Who’s in first?

CEDAR PARK, Texas – Anyone my age surely remembers the old Abbott and Costello baseball comedic routine, “Who’s on first?” The answer … “I don’t know – third base!”   I was reminded of this when a friend who is aware the Texas Stars are a hockey team, but really doesn’t follow them, asked me how they were doing and “Who’s in first?” My answer was “They’re doing pretty good and I don’t know.”
Anyone who follows the American Hockey League and especially the Texas Stars easily understands why I said I don’t know. One only has to look at the West Division of the Western Conference to find out why. Perhaps the better answer to who’s in first would be to say, everybody (almost).
There are eight teams in the West and after the games of 1/22 seven of them are separated by a mere three points. Milwaukee and Houston are tied atop the division with 56 points, Peoria and San Antonio each have 55 points, Oklahoma City has 54 points and Texas and Chicago each have 53 points. It’s even closer when you take into consideration games-in-hand for Peoria and Texas. Houston, Peoria, Oklahoma City and Chicago all play today, so this will all change faster than you can say “Who’s in first?”
“Frankly, it’s a little absurd to have (so few) points separating basically the top from the bottom when you’re past the halfway point,” Stars general manager Scott White said in an interview with the Austin American Statesman. “That basically means there’s no room for error, especially to start the second half of the season.”
The Stars’ record of 24-15-3-2 is almost identical to where they were last year when they suffered through a horrid February, recovered and nearly won the Calder Cup.   But the division wasn’t as competitive last year and the Stars can ill-afford to have any type of losing streak if they want to return to the playoffs.
Texas is in the midst of a string of nine games out of ten against division opponents.   Seven of these are home games, followed by eight straight on the road; another five against division foes.  
One thing that could work in the favor of the Stars, as well as the other teams in the West, is the addition of Oklahoma City to the division. The expansion to eight teams means that if the fifth place team in the West has more points than the fourth place team in the North, five teams from the West will go to the playoffs.   If things continue as they are (and there’s no reason to believe they won’t), there are going to be a few really good teams in the West sitting at home wondering what happened.
Contact the writer at: mitch.cooper@prohockeynews.com