The Two-Line Pass

The Lead

The Sharks are an astonishingly good team, the Red Wings are very good as well. The Blackhawks have a great deal going for them. And all of them pale in comparison with the Boston Bruins, who just two seasons ago finished 23rd in the league.

Tonight, Boston, playing its third road game in four days, dismantled Pittsburgh on the way to a 5-2 victory that came with surgical precision. Every mistake the Penguins made was paid for in blood.

Boston’s first goal came on a second-period power play when the Bruins overloaded the right side of the ice and, after PJ Axelsson mishandled a pass, he faked toward the corner and with the help of a forward down low, drew both Pittsburgh defenders below the faceoff circle and to the left of Marc-Andre Fleury. What every Penguin on the ice missed was Zdeno Chara sneaking onto the backdoor like a shifty forward half his size, that is until he shoveled home a seeing-eye pass from Axelsson to pull the Bruins even. Marc Savard sniped another power play goal a few minutes later to put the Bruins up 2-1.

Soon after, Pascal Dupuis put a slapshot into Mach 5 to beat Tim Thomas high to the glove side and tie the game again, but like using conventional weapons on Godzilla, it only made the Bruins angry. Phil Kessel scored on a tap-in 1:30 later and Martin St. Pierre and Dennis Wideman added third-period insurance goals to ice the game. And it all looked so incredibly easy. Tonight, they SILENCED Sid Crosby and Evgeni Malkin. The former had an assist on the Dupuis goal that was an individual effort, the latter had dick, and they combined for a nice minus-3 rating.

They now have the same number of points (60) as league-leading San Jose, which only leads the league on the formality of its one game in hand, but it’s not too far into the hazy past where San Jose looked all but uncatchable. The reason, of course, is that Boston is now undoubtedly the best team in hockey. In November and December, they lost an incredible TWO games in regulation, and this is a team that got off to a 2-2-3 start. In its last 30 games, Boston is 26-3-1, a winning percentage of .883(!).

The Bruins have scored the most goals (137, five ahead of Detroit and 11 ahead of San Jose), the and allowed the fewest (82, two ahead of San Jose and six ahead of Chicago, both of which have played fewer games).

They have the best goaltending tandem in hockey — Tim Thomas has a line of 2.04/.935 in 22 games and Manny Fernandez has a 2.02/.930 in 16.

They’re arguably as deep at forward as Detroit or San Jose and while they don’t have the singular star power provided by your Crolkins and Semvechkins and Datsutterbergs, you have to feel like the contributions of Marc Savard (12-34-46), David Krejci (13-27-40) and Phil Kessel (23-16-39) are pretty outstanding from any point of view from which you choose to view them. Blake Wheeler and Milan Lucic are playing pretty well too. And that’s not even counting the man-games they’ve lost to injury. Patrice Bergeron’s a guy any GM in the league would take in a heartbeat, and he’s missed the last few games of this nifty little nine-game winning streak the Bruins are on. Chuck Kobasew’s missed 12 games, Marco Sturm’s missed 19, and they’re both worth about .65 points a game. Not that the Bruins need it.

And the Bruins blue line is stacked as well. Zdeno Chara’s reputation speaks for itself. The guy was a Norris finalist last year, he eats big minutes and he’s a phenomenal leader on and off the ice. Dennis Wideman is the most underrated No. 2 defenseman in the National Hockey League, and he has more points than Chara. Aaron Ward has played well when he’s been healthy, Mark Stuart’s developing into a very nice stay-at-home defenseman in his own right, and the rotating collection of youngsters filling in for whichever defenseman is injured on a given night has never looked entirely out of place.

The Bruins have won nine in a row, and all but three of those have been at home. Six of those have been on back-to-back nights. They’ve lost five games in regulation all year. All despite a rash of injuries to several important players. And let’s hear the arguments that someone’s better.

The Bruins played Detroit already and beat them 4-1. No problem. They played Chicago too, controlled the entire game and won in a shootout, 2-1. The result was slightly better than Chicago deserved. They won’t play San Jose until Tuesday Feb. 10 in Boston, but with the way the Sharks are playing lately, they might not even be in this discussion by the time Big Joe Thornton and Co. rumble back into town.

