About 24 hours after Mighty Ducks fans worked their way through their first "Bryz-ga-lov" chant as rookie goaltender Ilya Bryzgalov worked on his record-tying third consecutive playoff shutout against the Avalanche, fans at the Arrowhead Pond of Anaheim were hurling less positive adjectives at WWE bad boy Edge who was about to face fan-favorite Mick Foley in a hardcore wrestling match.

While the Pond's transformation from the Ducks' home ice to the site of WWE RAW was fairly quick, a couple hours before the show was to begin Edge and former WWE women's champion Trish Stratus still had their minds on the ice that sat a few layers underneath the ring they would soon be wrestling in.

"I've been following the playoffs real closely since I'm in a hockey pool back home," said Stratus, a native of Toronto, Canada. "I have to go with my Canadian teams, Edmonton and Ottawa. I would love Edmonton to win it since they really pulled it together before the playoffs, but I really think Ottawa is the team of today's NHL. They're a fast team and that's what today's NHL is all about, so I don't see anyone beating them."

Although Stratus is an old-school hockey fan who would have made Don Cherry proud last week when she popped her dislocated right shoulder back in and continued wrestling, she actually likes the new rules that have made the NHL a more offensive game. "It makes for exciting hockey," she said. "It's been awesome. Like that Ottawa and Buffalo game the other day where they combined for 13 goals. I think that's awesome hockey."

As Edge, a Toronto native as well, talked about how big the Stanley Cup playoffs were back home, WWE chairman Vince McMahon strutted by in a suit and teased him for speaking "Canadian," which brought a smile to his face as he tried to collect his thoughts. "It's harder to follow hockey down here [in the States]," said Edge. "Back in Canada we have channels devoted to it. We have the Hockey Channel; we have the Maple Leafs channel, which somehow still continues even though they didn't make the playoffs. We have the CBC, TSN, I mean it's ridiculous in a good way."

The only non-Canadian-born wrestler backstage who knew what was going on in the NHL was Matt Striker, a die-hard Rangers fan from Long Island who has played hockey since he was 11, but hung up his skates and resigned as a high school social studies teacher to become a WWE wrestler last year. Although Striker was impressed with the nearly four-hour shutout streak Bryzgalov was on, he still had a hard time looking at the Ducks cartoonish logo and considering them a real contender.

"I just have a hard time believing in the teams that weren't around when I was a kid," said Striker, 31. "That's my problem. For example, when Joe Thornton went from Boston to San Jose this year, I was like, they have a hockey team? At the same time when you look at their lineup they're one of the best teams. But it's never going to be like the Canadians, Bruins, Maple Leafs, Flyers or any of those old teams."

While Striker was waxing poetic about the good old days of the NHL, Edge walked back to say that Striker "knows nothing about hockey."

"Whatever," said Striker as Edge walked away. "He's a Maple Leafs fan. Edge hopes to one day have a mustache like Lanny McDonald and his favorite player was Ron Duguay because he thought Duguay was sexy when he would skate without his helmet."