Star earns his stripes

NHL playoff understudy Turco ready for the marquee

You've undoubtedly heard, and are soon to be reminded (and reminded, again and again) that Stars goalie Marty Turco has never played in an NHL postseason game. "I like it when you tell me that," Turco is wont to say.

He's not kidding. Turco is one of those goalies who has never met a challenge he didn't rise to. He's 27 and made of some serious mettle, the same steely stuff that drove him to an NCAA-record 127 wins and four Frozen Four appearances while at the University of Michigan in the 1990s.

Think his confidence was worn off after two years of backing up the irascible Eddie Belfour in Dallas? By now you know that this season, Turco's first as a starter, he set an all-time NHL standard with a 1.72 goals against average. That's not a misprint. That mark is the equivalent of Bob Gibson's 1.12 ERA, and Turco made history in a style that had Ted Williams cheering in his freezer.

Turco could have sat out the last game of the season and gone into the record books, having eclipsed Tony Esposito's single-season GAA record of 1.77. Instead, like the Splendid Splinter, who went 6-for-8 on the final day of the 1941 season to finish at .406, Turco clapped on his mask, shut out the Predators 1-0 and skated into history.

No one quite saw this record-setting performance coming, and sure, you need a team as defensively committed as the Stars (not to mention an offensively anemic NHL) to get you anywhere close to this record, but I'm still going to say I told you so. It was back in October that we forecasted, among other categories, Turco as our NHL Breakout Player of the Year. So let me predict again.

Turco's final-game shutout secured the Stars' place atop the Western Conference standings and set up a showdown with the eighth-seeded Oilers. This has been the NHL's best playoff rivalry north and west of Colorado-Detroit. It's the sixth meeting between these two teams in seven years ("Here we go again," says Stars defenseman Derian Hatcher) and the Oilers have enough size up front -- and enough speed all over the ice -- to turn this into a long series, punish the Stars and give Turco the high-pressure test of his life. If you don't watch Game 3 Sunday night in Edmonton, you could be missing the most entertaining game of the NHL's first round.

My prediction? The Stars aren't going to lose this series, or any other this year, because of goaltending. Oh, Dallas may not be able to get past the star-laden Avalanche or Red Wings and make it to the finals, but not because Turco couldn't hack it. He's ready for this, just as he was ready when he denied a buzzing Boston College team in the NCAA championship game in 1998.

Turco will certainly flop and flail along the way (he's a Dominik Hasek-type). He'll surely whiz a few dangerous passes through Dallas' defensive zone (the guy stickhandles with impunity). He may even get a little rattled when Ryan Smyth and Mike York and Georges Laraque are crashing into him. But in the end Turco will compose himself. And he'll keep the puck out of the nets. Playoff virgin? No matter. The Stars are in good hands.

Other playoff thoughts ...

The Maple Leafs-Flyers series is going to be about which team can handle the most pain. This should be the most physically intense matchup of the first round -- Canucks-Blues comes next, and you better believe the league office is nervous that Vancouver's rowdy cast will do ugly things. ... Chris Pronger needs to quickly reassert himself in his role as St. Louis captain after missing all but five games this year. The Blues could get as far as the conference finals, but only if Pronger takes over a few games. ... If Islanders get any kind of goaltending from Garth Snow, and if Alexei Yashin does in fact show up at the Corel Centre, New York has a shot against the Senators. ... Devils over the Bruins in five. If Boston manages to make it a close series, this will go down as the beginning of Joe Thornton's legacy. ... New Jersey coach Pat Burns has a chance to knock out a pair of former employers if the Devils advance and draw the Maple Leafs in Round 2. ... This is a big postseason for Red Wings goalie Curtis Joseph: After all these years he's overrated by some, underrated by others and needs a trip to finals to raise his career into the elite ether.

Sports Illustrated senior writer Kostya Kennedy takes sides each week at SI.com.

 

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