BlueMonk

Honestly, I think there's been a lot of emotional overreaction to the game yesterday. I think 5 games is a fair suspension to McLennan. Iginla's work on Schneider was nowhere near as bad as it looked. Minor penalty? Sure. Suspension? I don't think so. The Lebda incident, I don't know. He received a clipping penalty for what he did. Langkow was hurt on the play, as was Lebda, and Langkow overreacted. It was a strange situation, with both players really unable to get up at that point. The NBC announcers went way overboard with their reactions to the stuff at the end of the game, and I think it's influenced some people here. The Flames gooned it up at the end, but I don't think it crossed the line nearly as bad as some people here do. The only non-suspension that I think is worth even discussing is Langkow's. I wish the Wings had a guy or two willing to drop the gloves. A couple of fights might have gone a long way towards eliminating the cheap shots we saw. When frustration boils over, sometimes the fights help the players get it out of their system. I expect a physical game tonight. If the Wings can win in Calgary, it will be a real statement game for them, IMO. But it's going to be very tough.

So, Stars-Canucks had a little emotion at the end of the game. Burrows takes a good chop at Morrow during a Dallas PP and does some real damage. Morrow can't even put weight on his foot, maybe a broken ankle or achilles injury? The next stop in play, Morrow literally hops on one skate towards the Vancouver bench - the look on his face just priceless - and starts throwing punches at Burrows. Cowan steps in to defend Burrows and they send both Cowan and Morrow to the showers. It looked like Green and Ott tried to go after the final horn, but the stripes came in and broke up a big scrum. Also, pretty disappointed in the passivity of Boogey in game 5. I was expecting more. Not sure if it was Lemaire who put the cuffs on him or what, but he was a non-factor and seemed to turn down a couple of dance offers. He also wasn't in the handshake line, which is pretty hard to understand.

To be fair to the Canadian media, here's The Hockey News' take on game 5. Sunday, April 22, 2007 THN PLAYOFF BUZZ: CLASSLESS CALGARY by Mike Brophy Shame on the Calgary Flames. It is one thing to uphold their tradition of being simply awful on the road this season in losing 5-1, but acting like a bunch of spoiled little brats in the final few minutes of Game 5 in Detroit was deplorable. Nobody minds a team that plays hard, even physically, in a losing cause, but the Flames deliberately tried to hurt members of the Red Wings and must be held accountable by the league. Among their many indiscretions, there was backup goalie Jamie McLennan’s three slashes on Detroit’s Johan Franzen, the third coming after the whistle when he slashed the Wing in the midsection. McLennan was brought into the game to replace starter Miikka Kiprusoff, who had to go back in after his backup was rightfully ejected. Then there was Calgary captain Jarome Iginla butt-ending Detroit’s Mathieu Schneider and then cross-checking him. Iginla was only called for the cross-check, but TV replays clearly showed the butt-end. We’ll see how the NHL handles this one. Two questions immediately spring to mind: Why the heck was Iginla on the ice in the first place? And what was Calgary coach Jim Playfair thinking? Maybe he should change his name to Playdirty. The Flames are a very good hockey team, but they showed no class in losing on Saturday. GOOD START The Flames actually had a decent start to Game 5. Defenseman Dion Phaneuf hit the post while his team held a 5-on-3 man advantage and Matthew Lombardi missed on a first period breakaway. DAN THE MAN Detroit’s Dan Cleary, who has been a very important player for the Red Wings thus far in the playoffs, particularly in the physical department, had an interesting afternoon. First he scored on a penalty shot after being hauled down on a breakaway while killing a penalty. Then he tripped and fell head first into the boards and appeared, at first, to be seriously injured. Thankfully he was OK. Calgary defenseman Mark Giordano took no mercy on Cleary, ramming him hard into the boards late in the second period. OLD MAN SHINES Detroit defenseman Chris Chelios, 45, became the oldest defenseman in NHL history to score a shorthanded goal when he connected at 10:54 of the second period. It was his 31st career playoff goal. Chelios played 15:50 and was plus-1, taking 24 shifts. WHY BOTHER? You have to wonder how it will affect the two teams, having to fly to Calgary to play Game 6 on Sunday. The way the Flames play at home, why not just give them Game 6 and play Game 7 in Detroit? CAN YOU SAY NORRIS? The only Red Wings goal Nicklas Lidstrom didn’t assist on was Cleary’s penalty shot tally. He was easily the game’s best player taking 36 shifts for 26 minutes and 26 seconds of ice time. OUCH! Not exactly sure what Calgary defenseman Brad Stuart will be looking for in terms of salary as an unrestricted free agent this summer, but he has sure been exposed as not a No. 1 or No. 2 defenseman in this series. FLY AIR BURT Dion Phaneuf is a tough kid who will one day win the Norris Trophy as the NHL's best defenseman. But when he decided to take on Detroit's Todd Bertuzzi late in Game 5, he looked like a little boy fighting a man. Bertuzzi flipped him onto the ice like he was a bag of feathers. - Mike Brophy

