Game day: Preds

Yup, I'm sure most people barely noticed we have a game tonight. For some reason or another... Yes, it's good news. I'll breathe easier (or start hyperventilating, whichever comes more naturally) once I have a better idea what's in store for the rest of the team. The newly reno'd version of nhlnumbers.com (great job, guys), shows pretty clearly that we aren't over the tough spot yet...

Given I spent the last one mewling in pain (I had a flu-induced headache, had nothing to do with the blown lead, really...), I've been looking forward to this tilt for a bit.

The Preds have been easy prey lately. Mason hasn't looked like the starter material he did last year - in fact, Dan Ellis has started the last couple of games for them. They've got some key injuries in Steve Sullivan and Shea Weber (believe me, we're in much better shape with only Primeau in sick bay). It's definitely interesting times for the team though - it's got to be tough to be put in the spot where everybody is interested in the team, but certainly not for its performance...

Chalk up another win for us...I'm hoping now that those so-distracting contract talks are over, we'll be treated to a preview of in-the-zone-Kipper. Even if it isn't quite November yet.

Kiprusoff is here to stay

I just came home to some amazing news. Sutter has managed to lock Kiprusoff up for 6 years at a cap hit of $5.8M per. That's an amazing deal, I think. I was starting to get a bit worried, what with the logical meanderings of Matt, but this certainly brightens my day.

Next up is Phaneuf. Given how much the Sutter family wants his man-children, I'd say it's as good as a done deal. The question is, how much? Exciting times for Calgary.

What a solid core this is: Iginla (top forward), Regehr (top? d-man -- he'll pick up this season, don't worry), and Kiprusoff locked up for at least 5 years. It's a good time to be a Flames fan, ladies and gentlemen.

K-Lowe -- are you taking notes?

Flames: 2, McGeough + Colorado: 3

Nothing angers me more than incompetence. No one seems to be more incompetent than Mister Magoo, on a more consistent basis. I hear he's retiring after this season -- why take so long? And how can he possibly still be employed by the league?

On the game itself, it was mostly okay. I liked a lot of what I saw. Most of the time. Maybe when I'm not enraged I could write something more coherent, but for now I think I hurt my teeth by grinding too hard. Note to self: Next time McGeough refs a game, wear a mouthguard.

In the meantime, I hope you all enjoy this clip of more McGeough excellence from last season:


(PS: how awesome is Aucoin? Hale continues to not-disappoint=impress.)

(PPS: I notice I already had a McGeough label. Man, how many refs have their own blog labels?)

Calgary Flames: Offensive Powerhouse

Iginla is on pace for 49 goals, 82 assists for 131 points.
Langkow is on pace for 66 goals, 49 assists for 115 points.
Tanguay is on pace for 16 goals, 74 assists for 90 points.
Huselius is on pace for 49 goals, 33 assists for 82 points.
Phaneuf is on pace for 25 goals, 49 assists for 74 points.
Aucoin is on pace for 8 goals, 41 assists for 49 points.

Now, I'm not saying they're going to keep this up. I sure hope they do. But how unreal is this? We're not so far removed from a time where all the talk was on getting Iginla a playmaking centre and we were winning 1-0 games and proud of it. Now we're scoring goals like it's going out of style, tied with Detroit with most goals scored in the Western Conference.

This does come at the expense of defensive excellence, as we've seen. Normally I'd be upset that Kiprusoff's stats are suffering like this, but the timing really could not be better. A statistically sub-par season will do wonders in bargaining for a lower wage for him, which means good things for the team and a better chance of keeping him and Phaneuf.

I'm not one that thinks you have to choose between strong defensive play and strong offensive play. I'm not seeing anything systemic with the Flames' system that is inherently poor defensively (with the exception of the 4-forward, 1-defense powerplay configuration we've seen on occasion), just lots of little brain lapses, puck hops, and some poor puck control defensively. I think that given the time for our defense to find its groove (and to be fair, half of them are new to this team), this team will become even more of a force to be reckoned with.

