Friday: Red, White, and Bleu

Hey y'all, and welcome to another Friday post here at HJC.  I'm a big man, so I know when to admit I was wrong, and I must say I was extremely wrong about the Golden Knights.  After sweeping the Kings in the first round, Vegas backed up their initial success with a shellacking of San Jose last night.  At the beginning of the season, I knew that they had a decent chance to make the playoffs, but I never thought they would do this well.  The pieces were all there for a playoff spot, the NHL had set them up pretty with a decent roster and a slot in arguably the weakest division in the NHL, so many of us felt that it was entirely possible that they could compete for a playoff spot.  Early on, I attributed their success to a lot of their veteran players having a chip on their shoulder after not being protected by teams that they'd contributed on for years.  As they kept winning, that hypothesis quickly fell apart, and it became clear that this was just a good team with a lot of talent that had very quickly built up chemistry and learned how to play with each other.  Even still, going into the playoffs I did not expect the Golden Knights to show up as well as they did, the regular season is one thing, but could a team that hadn't even existed at the beginning of last year's playoffs really expect to make a good showing come April?  Despite my doubts, Vegas has shown that they're more than capable of making a fairly deep run this year, and honestly, that's what they need the most.  As a fan of the former Atlanta Thrashers, I have to say that for an expansion team to succeed in an area not traditionally associated with hockey, they need to capitalize on playoff success, and they need to do it early.  To really cultivate and captivate fans, you need to produce results, something the Thrashers never could follow through on.  Vegas has come out of the gate in a full sprint, and as a hockey fan I'm glad to see it, because it sets a good base for the success of the franchise. 

In voting news, we have the regular COTW vote for April 20-26, with polls closing Friday at noon EST.

COTW April 20-26 vote (ends Friday @ noon EST)

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Now on to today's concepts!

Adam G.- Colorado Avalanche

Our first concept of the day is Adam G.'s latest entry in his De-Edge series, this one for the Colorado Avalanche.  The primary set seems to capitalize on the Avs' return to the mountain range striping, which is a design I have always loved.  The hem striping has been moved over so now there are two peaks on the front and back instead of just the one, and the arms have moved from a full length yoke design to contrasting cuffs.  I really like the change on the arms, and I think the hem choice is the right move so it isn't crowding the main crest.  I love the logo switch, although I'm not sure if the Avs would be allowed to use the Rockies' old logo, I'm not really sure about the legal situation surrounding it, so it may be safer to just use the Avs' retooled version of it.  The alternate is what really stands out here for me, I love the use of the logo as the arm striping, and the tri-peaks hem design gives an even better mountain range feel than the Avs' current design.  My main issue with this set is the color balance being incredibly off.  For burgundy being the dominant color on the dark jersey, it's completely absent on the light one outside of the logos.  On top of that, the use of black gear is the biggest flaw of the Avs' current set, but at least they work it into the main jersey, as forced as it is.  Here, it is missing from the set entirely, so it seems like it was just an arbitrary choice.  On top of that, as much as I hate to say it, if the gear is black, the dark helmets should be black as well.  Final verdict: the alternate is a daring and great design, but the lack of color balance really drags this one down.  7.5/10

Adam G.- New York Rangers

Adam's second design of the day is another De-Edge series entry, this time for my beloved Rangers.  Fair warning, as a member of the Blueshirt faithful, I strongly believe in the traditional design for the primary set, and tend to be hypercritical of uniforms that stray from that.  That being said, this design based off of the classic Lady Liberty alternates is not the worst way to approach a new design for the Rangers.  The problem with this set is that it's a little too close to the Lady Liberty design to be enough of a change for me.  Here the only real changes are simplified striping, the addition of a hem stripe, and white cuffs instead of red on the dark jersey.  Also, the silver and white in the numbers on the dark jersey are too close in color, they'd end up just looking like a white blob on the ice.  I'd say go with red numbers like on the original Lady Liberty dark jersey.  Final verdict: not a bad design, but not really enough change here, and what changes have been made aren't really for the better.  7/10

Maxence- Team France

Our final concept of the day is Maxence's design for Team France.  I really like the double blue color scheme, it's a subtle difference, but I think it looks pretty sharp.  I'm a fan of the logo and font choices, I think they fit really well with this design.  I also like the striping design, but I wish it were a little thicker, if only to make the jersey a little less bare.  Gear looks good, but the striping on the socks is a little too high.  Final verdict: not a bad set for Team France, and definitely fits with their international identity.  8.5/10 and my COTW NOMINEE!!!!!

That's all for me this week, see y'all next Friday!