Packer487

I am. Call me a Negative Nelly, but I don't think we win this series. I'd love to be proven wrong. The key is that we absolutely HAVE to stay out of the penalty box. Their power play will destroy us.... -Tim

F---, f---, f---, f---, f---, f---, f---, f---, f---, f---, f---, f---, f---, f---, f---. -Tim

Turco's on the bench, about 1:15 to go, faceoff in Vancouver end. Dallas Timeout. C'monnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnn Dallas! -Tim

This sucks....c'mon Dallas! -Tim

s***. Creepy Sedin. 1-1. -Tim

Not gonna lie, I love these in-game interviews that the networks have started doing. -Tim

My new routine: Home Games: Red Holmstrom jersey Away Games: White Doug Brown jersey Days when the Pistons and Wings are playing: White Billups jersey (not because I love them more, but the Homer jersey just wasn't working for the road games so I had to switch it up). Plus 2 of my friends from home and I have to start an AIM chat and rant about the game. 2-0 with that. I'm 7-0 in the seven completed series thusfar. The good news is that I picked Dallas.... -Tim

I had the same feeling! As soon as Mule pulled it to the center of the ice I just knew he was going to score. Crazy how that works sometimes.... -Tim

I think I took 2 of my girlfriend's cat's 9 lives away when we scored. I just yelled "YAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA" and Petey literally jumped 2 feet in the air, then booked out of the room. It was effing hilarious. That's for the slash, *******. Mule had 5 points and was +7. Yikes. -Tim

Shhhhhhhh! No jinxing stuff! The Flames are obviously going to score! They're going to score, they're going to score, they're going to score. -Tim

If that's true, Langkow is definitely suspended.... Someone on another board said that CBC's feed had a good look at the butt-end by Iginla. Did anyone see that? It wasn't clear on NBC's shot, but i wouldn't be shocked a bit if that's what he did. -Tim

Quotes from players (love Hasek's!) per ESPN: "It doesn't belong in hockey," said Franzen, who said the slash shocked him more than it hurt. "I think the league will take a look at a few things that happened," Zetterberg said. "It was really about getting some fights going at that point to keep our energy up and carry some anger into the next game," Douchebag McCocksucker (a.k.a. Iginla) said with several new stitches over his left eye. "We're not going away." "I was really disappointed. Not a little, but a lot," Hasek said. "Their goalie, what he did and Iginla, he's the captain of the team and should be in charge. Those last 5 or 6 minutes if you were watching on TV, I think it was sort of disappointing." -Tim

Melrose just said McLennan shouldn't be suspended. What an effing tool. -Tim

Suspension for this game should be: Iginla for butt-ending. Usually an automatic suspension but they won't do anything to him. He's a waste of talent. Too good of a player to goon it up like that. Langkow should be suspended for that sucker-punch to Lebda. McLennan will be suspended for that hatchet job on Franzen. And it should be LONG. Playfair should be suspended for putting McLennan in the game to do that. I'm sorry, there's no way the backup goalie does that on his own 30 seconds after he comes into the game. Playfair put out a hit on our player, John Chaney style, and as someone else said, strangely enough it's the only player that can be suspended with no impact on the team.. It's an embarassment to the game of hockey. They need to investigate it. That came from the top. And these refs should be done for a) that call on Maltby, b) losing complete control of this game. They call 5 and a game on Langkow and none of this happens. Instead, they let him get away with a blatant sucker punch. It's a joke. My bet: Langkow and McLennan are suspended. McLennan has to be, and if they suspend Langkow the league will be able to get away without suspending Iginla--who you KNOW they don't want to miss the next game. Wow, Melrose just said that call on Maltby was a "good call" -Tim

That had to come from Playfair. You don't put the backup goalie in and have him snap like that 30 seconds after he comes in. There's no way. That was a hit, John Chaney style. And this is all the refs fault. Give Langkow 5 and a game and none of this happens. -Tim

Holmstrom hit him from behind? WTF is Maguire talking about? That was right in the shoulder.... -Tim

THE PUCK DON'T LIE!!!! What a move! I'm really happy that our penalty kill looks like they know what the hell they're doing for the first time in this series.... -Tim

Penalty shot!!! They got one right!!! C'mon Danny. -Tim

Do either of them count? Awesome! Miss the call on Zyuzin and then call us for something. Why not. Seriously, why am I watching this game....we know who the refs want to win. -Tim

Tim Hardaway hates these refs. Schneider: Stop shooting the puck into people's shin pads when you're the last man back. Datsyuk: Sack up you fricken sissy Euro. Hasek: Refs: Lick my nuts. Flip: Lift the puck next time buddy. Overall not too bad. We should be up 1-0 right now (at least) and with a little luck we could've pushed 2 in (of course, I guess they could've as well). Hasek's on his game today...we're still running around in our own end a little too much, but if the refs will get off their knees (get it? Since they're blowing the game? ) we've got a pretty darn good shot in this one.... -Tim