Looking at the shift chart for last night's game, the defensive pairings at even strength are as follows:
Sarich - Regehr
Phaneuf - Aucoin
Hale - Warrener

I've been slightly impressed with Hale as of late -- he's better than I expected, and certainly better than Eriksson has been. The biggest surprises for me this season has been the play of Aucoin and Sarich. I was less than thrilled to hear about either acquisition initially, but Aucoin and Sarich have both greatly exceeded my admittedly low expectations. The pieces are all here for a very solid defensive corps, they just need to work with eachother. Every single pairing is a new pairing, and it does take time to slip into that groove and work well together.

Our forwards in the last game were arranged in the following lines:
Tanguay - Conroy - Iginla
Huselius - Langkow - Nolan
Moss - Lombardi - Nilson
Smith - Yelle - Godard

Conroy was also initially as suspect choice for a top line centre for me. But distributing the scoring power across two lines is clearly working, and who am I to disagree? I also think Lombardi and Moss can work some magic together, though Nilson's more of a dud on that line (but decent defensively).

I'm also liking the grit the team seems to have compared to last year. Both the intangibles (like last night's come-back victory with five unanswered goals) and the tangibles (Flames are tied with the Ducks for most fights this season with 10). [Sidenote: The top 10 teams in terms of number of fights are all Western Conference teams. Real hockey!].

I can see big things for this team if and when they find their groove and start firing on all cylinders. The inconsistency (period 1 last night and the entire SJ game) is a bit upsetting, but not at all unexpected at this point in the season. As Leanne has pointed out, the passing is suddenly "crispy" as opposed to "crunchy" rather suddenly in the 2nd period last night. Maybe Keenan is getting through to the boys.

Clarification from Leanne: I actually didn't have an opportunity to watch last night's game, but the crisp passing is something I've observed in several games this season, already. This is something Keenan's specifically been working on in the team - recall all those statements about "muscle memory" early on. I rather like this - work on the simple things, like making clean passes, and suddenly the hard things aren't quite so hard.

Hangover

(Or my theory about what happened last game. Somebody must've been "celebrating" Nolan's 1000th game early... )

Sooo...Minnesota tonight. Not too many expectations here - after all, Minnesota's played strong all season, and haven't lost yet. And the game's not anywhere I can watch it. We did stink to high heaven last game. I'm not sure what it was, but the Sharks had a much easier time of the Flames Monday than when I saw them play during the pre-season. And that's all I'm saying about that.

Anyways! McElhinney's out in Quad Cities, Keetley's back in town. I suspect they want to give McElhinney actual ice time which was a bit nicer than the other night so he can properly work his lower body (Note: Also a useful term when you can't remember which body part is broken).

I do expect Calgary to come back strong, even if they have not been put through the bag skate. They are professionals, after all.

Count on a low-scoring game. I expect we'll be pretty stingy for once, and Minnesota always is.

Disclaimer: I've only seen the 2nd period

And the third has not yet happened. But "HOLY MACKINAW", what the hell was that. Is Edmonton contagious? Abysmal. Can't clear the puck out of the zone on EV play, brutal penalty killing and powerplays, miscued pucks all over...I can't even watch this crap. This is a team that's night and day different from what we saw Saturday night, its not even the quality of the opposition that is mattering...the players themselves just can't touch the puck without it careening to an opposing player or skipping over their stick.

I'm also somewhat stunned to see Kiprusoff pulled after a goal he couldn't even see. I know he wasn't pulled for being Cloutier (he was actually pretty good tonight), it was to "shake up the team" or "rest Kiprusoff", but I'm also not convinced the best way to break in a rookie goaltender in the NHL is to throw him to the wolves as was done here. And Nilson on the powerplay? I'm not sure I agree. If things aren't working, the last thing I think should be done is put people on special teams they're simply not good at. It's a sure-fire way not to improve.

There could be some miracle. Some tear-jerking, emotional, bone-rattling speech in the locker room that results in a 3rd period Flames team ready to kick some ass and take some names. But at this point, I'm not very confident. Neither are the Flames.

On the plus side, I thought Sarich and Aucoin (and Hale?) were very good from what I've seen.
On the minus side, (insert everything else here).

Post-mortem

Not bad, not bad at all.

Is it kind of funny that the kid-ridden Oilers have a Raffi and a Penner (Dustin, not Fred, sadly) on the roster?

I won't comment much on the Oilers. Sam Gagner's first NHL goal coming in an arena where he practically grew up is definitely a feel-good story. The rest of the game...not so much. The kids seemed to be doing just fine for the Oilers, but the absence of vets in general to mentor this kids has got to be hurting the team.

