Mike Chen’s Hockey Blog: Wavering on OT

Mike Chen’s Hockey Blog: Wavering on OT:

Apparently, the tide is turning on keeping overtime the way it is. I see the logic of going to 4-on-4 — I mean, you keep things in the hands of the teams while freeing up the ice for more plays and more scoring chances which means less nights of crazy game times. And it’s not like players are going all out during their sixth period of hockey; hell, some guys can barely skate at that time. As a West Coaster, I love East Coast insane overtime games because they finish up in the late evening and I can get to bed at a sane time. Going to Sharks home playoff games, there have been many times I specifically thought, “God, I hope this doesn’t go into triple overtime — I have to work tomorrow.” At the same time, though, I’ve never experienced the delirious exhiliration that comes with a home-team triple overtime win (or, thankfully, the sheer depths of hell that comes with a home-team triple overtime loss).

Frankly, I’ve come to think that moving to 4 on 4 starting with the 2nd overtime is a good idea, and Mike sums it up well. Game 4 was a great example — Laurie and I set a curfew as soon as we realized we were going to overtime, because the alarm goes off at 6AM no matter what. I don’t want to go so far as to say we were happy that Detroit won it rather than see the Sharks win in the 2nd or 3rd overtime — but there is some aspect of that.

Now, I love watching overtime games, but they do become more of a test of endurance (for fans as well) than a game of skill. I remember even staying up until some ungodly hour during a trip to Victoria when a Memorial Cup game went five overtimes. Laurie, being the rational one, went to sleep and told me to tell her who won in the morning.

If there’s an argument for NOT doing this, it’s that these long overtime games impact a team’s performance down the road; they tire a team out, suck life out of legs, build up the lactic acid. It’s a part of the fabric that makes the NHL playoff such a touch thing to get through alive for a team. But, honestly, the more I think about it, the more I think that this comes down to “to win the cup, we have to avoid these long overtimes” is not a good reason for having them (and honestly, I think that’s true. If you look at the playoffs, teams that play a lot of OT, and play multi-OT games, struggle to get deeper into the playoffs and win the cup).

Frankly, anything that shuts the door on shoot-outs I’m for, too. Even in the regular season. I’d much rather seem them play 10 minutes of 4-4 in the regular season, just because that’ll reduce the number of shoot-outs significantly. But that won’t happen.

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