New England Hockey Talk

[bethandlouis]

Do you ever feel like you're talking to yourself?

[bethandlouis]

OLIE!

Got his shutout that he has been seeking, all season it seems. Watching the Isles/Rangers game. Louis keeps asking who we are rooting for. I keep telling him we are rooting against New York

[MGB Boy]

It lives! Where the heck you been hidin'? Did you slip into "Caps end of season malaise"?

I rooted for the Isles. Actually, that's not quite true. I rooted against the Rangers. Both because I hate the Rangers, New York City, and Jaromir Jagr, and also because the announcers on MSG are such utter homers that I have to root against them.

Hannu made his, uh, triumphant return to the NHL tonight. The Bruins want one more look at him before they have to figure out the goalie situation this summer, so they called him up and took the unusual (for Boston) step of announcing their goalie rotation for the final three games of the season; Two starts for Hannu, then Timmy gets the season closer at home. I guess they've seen whatever they wanted to see from Joey. Gotta figure either Joey or Hannu is gone before the draft this summer, only question is which. Anyhow, Hannu played quite well, I thought. Koivu deked his way thru the entire Bruins D for both goals, that was the difference in the game. Can't necessarily fault him for that.

Today's topic of idle rumination; Fans who boo specific players. I don't mean general booing, I mean the persistant booing of one specific opposing player every time he touches the puck. Generally speaking, I find it to be pretty lame. The standard circumstance is a player who used to play for team X gets booed every time he touches the puck when he comes back and plays in team X's rink. The longer it's been since the player left team X, the lamer the booing is. The later into the game the booing continues, the lamer it is. And perhaps the lamest is when the player being booed didn't walk away from the team, he got traded. Rob Blake played the first 12 seasons of his career in Los Angeles. At the trade deadline in 2001, the Kings traded him to Colorado, where he won a Cup, and for the next four seasons he was booed lustily by the fans in LA every time the Avalanche came to town. They just couldn't let it go, year after year, every time Colorado came to town, Blake got booed. Get over it, people! And he didn't even walk away as a free agent, the Kings traded him away. Totally lame. I assume they no longer boo him, since he returned there as a free agent this past summer. Folks in Boston don't boo Rolston or Guerin for walking away as free agents. It's silly.

Chara gets booed in Ottawa, because he left as a free agent. Ottawa conceded that they wouldn't be able to sign him because they had little cap space left and they'd already tied up most of their money re-signing Wade Redden for 2 years/$13 million, they essentially said "we hate to see you go, but we know we can't keep you." Chara moved on, as expected, but he's still booed in Ottawa for choosing not to play for free in order to fit under the Senators' cap number. What I understand less is that Chara also gets booed every time he touches the puck in Montréal. I don't know what offense he is supposed to have committed against the Habs, but all the way to the last shift of the game, the boo him every time he touches the puck. It's just silly.

In Montréal, they boo Vinnie Lecavalier and Marty St Louis regularly, as they have committed the grave offense of "being French-Canadians born and raised in Montréal and it's suburbs but who don't play for the Canadiens". To Montréal fans, there is no greater crime than to be highly skilled Montréaler and playing for some other team. Never mind that Lecavalier was drafted by the Lightning, not Montréal. Never mind that St Louis was undrafted and has been an unrestricted free agent *twice* (when he got out of college and when Calgary released him) and Montréal never showed an ounce of interest in him. They both still get booed, as if they did something wrong. It is the moral duty of all Montréalers to play for Montréal if they make the NHL. Playing anywhere else is unacceptable.

I'll be honest, I don't follow that crap well enough to know why the fans are booing half the time. I just know that I'll be watching some random game, like Dallas vs St Louis, and every time some random player touches the puck, everyone in Dallas boos. And at that point, I don't even want to know the backstory as to why, I just immediately start rooting for the visiting team because I find it lame.