That is part of it too. But at the same time, look at the goalies that we've had to face over the last few years: Kipper--One of the very best in the game...he's not a guy you want to see in the first round Roloson--Got hot and took the Oilers to the Finals Kipper--Took the Flames to the Finals Vokoun--We all know that he's pretty great Giguere--Took the Ducks to the Finals We've had some pretty bad luck with the draws. Though, part of it is that the goalies in the West are very, very strong as a group. Much better than the guys out East IMO. -Tim

Lebda should be on the other point. When you look at him as a player: World class speed, good shot, jumps into the play, good passer, average on defense you know what TSN or Hockeysfuture would write about him? "Power Play Specialist". I've always been against forwards playing the point. I understand the reasoning, but I've honestly never seen it be all that effective. Michigan tried it a bunch this season too with Cogliano and it never worked. Forwards just aren't used to the positioning, they're not used to being responsible for holding the puck in, they don't know when to step and when to drop out, etc. There was one play tonight where we won a faceoff, and it softly rolled to about 3 strides in from the blueline and Samuelsson was caught in no man's land because he didn't know if he should come get it or not. Any defenseman on our team would've known that he could go get it safely, but Samuelsson didn't. Then he panicked and threw it across the zone and it came out anyway. Lebda would be great on the PP. There'd be one less person on the ice too....so there'd be less resistance for him cruising in 5th gear up into the zone. I don't get it. I thought Babs did a nice job tonight. The changes he made to the lines worked even strength. The problem is that our power play is lifeless and our PK absolutely blows. I can't figure that one out....Too much talent on this team for the special teams to be that bad. Oh and our top line is invisible. Datsyuk scored his 2 goals, so he met his quota for the next 5 playoffs. I'm not ready to make my "I'm sure glad we signed him for $50 million" crack just yet, but the jokes are running through my head. Quick suggestion for a fix: Move Bertuzzi up to the top line. If we're dumping and chasing, we need a big body to go in the corner and get the puck. Holmstrom can muck and grind, he just can't skate. Bert is looking more and more comfortable, he can play in front of the net like Homer, but he's more talented overall. I'm sick of the same old s*** happening every season. We run into a team that squeaked into the playoffs, but they've got a hot goalie of course, and they force us to dump and chase and we can't do it. And yet we still outshoot the hell out of them, but their goalie has like a 95 save percentage and it ends up being much harder than it should be. Why the hell don't we practice this stuff during the year? I know they love being a puck possession team, but teams don't let us play that way in the playoffs. So lose 5 or 6 more games in the regular season but try stuff out so that when it gets to playoff time we have a clue what the hell we're doing. And yet, honestly, the series is probably where I thought it'd be right now. I picked the Wings in 6, so obviously I had them winning game 6 in Calgary--but losing 2 games elsewhere. So what are the two most likely games for us to lose? Both of the road games. And yet, I'm beyond aggravated. And it pisses me off yet again that we're not in the East, because all those teams with the exception of Buffalo suck. All of them. It'd sure be nice to be the #1 seed and get to face a team like the Islanders once in awhile. Or get a team like the Thrashers in the first round. Fricken Western Conference..... By the way, anyone who wants to see the Wings win the Cup this year needs to be rooting for Dallas to win that series vs. Vancouver, because there's no way in hell that we're beating San Jose, but I think Anaheim can take care of them for us......This PK against San Jose would be really, really ugly. -Tim

To be fair, saying "playing some of their best playoff hockey since 2002" ain't saying a whole lot. They're still fine. We're in good shape if for no other reason than Calgary absolutely blows on the road. But the PP and PK are definite concerns in the future, if we advance. Especially if we see SJ. -Tim

We're fine.... Things in our favor: 1) We played like ass and it was still a close game. 2) We got homered and it was still a close game. 3) Lidstrom will never play that badly again. 4) Hasek is really good after a loss. If we end up not winning the Cup this year though, it's going to be our special teams that are our downfall. Both the PP and PK are sub-par by Red Wing standards, and they were both really bad tonight...cost us the game. It's the reason that SJ scares me so bad, because I swear their PP was like 50% against us this year. I'm losing faith that they'll get it fixed, and if they don't it's going to be tough to make a deep run into the playoffs. That said, it's just one loss. No one honestly thought we were going to sweep this team right? It's not going to happen against a team with a goalie that is that good. I guess until someone wins on the road, you're just holding serve. Gotta get Game 4. -Tim

It's going to be really funny when this game goes to a 5th OT so we all have to stay up an extra 15 minutes and then someone scores 20 seconds into the next period. -Tim