Here are the individual and averaged predicitions for the first round of the NHL playoffs from Dobber, Angus, Bugg, Ma, Miller, and more! The panel's consensus picks boast an impressive 42-18 record over the past four seasons! But, the panel was a very un-expert-like 8-7 last year, a dissapointing spring after posting a solid 12-3 record the year before. On to the picks...

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Eastern Conference:

Western Conference:

Cup Final and Top Scorer:

Scoring Race:

About the DobberHockey Crew:

Darryl "Dobber" Dobbs - Pens the Daily Ramblings, Monthly Rankings, and the weekly column "The Dobotomy". He also appears thrice weekly on thehockeynews.com, as well as over at the Puck Daddy blog on Yahoo! every Thursday.

Jeff Angus - Author of "Angus Unleashed" and DobberHockey Senior Writer/Manager. Angus' thoughts appear in the daily ramblings on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday each week.

Matthew Bugg - Senior Writer for DobberHockey, author of Saturday's "Bugg Bytes," and co-author of the DobberHockey Fantasy Prospects Report.

Ryan Ma - Author of "The Wild West" here at DobberHockey every Tuesday.

Russ "Comish" Miller - Pens "Eastern Edge", which can be found here every Thursday.

Ian Fergusson - Author of the monthly column "An Expert's Audit", which can be seen here on the 12th of every month.

Justin Goldman - Author of the weekly column "School of Block", which can be found here every Monday.

Gates Imbeau – Runs the Black Aces, otherwise known as the DobberHockey farm team.

Marty "Mapletree" Kwiaton and Anthony Lancione - Pen the weekly Saturday picks.

Steve Laidlaw – One of the premier writers on DobberHockey’s Black Aces squad and newest columnist of our upcoming feature "Cage Match"

Tim Lucarelli – Author of Dub & Chase, which highlights up and coming NHL stars each Sunday.

Dave Poleck - Contributes the "Looking Ahead" article each Friday here at DobberHockey.

Jeffrey Renaud – Highlights a different NHL prospect each Saturday with his Prospect Prescription.

Alessandro Seren Rosso - Stops by here at DobberHockey every second week to give you the inside scoop on Russian hockey players/prospects - "Rosso on Russia."

Brian Kom - Hosts the Dobber Nation radio show on the 25th of each month.

Comments (30)

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Ian said:

	... nifty mittens 8/8
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April 27, 2011
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GMGates said:

... Dobber 7/8 (ANA) Angus 6/8 (PIT, ANA) Bugg 5/8 (PIT, CHI, ANA) Ma 5/8 (PIT, CHI, ANA) Miller 7/8 (ANA) Fergusson 7/8 (BUF) Goldman 5/8 (NYR, BUF, ANA) Imbeau 7/8 (PIT) Kwiaton 6/8 (PHX, ANA) Lancione 7/8 (ANA) Laidlaw 6/8 (MTL, PIT) Lucarelli 6/8 (NYR, ANA) Kom 5/8 (PIT, PHX, ANA) Renaud 6/8 (BUF, ANA) (5) Dobber, Miller, Fergusson, Imbeau, Lancione with 7/8 (5) Angus, Kwiaton, Laidlaw, Lucarelli, Reneau with 6/8 (4) Bugg, Ma, Kom, Goldman with 5/8

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April 27, 2011
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Ian /nifty mittens said:

	... Caps in 6 Flyers in 7 Bruins in 6 Lightning in 6 Nucks in 6 Sharks in 5 Wings in 6 Preds in 7
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April 13, 2011
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mick said:

	... rangers beat wash - upset in the east nashville beats ana - Vancouver Philly final Lou will perform fear not bashers!!!
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April 13, 2011
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steve laidlaw said:

	impossible Pengwin, that's probably because your outcome is impossible. Unless you meant PIT not PHI.
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April 13, 2011
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Pengwin7 said:

	Picks Nobody matched my exact picks of: WAS/BUF/BOS/PHI & VAN/SJ/DET/NAS. 7/8 with Ian(TB) & Gates(PHI). And both picked VAN/BOS w/VAN winning. Those are my "like minds"!
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April 13, 2011
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Ross The Boss Palmer said:

	Wings vs Yotes Their series last year was the best hockey I have ever watched. There were better series last year and other years, but the play between Phoenix and Detroit was amazing to watch. I am not a fan of either but love to watch their styles of playoff hockey.
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April 13, 2011
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Sanstanya said:

@Rob Alright fair enough. I vaugely do recall Van picked here and thinking that was overly bold. I wanted them to win but I wasn't picking them yet, mostly on maturity and a weak bottom 6 (including Ryan Johsnon who I admire but don't think you win with). But you're true - like Babcock said, until you've won it, you haven't won it. This year though, and I'm only looking at 1 rd at a time, I am taking Vancouver. And I think betting against SJ in rd 1 is the sucker's bet this time around. It's the only series that an upset would really shock me in.