Tonight's final game of the year in Montréal did give me one more chance to savor one unique aspect of Habs games; The RAAAAaaaahooooooOOOO! What is the RAAAAaaaahooooooOOOO? That's the sound of a Canadiens player getting checked. You see, up in Montréal, every time a Canadiens player gets checked hard, or falls and hits the ice, they cheer. Sounds counterintuitive, but you have to understand Canadiens fan logic. They are sooooo certain that if one of their beloved Habs got hit, or if one of their beloved Habs hits the ice, that there must have been a penalty. Thus they cheer because their beloved Habs are about to get a power play. A Canadien can't get hit hard, a Canadien can't fall to the ice without the other team having done something illegal, it's just not possible. So the Canadien falls, and everyone cheers, RAH! But then, no, what's this? There's no penalty? The ref hasn't put his arm up? What an injustice! And the "RAH" morphs into loud boos. Hence the trademark Montréal RAAAAaaaahooooooOOOO. Montréal is really the only place where I've seen it. And it happens several times a game, every game in Montréal. Canadien steals the puck, cuts toward the middle, gets levelled on a good, clean check, and the crowd goes RAAAAaaaahooooooOOOO! You have to admire that sort of collective arrogance on the part of a crowd to just assume that if one of their guys goes down, it MUST be a penalty, and to cheer the surely imminent power play...

-Ricardo

[bethandlouis]

Sorry I've been away. We drove down to MD to visit with Louis' parents and I've slipped into another season gone coma.

Well, Caps fans boo right. They boo whenever Jagr touches the puck, because, let's be fair, we paid for him after he left our team. It is still refered to as the Great Jagr disaster. He gets booed and probably always will. This season at the trade we saw Zubie, Zednick and Nycholat leave. They've never gotten boos. They were traded and didn't ask for a trade so the Caps fans don't boo them. They don't boo Lang or Bondra (after Bondra was traded they played the Caps again and if he scored a goal we would cheer). He also got a standing ovation when they played the Sens. He didn't ask to leave so he doesn't get booed. Witt gets booed because he begged for a trade for nearly a year and a half. So in some respects I can understand it. What I don't like is the noise that they used to make (I think they still make it and it's not boos) when one of the flyers (I don't know who) would touch the puck it's that <Woot><Woot><Woot> noise. I don't know who came up with it.

I too was rooting against the Rangers. i hate Jagr; however, there isn't anything that the isles have that I like. Last night there were some mathmatical eliminations. Carolina has been eliminated, the Islanders have been eliminated.

Now...onto the "Who do you think will win..." portion of our program
Stanley Cup?
Hart Trophy?
Vezina Trophy?
Calder Trophy?
William M. Jennings Trophy?
Art Ross Trophy?
Norris Trophy?

I think the Slugs are going to pull out a cup win this year, as much as I don't like it.
I want to see Luongo win but I think that Crosby will win
I think Brodeur is the front runner.
I think Evgeni Malkin should win it. But I've heard some buzz about Stastny.
Looks like there is a tie for this one. Hasek has my vote though (even though there's no voting)
Looks like Sid the kid is going to pull this one out.
I want to say Souray but I don't think he's the best D out there, I think he's the best D with an O.

[bethandlouis]

LET'S GO CAPS!

They killed the Thrash's hopes for the cup last year. They can't get the same satisfaction this year but nothing says "you suck" better than losing to the Caps! (I'm so ashamed )

So...getting ready to ramp up the cookie factory. Was supposed to get flour tonight but didn't. darn it! or is it Yar!?

[bethandlouis]

i was starting to think that I made that post too early. With 7:00 to go in the 3rd period and the Thrash get hit with a double minor high sticking. Then they come back and score a shorty goal then with 1:30 to go Laich lobs it over the glass for a delay of game. Then to top it all of with 44 seconds left Jurchina slashes Hossa. With Lehtonen pulled this creates a 6 on 3. I don't think I breathed for 44 seconds. it was a real nailbiter but with 2 seconds to go they cleared the zone and the game was over so I say it again LET'S GO CAPS!

