It's always nice when you can listen to a hockey game at work. I was fortunate enough to listen to this past year's World Junior Championships through a local station, and everyone at work seemed to enjoy listening to the games rather than listening to the crappy Muzak that gets played. Luckily, I can tune into NHL.com's radio feed of the Pittsburgh Penguins-New York Islanders tilt this afternoon. I almost prefer hockey over music at this point. It's far more exciting, and is never the same old playlist repeated over and over. And over.Oh, and look at this: Ryan Malone scored his 10th goal of the year 45 seconds into the game! Mark Recchi and Sidney Crosby drew the assists, and the Penguins lead 1-0.
Other game notes include the debut of Marc-Andre Bergeron suiting up for the Islanders since his trade yesterday. He is wearing #47, and is currently playing in Bruno Gervais' place while Gervais is out with an ankle injury. He will also be playing on the first powerplay unit for the Islanders.
The Penguins have gone 14-0-2 in their last sixteen games, and have not lost since January 10th when they dropped a 5-2 game to the Florida Panthers. The Penguins are 7-2-1 in the last ten games against the Islanders, but have dropped two of the last three at the Nassau Coliseum. The Penguins are 3-2-1 versus the Isles this season, with two games to play (including this one). In their last two meetings, the Penguins won 7-4 against the Islanders on December 15th, and won 5-2 on January 16th.
Update #1: Mark Recchi makes it 2-1 for the Penguins after Viktor Kozlov scored on the powerplay for the Islanders. The Penguins lead after one period of play.
Update #2: 4-4 after two periods of play. Malone and Recchi have a pair each for the Penguins, while Kozlov, Simon, Blake and Satan have replied for the Islanders.
Update #3: The Islanders rally late with Mike Sillinger scoring at 19:31 of the third period to give the Islanders a 6-5 victory over the Penguins. Malone scored his third of the game in the third period, while Chris Simon notched another and Sillinger scored the game winner.
The Pens have now dropped three of four on Nassau Coliseum ice, and the Islanders move into a tie for 8th spot in the Eastern Conference with 66 points, tied with Montreal and Toronto. The loss also snaps Pittsburgh's streak of 16 games with a point. Oh, and if any of you were keeping score at home for MacT in Edmonton, Bergeron had two assists and ended the game with a +2 rating. Great trade, MacTavish, especially since Grebeshkov won't be in an Oilers uniform until training camp.
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As I drove to work this morning, wondering what I should write about, it dawned on me how Kurt Russell played Herb Brooks in the movie Miracle even though they look nothing alike. And that got me to thinking which Hollywood star should play which coach if the NHL were ever to produce a movie about the league. Here are a few examples:
Barry Trotz of the Nashville Predators: the late Marlon Brando.
Michel Therrien of the Pittsburgh Penguins: Gerard Depardieu.
Ken Hitchcock of the Columbus Blue Jackets: Donald Sutherland.
Mike Babcock of the Detroit Red Wings: Anthony Michael Hall.
Craig MacTavish of the Edmonton Oilers: Norm MacDonald.
Jacques Lemaire of the Minnesota Wild: Ed Harris.
Paul Maurice of the Toronto Maple Leafs: Jeremy Piven.
Any others I should add? Post them in your comments. I look forward to the star-studded coaching cast we can create. I'm off to do more work. Keep your sticks on the ice!
Ugh. The Penguins game. High scoring, too bad they couldn't win it. What really irks me is the 3-star selection. Whoever was making the selections must have been on crack.
ReplyDeleteMike Sillinger is the first star just because he scores the game winner?
Recchi 2g, 3a, Crosby 4a and Malone 3g weren't recognized? I can see Robitaille being a star, 3a, but Sillinger and Simon? Come on. Whoever's selecting the stars needs to realize that a player's team doesn't have to win for that player to have been one of the best 3 players on the ice. Mark Recchi will likely be the first star throughout the league for today, but he won't even have been one of the 3 in his game! In fact, Recchi, Crosby and Malone could go 1-2-3.
The system in soccer is that whoever played the best game gets Man of the Match, regardless of result. And that's how it should be for hockey. Just because someone scores 1 goal doesn't make them the best player in the whole game.
Thoughts?
The problem is that the Islanders get to choose the 3-stars because the game was on their ice.
ReplyDeleteHonestly, it means nothing to me since you and I know that Recchi, Crosby, and Malone had a better game than Sillinger. Simon did have two goals as well, and should get recognized more than Sillinger.
And the game-winning goal scorer normally gets the 1st-star nod more often than not. Is it right? No. Is it biased? Yes. What can you do? :o)
Yeah. I just thought that usually a sportswriter or television personality is assigned the task of picking the stars and would have the sense to recognize the players properly.
ReplyDeleteI was under the impression Sillinger got 1st star when he really only got 2nd. But still. Simon did have a good game, +3 as well as his 2g, and maybe the thought is that players like Crosby, Recchi and Malone will have many more 3-star nights, while Simon won't be getting too many more.
I liked the system in the World Cup (of Soccer) where one arbitrary expert chose the Man of the Match for each game and submitted a full-on analysis of that player's game. Maybe that's something the beautiful game has that hockey doesn't. I'm not too worried though, I doubt it will change any time soon.
I'll be interested to see who the NHL's stars for the day are though..
Sportswriters sometimes barely have the where-with-all to tie their own shoes. After watching NBC screw up a ton of on-screen stats this weekend, I'd be surprised if the guys in the truck will ever get to use on-screen stats again.
ReplyDeleteI agree, though. The 3-star selection is way too biased, and should be selected based upon an analysis.