In the calendar year of 2008, the Bruins went 50-18-12 in the regular season, winning 112 points from 80 games. What Claude Julien has done on Causeway St. is truly amazing.

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The Lead

It should be noted that I’m a fan of defense-first hockey. I don’t think the trap was detrimental to the health of the sport, I don’t find the style pioneered by New Jersey to be upsetting in any way, and I would certainly prefer to see a 1-0 game than a 5-4 game any night of the week.

That said, there isn’t a team as eye-bleedingly boring, as rage-inducing or as generally unpleasant to watch as the Minnesota Wild have been for pretty much the entire month of December.

Their 2-1 loss to Calgary tonight wasn’t so much a defensive struggle as it was a study in attacking ineptitude by Minnesota and a spectacular goaltending performance from Wild backup Josh Harding. While Calgary only put 29 shots on net (not the most jaw-dropping of shot totals, admittedly), Harding made several point-blank saves including one flurry on a late Calgary power play when it was still 1-1 where he stopped four or five shots right on the doorstep while the Minnesota defense simply stood around, seemingly asking, “Oh should we have picked that guy up? And him too?” while Harding sprawled from one side of the crease to the other.

The problem, though, started as a symptomless affliction in October after Minnesota opened at 7-2-1 in their first 10 despite winning by two or more just twice and averaging just 2.5 goals in those games. In their next 10, a slight sniffled appeared; they were 5-5-0 with a pair of shootout wins and scored three goals or more just four times.

And now whatever problem the Wild have is settling into the lungs. In Games 21-30, the Wild went 3-6-1 and, while they scored four, six, five and four in the first four games of that stretch, they netted a total of seven in the following six. In Games 31-35 (No. 35 being tonight’s loss), the Wild are 2-3-0 and just playing dreadfully unwatchable hockey. No attacking flair whatsoever, even by Minnesotan standards, and it wasn’t as though Calgary played especially good shutdown hockey. The Wild simply have no one that can put the puck in the net. In fact, aside from the Islanders, no one in the NHL has a worse record than Minnesota’s since Dec. 1.

They’re playing so badly that even though they’re a team for which I have no great dislike, I firmly believe they deserve to be right where they are: dead last in the Northwest. I no longer even feel bad that they’re going to trade Gaborik for peanuts. Their defensive style is just that offensive.

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The Lead

Forget all the dickpunching and whining and diving for which Sidney Crosby’s been called out lately. It’s become quite clear that the guy plays with a different rulebook than most other NHL players, and that’s just one of those things you have to accept as a fact of life. It’s the same reason elite pitchers get strike zones you could drive a truck through and NBA defenses couldn’t properly cover Michael Jordan.

So when Crosby reached out and poked at an Evgeni Malkin knuckleball that was dangerously close to being a high stick and scored the against Buffalo in overtime to win 4-3, was there any doubt whatsoever that the goal would stand?

It was a marginal call to be sure. One of those ones where Penguins fans would likely see it as close but clearly a legal play while Sabres fans broke down the footage like the Zapruder Film. It would, of course, be very difficult to make a proper judgment given the available angles. But because of the Crosby factor, what the hell, let’s call it a goal and hit the bar. The officials could huddle around monitors or get the war room in Toronto breaking everything down, but the eventual result, regardless of whether or not it was a high stick, was so plain. It’s not like this was Ryan Stone tipping a puck home. Crosby hadn’t scored in nine games and why not, right? The Pens needed the win anyways.

I’m not even saying it wasn’t a goal or, even if he had played it with a high stick, there was sufficient evidence to overrule the call on the ice. I like Crosby just fine and I have no love for either the Sabres or Penguins. But this is the kind of thing that stokes the ever-burning fires of deep-seated Crosby hatred among NHL fans, particularly those in the Eastern Conference. The calls always go the Kid’s way and they always will. Everyone just needs to accept that. We’ll all be better people for it.

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The Lead

At the risk of angering both people who bother to read Good Night on a nightly basis, I have a confession. I only watched the Bruins game tonight because I went to an art show — I start my internship at Vogue next summer haw haw! — and at some point I have to just wash my hands of every, “Boy these Bruins sure are a top-notch team,” post I am backed into making.. at least for a while.