In more interesting news Kovulchuk got the ol' sit on the bench timeout tonight. A turnover in the neutral zone caused a near breakaway for Ovey. It wasn't until Hartley had the 6 on 3 in the last 44 seconds that he put him back in.

Here's a question. Milan Jurchina got a high stick. It was definately a high stick and it hit him right in the face. Now on the replay the homer Atlanta announcers said that it shouldn't be high sticking because he lifted the stick. Now let me try to explain this. Boulton was standing between the two circles in his offensive zone. Milan Jurchina skates in behind him (currently he isn't being covered or pestered by anyone in a Caps jersey) he puts his stick on the ice behind Boulton's stick and lifts it a bit off the ice to get him off the pass (I guess) and then continues skating to cover the front of the net. He realeased his stick (will Boulton picked his stick up off of Jurchina's (it looked like in the replays that he skated with his stick through the postition that Boulton had his in originally) Boulton makes 2 moves with his stick he lifts it a little (to get Jurchina's out from under his) and starts to place it back on the ice but before reaching the surface he lifts it up higher right into the face of Jurchina. So the question is this if lifting the stick is a legal defense how is it that the homer announcers said that he lifted the stick and it shouldn't be called? Bare in mind that Jurchina was past Boulton and the point of impact. It almost looked like a accident like Jurchina skated into the stick that was being held high.

[MGB Boy]

Saw the high stick in question, I was laughing the whole time. Did you enjoy the rampant homerism of the Atlanta announcers? Funny stuff. I thought it was a pretty cut and dried high stick, no question. Two aspects;

One, you have to be in control of your stick, you are responsible for it, and a penalty will be assessed regardless of whether the contact is the result of actual intent, negligence/carelessness, or purely by unavoidable accident. The rulebook has an exception if you accidentally hit someone in the wind-up or follow-thru of a shot, but not for the stick being lifted. It's a penalty, "he lifted my stick" is not a valid excuse.

Two, it wasn't the stick lift that caused it anyhow. His stick got lifted maybe to waist level, then stopped (and if anything, started to go back down again), then he lifted it by himself. A careless penalty. The Atlanta announcers were just being pure homers. The whining of "that's a as tough a high sticking call as I've seen" was garbage.

Hart: Probably Crosby, although I think one could get into an interesting debate about the whole question of "what truly defines someone as most valuable to their team?". Technically, it's not a "best player" award (that's the Pearson), it's a "most valuable player" award. But a whole lot of voters still just look at the points scoring totals and make their pick that way. There's been a certain groundswell of support for Brodeur and Luongo, and I think one could make a pretty good case for it (NJ minus Brodeur = no playoffs, Vancouver minus Luongo = probably no playoffs). But just as with baseball voters and the whole "should pitchers be eligible for MVP" debate, there's a significant chunk of people out there who don't think a goalie should win MVP. It isn't unprecedented, Theodore and Hasek have both won it, but there is a certain bias there. If I were to pick one of the goalies, I'd go with Brodeur, but I still think it will probably be Crosby.

Vezina: Brodeur. I know Luongo has become a fashionable pick of late with some pundits (especially the press in Canada, who are ready to engrave his name on it now, I think there's some homerism there since he plays for a Canadian team), but Brodeur has better numbers on a slightly worse team (I don't mean worse strictly in terms of record, I mean worse in terms of assessing the talent on the team aside from the goalie). #3 GAA, #4 save %, #1 in wins with 47, #1 in shutouts with 12 (50% more than the second place guy. Luongo, I'm not so crazy about. Something about him makes me feel greasy. Wouldn't be shocked if they ended up giving it to Luongo, but I'd disagree if they did.

Norris: Wouldn't be surprised if they gave it to Lidstrom just out of habit, he's won four out of the last five. Neidermeyer and Pronger will probably make the finalist list too, but I'd bet on Lidstrom.

