nossagog

Hey its work the past few years . . . . . . oh wait, never mind.

Sami, I'm glad that at least someone has finally understood that special relationship the Pens have with our Uncle Gary besides us Pens fans. And because of that, the Pens, and their fans, really don't care who we face. Uncle Gary will take care of us no matter who we face.

Come ONNNNNNNN Flyers. I'm rooting for a Flyers/Pens matchup in round 2. Not because I think that it benefits the Pens in any way, but the sheer animosity between the two teams would come out at the drop of the opening faceoff in Game 1 and continue throughout the series. THAT is what playoff hockey is about, surviving series like this.

Polaris, I was actually chuckling in game 5, he almost NEVER went back for a puck, no matter where it was. I think DFB put a tight leash on him.

Do you think Elliot will stay around either. They obviously don't have faith in him, and he probably wants to be a start somewhere, and has numbers that say he can.

Doc, I don't think you'll find many that are going to bash you. Even those who used to support Ovie, including Caps fans(go to one of their sites), have just about given up on Ovie. Curley Boudreau(Jack Adams award winner) tried to change him, failed and got canned. Hunter tried, failed, and got canned. Oates tried, failed and got canned. His team is on its 8 starting goaltender since he came into the league, good luck Jaroslav They've tried the wide open offense, scored lots of goals, lost early in playoffs They've tried to play tighter defense, goal production down, lost early in playoffs(and now missed the playoffs) New Coaches, no change. Different styles of play, no change. Change team mates, no change. The common thing, Ovie's still there, and will be there as long as he's putting cans in the seat. My biggest criticism of Ovie is and always has been that he's a self centered player who thinks only of himself and scoring goals. I used to get bashed on other sites, since I was a Pens fan, I was only criticizing The Great 8 because I was jealous that he was better than Crosby. Yep, he's better at scoring goals, and that's it. Other players who came in at the same time as Ovie have improved their games, especially in areas that they were lacking. Ovie has not. He's not tried to get better at defense, backchecking, blocking shots, heck, has he EVER taken a faceoff. He has become SO one dimensional, he's almost not even effective at 5v5 any longer. His game has gotten WORSE. He's becoming the highest paid power play specialist ever in NHL history. Team Captain? His comments after he was criticized about not getting back on defense on the game winning goal against coming down the stretch was telling. He said, "Well other players didn't come back either". Really, not many players would try to deflect blame somewhere else, let alone a team captain. I just can't see how the Caps can get rid of him. That contract is so restrictive, what team would take him. It would have to be a team that consistently spends to the cap, which would be a perennial cup competitor. But those teams also have good management who see Ovie in a much different light than most. They are in the business of building "teams", not individual stats. Its a shame really, he was one of the most exciting players in the league, and the Caps were such an offensive juggernaut at one point. But IMHO, he has been the biggest reason for the Caps downturn. I just don't see it turning around until he's gone, but will the fans stay afterwards or through this if they can't make the playoffs.

Cute, loved him droppin the gloves at the end.

I'm NOT defending Fleury on this, he should have played that with his body behind it just in case. But . . . Watch the play unfold. I think it was Scuderi and Adams whose guys skated right past them in on the puck. The Jackets were going to get there first. Those two FORCED the issue for Fleury to play by not getting near the puck first, or at least at the same time and tie the Jackets up. That's totally unacceptable with less than a minute in a one goal game. Where was the hustle from them. Were they surprised that the Jackets played the puck deep? I would have rather seen them play the 1-3-1 with the sweeper at that point.I'd have had my players.going back HARD to get that puck out. If you don't want to, I'll find someone else. Again, not releasing the blame from Fleury, but there's more to be spread around than just him.

Canoli, it's a 'burgh thing. He did NOT try to "Pitchfork" it, he tried to poke it with his "Pickle Stabber". Yinz are going to have to take a refresher in Pittsburghesse.

B21 is really Doc Emrick in disguise. Next thing you'll be doing B, is talking about how the Pens new strategy is to bunt the puck deep into the endzone so the Pens fore check can blitz the Blue Jackets fullbacks. Start practicing the cross sports analogies.

Terrified? of what. That a team that we root for, not that we play for, may lose games and get eliminated from the playoffs? Not me. I'm more terrified of the coming credit crisis as the fed raises interest rates. They can't keep printing money to pay for everything for ever. Hockey? dude, its just a game, and we're not even playing it. Get a life.

Actually, the make up call on the third penalty was the bogus dive on Kunitz which nullifed the slash, the interference call a minute later was just icing on the cake. But the Pens have no one to blame but themselves. DFG put them in a defensive shell, they backed into their own zone and left open the neutral zone. They helped create pressure that the Jackets kept on them. Any time you do that, you are going to take those penalties. It was the laziness on the Dubinsky goal had me. TWO jackets went hard at the puck on the dump in and skated right past Scuderi and Adams so that Fleury felt the need to play the puck. If either of them gets to the puck first, this doesn't happen.

Well I don't thing that their going to start Zatkoff in goal now. Looking at the games, he's actually played well except for the end of game 4. He has been horrendous playing the puck behind the net all his career. He should know better. Is it in his head now? Probably, Its easy to blame him for this one, but it was a team effort to lay back and allow the jackets to dictate the game as they did. This is classic DFB at its worst.

