We down in MSG, yeah, you know me!
off the top:
I guess you'd have to have seen that particular episode of "In Living
Colour" to fully appreciate that title. If not, it's still kind of funny,
with respect to today's game.
A new definition for
Canada's
tourist industry?
the score:
FIRST PERIOD: Pesky Barnaby keeps harassing my players . . . a very
physical period, involving a lot of players being squished into the boards.
I couldn't see the checks, but I could hear them over the radio stream . . .
*crash* *bang* *slam* Chara got into a fight during the commercial, so he
was gone for five. Not that it was a big deal. Ottawa has a helluva lot of
defensemen. Both the Rangers and the Senators seemed to be having
difficulties getting the puck out of their respective zones. Havlat had a
nice rush with
Markkanen
out of position, but his shot hit the leg of a defenseman. Hamel had a nice
rush as well, but again was unable to convert. Then Kovalev had a nice
break to the Sens net, but was taken down with a high stick to the face by
Reds. "The Rangers have a nice back-door play that involves Brian Leetch .
. . Known as a back-door expert, Brian Leetch can sneak up on you any time."
Ah, Gord Wilson, are you inferring something? Hossa shut him up shortly
thereafter, by nailing a puck that missed him by about seven inches. Yay,
Marian. What a way to kill a penalty. God, these play-by-play guys are
seriously on CRACK most days. They make too many BAAAD puns. I think for
this game, they were sitting between the two penalty boxes, as they kept
making remarks about how close the players were, and how they were making
faces at Perry Pearn across the rink. Does the MSG not have a press box?
Again with Barnaby being annoying. Hell, he almost got it in, but hit the
mesh on the OUTSIDE of the net. Go to another commercial break -- and you
learn why hockey players make bad actors . . . Havlat tried to send another
puck in the direction of the colour commentators when play resumed after the
adverts, but unfortunately, he hit the glass. Nice rush by Spezza, but he
was caught up by a stick on the ice. The puck remained in the zone,
however, and the shots were in favour of Ottawa (6-5) by the end of the
period. No scoring leading into the second . . . The Sens now have five
games in the next seven days, and they're trying really hard not to get
themselves more injured than they are now, so they're avoiding fights and
stupid penalties, as they don't want to tire their special teams. The
Rangers seemed to ignore this, however, trying to irritate the Ottawa
players as much as humanly possible, spearing Chara in the chest and Simon,
who fought Chara earlier in the first period, giving Alfie a little bit of a
rough-up. Don't piss him off -- he's little, but he can nail you good. The
Rangers played a cautious game, not wanting to have a 9-1 embarrassment on
home ice, and Ottawa did the same, not wanting to tire themselves out.
SECOND PERIOD: Reds took another penalty for hooking almost right off the
draw. Dope. Lalime made some nice saves by staying in position, and
Pothier bailed Leschyshyn out of a bad defensive move, so the penalty was
over, no damage done. Holik got a minor for unsportsmanlike conduct (I
guess he said something mean), and Ottawa went to the power play for
themselves. Against the second-worst PK in the league, one would hope
Ottawa would be successful. Redden compounded his errors of the afternoon
with a no-look pass and wasted some useful seconds. And it was like that
for the rest of the power play. Schaefer suffered an "upper body injury"
and didn't make it back to the bench. Neil got a huge check and then a
stick to the face, with no call made on the play. Simpson took issue to
this, and took on Simon in a scrum. They both go down and the fight lasted
a grand total of maybe ten seconds. They got five each. Another brilliant
period by the callup Denis Hamel. He's gonna make it someday soon . . .
More good production by the 9-21-18 line, but alas, no scoring. They seemed
to have changed the pace of the game, however, and things started to lean
Ottawa's way a little bit. No calls on some strong plays screwed up a nice
rush by the Havlat line -- again. As an aside, what's with people
firing pucks at Super-K?
It happens at least once a game. At least with today, the pucks were more
going into the audience, but still . . . Both teams tried to be too fancy,
passing instead of shooting, and that's why the score is so damned low. At
least, for Ottawa. Holik, left all alone because Hossa thought the puck was
somewhere else, put the same puck into the net behind Lalime. Then he
requested the puck. It's not like it was his first. Fifteenth of the year,
271st career. Hmm . . . milestone? Apparently, it was for
Tyutin's
first career point. Ottawa made up for it on the power play following the
goal. Chara did a trademark shot from the point from Alfredsson, and Havlat
nailed the rebound past Markkanen to tie the game at 1-1. Someone checked
Hnidy in the face, and Ottawa got another power play. Redden was strong on
the offense, getting some nice shots on net, but no conversion by the end of
the period.