Yeah, they’re a hell of a goddamn hockey club and even when they suck they score eight goals and win anyways. David Krejci had a hat trick and I think he’s like the fifth Bruin to have one this year (I know for sure Kessel, Lucic and Wheeler had one each but I feel like I’m forgetting someone and don’t care to look it up). Not that the game wasn’t fun to watch and featured 13 goals and a couple fights, but there’s just no other way to say, “They’ll beat you any way they want!” that no one else has said. At some point you have to stop looking at your computer screen and going “I have to write like 600 words on these guys winning AGAIN,” and tell yourself no.

Watching a good team gets pretty damn boring sometimes. That picture’s pretty funny though, right?

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The Lead

Earlier tonight, I was trying to compose my thoughts about Trevor Linden for this thing here and, I dunno, it made me feel kind of conflicted. I mean, the guy played for the Canucks for like 17 years, and as a Flames fan, especially one that still remembers the first round in ‘94, it’s not easy to line up with him on that.

As such, and because I’m not a fan of the Canucks, it feels more than a little strange (and frankly a bit inappropriate) that I’m going to say what I’m about to say.

As a hockey fan, how can you not love and respect Trevor Linden? A good kid outta Medicine Hat that only ever wanted to play the game and help the community. You’ll never hear anyone say a bad word about Linden, who gave so freely of his time and energy. Not from the fiercest of opponents, not from a fan on the street, not from anybody. Trevor Linden always exuded genuine, honest class. He is the perfect ambassador for not only the sport of hockey, but sport in general. All professional athletes should aspire to be what Trevor Linden always was, is and will be.

He never scored 50 goals and he never sniffed 100 points. He didn’t play his entire career in Vancouver. That doesn’t matter, though. Trevor Linden will always be the greatest Canuck to pull on the sweater.

This video, which ran tonight ahead of the Canucks’ fitting 4-1 win over Edmonton, says more about what he means to Vancouver — both the franchise and the city, as a player and a person — than I ever could:

Thanks for everything, No. 16. You earned it all and more.

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The Lead

You may or may not have gotten the memo on this, but Jarome Iginla is a pretty decent hockey player.

Tonight he almost singlehandedly willed the Flames to a 6-3 win over the St. Louis Blues on the strength of a two-goal, two-assist performance. One goal was lucky, one goal was scary, one assist was beautiful and the other was heads-up. If there’s a more complete player in hockey, I’d like to know about him.

Iginla opened the scoring with what can only be described as a goalscorer’s goal, as a bouncing shot from Cory Sarich deflected off the inside of a falling Iginla’s glove and in just 4:14 into the game. His second goal, which came at 17:38 of the first, was one of those vintage Iginla plays where he finds himself in acres of space for some inexplicable reason and loads up a trillion-mile-an-hour snapshot off one foot. How does any team allow Iginla to find himself with a puck on his stick and no defenseman within 10 feet of him? Note to NHL defenses: Giving Iginla this kind of space is not conducive to winning hockey games.

It should be noted, before continuing, that were it not for the play of Chris Mason during that first period, things could have been a LOT worse for St. Louis than 2-0. He made 13 first-period saves and a great many of them were of very high quality. He certainly prevented Iginla from having a hat trick in the opening 20, that’s for sure. And for a while, Miikka Kiprusoff, who had far less work to do than did Mason in making eight saves in the first, made it seem like this game would end up being a goaltending battle. But once Iginla got that second goal, the Flames were off to the races.

Matt Lombardi scored his third of the year early in the second before the Flames defense decided to take 10 minutes off and let the Blues cut it to 3-2 — and Adrian Aucoin’s giveaway on the Patrick Berglund goal was so good he should’ve gotten an assist — before Iginla hefted the Flames onto his back again, setting up consecutive goals from Mike Cammalleri (and what a beauty this feed was) and Aucoin, via an ahead pass to Lombardi that sprang them for the 2-on-1.

