AUTOPSIES AND OPTIMISM

The day after the regular season concludes is always a day of post mortem for 14 teams, and a day of chest puffing for the other 16 who are headed to the Stanley Cup Playoffs.

Today, Cup dreams are percolating from Detroit to D.C. while autopsies and exit interviews are being scheduled in:

Atlanta -- Where a franchise at a tipping point has to recover from dealing their best all-around player at the trade deadline.

Buffalo -- Where ownership/management need to enroll in summer school classes and learn how to sign their own core players (goalie Ryan Miller is next)

Carolina -- Where they are wondering; how do you go from winning the Cup to missing the playoffs two years in a row?

Chicago -- Where all that franchise and that town need now is a big bucket of patience.

Columbus -- Where if you can shoot a puck off the deck of a boat and hit water the Blue Jackets will be contacting you this summer.

Edmonton -- Where a late season charge by the peach-fuzz faced Oil will have all involved counting down days till opening night 08-09.

Florida -- Where the question is: Are the Panthers in need of a complete enema, or just some cerebral tweaking?

Los Angeles -- Where they use (and abuse) more goalies than an Alexander Ovechkin/Brett Hull Shooting Camp, and lose more games than anybody. Oh well, at least nobody in the City of Angels notices.

New York Islanders -- Where the only things they lead the league in are accredited bloggers and internet high jinks.

Phoenix -- Where the Great One had his young Desert Dogs playing hard and hungry. If hard work was the currency in the NHL they'd be a wealthy bunch. (It isn't, talent is, and they don't have enough of it...yet)

St. Louis -- Where coach Andy Murray's exit interviews with individual players started during the 3rd period of their finale versus Columbus and will last until mid August.

Tampa Bay -- Where the Bolts brass (And whoever owns them) will have to embrace spreading the $56 million in cap money around to more than just 3 players.

Toronto -- Where whoever the teachers hire to napalm the Buds culture of entitlement, delusion and ineptitude better have a big flamethrower and lots of fuel.

Vancouver -- Where fans, media and management have a lot to chew on. Is Trevor done for sure? Is captain Naslund returning? Is Brendan Morrison suddenly brittle, on a run of bad luck, or in the budget? Is Roberto Luongo happy, exhausted, handcuffing the organization, all of the above, or none of the above? And are the Sedin twins worth all the future cap space? (Not to mention the annoying inability to tell the two of them apart?)

Those Failed Fourteen have five months to come up with the answers.

The Successful Sixteen get a couple days to prepare.

Our Dallas Stars -- They're goin' to Disneyland!