Ya know, in the back of my head I always knew this, because I know that getting the hook would affect your GAA. But I guess in my mind, over a season, with a max of 5 extra mins of OT, it didn't matter, and it was almost equivilant to per game. But with a limited number of games in the Playoffs, one of which was a 3OT game, I was shocked at the difference

Baseball? What is this thing you call baseball?

Wow, for as long as I've watched hockey, I've never really thought about how they calculated the GAA statistic for goaltenders. I just assumed, that is was the average per game played. But as I was perusing stats today, I noticed that Ryan Miller's GAA was 1.88. I thought to myself, "Self, (that's what I call myself when talking to myself), how can his GAA be 1.88 when he has given up 7 goals in 3 games? ". The math didn't add up. Well of course it doesn't when you see that GAA is calculated on minutes of playing time averaging the goals against vs the minutes played/60. In the regular season that doesn't really matter much. But in the playoffs, when you have a three overtime game, those 3 goals you gave up just became a 1.5 GAA. After all these years of watching, I didn't know that. Huh, I guess I don't know as much as I thought. (By the way, you can ask my wife, she would probably agree)

Joe, not defending him, because he was a douche, but you know that the hit I think you're refering to was not what ruined Neely's career, This particular hit? Simply wreckless and unnecessary. With his "history", he's going down for a few games.

This is probably the biggest difference between now and the FInals years. Our third line had an identity. Kennedy/Staal/Cooke. It was always together, it never changes. Today, it change every game, and several times during the game. This is why I cringe whenever I see our third and fourth lines on the ice, they get dominated.

Yeah, he did it again last night, Bennet starts on line one, then he's gone, Stempniak is on line one. And what was with the end of the game. With a one goal lead, the forwards are Stempniak, Adams and Sutter. So that's One from the First(or first at the moment), one from the third and one from the fourth. Key time in the game, and he mixes lines. Do we HAVE a checking line?

@B21 My problem with #7 is the whole consistancy thing. If you are constantly IN GAME changing lines, it causes confusion. Players need to know their linemates. As much as we I always make fun of Dupuis because of his mediocre skills, it didn't matter because he/Sid/Kunitz knew where each other were going to be. With the injuries this year, DFB has never stood pat with a 1st, 3rd ot 4th line. The only one that has stayed the same has been Geno's line. On the game winner Saturday, he had Jokinen with Stempniak and Sutter, they never play together as a unit. I understand that we lost Gibbons during the game. But that should have been a single move to put someone up on Sid's line, like Stempniak, NOT Vitalle? Its just so confusing watching sometimes, it has to confusing to the players too.

Okay, here are the keys I see it to the game tonight. 1) First off, I want to see Derek Engellend in the line up on the fourth line. We need a more physical presence there. And what I would also like to see is for him to pepper Dubinsky with the same fervor as Dubinsky had been peppering Crosby. Crosby has held his cool so far with some of the stuff that's going on, need to help him out a little more though. 2) Easy in, Easy out. Stop trying to skate through all the Jackets forecheck, its not working. Get the puck out of the zone, cross center ice, and have speed and numbers to dump and retrieve. Don't allow them the easy counter. 3) Shot the damn puck, get to the damn net. Don't pass up shot oppurtunities trying to force one timers, especially on the power play. And stop the cross ice saucer passes throught he middle. And let's clog up the net mouth for some rebound oppurtunities. You can't get a rebound if everyone is along the perimeters. 4) Crisp passes. Too many lazy passes are causing 50/50 pucks at our offensive blue line, leading to things like short handed oppurtunities. Stop the stupid weak drop passes. If the point man can't handle the pass, so be it. But we can't keep giving up odd man rushes because of lazy plays. 5) Just stay out of the box, on the stupid stuff after the whistle. Chris Kunitz, I'm talking to YOU. Let it go after the whistle, especially in their barn. 6) Keep the pedal to the metal. Game 2 turned due to laziness after they built a lead. 100% from puck drop to final horn, THIS IS THE PLAYOFFS! Step up Sid, say something. 7) Tell DFB the game has been moved to a neutral site, in California, and drive him to the airport. Then hopefully we'll have some constancy in the lines instead of the typical forward merry-go-round. Doesn't seem like too much to ask for.

The problem is, this is what will be shown on ESPN as a "highlight" since they don't care about hockey. I guess a slot needs to be added to the wheel of justice, if its a bruin, skip it.

Okay so this is like three spears to the nads and a two handed slash behind the play by players already in this playoff season, and I've only watched about 7 of the games. I can't say that I've seen as much of this kind of thing in the playoffs in prior years. If the officials are not seeing this, the league needs to step in with more than pocket change as a penalty. This is embarrassing. This is when we want the game to shine, not look like a group of thugs on ice. There is no need for this in the game, none, its not even close to a hockey play, and its what gives our game a bad name. All you need to do is ask, what was Lucic's intent. The only intent here is to make the other player hurt, period. Maybe I'm being over the top, but this is the kind of thing that makes me very angry, and makes me lose respect for players and teams. Not that I have much left for Boston, as this is what they do. If someone did this to a Boston player, Curley would have gone balistic in an interview about cheap and dirty play. Sorry, rant over.

They need to have a little more urgency on the PP, and get the puck to the front of the net. RIght now, we're totally a perimeter passing team, and the passes through the middle are the whole cause of the chances the other way. The only chances were getting are from point shots. Work the puck behind the net, get bodies in front, and jam away. They don't have to be pretty to count.

Canoli, you can see ALL 5 pens players in the frame around the net, and no one picked up Calvert. Just unexcusable