Ross: Crosby.

Jennings: Right now, Minnesota has the edge, having given up four fewer goals than Detroit. Both have two games left. Detroit has two against Chicago. Minnesota has Edmonton and St Louis. It's gonna be close, either the Backstrom/Fernandez duo or Hasek. Minnesota just might hang on.

Calder: Malkin, but I think this was his to lose, he was appointed rookie of the year before the season began, and while I don't know if he's been quite as good as hyped, he certainly hasn't been bad enough to lose it. Stastny and Kopitar have been good too, but the west coast late game low visibility effect will kill their chances.

-Ricardo

[Actual Size]

LET'S GO SABRES!

[bethandlouis]

Now the really interesting one is the Jack Adams Trophy. Lots of people want to see Ted "Where's The Rick" Nolan win this one. I don't think it should happen. Seems Lindy should win this one. I mean how much of it is talent on the ice and talent in the clipboard? Maybe Gretzky should win it. I mean it has to take a lot to stay with a club like Phoenix.

What do you expect from a place that identifes themselves as blueland? I started listening to the game in the car on the way home from work, it was the atlanta feed. I liked it. It was a 2 way street as far as the intesity of the calls. The announcers got just as excited when the Caps scored as they did when Atlanta scored. I know that the announcers, in some way, have to cater to the market that they are in but please cater in a manner that follows the rules of the NHL. That's all we need is a bunch of people thinking that things are penalties when they're not and things that aren't penalties are.

You don't have any Cup predictions?

I am starting to think about going to the Hall of Fame. It's a trek (9 hours from here) but thought I could make a weekend of it. Now bear in mind this is only in the preliminary stages, but Louis and I are going to be selling one of our houses this year so i thought as a celebration we could go. Do you think we could turn this into a MINI run? Do you think anyone would be interested? I went to Toronto when I was in high school (as a part of a band trip, yes, I was a band geek). I had a lot of fun. We went to the CN tower (which Louis really wants to go to. The Science Centre (actually played a concert there (well, I wouldn't call it a concert per se it was more a you walk in the building and whoa, there's a band)) We saw an off broadway show of Les Miserables and went to the Mall (what else to you do with bus loads of teenagers) But we didn't get to the HHOF. So what do you think?

[MGB Boy]

I'm pacing myself on a Cup pick. Need to soak in the juices of the remaining couple days of the regular season before making my wise prediction.

Adams: I've heard Ted Nolan's name, but I don't think they are good enough, they probably won't even make the playoffs. Lindy Ruff? Maybe, but he won it last year, and they don't like to give it to the same guy twice in a row (it's only happened once). Buffalo was a great surprise last year, but this year they're just doing what's expected. Wouldn't be surprised if Ruff is the victim of increased expectations. I've heard a few people say maybe Michel Therrien in Pitt. The pro: His team was supposed to get good eventually, but they are way ahead of schedule. The con: He's got Crosby, Malkin, etc. He *should* do well. So I say no. How about Barry Trotz in Nashville? He looks like a radioactively mutated hedgehog, which rocks, plus he's got the Preds challenging for first in the Western Conference. Like Ruff, he's been with his team a long time and has built them up from crap to contender. I say give it to the mutant hedgehog.

Looks like the Jennings is just about done. Minne shut out Edmonton last night, while Detroit lost to Chicago. So the Wild have a six goal lead with one game to go for each.

Wow, Florida scored a touchdown on Tampa tonight. As much as I'd like to see Marty and Eric win another Cup, I can't see it happening with Tampa's current goaltending situation. It's an old cliché, but it's true; You can't win in the playoffs without strong goaltending.