On our side...it was an overly expensive win, losing Primeau to a busted ankle and Moss to Raffi Torres. I may comment on that some more later. Right now I'm kind of guiltily thinking about my musings before the game that so far, Calgary's been pretty lucky injury-wise. I thought Torres' hit was questionable at best (Translation: That punkass was effin' dirty), and can only give up kudos to Nolan and Warrener who made it clear that nobody on our side liked it.

That said, I liked most of what I saw this game. Kipper made a couple of jaw-dropping saves, tough to do with as much quiet time as he had during the game. We saw Eriksson checking out the view from the press box for the first time, and Hale was definitely a marked improvement, with a strong physical presence and no glaring game-losing giveaways. With the top two pairings in particular, I love what's going on with the D this year. I like that Phaneuf is taking more chances in front of the net (and being smart enough that this isn't a defensive liability of McCabe-like proportions), and that Regehr is actually shooting at the net.

The forwards were decent too. The top two lines had another, mostly consistent game. Even Godard, who got more time thanks to the absences of Primeau and Moss, seemed to capitalize on his extra ice time (though I had to laugh as he chased down a puck to try and prevent an icing call...wouldn't that make the guy ahead of him skatefaster?)

Oh well, it's all good! Next game against San Jose.

Bring. It. On.

Er...this is a bit late, but here goes.

Basically, I'm expecting nothing but good from this game. The boys are clicking in ways we never saw in the pre-season, when they did play Edmonton, they've been winning recently, so there's no headgames the way we know they're all so prone to playing...

This isn't to belittle Edmonton, who haven't been as terrible as they could have been since the start of the season. There is light at the end of the tunnel, if all their prospects turn out to be as promising as Gagner and Cogliano have been. BUT... remember that one of those guys is also Schremp. So....not so much.

But whatever! There's a chill in the air, I've got popcorn ready to go, and I've been snickering at the Leafs' awesome ability to maintain a lead. It's Saturday night, and things are going to be just dandy.

Flames. Win. That's all I got.

Home again

(Kudos to Dave for running a fantastic during-game-not-liveblog last game. I saw what I needed to - 4 goals by the good guys - and left due to last minute commitments before I could see the debacle of the finish)

I'm in a good spot right now, hockey-wise (we'll ignore the state of my fantasy teams, ok? Just forget them....). While the road trip has to be looked upon as having had mixed results, it was a hell of a lot better than anything we saw on the road last year.

Back to the home barn then... it would be kinda nice to actually pop in a win at home, especially given the pure awesomeness of our record there last year. But the road trip was good. The pressure is off to get that first win, I'm sure they've had some time to gel and bond and get some quality time with Coach Keenan(/sarcasm), so now they have a nice long homestand to get that home-cooking going.

So tonight we've got the Kings. Good news is, they had that long road trip to start their season, though understandably they're not quite as badly affected as the Ducks were. We'll see some hot young talent, with faces like Kopitar and Cammalleri. Pity we just missed Bernier, then again, perhaps it's just as well.

Look for Kipper to shape up - I imagine his game-by-game stats will look a lot better by the end of the homestand than they do now, Phaneuf to keep on playing his monster game with his monster minutes, and the Flames to clock in a win.

Cheers!

Pre-Game: Calgary @ Colorado

9:00pm eastern, 7:00pm mountain, the showdown begins: the Calgary Flames (2-2-1) face the Colorado Avalanche (3-2-0). My prediction is a high-scoring, high octane affair with the Flames coming out on top 6-5. Our defense has yet to really gel to be anything to be supremely confident in, Kiprusoff still looks like he's sitting just outside of "the Zone", and Colorado's defense will never gel to be that great.

But this will definitely be a game I'll watch carefully tonight. If the Flames can pick up another consecutive road win, it'll go a long way to burying the main weakness from last year and hopefully allow everyone to move on with a clear head. I was getting real tired of whining about the road woes and the evil twins. Perhaps the fact that Keenan actually has a spine will impact the rather fragile mental situation of the team last year.

Speaking of Keenan, is it too early to make any judgments? Yes, yes it is. But I do like what I see so far for the most part, and I've no major complaints yet. Maybe in a month there will be more room for criticisms and praises, but for now I'm curious to see how this all plays out.

