Shootouts are fun to watch. They are also, clean, quick and reliable when it comes to ending a hockey game. But -- and this is hardly a revelation -- they are also most definitely an awful way to declare a winner in an NHL game and they represent a problematic reward for both the winner and the loser. If they were intended to be win-win, they are failing. Shootouts are lose-lose.

The Blackhawks, who "won" last night's entertaining game over the Wild via shootout, earned just as many standings points when a couple of guys flipped breakaways into the net as they did for 60 minutes of end-to-end action. That's not right. And the Wild, despite technically "losing," were still allowed to feel good about themselves -- a little too good, per Russo's gamer, for our liking.

Last night on Twitter, we had two modest proposals for different ways to end a game: 1) Five minutes of 4 on 4 overtime, followed by five minutes of 3 on 3 overtime, then simply a tie if that doesn't settle things. 2) A Slap Shot-esque strip tease. While the second option garnered a lot of positive support from female followers -- including the suggestion that one round might not be enough -- we're not going to carry that initiative all the way to the league. As for the first one, well, it's better than a shootout in that it still requires a form of real hockey to be played. But it still seems silly to change the rules of the game at the most important time.

It could also be argued that changing every game to make it worth three points -- thus giving a team that wins in regulation three points instead of two -- might make the overtime system seem more palatable. But that still doesn't account for the fundamental problem of how the overtime is handled.

For our money, the best logic is this: Since there's no good way to break a tie in hockey short of a legitimate goal, stop insisting that ties be broken. Make overtime 10 minutes of 5 on 5 skating -- or at worst, 4 on 4, if the purists will allow that the game is essentially the same but with more open ice. And if nobody scores, both teams get a point. If you lose, you lose. Zero points. If you win, you win. Two points. If trying to win isn't enough incentive, why are you playing in the first place?

Your thoughts, as usual, in the comments (assuming you haven't fainted by now at the sight of two consecutive days of opening posts on hockey).

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