NHL / Richard Douglas / 12 June 2009 / Leave a comment

Hold on to your skates, hockey fans! This one's going to be close, says Richard Douglas.

So it comes down this.

After 105 games over nine gruelling, bruising months, the pursuit of the Stanley Cup ends on Friday. They may be tied at 3-3 in games but the Detroit Red Wings ([1.56]) are still the favourites to retain their crown against the Pittsburgh Penguins ([2.72]). The odds are justifiable purely on the basis of the venue. All six games in Final series have gone to the home team and the decider is being played at the Joe Louis Arena in 'Motown'.

Only once in the 42 years of the modern NHL has a Stanley Cup series gone with the hosts for the first six games and gone with the visitors for the last. That came in back in 1971 when the Montreal Canadiens won on the road.

Detroit have a record of 11 wins and one defeat at home in the play-offs; that includes three victories against Pittsburgh with an aggregate score of 11-2. The last of those defeats was a 5-0 spanking on Saturday when, as the cliché goes, the Penguins were lucky to get nil!

Sidney Crosby, Pittsburgh's outstanding offensive player, has been non-existent in the games at Detroit so far. Henrik Zetterburg has gone man-on-man and kept him scoreless. The Swede's bodychecking and discipline has typified his relentless, robust team.

On the other hand Crosby's partner, Evgeni Malkin has refused to be intimidated and therefore been more effective. It has helped the Penguins hang on to Detroit's coat-tails but both must fire this time around.

This term, Crosby and Malkin have taken the third and fourth places in the all-time points-per-game list in the Play-offs. There is an element of 'flat-track bully' about that stat but, at the same time, these players are match-winners even against the Red Wings' famed defence.

Pittsburgh are certainly up against it, but then they have spent pretty much their entire season that way. In February they seemed entirely adrift of the play-off places but a change of coach elicited a long, unbeaten rally. In the Second Round of the post-season, they trailed Washington 2-0 before coming back to win. They have done the same thing in this series too.

In fact, you could flip the argument around and suggest that Pittsburgh have been boiling in the pressure-cooker for four months and it is Detroit who are in an environment they have not really experienced before. Their decade of dominance has not been tested to this extent. But then 2008-09 has been the year of the close-run thing. Six of the 15 post-season series have been decided in the seventh game, another four have needed six rubbers.

It is only the eighth time since the great NHL expansion of 1967 that the Stanley Cup has gone to the wire like this and the 15th in the entire history of the competition. Tellingly, the record in those matches is 12 home wins and just two away. In play-off history, 80 of the 128 Game Sevens have gone to the hosts. Yet again the stats point to Detroit.

Their 5-0 win in Game Five is the only time the two sides have been separated by more than two goals in the Final series. That makes Detroit -1.5 points very interesting at [2.54].

But if the Red Wings are leading at the end of the first period then consider lumping on. They have won all seven play-off games in 2009 when they have been in that position. They have also won 10 of 11 when scoring first.

And if you are impressed by those stats then consider this - Pittsburgh are 10-0 in the play-offs when leading at the end of the second quarter while Detroit are 12-0. If you are prepared to put your faith in the numbers then lay the living daylights out of a second-half comeback.

In such close, difficult circumstances, you have to consider the keepers of course. So often they are the match-winners. Detroit's Chris Osgood and Marc Andre Fleury of Pittsburgh have been pretty much exemplary this term. However those mistakes that have been made were at the hands of the latter.

That, if anything, is a microcosm of the pre-match feeling. Detroit have the edge in experience and power plus they have the significant component in this year's final series - home advantage.

Pittsburgh will need the biggest of games from their big players - something they have not been able to rely on so far. That is why you sense Detroit will find enough chinks in their armour to squeeze out the all-important win.

But it is going to be very, very tight.