From there, the game was academic and Iginla had career points Nos. 796, 797, 798 and 799. To give you an idea of just how important Iginla is to the Flames, he has scored at least one goal in 12 games this year and the Flames are 11-1-0 in them. That’s a .917 winning percentage! When he doesn’t score, they’re 6-10-3 for a winning percentage of .395. That’s an awful big swing, obviously, and it points to both the Flames’ frustrating inconsistency and Iginla’s inherent value to the team. He may be on pace for “only” 44 goals and 98 points now, but if he shows up, the Flames are nearly unstoppable.

As a Flames fan, I wish he’d shown up to more than just 12 of 31 games this year.

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The Lead

If this had been 1997 or so, tonight’s game would have been an outstanding one to put on national television.

But given that it’s not 11 years ago, and almost no one from either team in those fabled Detroit/Colorado games that featured so much violence and drama and hatred still remains, only the shadow of a dead rivalry, rather than palpable tension, remained hanging over the Versus broadcast.

Those games, complete with line brawls and goalie fights and probably four or five of the best players in the world, leave fan, media and player alike hoping for something that is impossible to achieve. What remnants may have remained of the rivalry have been rendered obsolete and irrelevant by passage of time.

As a result, tonight’s 3-2 Avalanche win, even though it was a perfectly good hockey game that was ultimately decided by a penalty shot in the third period, was more or less dramaless. Where the Wings/Avs games of old were circle-this-on-your-calendar, not-to-be-missed events, this was in just about every way one of 82 of the schedule.

Maybe it’s because Detroit has positively owned Colorado over the last few years, winning each of the last eight and 16 of the last 18. Maybe it’s because Claude Lemieux and Patrick Roy aren’t around to stir up passion and anger from the strangely emotionless Red Wings, who have spent far too much time playing from behind of late thanks to slow starts and the expectancy that they’ll win simply because they’re the best team just about every night. Or maybe it’s because there isn’t one person on the Red Wings anyone is afraid of.

In any event, the Avs came out completely unintimidated and beat up on Detroit with the counterattack. Both Wojtek Wolski and Paul Stastny scored first-period goals that capitalized on Red Wing mistakes and it was 2-0 Avs just 4:34 into the game. Detroit was punchless and seemed disinterested in the game. The Red Wings only blocked two shots all night, while the Avs blocked 16. There wasn’t a tremendous amount of checking (except for Brad Stuart, who led everyone with six hits), and there wasn’t a tremendous amount of inspired play from the Detroit bench.

Any time Andrew Raycroft completely shows up your team, for instance, you had a bad night. Raycroft stopped 34 of 36 shots in the win, and Detroit didn’t exactly make him earn it either. Lots of shots came from the perimeter, and Detroi’s shot selection in general (as evidenced by the high number of blocked shots) was poor.

Jordan Leopold’s eventual game-winner that came on the aforementioned penalty shot at 1:51 of the third was very nice, and a dagger to the Red Wings, who had been composing themselves a bit for the latter part of the second period. Marian Hossa’s goal to close the scoring was largely unimportant in the grand scheme of the game.

It was pretty sad, really. Versus spent most of the lead-up screaming, “RIVALRY GAME!” and the general malaise in the game from both teams was disheartening. It would have taken Tomas Holmstrom spontaneously combusting at center ice to make it even remotely interesting to someone who remembers watching that Detroit/Colorado game live.

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The Lead

I knew the Flames would lose this game the second the Sportsnet broadcast compared the first two games of the team’s four-game road trip to the infamous six-game trip from last season that saw them win all six and outscore their opponents something like 25-16 (of course they ignored the fact that none of those six teams made the playoffs last year. That was neither here nor there). Calgary had, after all, beaten St. Louis in overtime and shut out the so-so Rangers.

What, then, could possibly go wrong against a team like the Canadiens that are, y’know, good? Oh, right, the Calgary Flames played after winning two in a row and coming off a dominant performance. Any time this year the Flames have played a good opponent after a dominant performance, they have lost because they just don’t show up every night.

Tonight, in a 4-1 loss to Montreal that, coupled with a Canucks win, saw them drop out of first place in the Northwest, the Flames were victimized by not only an outstanding performance by Canadiens backup Jaroslav Halak, but also their own disappointing lack of hockey sense and puck luck.

