The Two-Line Pass

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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My internet and television have both been spotty as hell tonight so I didn’t watch any hockey games. I did, however, get this sent to me by reader “Lexus Prime,” which I am assuming is his real name. As a consequence, you will get no Good Night. Settle for this and take your issues with my lack of posting up with Comcast.

Check this out: On a delayed call for the Habs, Ryan O’Byrne is pressured by Doug Weight back into his own zone and puts the puck into his own net. O’Byrne’s side of the story is that he was unaware of the delayed call and thought he could pass it back to Carey Price, who was enjoying some Gatorade on the bench. You see where this is going. Bill Guerin was credited with the goal.

The goal tied the game at 3-all inside of five minutes to go in the third period and the Habs ended up losing to the Islanders in the shootout. Also, it’s important to note that this happened IN Montreal, and the fans understandably got on him for the rest of the game.

This could be the best thing that ever happened. O’Byrne’s reaction is my new all-time favorite gesture. But he has to be traded now, right? He’s been awful all season, but this must be the end of the Ryan O’Byrne era with Les Habitants.

So yesterday the Habs’ Tom Kostopoulos was given a three-game suspension after he demolished Mike Van Ryn from behind along the endboards, which was a perfectly reasonable suspension.

But how is there no action being taken against the Canadiens for the way they treated former teammate Mikhail Grabovski?

I hate to be the one that is constantly calling for this player or that player to be suspended or fined or whatever and I’m not doing so here, but it’s pretty clearly a team directive to punish Grabovski for the crap he pulled with Montreal last year. Not that he helped his own cause by taunting various Habs players over the course of the night, but again, this strikes me as something that came down from the top.

Watch that video around 1:10 into it. Right before Koivu gets in his face about something, he makes a point to not pull up short of Grabovski even though he is clearly prone on the ice after having been drilled just after the whistle on an offside call.

For those that don’t know the full story here, Grabovski spent much of the season as a healthy scratch and one day, before a road game in Phoenix for which he was once again going to be watching from the press box, he flew to Los Angeles instead to meet with his agent. Neither the Habs players nor front office types took too kindly to that and now that Grabovski has been traded to the Leafs, even his lifelong friends the Kostitsyn brothers are lining up against him.

According to La Presse (click for moon language.. translation from HFBoards):

“He is not my friend anymore,” said Kostitsyn on Monday. “I do not have respect for him. He’s not even a team player.”

…

”I have a good memory, we’ll see each other again,” when thinking about the next game between the two team on January 8th.

Other pertinent quotes followed.

Alex Kovalev: “No, don’t talk to me about him. He’s in Toronto and I am here. I’ve got nothing to say.”

Chris Higgins: “He’s not here anymore. I don’t care about him.”

Guy Carbonneau: “He’s playing a lot and he’s happy in Toronto. Good for him.”

Now I’m not saying Grabovski’s actions were justified because they weren’t, but they were taking run after run at him on Saturday with very little recourse from the Leafs and surprisingly no action from the league, especially in light of that second Kostitsyn quote. Even Grabovski seems to imply that he believes the orders came down from Carbonneau.

It will be interesting to see how everything shakes out on Jan. 8.

You’re probably going to hear a lot tomorrow about the hit Detroit’s Tomas Kopecky laid on Montreal defenseman Mathieu Carle (not to be confused with Tampa’s Matt Carle, though they play the same position. Someone pass that info to the Detroit color commentator).

Just five minutes into the Habs’ exhibition game, Carle carried the puck through the neutral zone down the right wing, dumped the puck in and less than a second later got demolished by a totally clean hit from Kopecky that he never saw coming. He was knocked unconcious and came back around about 15 minutes later while they were still working on him on the ice. He was taken off on a stretcher and brought to a Detroit hospital for further testing.

Watch the video for yourselves.

Some (namely Habs fans) will find the hit to be egregiously dirty. Others (namely objective observers who understand the sport) will say that it was perfectly clean, and that’s why players are taught to keep their friggin’ heads up in the neutral zone.

Anything that’s made of this is a total non-story. Even if the term “headhunting” is thrown around, it’s crazy talk. Don’t wanna get drilled, don’t put your head down. It’s that simple. Really.

Later in the game, Nicklas Lidstrom took a puck in the face and was also brought to the hospital. Yeesh. That could be bad, bad news for Detroit.

Now that the Canadiens have gotten rid of Cristobal Huet, it’s Carey Price’s show up in Montreal for the next several years (that is, until the press and fans alike show up at his door with pitchforks and torches a la Jose Theodore. Halak’s the future!).

But when Price showed up at a Montreal golf tournament looking like this:

Hey now!

People were pretty amazed.

Turns out, Price has dropped between 20 and 25 pounds from his robust weight of last season (226!?) and is now down to an ideal playing weight. While it may make him a little smaller in net, and boy did he look big last year, no amount of padding can’t be added to correct that problem.

This Canadiens team is leaner. Goalie Carey Price, having learned  the evil of chocolate bars at midnight, says he’s lost 20-25 pounds since the spring.

“When you’re packin’ an extra 20 pounds, it’s kinda hard to get  around,” said Price, eager for his sophomore season.

Price also told the Canadian Press he felt tired from playing two straight years, neglecting to mention that he was also walking around with the equivalent of a fat baby on his back.

Similarly, Habs forward Alex Kovalev has also dropped 12 pounds. Why do I get the feeling that, with Georges Laraque coming in this year, the team wanted to save money on catering for the other players?

“With Georges, I think everybody gained a little bit of weight,” said rugged forward Steve Bégin, who is used to skating over or through the opposition.

Remember a few months ago when the Habs’ Ryan O’Byrne was arrested for stealing a girl’s purse in Tampa?

Well he doesn’t have to worry about that any more.

Thanks to the wonderful people at Google, we have this shoddy translation of the CBC report:

Ryan O’Byrne has been bleached of all charges by the Justice Tampa Bay.

That is what the prosecutor’s office of the County of Hillsborough said on Radio-Canada Sports through Pam Bandi.

Implicated in history flight bag in Tampa, O’Byrne wrote a letter to the complainant in order to offer his apology.

The Canadian defender also pledged to carry out community work at his home in BC.

Also arrested during the evening, the attacker Tom Kostopoulos was exonerated.

Phew.

Unfortunately for O’Byrne, the charges might be erased, but photoshops like this will remain forever:

Lookin' good, O'Byrne