THE NHL / HELENE ELLIOTT : Has League Forgotten Rockies, North Stars and Flames?

There’s a song that says love is easier the second time around. The second time around for the NHL in Denver, Minnesota and Atlanta, though, is less certain to be an easier and more successful experience.

The Quebec Nordiques, who can’t get the government to build them a new arena, appear bound for Denver, despite delays in talks between club President Marcel Aubut and Comsat Video Enterprises. When they move, they will share a new arena with the NBA’s Denver Nuggets, another Comsat property. Aubut and his four partners will make a dandy profit--they paid about $16 million Canadian and will share an expected $75 million U.S. The arena will have many busy nights. Is everybody happy?

Perhaps. But in the midst of all the gushing over state-of-the-art arenas and luxury boxes, no one seems to recall that Denver’s first NHL team, the Colorado Rockies, left town in 1982 because of dismal attendance. They moved to New Jersey and became the Devils, who are rumbling about leaving now too.

The purchase of the Winnipeg Jets by Minnesota businessmen Richard Burke and Alan Gluckstern was put on hold because owner Barry Shenkarow balked at repaying $11.7 million in losses that were covered by the governments of the city and province of Manitoba, which would have cut into Shenkarow’s $45 million bounty. Burke and Gluckstern say their agreement in principle to buy the team remains intact, and if they can’t cart the Jets to Minneapolis for the 1995-96 season, they’ll try for 1996-97.

They haven’t said how they plan to hurdle one key obstacle: Burke needed $20 million from the state of Minnesota to finance the deal and legislators were reluctant to pass a bond issue to provide the money. Maybe they remembered how poorly the North Stars drew in their last years in suburban Bloomington and feared the Jets would face the same problem.

Minnesotans love high school and college hockey but won’t go to see bad NHL hockey, which only makes them smart. And unless the Jets pick up a top-notch goalie and a couple of defensemen along the highway between Winnipeg and Minneapolis, they’ll be bad.

As for Atlanta, the NHL probably will take $75 million from Ted Turner for an expansion franchise this summer. League executives love his fat wallet and his cable TV stations, which they hope he will use to give the NHL broader exposure.

They’re forgetting that the Flames, who played in Atlanta from 1972-80, drew well initially but wound up playing to ever-dwindling crowds.

One day, the commissioner of a professional sport will say his league has enough teams and the quality of play must take precedence over the quantity of teams. Unfortunately, Gary Bettman isn’t that commissioner.

RANGERS WERE STRANGERS

Who were those impostors who wore New York Ranger uniforms for the first 48 games? The team that barely made the playoffs as the eighth Eastern Conference seed, couldn’t play defense and had no power play can’t be the same team that defeated the top-seeded Nordiques in six games.

It’s the same team, but players who stumbled to a 22-23-3 record were rejuvenated by the start of the “real” season. The Adam Graves-Mark Messier-Pat Verbeek line made strong contributions at both ends of the ice, and defenseman Brian Leetch, although hampered by tendinitis in his arm, made timely rushes. Even Petr Nedved, who used to disappear when play got physical, took hits to make some outstanding passes against Quebec.

General Manager Neil Smith believes the Rangers’ transformation comes from their playoff experience and their cumulative 32 Stanley Cup rings.

“There’s nothing they haven’t been through before,” Smith said. “There’s no deficit they haven’t seen or come back from. . . . The pressure early in the playoffs is on the upper-seeded teams. It was on us last year [when the Rangers had the NHL’s best record].”

COLOR HIM BLUE

Funny, but it’s never Mike Keenan’s fault when his team loses. Besides blaming the officiating and his own goaltending, he attributed the Blues’ seven-game loss to the Vancouver Canucks on a lack of depth. An interesting observation, because he’s also the general manager and made no major deals before the trading deadline.

“The team I coached last year [the Rangers] was much superior in talent and in experience and in approach and discipline,” he said. He singled out Esa Tikkanen and Greg Gilbert for not having done more. But they’re role players, not scorers. To blame them is absurd.

The real question is why Keenan practiced the power play only twice all season. He claims that’s because his mentor, Scotty Bowman, never does, but the Blues clearly needed practice even before they allowed the Canucks to score six short-handed goals.

“There’s no question, the power play lost the series for us or at least was a big part of it,” Brett Hull said.

SHARK ATTACK, PART 2

The San Jose Sharks’ elimination of Calgary was not an upset.

The Flames were vulnerable and rookie goaltender Trevor Kidd had no help from an over-hyped and under-industrious defense.

The Sharks were peaking as the season ended, as they had a year ago when they upset the Detroit Red Wings and took the Toronto Maple Leafs to seven games, and Craig Janney responded well to pressure with a goal and two assists in Game 7.

The only surprise was that goalie Wade Flaherty won the last two games after last year’s playoff hero, Arturs Irbe, had failed.

That said, the Sharks’ playoff run will be ended by the Red Wings. A year ago, Bowman’s team had shaky goaltending, a porous defense and no cohesion. Acquiring goalie Mike Vernon, a proven playoff winner, has done wonders. So has Bowman’s defensive system, which is effective without being conservative. In Sergei Fedorov, Steve Yzerman, Dino Ciccarelli and Ray Sheppard, the Red Wings have too many weapons for the Sharks.

SLAP SHOTS

One of the top playoff performers is one of the NHL’s lowest-paid players. New Jersey Devil goalie Martin Brodeur, who had three shutouts and a 0.97 goals-against average against Boston in the first round of the playoffs, earned $140,000, which was pro-rated for the lockout. He was tied at the bottom with Philadelphia Flyer defenseman Karl Dykhuis. The Devils last offered Brodeur $3.6 million over three years, but he wants $4.4 million for three years.

Brian Sutter’s dismissal by the Bruins was no surprise. Players quit on Sutter before the end of the season and questioned his tactics during the Devil series. . . . Chicago Blackhawk center Bernie Nicholls hasn’t scored a goal since March 31, but he had eight assists against Toronto and set up Joe Murphy’s game-winner in the opener against Vancouver.