HC, Barring anything out of the ordinary (and with all the tests you've had, you can rest easy that it's not), it's just a matter of calories in vs. calories out. Dieting pretty much just boils down to that. It's a pain in the butt, but if you really want to adjust your weight, it's hard to beat writing down everything you eat each day, and figuring out how many calories you're consuming daily. You might be surprised how much that fluctuates. When you're busy and stressed, you may eat much less (or much more). The rule of thumb is this: For every 3,500 calories you eat, that's about a pound of body weight. Say you write down what you're eating (and pay attention to serving sizes, they can be deceptively big or small sometimes!) and find you eat 2,000 kcals/day on average. To stay at the weight you're at, you'd continue to eat that much. Basically, you're body is burning the same number of calories you're eating (caloric balance). To gain a pound a week, you'd add 500 kcals to your diet each day, which would mean 2,500 calories. To lose a pound a week, you'd subtract 500 kcals/day, or 1,500 per day. The other factor is exercise. If you burn more calories, you can lose weight that way. You could add an exercise that burns 200 calories each day, subtract 300 calories from your daily intake, and achieve the same thing. You shouldn't try to lose or gain weight much faster than 1 pound per week. Especially when you're trying to lose weight, you can easily push your body into catabolism, where you're burning muscle rather than fat, if you try to do it too fast. What you eat matters, too, especially when it comes to whether the weight you're gaining or losing is muscle or fat. But in terms of your total body weight, it's pretty much down to how much you eat.

Awesome.

I have no gripes with the VS coverage. They were pretty bush league last year, but the improvements have been huge. I've really gained a new respect for Bill Clement. He's clearly the face of VS hockey coverage, and he's been all over the radio talking on XM and even the local stations discussing the NHL. He's a very good ambassador for them. The complaints about VS have more to do with the coverage the NHL isn't getting on ESPN, but the way they've handled the NHL this season has been pretty good.

I edited the title to put the quote in the correct context.

No question the Flames have improved by leaps and bounds. One minor quibble, though: the stats do, indeed, lie when it comes to hits. Those are kept by the home arena and are notoriously unreliable. The coaching staff keeps hit totals and if we had access to those, we'd have a much more honest appraisal of which team was outhitting which. As for the rest, yeah, there's a story being told by the numbers for sure.

Special teams, special teams, special teams. That's it, right there. You see the Flames blocking shots on their PK? That's playoff hockey.

Is everyone confident the Wings are going to advance past this round? I'm not. But if they get to round 2, I'd rather they play Nashville. Why? Because San Jose is freaking scary, as we're seeing in this Nashville series. Remember, going into this series, people were questioning the Sharks? Granted, a lot of those people were Nashville homers, but still. I heard things about how the Preds had a 3-1 season series edge. Well, as you're seeing, that's not a reliable predictor of playoff success. The Sharks have big, strong forwards who have great hands. They've got very good goaltending. It's just a balanced team. When their top line is out there, it's almost impossible to stop. The Predators look like little kids riding the Sharks piggy back trying to slow them down. San Jose is a very difficult team to face. The Preds tried to take the series in the alley, and it helped them win a game. But the Sharks have smartened up and they're leaving that stuff alone now, just playing hockey. I'd love to see Nashville come back. With 2 of 3 at home, it's possible. Teams in this position, down 3-1 but with home ice advantage, have done it many times. The Preds would be a tough opponent for the Wings, too. But the Sharks? Terrifying.

Yeah, has anyone seen Brodeur in the playoffs? He's let in some howlers, arguably a bad goal in every game of that series so far. Hell, Kiprusoff would like to have a couple back in this series. That Datsyuk goal in game 2 was one that WIngs fans would have gone ballistic about if it was scored against one of their goaltenders.

Awesome. Gives me chills.

