BY: Eric Duhatschek

Just about everybody chattering away on the television this past weekend said pretty much the same thing about the 2010 NHL playoffs - it is wide open, anything can happen, never closer etc. etc.

Sounds good in theory, but when it comes right down to it, where are all these playoff dark horses hiding?

I’m sitting here, trying to find one scenario in which a lower-seeded team will be able to oust a higher-seed - and of course, the one that everybody in the prognostication game is going to focus on is Detroit over Phoenix. Why not? It’s a five seed over a four seed, so technically it becomes an upset if it happens, but given the Red Wings’ playoff history vis a vis the Coyotes and the way they've been playing lately, few have the gumption to pick Phoenix to win the series. I did - but only because of an object lesson I learned last year, when I had tentatively picked Anaheim to knock off San Jose in the opening round and then chickened out just before I hit the send button. I reviewed that item a few minutes and figure in hindsight, I must have confused a lot of readers - praising Anaheim, dissing San Jose’s chances and then ... what? The pick was Sharks in seven? So this time I’ll crawl out on that one Western Conference limb and see what happens.


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