And, forgive me for saying this, but I love Paul Stastny. He is my sugardaddy in a few of my fantasy leagues. If Colorado is to score, may that gentleman be blessed with points.

(Side note: The following photograph made my day)

Liveblog: Audience of one

Well, that's it kids! This feels better than the last time I did this. Or the time before that. And Duncan, we missed you. You gotta watch the games, apparently.

Back to school, sigh.

9:10 PM: Oh, Dave. You're opting for Master Chief, over thissss? Lombo just gunned it and put in the net! We win! I hear "You can put it in the win column!" for the first time in a long time. Sucka!

(Yes, Dave, I'm calling you a sucker. Hasn't been the first time, has it?)

9:08 PM: Good shift for us... but it's back in our end now. Then they took it back...good chance for Aucoin and Langkow there. Sounds like, as usual, a run and gun kind of OT...

9:05 PM: We got a point! We got a point! Wait, why am I cheering? I don't know why the guys on the radio are talking shootout stats. Don't we have to survive OT first?

9:03 PM: A minute left... let's keep it clean...20s...a whistle with 2.4s left in regulation, but the faceoff will be in our zone. No pulling Kipper this time! 2.7s left, actually. And another hard shot at Kipper just as the buzzer goes. Whew.

8:59 PM: No goal there. We continue to keep the puck out of the net...

8:56 PM: I wince as they scramble for the puck in Kipper's crease. While we're on the PK. It stays out. How about getting the lead for once? Geez. They're reviewing the scramble now. Boo. Urns.

8:49 PM: Tanguay with a good chance. I was just woolgathering over the last little bit, and it feels to me at least that overall, this is a mostly consistent game. They've been almost-good all game, as oppposed to goodbadgood or some combination thereof.

8:43 PM: I am home alone, and I just yelled out loud. That's right, kids! Lombo. Short handed! Woohooo! Actually, it's even strength, just barely. I love it when Lombo remember to bring his jet pack.

8:38 PM: I am envious that kids nowdays get to be the Flames Jr. Reporter(TM). Discipline, discipline, discipline. Sarich is off again.

That almost rhymes.

8:34 PM: Great shift by the first line just now. But like I yelled at them repeatedly at points last month, just SHOOT! Dammit... muttering to myself that the period is young yet. Yet.

8:29 PM: Ummm...third period is underway? Nothing too interesting? I'm going over the stats page nhl.com has put up for this game. It's interesting. You can see quite clearly Phaneuf is having a monster night, as is Iggy. This is as it should be.

8:17 PM: Curtis McElhinney on the interview for the intermission. He talks like a robot, but mentioned he'll be back soon from his injury, and discussed his note-taking skills. This is almost school-related! (Er. Almost.)

8:07 PM: It didn't work, but I like this. With 1.2s left in the second, Keenan pulls Kipper. Awesome.

8:05 PM: Speaking of powerplays, Modano's in the box right now. It happened while I was musing about the labour market here. And speaking of squandered PPs... though the period is nearly done now.

8:01 PM: Another great Iggy chance. This was after a squandered PP... I love Calgary, where every radio commercial is a help-wanted ad. Anybody know how to work with steel?

7:57 PM: No goal. And three minutes.

7:54 PM: Oh, the plot thickens. Langkow has a fantastic chance, dings the post, and the light goes off. Incidentally, seems like some Dallas player has landed in the box. I wonder how long it'll take Peter Maher to mention Game 6...

7:47 PM: Hagman. On the PP. Fifth goal of the year. Sigh. The good news? We're about halfway through the game. As a side note, Zyuzin just notched an assist for Chicago. Oh, happy days...

7:43 PM: Warrener goes off. Or doesn't. That's Phaneuf in the box (the radio guys are convinced it should have been Warrener. I'd rather have him sitting than Phaneuf). I think I've mentioned my misgivings about discipline before, can I repeat myself? Curled up in a corner and twitching now... (Not really. But I can pretend.)

7:40 PM: I can't believe we killed all those penalties off. Especially given MG's recent misgivings. Can I curl up in a corner and sob for a bit?

7:37 PM: Sarich goes off. Gawd.

7:34 PM: Oh. Karma, huh. Or something. Dallas sends another player to the box. I wince as Lundqvist gets out of the box...and gets a breakaway. Happy thoughts, kids, happy thoughts!

