SaucyJack

Mariners score! They score…er… make that Marner. Sorry. Marner makes it 1-0 Leafs about 2/3 of the way thru period two.

Two close calls in the past two minutes but no Two-ronto luck.

Maple Leaf radio guys giving true confessions midway through period one. Well, both frankly admitted how terrible the Leafs have been on home ice in recent playoffs history… …and then of course how that must change. BIG GAME tonight, therefore…more than just who takes a 2-1 edge.

Furious 6-on-5 at the end, but no score. A respectable result but Caps lose both MSG tilts.

4-3! Tom Wilson seems to tip Hendrix Lapierre’s blue-line shot past Shesterkin.

Lazy play from Ovechkin leads to an odd man short-handed rush and the 4-2 Ranger lead late in period two.

A Jack Roslovic super-snipe high short side on the pp put the RAGamuffins back up 3-2.

Dylan Strome wakes up, rushes to the net on the PP, and tips the ol’ biscuit into the basket for 2-2. Blimey.

Mika Zibanejad wiiiiide open on the Rag power play for the 2-1 lead. (Interesting that he actually hails from the country of Zibanejad, nestled amongst neighbors and once Soviet Union provinces Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan.)

Four careless (maybe skill-less) Caps giveaways in just 1 minute of power play time. NYR with a good short handed chance. Fer crissakes.

Strome with a great chance. No dice. (At least people are aware he is in the lineup unlike Sunday’s game.)

Vincent Trochek’s tying goal, beautiful tip redirection, like buttah…

Well well well well well. Caps lead in Game 2. McMichael.

A sad night in the Hamptons, I reckon.

Surely the world must End soon.

Leafs’ radio analyst may need to administer CPR on his PxP partner.

Matthews…tremendous move! Made the Leafs’ announcer happy…

Long drive today with a late start…so I listened to Maple Leaf radio via SiriusXM for the first two periods. Now back home only to find the ESPN announcers so BORING! (Compared to the Toronto PxP guy, so now I’ve got that synched with my TV video but audio muted. Ha! go leafs…

We’ll have to liven things up, then, eh? Who knew how complicated this was? https://montrealgazette.com/opinion/watchwords-origin-of-the-term-canuck-lies-in-an-unlikely-place Not the first term, meant as disparagement in some cases, to be embraced by the objects of such scorn. As a kid, when Buffalo and Vancouver entered the league, I’d never heard the word pronounced. I’d think or say ‘KAY-nuck’. It was months before I heard the Blackhawks announcers utter ‘cuh-NUCK’. Oh! P.S. The article also explains where ‘Canada’ aka ‘Kanata’ comes from. Who knew? (In USA anyhoo…) P.P.S. KAY-nuks win!

That convention was better for live fans, especially season ticket holders. More color variety over the campaign if the visitors wear their color (“dark”) gear. As a kid, the convention was as now…great for TV viewers when (as for Chicago) only road games were televised, so you saw the different colored jerseys of the opposition. I liked that. So since the days of Orr, Esposito, Beliveau, Howe, Hull, et al, the convention changed (good for Winnipeg White)…then changed back.

I’m aware that ’Winnipeg White’ is a crowd tradition up there…would the NHL allow the Jets players to also don white jerseys (and the visitors dark) against convention? Doesn’t make full sense to me, as it stands.

ESPN announcers emphasized how ineffective Ovechkin was. But I’d say the same for Dylan Strome: I can barely remember them saying his name.

Nice move by Kreider to juuust beat Lindgren’s pads for the 4-1 nightcap goal; makes up for his bad short-handed attempt earlier, I guess. Well, let’s see what young Spencer Carbery pulls out of his Coaching Hat for Game Two on Tuesday Night.

Sean McDonough on ESPN just said it about the young Capitals players on the ice this afternoon: winning the Calder Cup is one thing; the Stanley Cup another…

Horrid shot from Kreider on the glorious Ranger short-handed chance.