from Ed Willes of the Vancouver Province,

The first round of the 2014 Stanley Cup tournament is now reaching its climactic final stages and everyone who cares about the game should be rejoicing over what they’ve seen.

In no particular order, there is the broad-sword fight between St. Louis and Chicago; a Pittsburgh-Columbus series which is wilder than Dennis Rodman; two street brawls between Colorado and Minnesota and Anaheim and Dallas; and a San Jose-Los Angeles series that doesn’t need referees so much as it needs UN peacekeepers.

Boston-Detroit and New York-Philly have served up their own storylines, but they haven’t quite measured up to what’s gone on around them. Picking the best series, in fact, is a little like the classic Ginger-Mary Ann debate, only this year it’s Ginger, Mary Ann, Elle Macpherson, Brooklyn Decker and a young Brigitte Bardot. Each series has offered up something a little different, but the overall effect has been stunning.

The first round traditionally delivers the most intense, dramatic and interesting hockey of the playoffs, but this year we’ve witnessed something different, something we haven’t seen for a long time.

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