7:33 PM: Bah! Iggy gets a double minor for interference...and unsportsmanlike. This takes away our PP. Yeah we were on the PP. Why didn't I tell you earlier? Dishes. So looking forward to living in a house with a dishwasher that doesn't have two legs again...

7:11 PM: I can't believe I just delivered snaps for that. But. Iggy. Oi! Oi! Oi! 1-1. With about 21 seconds left in the 1st.

7:05 PM: In other news, Andrei Zyuzin has collected a holding and a hooking minor for Chicago. We hardly missed ye. Oh, the game? Iggy had a breakaway. Couldn't convert. This Ctrl-S thing is driving me nuts. Good pressure this shift though.

6:59 PM: Jere Lehtinen gets hit. Hard. How come damn Ctrl-S doesn't work to save a post the way it used to? I sigh and resort to the mouse.

6:57 PM: Peter Maher points out how Atlanta is the only other team in the league who hasn't won a game yet either. How...appropriate (given where we moved the Flames from). A good attempt by Stu Barnes gets steered away.

6:51 PM: Peter Maher decides now is a good time to point out just how long it's been since Calgary's won a game in Dallas. What were you doing six years ago? The colour guy blames the defence. He might have a point, at that.

6:47 PM: Damn Stastny. He's killing me in various fantasy leagues.

6:44 PM: Modano. Sigh. We're down 1-0 already.

6:43 PM: I finish labouriously jotting the reference for the paper in my notebook. Having to stick to American spellings is going to kill me one day. Yes, I know we can do this electronically these days. And oh, we had some decent pressure in the Dallas zone.

6:38 PM: Puck drops. Interesting note - Phaneuf is paired again with Aucoin. Huh.

6:32 PM: The broadcast crew is re-iterating the obvious. I am looking at upside-down A's and backwards Es and a bunch of other symbols, and bitterly remember that once upon a time, this was supposed to be gibberish.

Well... here we are. I'm going to be reading some papers for school the same time as the game goes and during the liveblog...if you're here, welcome, but understand that you need a life about as badly as I do. Maybe more.

Apathy Month

So, even though this is hardly an unexpected start to the season, I have to confess I'm a little annoyed that we haven't got a win yet. That Derek Morris scored a goal this season before Iggy did. That piling on the Philly bandwagon seems more of a sure-shot method to fantasy hockey victory than putting your chips behind Kipper.

I know we'll pull through, but I also understand what the Herald reported Keenan as having said this morning as well. As an outsider coming into the team, it must be completely flabbergasting to see your captain not quite ready to turn the jets on, to see your unflappable goalie...well... as unflappable as always, sigh. So far, this is one of the qualities I like about Keenan - no one will be too complacent, with him around.

So tonight! A visit to a rink where it seems like we never, ever win. Remember the last visit? That was a liveblog wasn't it? In keeping with tradition, maybe I'll liveblog this...

(Yes, it's a Friday night. But this is a PPV, and ... I have no life... lucky you!)

Pre-Game: Calgary @ Detroit

Tonight, in The Joe, the Flames will the Wings. A rematch, I guess. I must confess that I haven't yet watched a full Flames game this season. First my excuse was I'm out in Toronto where I couldn't find the pre-season games on TV. Now, my excuse is I'm too busy. In reality, I just do not like watching teams that aren't ready for prime time. Historically, October Flames are not ready.

All I know is what I've seen on the scoresheets (tangent: I loathe the new scoresheet -- where's my goalie stats? -- need two sheets for the same information now...). Also, the collective views of the blogosphere.

While the Flames haven't been blown out 7-1 or anything like that, I'm not convinced that they're playing to win so much as they're playing to impress Keenan. A lot of overly fancy plays and simple bungles with the puck cost several games. I'm hopeful that during the few days they've had off, they've gone back to basics (and maybe -- please -- worked on the powerplay), but only time will tell.

I'm still tentative about this team, but the pieces are certainly all there for a contender. I think if there's any coach out there that can break the bad habits Nervous Jimmy gave this team, it's a hardass like Keenan. But it takes time (hopefully not too much).

The Flames need a win against a good team to inspire confidence and get the ball rolling. Tonight might just be the night.

Wake me up when October ends...

