Puckheads in the United States will get a true taste of Canadiana when former Boston Bruins head coach and CBC hockey analyst Don Cherry will join ESPN analyst Barry Melrose for pre and post game analysis throughout the NHL Conference Finals.

Cherry and Melrose will do analysis for ESPN SportsCenter, ESPN Radio and ESPNEWS. 

The Battle of Pennsylvania gets set to begin in earnest tonight between the Philadelphia Flyers and the Pittsburgh Penguins.

The Flyers are already series underdogs at +200 and they could be missing defenseman Kimmo Timonen for the duration of the East Final.

Timonen has a blood clot in his leg he sustained after being hit by the puck in the previous series against Montreal.

Philly is +170 on the Money line for tonight’s game. 

The NHL Conference Finals begin tonight with action taking place on the Western Front.

The Dallas Stars are listed at +205 to win the series against the Detroit Red Wings and are +175 on the Money line tonight.

Dallas has dropped seven out of its last 10 SU against Detroit.

With the NHL playoffs raging on, the IIHF World Hockey Championship might go unnoticed but there are two games taking place tonight.

Canada and Norway played earlier in the day while Switzerland (+2) will take on the Czech Republic (-2) at 7 pm EST and the U.S. (-3) will take on Germany (+3) at 7:15 pm EST. 

After playing the equivalent of more than two games on Sunday/Monday, the Dallas Stars will have one more day of rest before resuming their run to the Stanley Cup Finals.

The battle for the Clarence Campbell trophy–between Dallas and the Detroit Red Wings–begins tomorrow with the Stars listed at +175.

While all the attention is centered around the Conference Finals in the NHL, the Toronto Maple Leafs announced that head coach Paul Maurice has been fired.

After missing the playoffs for three straight seasons, the Leafs look to undergo a major rebuilding process.

Despite being scared straight by Team USA yesterday–where the Americans barely lost 5-4–Team Canada is still an odds-on favorite to win Gold at the World Hockey Championships.

The Canucks are paying out at even money in SPORTSBETTING.COM IIHF championship futures.

With only four teams left in the NHL playoffs, many are beginning to project who the eventual playoff MVP will be.

SPORTSBETTING.COM has Pittsburgh Penguins superstar Sidney Crosby (+450) as the odds-on to be the 2008 Conn Smythe trophy winner.

The odds seem stacked against the Philadelphia Flyers in NHL playoff betting.

Philly is +170 in its Eastern Conference Final series against Pittsburgh and is listed at +2000 to pull the upset and sweep the Penguins 4-0.

However, the Flyers are a grittier team and grit is invaluable in the playoffs.

Can Philly beat the odds?

It took four OT periods but Dallas was finally able to eliminate the San Jose Sharks from the NHL playoffs by a final score of 2-1, catapulting the Stars into the Conference Finals against the Detroit Red Wings.

On the Eastern Front, the Conference Final will be a battle of Pennsylvania as the Philadelphia Flyers will battle the Pittsburgh Penguins.