2006/2007 Hockey Season Thread

[SeanDMan]

THE SABRES... ARE WHO WE THOUGHT THEY WERE! If you want to crown em, then crown the motherfuckers. But they ARE who we THOUGHT THEY WERE. And we let em off the hook.

[gunnar hendershow]

Amazing comeback by Buffalo tonight it seems. I'm still not sold on them as champion yet, especially since they have cooled down from the start of the year. However, if they can win games like this then it goes without saying they are to be the most feared team in the NHL at least.

[SeanDMan]

The Sabres played a shit game, this was just Andrew Raycroft at his finest. Buffalo are lucky to have one point, they should be giving Andre Raycroft donatings for throat surgery after that monumental choke job.

[SeanDMan]

Also, I think it's offical: Fuck Rayzor, from now on he's earned the nickname Andrew "Red Light" Raycroft.

[Clawson]

I'm seriousily considering lynching him. Seriousily.

[oldskool]

Laracroft wasn't great, but seriously nobody can give Buffalo THAT many consecutive odd-man rushes and expect a goaltender to stop them all. One of them was a fucking 3 on 1, for god's sake.

[NobBe Nobbs]

Bollocks. And not just bollocks, I mean dog-fucking shit-stained bollocks.

[The Sultan of Swank]

I was actually watching the game as it was really important for Montreal as well. When I saw Toronto up 4-1 in the third, I figured that it was over and I could stop watching TSN verbally fellate the Leafs, but wow, I check the paper this morning and Toronto really dropped the ball. I mean montreal did the same thing to Boston the other night, scoring 4 in 7 minutes on 4 shots, but this was embarassing for Toronto, and I'm not trying to be mean here either because I wouldn't mind seeing 7th and 8th go to Montreal and Toronto, but damn, for all that talk about the RAYZOR!!!! and his 33 wins, he played like he did back when he was on Boston.

[GCCWolverine]

Sabres have to get some credit - especially considering they still have at least 5-6 regulars out (Connolly, Afinogenov, Paille, Gaustad (season), Lydman, Kotalik).

[Only In Dreams]

Okay, good job Sabres.

But in all seriousness, you have to realize that a team to be up 4-1 on the best team in the East, and playing pretty solid the first 40 minutes only to watch them fall flat the final sixteen minutes of the game please. It's just that the Leafs choked, and at this rate do not deserve to be in the playoffs.

And Thomas Pock. That's all I have to say about the Rangers/Boston game. The Rangers were playing flat the entire game, couldn't stay out of the box, and then Thomas Pock decides to score. Good for him, first goal in 33 games, and nothing bigger than scoring to tie the game with a minute left.

CLUTCH!

LOVE <333!

Edited March 24, 2007 by twoonglue

[Clawson]

Buffalo got away with three penalities that Ann Frank could have seen in the final five minutes of the first. Fucking hell.

[oldskool]

So yet another facial injury. And Briere took McCabe's stick somewhere between that big-ass nose and his mouth...

How about this Campbell guy stops wasting time on "cheap shot" this and "fights bad" that, and institutes mandatory full face masks for all players? It's just a matter of time before somebody gets blinded or killed by a puck or a stick to the face? How much fighting would there be if everybody had a cage on?

EDIT: Campbell just checked his own fucking goalie If there's a GIF of that, I NEED IT.

Edited March 25, 2007 by oldskool

[Clawson]

Was it harder than his hit on Umberger? Because that would be classic. I still can't believe I have that one in my avatar.

[oldskool]

It wasn't as hard as the Umberger KO, but holy christ Conklin got run over.

[Toe]

At least the Leafs got two. They should have had four points, but they stay in the race with the two. They need to at least go 5 of 7 in these last games, and they have to beat the Hurricanes, Islanders, Rangers and Canadiens when they face them.

