All-Star Game and 'Miracle'

This weekend, the best players in the NHL will take a break from the stresses associated with regular season competition and travel to Minnesota for one of hockey's most uplifting experiences. No, not the premiere of the much-anticipated Disney film Miracle, but rather the 54th annual All-Star Game.

Though Miracle does figure to be a great film, capturing the extraordinary U.S. upset of the Soviet Union during the 1980 Olympic Games, this weekend's festivities in Minnesota will surely raise just as many goose bumps.

The collection of talent converging on the Excel Energy Center in St. Paul is mind-blowing. The deserving starting goalies are the New Jersey Devils' Martin Brodeur for the East and the Dallas Stars' Marty Turco for the West.

Usually, the coaches rotate new goalies in for each period to ensure everyone gets equal ice time (kind of like Little League). Each team carries three goalies - the West's netminder reserves are Nashville Predator Tomas Vokoun and the Minnesota Wild's own Dwayne Roloson. The East has Florida Panther Robert Luongo and Montreal Canadian Jose Theodore for its back-ups.

Other starters for the West, as voted in by the fans, include forwards Bill Guerin (86,657 votes), Stars teammate Mike Modano (86,119) and Todd Bertuzzi (104,361) from the Vancouver Canucks, and defensemen Rob Blake (104,809) from the Colorado Avalanche. Also on the West's roster is Nicklas Lidstrom (90,995) from the Detroit Red Wings.

Clearly, the biggest outrage here is that the Dallas Stars, a team struggling for position in the Pacific Division, boast three of the six starters (the only other teams that have three total representatives are Colorado, the Ottawa Senators and New Jersey) including the struggling and injury-prone Mike Modano, who, though claiming to be turning it around, had a grand total of nine goals and an embarrassing -16 +/- rating.

In the Eastern Conference, it seems Atlanta Thrashers fans really got out to vote with a whopping 145,380 votes (the most in the league) going to forward Ilya Kovalchuk. This extremely talented, Russian-born 20-year-old has had an outstanding first half of the season, tallying 26 goals and 31 assists, tying him for fourth in the league in total points.

Sharing the first line spotlight in Minnesota will be Tampa Bay Lightning star Martin St. Louis (79,707 votes) and Boston Bruin fan-favorite Joe Thornton (51,247), complete with a newly constructed cheekbone after the Bruins' brawl with Eric Lindros and the New York Rangers two weeks ago. At the blue line for the Eastern All-Stars are the Devils' Scotts Niedermayer (104,567) and Stevens (121,838).

Unlike baseball's newly established All-Star game rules that have real implications on the season, the NHL game continues to be completely superfluous. This can be attributed to the entertainment value associated with the high-speed, offensive action that has come to define past All-Star Weekends.

Last year, the West won 6-5 after prevailing 3-1 in an unprecedented shoot-out to decide the outcome. Atlanta Thrasher Dany Heatley had four of the East's five total goals. (In a somewhat related story, Heatley returned to the ice this week and scored his first goal of the season on Tuesday after missing the first half of the season recovering from the September car accident that tragically killed his friend and teammate, Dan Snyder). Last year's exciting contest is a great example of what tends to happen in a game featuring the most skilled ice-hockey players in the world.

That's not to say, however, that gimmicks are left completely out of the All-Star Weekend. Indeed, there is an "NHL Young Stars Game presented by Upper Deck," featuring the most promising youngsters in the league, and there is also a televised "Dodge/NHL SuperSkills Competition," in which players compete for various titles, including "Fastest Skater," "Hardest Shot," and "Best Goalie."

Perhaps the most exciting part of the All-Star Game for Tufts students is that they can actually watch it through our dorm's cable service, as ABC will cover the event live (All-Star Saturday, 8 p.m.; All-Star Game, Sunday 3 p.m.).