There is playoff hockey for Atlanta.
Well, kind of.
The Stanley Cup playoff between the Winnipeg Jets and the Nashville Predators, which begins tonight, is as close to the NHL as the city has come since the Thrashers packed up and moved away in 2011. There may be little solace in the seven-season absence of the sport in Atlanta but diehard fans might find some placation in the second-round series.
The Jets, you know the old Thrashers, still have several players who skated here in the final season, including Dustin Byfuglien, Tobias Enstrom, Bryan Little and Blake Wheeler. Nashville is just several hours drive from Atlanta, the backyard by NHL standards. Fox Sports South will televise a postgame show locally after each game. Trivia answer Chris Mason serves as the color analyst on Predators broadcasts for Fox Sports Tennessee during the season and will appear on the postgame show to be aired in Atlanta. The trivia question: Who was the goaltender for the last Thrashers game? Mason made 15 saves in a 5-2 loss to the Penguins at Philips Arena on April 10, 2011, the final game in the 12-season history of the franchise.
Mason, who played just the final season for the Thrashers, played one year with the Jets after the move. He declined a two-year deal to remain to sign with the Predators the following season. His last season in the NHL would be memorable for two reasons. The start of the 2012-13 season was delayed by a lockout. During his second stint with the Predators, he played his first six seasons with the franchise, he was part on an in-game television segment. During the third period, the backup goalie would put on headsets and talk to the broadcast booth. The segment was well received and Mason was so good that he had a standing offer to return once his playing days were over.
After three years in Europe, two in Italy and one in Germany, Mason retired. His family settled in Nashville and he worked radio broadcasts for the Predators last year. There was an opportunity to be an developmental goalie coach for another NHL franchise but there was something about broadcasting.
“I was over the moon,” Mason said when he was offered the television color analyst position this season working play-by-play man Willy Daunic.
Consider Mason as the Darren Eliot of Nashville broadcasts. Eliot the former NHL goaltender was the color analyst for the Thrashers.
“The funny thing was when you are a player, you know there is other stuff going on with the production but you don’t know much about it,” Mason said. “It was quite an eye-opener for me to be on the other side. I just loved the passion that people have to do a broadcast. There are so many different layers to it that as I player I had no idea. It helped me to be part of a team again. You are working together to try to put on the best show.
“Nothing is ever going to replace playing the game you played your entire life and loved but I feel this is my calling after the game. I couldn’t have been happier with how this year went.”
As for those Thrashers - sorry Jets - they recently won the first playoff game in franchise history. The Thrashers made the playoffs just one, getting swept by the Rangers in 2006-07. After the move, the Jets made the playoffs just one before this season, getting swept by the Ducks in 2014-15.
However, this season the Jets finished second in the Central Division with 114 points, three behind the Predators. They eliminated the Wild in the first round, 4-1, with a series-opening victory on April 11 as the first playoff win. The Predators advance by eliminating the Avalanche.
“It was crazy,” Mason said of his reflections of the organization’s move to Winnipeg after it was sold by the Atlanta Spirit ownership group. “I tried to connect with the fans. The fans, they have are so passionate. They love the Thrashers. They love the game. That was the thing that I really felt bad about. That team got taken away from the fans who loved them. I don’t know who is to blame for that. … It was a tough situation all around.”
Game 1 of the seven-game series airs on the NBC Sports Network tonight. Game 2 in Sunday. The series moves to Winnipeg for Games 3 and 4 Tuesday and Thursday.
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