Halak saw 14 shots in the first period and stopped all of them, which, based upon the quality of those shots, was the only reason it wasn’t 3-1 through 20 minutes. Instead, Robert Lang scored off a goofy bounce on a centering feed that hit Mark Giordano’s leg and got behind Kiprusoff.

The second bad bounce came in the second period when a shot from Calgary’s point hit a shinpad and bounced back to center ice like it had been shot out of a cannon to spring Matt D’Agostini for a breakaway and his fourth goal in as many career NHL games. Dustin Boyd pulled the Flames back within one just over two minutes later but Lang added an insurance goal to double the Montreal lead late in the period.

But when Calgary got a power play early in the third, the game was officially put out of reach by Calgary’s own stupidity. A Habs forward broke his stick while on the PK, but instead of forcing the puck to that side and trying to draw him out to the point and create space in front of the net, Calgary kept it on the strong side and passed back and forth between the point and the man on the halfboards before eventually sending it down low. Not the worst idea in the world but it should’ve been on the other side of the ice. However, when the puck comes down low, the other Canadiens forward trips a Calgary player to draw a 5 on 3.

And this is where the insane part comes in. With 28 seconds left in the original penalty, instead of giving Montreal the puck or putting something low at the net to hope for a scrum, a rebound or Montreal control, Todd Bertuzzi backs out and tries to uncork one from a goofy angle, only to see the puck sail about a mile high and wide and bounce out of the zone and to center ice. At this point, it still doesn’t occur to the Flame that retrieved it to just give the puck to Montreal. Instead, all six Flames CLEAR THE ZONE and regroup for a rush down the center of the ice that somehow doesn’t get a shot on net. By this time, Alex Tanguay, who took the original penalty, has come out of the box and is the first Hab to touch the puck. The game was lost right there. The fact that Andrei Markov scored 39 seconds after Montreal killed the second penalty was just hilarious salt-rubbing.

This was just another game Calgary simply wasn’t prepared for and, no matter how well they played on Sunday or Friday, you have to come to play against good opponents. I would’ve thought Calgary got that note by now, but they pull this all the time. Oh and Detroit’s tomorrow night? Yeah, that should go well.

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The Lead

The bad news is that the Penguins blew another two-goal lead and had a really bad night on the power play. The good news is that there really, really has to be a light at the end of the tunnel at some point. Right?

Despite more strong performances from Evgeni Malkin and Sid Crosby, the Penguins were once again victimized by the poor everything-else that’s been going on with their team and fell to the so-so Sabres 4-3 despite having led the game 3-1 early in the second period.

Buffalo took about 390 penalties in the game (ballpark) but the Penguins power play, which despite its high ranking in the NHL has actually been quite bad lately, went 1 for 8 and only converted one of its three chances at 5 on 3. I can see why it’s tempting for Michel Therrien to just tell Sid and Geno to go do their thing out their with the extra space, but “their thing” seemed largely to involve passing the puck around the perimeter until someone on the Pens decides to try to send it into the box, at which point it will be chipped out harmlessly by a Sabres forward who got his stick in the obvious passing lane. And repeat. Over and over.

But Crosby and Malkin are only two men, and the other Penguins did little to help their cause despite what looks like a two-goal effort from Ruslan Fedotenko and a two-assist night for Petr Sykora. Malkin’s set-up on the first Fedotenko goal was absolutely gorgeous as he fed the puck between his legs to himself in a successful attempt to shake the defender and found Fedotenko alone in the slot. Any NHLer on any team could’ve scored. The assist, as it is with so many Crosby/Malkin setups, was the play, and the play was eye-popping. Fedotenko’s second goal was another Johnny-on-the-spot goal on a bang-bang play with Malkin and Sykora.

But to their credit and despite numerous penalties, the Sabres were still in it thanks to a Derek Roy goal that was sandwiched by the Fedotenko markers. But when Tom Vanek took a delay of game call (by falling on the puck during a penalty kill) with 20 seconds to go in the first period and Jochen Hecht was whistled for a trip 19 seconds into the second to give the Pens about four straight minutes of uninterrupted power play time, you knew that, bad man-up play or not, the puck was going in the net. And of course it was Crosby who set up Kris Letang’s first goal of the year to put the Pens up two at 1:31 of the second period.