[grind your soul]

I still don't understand how people are saying it's all Raycroft's fault for the choke-job on Friday. Was it partly his fault? Of course it was. But it's not like he just let in four cheap wristers from the blueline and just looked like a fool. Two of the goals were breakaways, one was a slapper from an odd angle by a guy with 37 goals on the year, and one was a cross-ice pass to a guy who wasn't being covered by anyone. The Leafs players just simply stopped playing after they made it 4-1, and never started again. It was a team effort to lose that game, not a one-man show.

And Raycroft came back yesterday and made some big saves to help us get the 4-1 win against those same Sabres. Does Raycroft deserve the hate he's getting? Some of it, sure. I'm not convinced he's the "answer", nor do I think he ever will be. But I think that, in some cases, he's played better than what some have given him credit for. Not many, mind you, but some.

Anyway, enough Raycroft defense. Here's a post I made somewhere else about the Habs/Bruins game from Thursday, where Boston blew a 3-1 lead going into the third and ended up losing 6-3:

Boston is seriously one of the worst teams in the league, and I blame most of it on their horrible coach, Dave Lewis. I seriously was sitting there watching it, yelling at the team, yelling at Lewis, because his tactics were just completely moronic. I mean, trapping is one thing, but TRAPPING WITH THE BOSTON BRUINS?

Firstly, your team isn't defensive. So, trapping probably won't work. Putting your best offensive players in a trapping role instead of actually using their best qualities is stupid.

Trapping when you're up 3-1? It's iffy with your weak defensive team [Chara and Ward be damned], but okay, maybe it will work.

Trapping when you're up 3-2? Well, it didn't work when you were winning 3-1, but maybe they can pull some good plays out of their ass.

Trapping when it's 3-3 in the third period? I mean, what the hell are you trying to do? YOU CAN'T WIN A GAME IN THE NEUTRAL ZONE. ESPECIALLY WHEN YOU DON'T KNOW HOW TO PLAY DEFENSE.

Trapping WHEN YOU ARE LOSING 4-3 IN THE THIRD? ARE YOU SERIOUS? REALLY? ARE YOU REALLY GOING TO DO THIS? YOU NEED TO SCORE A GOAL TO TIE IT. WHY ARE YOU JUST TRYING TO PREVENT THEM FROM SCORING AGAIN? DID IT WORK THE OTHER THREE TIMES? YOU STUPID IDIOT!!!

I mean, at some point, you'd think MAYBE he'd get the message that trapping with a poor defensive team and a floppy beer-league-style goaltender isn't going to work. What the hell is it going to take? It just absolutely frustrates the hell out of me just to watch this kind of crap! I thank god I am not a Bruins fan!!!

And, one more thing, SHAVE THE HITLER 'STASCHE, YOU HORRIBLE OLD MAN.

Edited March 25, 2007 by grind your soul

[SeanDMan]

I didn't actually watch the Nashville game, but still, I bet GYS is lying.

[The Sultan of Swank]

I don't see Raycroft making 19 saves as a huge performance against the Sabres. I expected the Leafs to win the second game against Buffalo simply because it's embarassing for any team to blow a 3 goal lead in 7 minutes and you definately want to prove that hey, mistakes happen.

Montreal has won 6 of 7, but the position we're in is completly our fault so I don't really feel like it's a huge accomplishment, but it's nice to see our young guys turning it up huge lately. Montreal can only afford a maximum of 2 losses in their remaining games or it's over I say.

The only good thing about everybody winning on the same nights is that Montreal is now only 2 outside of 6th place and a playoff match-up against Atlanta I would take any day over Buffalo or Jersey.

[grind your soul]

Rags won today, Isles of course got a point, because why would any game between two teams fighting for the play-offs be less than a three point game. Fucking NHL standings.

Anyway, a 19 save performance where Raycroft stopped two breakaways and a bunch of crazy scoring chances is definitely better than a 30 save performance were 27 of the shots are low-percentage blueline wristers. You can't judge the bigness of the performance by the shots. It's mostly by chances.

Atlanta > Habs

[SeanDMan]

The Rags and Isles game wasn't that bad, very chippy, as you might expect.

And the Vancouver Canucks trapped their way to four goals tonight. >_>