THIRD PERIOD: Holik and Smolinski got offsetting slashing penalties over to
the third, and then Hossa drew another one, so Ottawa was back on the power
play -- no scoring. Holik became the pest of the third period, irritating
Mountain Man Dean with some slashing to the giant's feet. What a tool.
*CLINK* New York hit the post after a Spezza giveaway. Then there's a mess
of White, Smolinski and Leetch at the Ranger goal resulting from a chuck
from Hossa to Chara to the net, and a deflection, and it goes in. Chara got
the goal, Hossa and White the assists. Mironov knocked Spezza into
Markkanen and the goalie got angry, nailing poor Jason with his paddle.
Then Van Allen won a face-off, passed it to Leschyshyn, who passed it to
Neil, who then deflected it off Langfeld to make it 3-1. HAHA, then after
some more back and forth, Hossa nailed some dude flat, which knocked the
puck free to Havlat, who feathered a backhand to Smolinski. Smoke went top
shelf and makes it 4-1. Then Alfie got into a fight. Dope. Then the
colour dudes mixed up Hnidy and Lalime. ON CRACK. New York fans are not
pleased. Are they ever? Simon ran at Redden, and Pothier stepped in to
say, "um, no, I don't think so. I'm not bigger than you are, but I'm
annoyed." Pothier and Simon went off for the penalties. It's good that
Pothier went instead of Redden, though. Smart move by Pothier. HOWEVER:
Barnaby, the annoying goob, got a penalty shot. Man, Havlat shoulda gotten
one in the first period when some dude stuck his stick up his shirt.
Barnaby, the goob, missed, though. I think we should get Chara to beat the
shit out of him again. Sarcastic cheer from the Ranger faithful at the
final-minute-of-play announcement. *CLINK* Leetch hit the post. Aw,
shucks. Final score: OTTAWA WINS. Yeehaw.
Holy referees, Batman! If they bring back the one-referee system, leaving
three officials on the ice, maybe they'll lift the ban on the organist
playing "Three Blind Mice." Dopes. That was a boring game. Really. I
mean, listening to it is hard enough. Then they don't SCORE for nearly two periods, and it just gets DRY. Meh. At least they won.
off the ice:
Rob "Bob Vila" Ray had an interview with Dean Brown when he arrived in
Ottawa yesterday. Apparently, he's expecting his first baby. That would
explain the paunch . . . he made some good comments about the "real world"
versus the "fantasy world" of the NHL. He knows what's expected of him, so,
despite detractors saying his acquisition was a waste of money, he and the
team think the whole deal was a great idea.
Belfour's back is still bothering him, so Kidd's still in net for the Leafs.
This is a good thing for Ottawa, because Kidd sucks. Ottawa can easily
pull ahead of them in the division, as long as the Eagle remains grounded.
After working out some visa problems getting over the border, Schastlivy has
made a turnaround in Anaheim, scoring the game-winning goal last night. So
I guess this trade worked well for all concerned parties.
in other news:
Well, day one of hell week hasn't been so bad. After dealing with some
clients in the morning, I was able to lock the door for the afternoon and
listen to my hockey game. I've got my music and my books, and I'm hoping to
get something accomplished this week. I didn't really get anything done
this morning, as Jen (we had an escrow closing and she was grumpy, however)
was here and I actually had some pseudoreal work to do, and then with the
game this afternoon, I was pretty useless. I even got my ass kicked at
solitaire and freecell. *sigh* But there's always tomorrow. I'm going to
leave the game open all week, and see how much money I lose. I'm at -$696
right now. I can fight back from that, right?
Chel came at the end of the day and harassed me for a while. There was this ominous rattling at the door and we froze, waiting for the creepy whoever it was to go away. Turns out it was actually my dad. So I had to explain to him that I didn't open the door to people when I'm by myself at the office. I already had a bad experience this morning with a Jehovah's Witness, and that was while Jen was there. So you have to identify yourself when you knock.
Posted by Ally at February 16, 2004 12:00 AM