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April 13, 2011
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Rob said:

@Sanstanya Last season the concensus was Vancouver on here as well. I believe it was van/pitt being the popular choice. I'm not saying Van doesnt have a great team. In fact, they have the best team. And, on paper this shouldn't be a close series. However, I have seen enough of Luongo in a big game to know Van is far from a lock. Maybe this is the year Luongo plays in the playoffs the way he does in the regular season. If he does, Van wins the cup. If he doesn't, Chicago beats them for a third straight year. Until teams prove they can win (vancouver, sharks, capitals) it's a suckers bet to pick them.

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April 13, 2011
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Marcus Lepkowski said:

	Phoenix Phoenix is going to beat Detroit in 6.
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April 13, 2011
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Sanstanya said:

@Rob Well, perhaps ironically, this is probably the 1st time that people are picking Vancouver. They sure as hell weren't the favourites last year. But if that is the entire basis for how you're picking teams year-to-year you might be dissappointed, and you also perhaps don't see alot of Vancouver games? The ones I have watched don't much remind me of last year's team. Nobody should care what anyone did last year. We have seen a few times recently cup winners miss the playoffs the following year, and in those instances they are rightly not usually picked to repeat because it is obvious the team has changed. Things change fast. Chicago was an absolute force last year; this year they are a good but not great team. Not even close to what they were. I don't think it's a lock at all, but I do think Vancouver is definitely the better team. Side predictions for that series: 1. Luongo does not get pulled in the series 2. at some point, Crawford does get pulled 3. one or more series Vancouver goals is/are scored with Ryan Johnson on the ice 4. No Chicago goals are scored with Ryan Johnson on the ice 5. *wildcard (based on nothing): upon his return, ex-Oiler Raffi Torres absolutely levels ex-Oiler Fernando Pisani.

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April 13, 2011
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Big Ev said:

	... Now it's basically guaranteed that Vancouver and Boston won't make the Final
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April 13, 2011
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Rob said:

	... So, just how many times does Luongo have to be terrible in a big game before everyone on here stops picking Van each year?
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April 13, 2011
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Sanstanya said:

	consensus? The consensus final is VAN/BOS but it looks to me like you have 4 BOS picks (and 4 PHI)and 5 WSH picks for the final. So shouldn't "consensus" be VAN/WSH? splain? Cheers.
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April 13, 2011
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Jason Arbuthnot said:

	No love for Buffalo? I say Buffalo in 6
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April 13, 2011
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bill said:

	upset i like LA to upset SJ myself
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April 13, 2011
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Jeff Angus said:

	... No one wants to take LA.... Bueller?
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April 13, 2011
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Marc said:

	Way to go Ma! I'm pretty sure I'm going to be the only one in my pool to go with CHI. Everyone's lovin VAN up, and I just don't see it being that easy.
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April 13, 2011
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Draft Dodger said:

	... Lundqvist stones the Caps in game 1 and gives them Halak flashbacks, Rangers in 6
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April 12, 2011
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steve laidlaw said:

	... No love Carson? I think I deserve some for being the only fool taking Montreal. Now say what you will about Nashville over Anaheim but at least FEELS like a big upset.
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April 12, 2011
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Brian said:

	... for the record, I've got BUF in 6, Flyers be damned
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April 12, 2011 | url
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Tim Lucarelli said:

	... Just sent my picks in!
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April 12, 2011
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Ryan Ma said:

	... Wow so much love for Van... There's gonna be a lot of hearts broken when the Hawks knock them out in 7.
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April 12, 2011
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Jeff Angus said:

	... Look through past few years - I always pick a few upsets. Just couldn't justify any this year. Picks are such a toss up - looking at past statistics it is basically a guessing game.
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April 11, 2011
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Carson said:

	... Where are the upsets, no balls on the panel. lol! Especially the final, seeds 1, 2 and 3 throughout with the exception of Ryan's pick. There are always upsets so you gotta predict a couple. NYR over Wsh and Pho over Det are my two. Oh well, should be good...
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April 11, 2011
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Jeff Angus said:

	... As I said, excel was giving me serious attitude. I think I fixed it...
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April 11, 2011
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Steve said:

	... The font and color scheme are awful... my eyes are bleeding!
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April 11, 2011
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jj said:

	agreed.. Who formatted this? lol.. It really could've used some blinking text and comic sans. All kidding aside, please please repair this as the last few years' edition were fun to read.
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April 11, 2011
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Jeff Angus said:

	... Fixed the font - had trouble copying from excel. Thanks.
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April 11, 2011
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Dareo said:

	... The dark blue is horrible - virtually unreadable.
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April 11, 2011
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