Uh...nothing new tonight. Go Langkow. Go Lombo. Go Phaneuf. Boo Eriksson. Let's try not to lose the next one with mere minutes/seconds to go. Penalties. Officiating. Um. Come out and play. For 60 minutes, damn it...

On the other hand, it could have been worse. On After Hours, Keenan indicated (shocking Kelly and Scott in the process) that McElhinney injured his knee during warmup. According to Iron Mike, we could have seen David Hale in net, kids! Or Warren Peters...

Doesn't that warm the cockles of your soul?

(Ok, what the hell does that phrase mean, anyways?)

From the rest of the league: There seemed to be a rash of SHG all over tonight. Don't get it... Also, everybody should find a pop tart to buy expensive cars for, if Mike Comrie can keep this up. I mean, everybody. Let's empty out the Disney Channel.

Next game: myomy. Road game. In Detroit. This could be very good, or very ugly, take your pick. Take my advice and focus on the goaltending drama.... I guess we'll see Keetley come up, if McElhinney turns out to have a bona fide knee issue.

Still pre-season? No? Oh well.

So... due to other commitments, I only caught the second and third periods, really, but that seems to have been two periods more than Dave, so I'll just chime in with my thoughts on the game.

Craig Simpson was wasted on the Oilers: Seriously, what was this guy doing coaching? He produced much better colour commentary than we ever got from Drew Remenda last year. It was well timed, he knew when to shut up, and if you listened to him, you might even learn a thing or two. Huh.

Discipline: This is going to be a big one this year, and something that was nagging at me through the post-season. The refs do seem to be calling more things, and calling them consistently, so if we don't shape the hell up, it's gonna hurt.

Eriksson: Sigh.

Line Juggling: My head was spinning with all the line rotations this game. Looks like Langkow was battling hard to stay on that top line - based on the second goal, he just might stay there.

Day late, dollar short, blah blah: Seems to me that if the 3rd period Flames had shown up a bit earlier in the game, I wouldn't have to be surreptitiously optimistic. Still, at least they showed up...I was afraid before the game that we'd have to coax them out from under the stalls in the dressing room.

Next tilt is Saturday vs Vancouver...we'll see how that goes.

Showtime

Yep, it's been a long six months. Bring on the lame fire-themed puns.

Tonight, we play the Flyers in a relatively rare matchup. In fact, the Flyers have not played in Calgary since October 12, 2002 (Wikipedia is amazing, I would just like to emphasize). Remember then? Roman Turek was our starting goalie, Flames fans were just starting to be abuzz about their most recent 50-goal scorer, and ...what? Only him and Conroy and Regehr are left from those days? Time flies, kids, indeed, it flies...

To finish up, Greg Gilbert was still the coach, the roster was dotted with illustrious names such as Scott Nichol and Blake Sloan, and...oh, you get the picture. Maybe we should invite the Flyers out to have tea and pancakes more often.

As an aside, it was the last time I actually lived in Calgary during the start of a regular season. But I digress.

Back to tonight!

I think many of us are anticipating a slow October. Well... it doesn't get any better than this. We get to start the season with a home date, against a team that was decidedly weak last year. I mean, they fired their coach (and purged most of their front office) long before most of us started grumbling about the sartorial misdeeds of one Jim Playfair.

That said, Philly's done some major renovations over the summer. We'll see some familiar faces like Lupul and their captain, Jason Smith. We'll see some old Flames like Denis Gauthier and Jim Dowd (will they be factors? Um, probably not...). We'll get to see Briere and Gagne hooked up for the regular season for the first time. And they have been smokin' hot. (Shit! About the lame fire-themed puns...).

And what about us? Flames fans, have, as a whole, psychoanalyzed the entire team into a rubber room. We know about their insecurities, their self doubts, their phobia of THE ROAD. We know about the coach's schizo personality, Dion's need for a security blanket (preferably named Hamrlik) and Iggy's inability to see a stormcloud in a hurricane. We know Juice and Tanguay will crumble like feta cheese the first time they're scolded in public.

The game doesn't get played in our heads after all. Time to forget what we know, and to just sit back and enjoy. Are we ready? It's too late to find out.

It's hockey time! Go Flames.

(Um, Calgary in a run-and-gun 4-3 win. I'm expecting to be entertained.)