Been to the Hall of Fame once, back when I was in college, shortly after they completed the renovations and moved into their new digs at the old bank building. Very nice. The great hall where the trophies are stored is gorgeous. Also went to the mall (the Eaton Centre) and an assload of hockey shops while I was there (as one would expect, there are a ton of hockey shops in the GTA). It is indeed a heck of a trek, but it could make for an interesting MINI roadtrip. Those fools like to drive up to the middle of nowhere in Labrador in mid-winter, why not Toronto? It's quite lovely in summer, too...

-Ricardo

[bethandlouis]

We had a great time at "Hockey Night in Essex". The drive home was a bit interesting. No visable road surface until Montpeilier after that dry as a bone. Did get to see an accident involving at least 3 vehicles (possibly more as I was too busy trying to stay somewhere on the road. About 1/4 mile down a 2 car crash. Made some good time after getting out of the snowy areas.

Off to bed to rest my head. Good luck bowling!

[bethandlouis]

Islanders playoff hopes are still alive. I'm definately rooting for the isle. If they win they knock out the Leafs and they'll probably lose in the 1st round seeing as they have to play the Slugs and without with The Rick they don't have much chance. Although, Dubie has been doing a great job between the pipes. Certainly better than that Dunham guy.

It was nice to see the Flyers end the season at home with a win. Great job Dreamy Eyes!

[bethandlouis]

Unbelieveably the Islanders. against all odds, have won a playoff berth. I wonder if they can pull the upset of the season off and beat the Slugs. That would be something.

[snid]

Another snowy evening on I-89 between Waterbury and Burlington. Not sure how bad it was south of Waterbury though.

Stupid snow.

[MGB Boy]

Stupid f'ing snow, more like. I'm officially very sick of this. That one Sunday afternoon we had where it was 59° and sunny was enough to kill any winterjoy in me. I wanna take the winter tires off the MINI. I wanna get the MGB all tuned up and polished up. I wanna put away my parka and my gloves for the season. So today we celebrated everyone's favorite pagan fertility festival with a mid-day ham dinner at my brother's place, then afterwards we settled in to watch the Isles-Devils game, with snow steadily falling outside the window. F this stuff. Two weeks from tonight I'm going to be at Fenway watching the Sox and Yanks. Better be warmer by then.

So it seems that the dire claims of the Isles being DOA from Ms Beth and Mr George were indeed misplaced. Playoffs, baby! And in a manner that could not possibly be even remotely more dramatic. Very amusing. What I would have given to have been in sports bar in Toronto when Dubie made that last poke-check. Sweetness.

Watched the "game in an hour" replay of the Leafs-Habs game last night at 1:30am. It was as if Huet and Raycroft were having a contest to see who could suck more. I'm not sure who won, Huet gave up more goals, 6 vs 4, but he also played the whole game whereas Raycroft got pulled halfway thru, and thus gave up his 4 in half the time. They both gave up some "you gotta be kidding me" goals, but I think the easy unscreened shot to the glove side that Raycroft just waved at was the prize-winner. Nevertheless, I think the fans and press in Montréal should be asking some serious questions about why Huet started over Halak. Yeah, I know Huet has more experience and all else being equal is a better goalie, but he also hadn't started a game since Valentine's Day, almost two months ago. Gotta question that. Even if you don't trust Halak, what about Aebischer? It's one game for your whole season, and you start a guy who has played 18 minutes of hockey since February 14th? Interesting choice.

Here's the match-ups, who will win?

No. 1 Buffalo vs. No. 8 N.Y. Islanders

No. 2 New Jersey vs. No. 7 Tampa Bay

No. 3 Atlanta vs. No. 6 N.Y. Rangers

No. 4 Ottawa vs. No. 5 Pittsburgh

No. 1 Detroit vs. No. 8 Calgary

No. 2 Anaheim vs. No. 7 Minnesota

No. 3 Vancouver vs. No. 6 Dallas

No. 4 Nashville vs. No. 5 San Jose

Now if you'll pardon me, I need to go by some archival grade document paper on which to print out my Major Award...

-R

PS replace that burned out headlamp.