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Two postgame thoughts: The other team is allowed to improve. There's no point sighing about how game 2 was different from game 1. Assuming Boston wouldn't be able to come up with a better effort in game 2 just isn't realistic. Howard didn't have a very good game, but the loss wasn't all on him -- or even mostly on him. If he had allowed 2 goals in each of the first two games, on the road against the #1 seed, he'd have a better GAA, and would have demonstrated consistency on the road, and the wings would be down 2-zip. If you score 2 goals in 2 games on the road against the 1-seed, and you go back home with a split, that's kind of incredible. Credit to Howard for stealing one. Now, it's up to the rest of the team to figure out how to win a game *without* needing Howard to steal it.

Howard's never been very good at handling the puck, so a play like this shouldn't be entirely too surprising, like the guy or not. It's a weakness of his game, and all goalies have weaknesses. It was a terrible play and utterly atrocious timing for such a play, but if you liked the guy before and this is the only reason you're bent out of shape now, you either haven't been paying too close of attention or you'll get over it. I suspect the latter. As said, he's never been known to be too hot at handling the puck, but he does many other things well a lot of the time. He's not perfect as we've seen through this regular season, but he was great in game 1, had some great moments in this game, and in the end, we absolutely didn't lose this game because of that play. I wouldn't even call it momentum turning. What was momentum turning, if you can even call it that this early, is when we kept taking stupid penalties and getting rattled by Boston's physical game. That is what lost this game for us. If we can stay composed and stay out of the box and use our speed against Boston to draw penalties, we can beat them. If we lose our cool and give Boston too many power play opportunities, we're toast, and bad or great, Howard's play won't end up being the factor that changes the outcome of the series. Don't get me wrong, he needs to be on his A-Game no doubt to keep us in it, but it won't be enough to overcome Boston if the rest of the guys lose their cool and play into Boston's game.

Tootoo vs Chara

Chara is a punk. If he did anything, Brendan should have ripped that C off his sweater. Props to the kid for standing up for himself. Sad he's the one that is having to do it after being run for 2 games straight. Reminds me of that play earlier this year where he got run and had to get up and go after the guy himself, then he got a cross check and the other guy got a dive. Can't remember who it was off hand. Bruins played the harder game today, but it makes me sick to see them running around at our guys, charging guys from across the ice and getting their elbows up on almost every hit...and getting away with it. Then to have to listen to Olzcyk defend it.

Pretty funny how chara acts tough until a guy like Tatar leans on him and he dives...

Howard's opening gaffe really set the tone. The 2nd one was weak, but the Bruins were camping out in front of the net and our D wasn't clearing s***. We desperately miss Zetterberg and Ericsson. I don't like how the Bruins beat us up tonight and rubbed it in our faces, Smith should've Bobby Clarked Chara when he had the chance that big f*** lurch. We are very much alive in this series, and Boston laughing at us today should piss the Wings off to no end going into Game 3. Babs needs to change the lines, gotta get the kid line back together, gotta get Nyquist some help, and if Alfie is hurt take his old ass out. He was ******* horrible today, doesn't look like a guy looking for a Cup, he looks like Sammy.

Franzen needs to start playing or be bought out. He is not worth the cap hit for the 25 games a season he shows up for. The rest he brings nothing to the team. He can't live off the playoffs anymore as he now has just as many bad ones as he has good. Sent from my Nexus 10 using Tapatalk

Alfy has been terrible

For god's sakes give Datsyuk some decent linemates. Franzen and Abs? My god what a joke.

Really need Mule to produce. Someone kick the ass in the ass.

From the HFBoards...

He's been good down the stretch until this game. Is Quick below average then since he's let in 12 goals in 2 games?

Thanks to drum for the cap.

I like Alfie a lot, actually, if Z and Datsyuk are healthy, he's on the top line with them. I just don't think that he fits with what I was trying to do there, unless we're to give Franzen the boot (PLEASEEEEE)

After watching this video last night, even the Bruins announcer is yelling at the players to get up and that they are embarrassing pointing out 6'8" Chara dropping like a sack of potatoes. I chuckled and said watch little Tater is going to 'take' Chara down. Couldn't believe when it happened and he got the penalty. I've rewatched that play a couple times and Chara totally embellished that, even held Taters stick. No way a guy that big falls apart like that. Chumps.

About Howard - he made a really weird comment yesterday, something to the effect of "You don't really know how it's gonna go until you're in the game. Maybe you have a good night, maybe you don't. You never know." Does kinda make me wonder about him a bit.

Well, our GM likes to overripe players. That means more Lashoff and Kindl, and less of guys who are better than them.

Say it with me everyone... SEVEN-GAME-SERIES. We made the playoffs with two games to spare, the Bruins clinched weeks prior. We are going back home with the series tied 1-1. If this team has proven anything this season it's that they can step up in big moments and win games they shouldn't win. There was some clutch play out of this same team not weeks ago when it came down to making it this far or not. We might win, we might lose, but we made it this far, and we are facing a tied series now. There's zero reason to jump ship at this point if you have stuck it out all year and seasons prior.

2nd goal sneaked through five hole when he thought he had it covered and 4th goal was him not controlling the rebound or able to cover. Just a terrible game by him.

That was more on Smith than Howard.

credit to Abdelkader for charging towards the cage....forced the D to stay with him and allowed Datsyuk to have more room to the outside to use the screen

From CamFan81 @ HFBoards,

Billboard on 1-65 in nashville,Classy move by the preds

How are we supposed to measure whether Howard is any good if you don't compare him to other goalies?? For being a discussion board you Mods sure hate discussion taking place. I don't really know what you guys want. Should we start a goalie comparison thread, one which will inevitably lead to Howard being discussed. Then we would have TWO Howard threads! Or would it be reasonable to discuss that in this thread? You know, the one specifically about Howard.