Seventh Heaven

If you had told me three weeks ago that yes, we would indeed embark on a six game winning streak, I would have guessed that you were kidding. (And if you told me the Flames would be awesome the same time as the Stampeders are, I'd ask you what you were smoking)

Last night's game was particularly interesting since it marked another occasion where but for the services of the third and fourth lines, we would have been in considerably more trouble. The goals we got for the most part weren't pretty - they were garbage goals for sure. Just look at the number of players who got credit for the first one - Prust, then Primeau, then Nystrom.

And that last shift - wow. I don't think we've played a more exciting minute of hockey this year. And finally we saw some shot blocking. Yay, shot blocking.

Bertuzzi is settling down to become the player I thought we were getting. Iggy is taking a nap after his big week last week.

And a big congratulations to another member of the Flames family. I had heard about this a couple of days ago, but Jim "Bearcat" Murray is all set to be inducted into the Hockey Hall of Fame. Next to Lanny and Theo, he was certainly one of the big parts of the Flames' early glory days when I was growing up, and figured prominently in one of the funniest stories of the Cup run, potentially garnering a +1 after the LA series.

I can't help but think how far the role of the trainer has advanced since his era; but that is a pile o' musings for another day. Anyways, kudos!

Today we're in Anaheim - we're hot, they're doing better, especially after Getzlaf finally got his root canal. They're rested, we just might see the McE finally start a game. Who knows?

I don't have too many thoughts on this. Check out the Battle of California for awesome intel from the other side for this weekend trip.

What else, what else! Well, October has ended! Which means it's time for a Open Ice Hits Fantasy Update! (No, it is NOT true that I wait till I get into first place before I put this up! Well, not really)

It has been a crazy month, but finally teams are sorting themselves out this year. I'm pleased to say that for once, Dave does NOT suck, and that yet again, I'm burning through games like crazy.

1. The Naughty Nilsons (me)
2. Steel Thunder(ST)
3. The Pantless Pirates (Dave!)
4. Flaming C (the mysterious Paul-Marc)
5. Wasilla Meth-Heads (Dave's brother. Hi, Adrian!)
6. Bancouber Pucks (Marcel)
7. Retired Warreners (MG Kent W)
8. FB Craig Conroys (Duncan)
9. screaming dobermans (WI)

Stay tuned next month for our next update! (Though yes, we'll blog again before then. It's not our fault life is crazy)

Mindgames

It was instructive last night watching the U of C Dinos men's volleyball team take on the U of A. (Bear with me, I know this isn't the right sport for most of our readers quite yet)

When we got there, you couldn't really tell (I'm by no means a skilled spectator of volleyball) which team was going to win. Drills were the same, stretches were the same...

Then the game starts (the match is best of 5 games), and the U of C takes a respectable lead. Then shit starts happening. The U of A battles back, wins the game (which the U of C had a good chance of winning) 23-25. A nice close one. (Seeing a pattern? Let me draw it even further...)

Next game, it's clear the Dinos are rattled. Mistakes start piling up. Individually, they're trying a lot harder. They're swinging at the ball harder. They're taking more chances. But as a team, they're falling apart, because they're not really depending on their guys anymore. Now they lose 19-25. (See what I'm getting at now?)

Next game, there's no way the Dinos are winning. The U of A easily secures a six point lead that turns into an eight point lead that the Dinos just aren't going to catch up to. And the mistakes are getting worse. They're missing serves. They're hitting balls out of bounds. All of this due is the extra pressure they're putting on themselves, as individal players. This results in less creativity as a team, because you no longer trust your teammates to put together an elegant play that p0wns the other guys. YOU'RE going to be the guys who hauls your team's bacon out of the fire.

Why, if they were hockey players, you might even say, you've seen that game before.

Haven't we all?

I was startled by how similarly the Dinos last night and the Flames in the last week past reacted to adversity. As soon as the other team didn't roll over and play dead, they fell apart. They looked fragile. It struck me, how much of sports, at that high a level, is about what happens in the head as much as it is on the court or on the ice.

Stuff to think about, at any rate.

Anyways! When I went to check out some volleyball action, it seems like I missed a gooder of a game! Mind you, it wasn't exactly against the toughest competition this year has to offer...

What struck me, listening in on the festivities intermittently, is that our special teams were good. Especially the penalty kill. I've been meaning to bring up the number of PP chances we've been giving the opposition in weeks past... you can't do that and win the game. No way.

Anyways, good job, good job, and now we have an ENTIRE WEEKEND without the Flames playing. I believe they're doing their skills competition tomorrow (anyone going?), but with that and the All-Star game next week (a second ENTIRE WEEKENDwithout the Flames playing), who the hell designs the schedule?

Bah.

In other news, looks like we will not be able to complain about Don Wittman's play-by-play come playoff time. Rest in peace, all that good stuff.

Adversity

After a full week of the world juniors, I'm kind of tired of that word.

However, congrats to Team Canada, in all it's man-loving glory. (By the way, if you haven't yet checked out Kyle's coverage of the tournament, get thee there and read away. Good stuff).

Woo!

Not a word that really applies to this week's edition of the Calgary Flames, either. The wins continued to come in San Jose (a game which sadly I missed), and I'm kind of expecting them to keep on showing up. It's definitely a far cry from a month ago, and let's not go back there again?

LA has not been a good team this year. In fact, checking out m'girl kms2's blog (yes, link usually stealthily hidden on our sidebar), you can see that while the Kings have been winning recently, it hasn't been happening nearly often enough.

Easy prey? I don't think so. They've got to want to collect some momentum right now. They have some guns in Kopitar et al., and some real experience, in guys like (he's still alive??) Rob Blake.

This will be a tight one where our guys will have to be pretty aggressive against their scorers, and just play a nice simple road game.

Uhhh... 3-2 for us. Lombardi is long overdue, so him, um, Eriksson gets one for slowly peeking into my good books, and Nilson (because he's been scratched for a while so let's see if he can score one from the press box).

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!