SFwingsfan

Quack.....Quack........Quack

New York and Detroit for so many reasons..... 1. orginal six 2. the two most popular US teams 3. shannahan* 4. avery* 5. shannahan* * note: could also be reasons I would not want this matchup

That is exactly what I was thinking.

Joe Thornton reminds me of Steve Yzerman, yes. That is as far as i'm willing to go with it. As a kid growing up going to all the Wings games Stevie Y was the best player and a class act. He was the player you watched the most when you went to the games. Now I live in the Bay Area and Joe Thornton is the best player on the Sharks and he is a class act. When I go to the games I end up watching him the most. So he REMINDS me of Stevie. He is 27 years old, he has proven very very little other than the fact he is one of the most gifted playmakers in the game. But please, I would not put him in the same BALLPARK as Stevie, ok ?

At the game tonight, a co-worker of mine who is a casual hockey fan asked me, "so who is the Sharks best player?' My response was "Joe Thornton and he wears #19 just like Yzerman." I realized that I had just put the two men in the same sentence. When I moved out here (from Detroit area) less than two years ago I didn't know much about the guy. Obviously never got to see him play much as he on was Bruins, only highlight reel stuff. Well now having seen him play live about 20 times I get what all the fuss is about. He is a force to be reckoned with. His playmaking skills are sick and his puck control could be the best in the league. It takes a truck to knock him off the puck seriously. Also living in the Bay Area you get to see him in long interviews and commercials, etc. He is a total class act and a great ambassador for the game in California.

It makes no sense to me that people can justify booing Federov and not Shannahan. Just for the record if you buy a ticket you have a right to boo whoever you desire but I just don't get the inconsistency. Both men "chose" to leave Detroit, period. Sergei Fedorov was the #2 most important player in all 3 cup wins behind Stevie. I also agree there is definitely some anti-european pro canadian (read north american) thing going on here underneath the surface. If you boo Sergei, you owe it to yourself to boo Shanny.

Lang needs to play less, much less...

According to the flight tracker, the Wings land at San Jose airport in about 10 minutes, why did they stop in Colorado on the way? http://flightaware.com/live/flight/N682RW Credit is due to who originally posted this link, pretty cool thanx.

I walked out of the 9-4 game with 10 min left in the 3rd period. It was just too much to see all the Sharks fans going crazy that they were actually beating the Red Wings (and Hasek) that bad. No matter what happens next week, I promise I won't leave early this time.

Born and raised as a hockey player and Red Wings fan in metro Detroit. Moved to the Bay Area 18 months ago and have been following both teams very closely having attended about 10 Sharks home games (2 vs Detroit). I also went to 2 Wings games at JLA over the holidays. All I can say is that when Vancouver scored that 2nd goal last night I had a really wierd feeling knowing I would be seeing the Wings play at least 2 playoff games at HP Pavilion. My first playoff games in an away rink, very very odd. Obviously like most everyone I was hoping to play Dallas as I considered them an easier path to the finals than San Jose. However, I think this series is what the new NHL is supposed to be all about. During the regular season I would have had to say that in a series the Sharks would have the advantage but I just can't say that now. I think these teams are very evenly matched. The x factors for Detroit are Hasek and Bertuzzi. In order for us to win these two have to be at the top of their games. I also think winning both games 1 and 2 at JLA is key. It's hard to describe the atmosphere at HP Pavilion for hockey games. It's wild and loud but not like JLA. Can you imagine if the Wings had a stuffed mascot named Wingie (ala SJ Sharkie)? He would unfortunately get his ass beat. I try to explain to people that we have a mascot...a moderately obese guy named Mo Cheese who dances...hahahaha. Anyways, yeah i'm scared of the Sharks and I think this series is pretty much a toss up but Hasek and Bertuzzi give us the edge. Detroit in 6.

Mickey Redmond said that the early games mess up many of the players normal routines and superstitions which clearly have an impact on how they play. Apparently the players don't like these games much more than the fans. Remember, it's all about the ratings.

Ok let me get this straight, CBC is broadcasting the game in HD but VS. is too cheap to give us the HD feed? Unbelievable!

I have very mixed feelings about this but i'm inclined to say he should play. I mean why did we get this guy? If he has been cleared to play and he wants to play he should play. I'm very concerned that Babcock and co. made this decision because Game 1 was a cakewalk. If we had lost Game 1 I bet he would be playing.

attendance = 19,204. I have a feeling this is the first non-sellout in years.

Well if you live in the Bay Area on Comcast you can forget about watching today's game in HD. As the HD channel is a split with VS / The Golf Channel they have decided to broadcast a low def women's golf tournament on the HD channel instead of the Red Wings game. I'm basically beyond angry.

