bite at the Abominable Snowman but they just won't be able to find that neck through all the hair. And in the end, that's all that really matters.

Current affair: Avs in 5. To paraphrase Leonard Nimoy, "yo mama so hairy, Bigfoot take pictures of her!"

DETROIT v. LOS ANGELES

Detroit still has a fairly solid line of Russians, including Igor Larionov, Igor Federov, Igor Kozlov, Igor Bivor, and Igor Tutakherpantsov; they're also blessed by Brendan "Bananarama" Shanahan. Los Angeles' best player is Luc "Skywalker" Robitaille, but he is not Russian, and this presents serious problems in the era of the Warsaw Pact's demise. The answer can be found in a quick examination of a large-scale Central Asian economy.

Political and economic reforms carried out by Kazakhstan since its independence are aimed at transition of the country's social-economic system to market conditions and principles as well as to overcome the economic crisis occurred due to collapse of the centralised plan-economic system of the former Soviet Union. The range of drastic measures on privatisation and restructuring the state property, increasing the level of liberalisation of the economy, decreasing the inflation rate, decreasing, reduction and regulation of the state budget have been elaborated and implemented.

However, notwithstanding the steps undertaken, the economic situation in the country is still remaining tense and difficult. The following data characterise the GDP which is regarded as the most important macroeconomic indicator (1995 figures are taken as a basis for estimating the current GDP)

Source: National Hockey League Agency on Statistics of the Republic of Kazakhstan