[Update, morning of April 3]
Yes.
They lost last night and the Canadiens won.
[Update, morning of April 2]
The Senators are still in the race.
Either that or Sports Club Stats has a bug. It still saw 2 times out of 50 million where they win a 3 way tie with the Canadiens and Sabres. They can’t miss. :)
To stay in tonight:
- The Senators need to beat the Bruins
- The Islanders need to beat the Canadiens in regulation
[end of update]
I see on the web they supposedly are (thanks Jon), but I’m showing them still making it 3 out of 50 million times.
Here is what has to happen:
The Senators have to win out.
The Canadiens have to lose out in regulation
The Panthers have to get 0 wins and at most 1 ot loss.
And the Sabres have to finish with 2 wins, 3 regulation losses and 2 overtime losses.
Which leads to a 3 way tie for the 8-10 seeds between the Senators, Canadiens, and Sabres.
All with 88 points and 39 wins
The next tie breaker:
If more than two clubs are tied, the higher percentage of available points earned in games among those clubs, and not including any “odd” games, shall be used to determine the standing.
There are no “odd games” to remove. They all play each of the others 6 times, 3 at home and 3 on the road:
10/10/2008 Sabres beat Canadiens 2-1 (so)
10/27/2008 Sabres lost to Senators 2-5
11/11/2008 Canadiens beat Senators 4-0
11/20/2008 Senators lost to Canadiens 2-3 (so)
11/29/2008 Canadiens beat Sabres 3-2
12/20/2008 Canadiens beat Sabres 4-3 (ot)
1/6/2009 Sabres beat Senators 4-2
1/17/2009 Senators lost to Canadiens 4-5 (so)
2/6/2009 Sabres beat Canadiens 3-2
2/7/2009 Senators beat Sabres 3-2 (so)
2/11/2009 Sabres lost to Senators 1-3
2/21/2009 Canadiens beat Senators 5-3
3/4/2009 Sabres beat Canadiens 5-1
3/7/2009 Senators beat Sabres 6-3
3/17/2009 Senators beat Sabres 4-2
3/19/2009 Senators beat Canadiens 5-4
3/28/2009 Canadiens lost to Sabres 3-4 (so)
4/6/2009 Canadiens lost to Senators ?-?
Talley those up to get:
Senators: 7 wins, 3 losses, 2 ot losses 16 points Pack your bags!
Canadiens: 6 wins, 4 losses, 2 ot losses 14 points
Sabres 5 wins, 5 losses, 2 ot losses 12 points
Now, come to think of it, I’m not exactly sure what the NHL means by “higher percentage of available points”. My code just uses average points per game. But it’s irrelevant in this case because they all had the same number of games and the same number of ot losses.
Senator win the tiebreaker and make the playoffs.
Or am I crazy?