But then everything fell apart. Buffalo cut the lead to 3-2 just 5:09 later and tied it with 5:11 left in the period. The Pens were in total meltdown mode at this point as Dany Sabourin just stopped playing the puck well and the defense did nothing at all to assist him in a meaningful way. The Brooks Orpik-Letang pairing was especially brutal, having been on the ice for both of Buffalo’s two second-period goals, as well as Vanek’s game winner (his league-leading 20th) early in the third.

Crosby and Malkin were both very good tonight and their talent alone nearly stole a point in a game in which the Penguins were given every opportunity to succeed and simply failed to do anything with them. I don’t know how much longer the team can stay in contention in the volatile East with a supporting cast of has-beens and call-ups. Crosby and Malkin (Crolkin?) can’t be expected to win them every game. Someone’s got to step up. But who could possibly do it?

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The Lead

Start from the bottom up as far as, say, the top 20 goalscorers in the National Hockey League at this point in the season.

Slava Kozlov at 20 with 12 goals. A bunch of other guys are tied with him, like Jarome Iginla, Shane Doan, Patrick Marleau and Patrick Kane. With 13 each you have Alex Semin, Devin Setoguchi, Sid Crosby, Dany Heatley, Simon Gagne and Rick Nash. Teemu Selanne, Patrick Sharp, Zach Parise, Marian Hossa and Alex Ovechkin are all next with 14 apiece. And above all of them, just behind Jeff Carter and Tom Vanek’s 18 goals, is Phil Kessel, who has 15.

The kid had 19 in 82 games last year, and through 25, he’s already got 15 and he’s a huge reason the Bruins are tied for the lead in the Eastern Conference with four games in hand on the New York Rangers. Hell, he was a big reason the Bruins even won tonight.

The Bruins hadn’t played since last Saturday after playing its busiest stretch of the season, 10 games in 17 days, and tonight they sure looked it. They were sluggish and inattentive in the first period, where they were outchanced by Tampa about 8-2 or so. Tampa (TAMPA!) looked almost dominant in the flow of play. Marty St. Louis’ goal was a prettyish little two-on-two play, but if Mark Stuart had paid the slightest bit of attention to his man instead of Vinny Lecavalier, who had the puck, he wouldn’t have looked quite so stupid in flailing to block the ensuing pass or shot, both of which he was hopelessly out of position for. But because Tampa’s Tampa and the Bruins are the best team in the East, they only managed one goal despite the huge advantage in play. Fortunately for Boston, Tim Thomas, who made 30 saves, allowed just one goal and once strangled a grizzly with his bare hands, settled down after that.

In the second, the Bruins tried to inject a little artificial life into their game. Zdeno Chara got into a bit of an exchange down by Tim Thomas and that seemed to really fire up the bench. Within a few shifts, the Bruins were starting to compose their attack, and once Kessel’s line, that also features Milan Lucic and Marc Savard, hopped over the boards, you knew they’d be leveling the score soon enough. Kessel lifted a stick in the neutral zone, stole the puck and broke the other way on a rush, only to crush a slapshot off the far post from 50 feet out, and the pressure from Boston kept building. Kessel finally tied the game on his next shift at 12:21, converting a sexy no-look pass from the endboards and into the slot from Savard.

The score remained tied until excellent rookie Blake Wheeler blocked a pass attempt on a Tampa power play and sprung David Krejci for a gorgeous shorthanded 1-on-2 goal. His toe-drag around Paul Ranger was beautiful and the speed of his release to get the puck away just before Andrej Mezsaros got a stick in there was unbelievable. That’s a goal you’ll be seeing in a couple highlight videos, I suspect.

Kessel also added an empty netter with 0.5 seconds remaining to bump his goal total to 15, THIRD in the NHL. If you had taken a DeLorean back one year ago and said to anyone who watches the Bruins a lot that Phil Kessel would be lifting sticks, blocking shots and shooting the puck more than anyone on the team, they would’ve had you locked up. The transformation this kid has undergone is ridiculous.

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