NHL Center Ice = FSN Detroit feed

I know Modano rose through the ranks of the Little Ceasars "AAA" hockey program that back in the day used to play at the old Oak Park Ice Arena. Geez, people might even recall that during this period the Red Wings (and visiting teams) used to use this place as one of their practice rinks. I'll never forget during the first and only Sergei Fedorov hockey camp we were eating our daily lunch of Little Ceasars pizza (still pretty funny) and one of the instructors pointed out Modano in a photo of an old team. Quite simply one of the greatest American players of all time and a total class act.

NHL Center Ice = FSN Detroit feed (not avail in HD)

Scott Burnside from ESPN.COM article today on why the Predators need to leave Nashville NOW! "Let's preface this by saying we love the Nashville Predators. We love how they're put together, how they're coached and how they play. But this is a team that seems destined to be in a perpetual struggle to make its way in the community. Sporting one of the best teams in the Western Conference for the second straight season, the Preds have managed to sell out the smallish Gaylord Entertainment Center eight times this season and reported crowds of less than 15,000 on 15 occasions. What's more worrisome is if the Preds reach the Cup finals, will the team have to threaten to black out its home playoff games to ensure sellout crowds as it did during the first round of the playoffs last spring? Yikes." Nuff said.

hahahahaha "Nashville announcers" 2900 tickets left for Preds/Edmonton 3000+ left for the next Preds/Wings game.... In a 17,000 seat arena less than a month before the playoffs, PATHETIC.

These announcers blow. Thank goodness for Ken and Mick tomorrow night. Don't get me wrong Terry Crisp definitely has hockey credibility.......but he is nothing compared to the Mick.

Kronwall sucks. Ok ok edited... Kronwall = overrated heavily. We need Schneids.

Ok, I agree with everyone who says that too many tickets go to corporate season ticketholders and not your average John Smith, but the reality is this. 99% of pro sports teams in this country don't care who buys their season tickets as long as they are sold. Companies? scalpers? fans? You think they give a crap? I worked for one of teams in Detroit and now I work for a company heavily involved in pro sports on the west coast and I can tell you that nobody cares as long as it's a sold seat. You think they are going to call up major corporations in the Detroit area and say "well we have noticed that you haven't been using 2 of your 6 seats for most of the season, we are going to force you to give those up so 'real fans' can buy them" No friggin way thats ever going to happen.

I completely agree that hockey benefits from HD more than any other sport, period. You have to admit there is A LOT more in HD this year than last year. It's pretty much standard that 80% of the VS games and 95% of the NBC games are in HD. The sport is also lucky that many (not all) local networks (like FSN Detroit) are now in HD at least for home games. I live in the Bay Area and all home Sharks games are in HD and many away games as well. Now that brings us to the topic at hand and the frustration of Wings fans who live outside the local broadcast area and are forced to watch the Wings on NHL Center Ice. It is just plain annoying when you are sitting in front of your HDTV watching Center Ice and Ken Daniels says "tonight's game is presented in crystal clear high definition" and you think "yeah thats great for people in Michigan." However, NBA fans I know have the exact same gripe with NBA League Pass. Granted NBA fans have multiple HD games weekly on ESPN, TNT, ABC, and NBATV, but League Pass subscribers get screwed just like us hockey fans. The point i'm trying to make here is that if they haven't done it for NBA League Pass then they are a long way from doing it for NHL Center Ice. The even more frustrating thing is that NHL Center Ice is in fact broadcasting a very small amount of games each month in HD pulling from the local market feeds. This is what they "claim" is being broadcast in HD in the month of March to NHL Center Ice subscribers: http://www.indemand.com/sports/nhl/schedul...lScheduleHD.pdf Here's what really sucks. Even if you have NHL Center Ice, you have to be lucky enough that your local cable provider pumps these games on your HD channels. I'd like to take a survery of NHL Center Ice subscribers. According to the schedule above, last week's Wings/Preds game was broadcast in HD on NHL Center Ice from the FSN Detroit feed. How many people out there with NHL Center Ice actually saw this game in HD? The same goes for this Tuesdays game which again is supposedly available to NHL CI subscribers in HD. Maybe I just have a crappy cable provider but i'd really be curious to know how many people are getting these HD Center Ice games. Even more disturbing is that ESPNHD seems to lack the local HD feeds for SportsCenter highlights. Sure, sometimes you'll see the HD local feed in the highlight reel but it's rare at best. You can bet last night's SportsCenter didn't show the game highlights in HD, rather they pulled the highlights right off of Center Ice instead of FSN Detroit HD which apparently they don't even have access to.