San Jose's power play looks like sh**. This game is ripe for Nashville's picking. They're being beaten on the ice like an ECHL team, but they're only down one goal. And San Jose failed to convert a 5 on 3, which is the kiss of death.

Yeah, Lilja deserves praise. I've been really critical of him, and I think justifiably so, most of this season. But in this series thus far, he's played great. Mathieu Schneider, too. He's a veteran and I was concerned about age being a big liability on the blue line. It's too early to say they're out of the woods, because the playoffs are a long grind and the older players will have their stamina tested. But so far, I've seen none of the laziness he exhibited so often during the regular season. Samuelsson, on the other hand, sucks. Einstein argued that there are no instant actions in nature. Well, Einstein never saw Samuelsson shoot the instant the puck touches his stick, in any and all situations, from anywhere on the ice, no matter how clogged the shooting lane or how bad the angle. Newton wins.

Well, the Wings have played perfect hockey against the Flames so far. Mike Babcock deserves a lot of credit. He's forged a great gameplan against Calgary, and the Flames have not adjusted properly yet. If not for Kiprusoff, these games would have been complete blowouts on the scoreboard. Babs is outcoaching Playfair, plain and simple. Now the Flames need to regroup and let their home ice help them out. 2-0 is not a lead that gives me any real confidence. Calgary wins game 3 and this series really changes. If the Wings play the same way they did in these two games, there's no reason they shouldn't be able to have success in Calgary. But they're not going to outshoot the Flames 50-15 or whatever the tally was today. Lidstrom's work on Iginla has been spectacular, eh? Amazing what Nick does without really playing a physical brand of hockey. I don't know if there's a historical precedent for what he does in the NHL. Nick is unique. The young players are really, really stepping up. Filppula and Franzen, especially. And Datsyuk! I told you guys he'd get it together in the playoffs this year.

Don't expect that to change, either. He has the physical tools to be exactly the kind of player who dominates in the playoffs, it just doesn't make any sense. Heart of a bunny rabbit.

What will happen? This was timothy1997's poll. I couldn't fix it, Timothy, I had to post a new one. Sorry!

I hope the Wings do try to get in the face of Kipper. Not to knock the guy out or seriously injure him, but to let him know they're not afraid to go to the net and to keep the Flames and Kipper himself on guard against it. You can't have their goalie feeling freakin' invincible out there. Get it in his head and try to keep it there. They don't have to go all Nashville** on him and try to injure him by constantly crashing into him with lots of dirty hits, stickwork, elbows and knees to his face. Just let him know they're around is all. ** Just having a little fun with the Nashville fans. I'm kidding!

Hahahaha. Jiggy, you're instantly one of my favorite LGW members.

Re: ticket sales, I was listening to Karsch and Gator today and they were discussing how this game likely would not sell out. They scoped the rest of the league, and the Wings have the 2nd highest "lowest price" tickets of all the playoff teams. In other words, if you compare the cheapest tickets in every arena, the Wings charge the 2nd most (I think Vancouver was 1st). The Wings cheapest seats are $63 for round 1. In Dallas, you can get them for something like $13.

Very good win in game 1. The Wings countered the Flames' physical game very well by doing a lot of hitting of their own. Calgary was terrible, just didn't show up at all, although some of that was Detroit's play. Datsyuk scoring a goal was big, Zetterberg looked pretty good and the Wings shut down Iginla. Glad to see the Wings answering the physical bell, including running Kiprusoff. That wasn't even remotely an injurious play, but they showed they're not afraid to get their hands dirty.

This is a bit silly. San Jose can take care of itself just fine in the physicality department. Nashville isn't going to intimidate them.

He's knocked at least two Wings goalies out of games, one on a stretcher. They may have all both Legace, come to think of it. His hit on Jiri Fischer ended his season. Cheechoo. Going by memory, I believe he put Martin St. Louis, Naslund and Pavol Demitra (when he played for the Blues) out of games, although not for an extended time. I would love to see a list, though. That's a lot of players who somehow get hurt when he's doing the hitting.

Crisp obviously understands hockey. I think what irritates fans of teams (besides Nashville) about the Nashville crew is the homerism. But cripes, I can't get too worked up about that. They may be worse than some, but they're not as bad as others. Wings fans just pay more attention to Nashville and notice it more. The Altitude crew is way, way, way worse. They're an embarrassment to the game. The Nashville guys aren't even close to that bad.