Satan de Mayo

B's slap the Flyers away tonight, 4-1. It wasn't that much of a blowout, though. 3 goals were scored right away, as Asham got the game started for the Flyers. But the B's responded quickly with 2 goals from Wheels (tip-in) & Satan (breakaway after Krejci got smoked at the blue line by Richards). And then the B's just clung for dear life for most of the 2nd period. Recchin Ball put in a rebound (off Pronger's glove) on the power play to make it 3-1 with about 17 minutes left in the game, and the B's just held on until Bergeron iced it with an empty-netter.
random crap

• Unruly savages, those Flyers fans - they bolted for the exits with about 4 minutes left. Orange Crush, my ass.
  
• Still not much jam from Carcillo and company. No fights, no line brawls, not much nastiness tonight. KPD figured that tonight would be the nastiest of games. It's weird - by not playing Philly's game and instead just sticking to playing defense and such, sticking with the game plan and not letting the antics of Philly get too far under their skin, they're able to stay focused and just win the games. I dunno. Asham is still a complete dirtbag and I'd like for someone to douse him with gas and light him on fire.
  
• That's, what, 4 game-winning goals for Satan now?
• B's owned the Flyers on the faceoffs again (31 vs. 22), with Bergeron leading the way (12 for 18)
• A pretty much clean hit on Krejci by Mike Richards - Krejci probably has a separated shoulder or something. McQuaid is also hurt, though we seemed to play better rolling 5 defensemen instead of 6. It's rumored that Stuart might be available for Game 4.
  
• Flyers defensman Lukas Krajicek, every time they said his name ("KRY-check"), I was reminded of X-Files.
• The Bruins' PK continues to be pretty good tonight - I think they're 13 for 15 on the kill for the series?
• Seriously, 10 years ago, didja ever think you'd be rooting for Mark Recchi?
• Let's close it out, boys. Don't let these guys think they have a chance - just put them down and move onto the next round.
  

B's Win in OT, 5-4

Okay, so the Flyers showed up today with quite a bit of rust caked onto them. The first period was all Boston. Goals by Begin and Bergeron. I asked Minnesota, "Hey, are we doing that good, or are they doing that bad?". We both agreed that Laviolette would have them coming out like crazy in the 2nd period, which is pretty much what happened. Philly goals by Bernie, er, Ryan Parent and Chris Pronger. Boston kept pace somewhat with a Satan goal. This Satan pickup is looking more genius with each passing playoff game. Anyhow, onto the 3rd period and Krejci scores one of his bullet-time goals, reminding us that the Matrix is alive and well. He slowed time down for himself while faking Boucher out about 9 times before shooting into an empty net. 4-2, Bruins and we all thought it was a wrap. Nope, Philly came back like a case of herpes with 2 goals from Mike Richards and Daniel Briere. Onto OT. Philly really had the momentum going into OT. BUT, the OT session started with the B's in pure assault mode, but Boucher held strong...until a loose, bouncing puck came onto Savvy's stick after Wideman pinched in, and he wound up (backscratcha!) and unloaded a BOMB over Boucher's shoulder. We saw the net move, the puck bounce out, and Savvy skate towards the glass. In one of the more amusing goal celebrations, he tossed his stick into the stands, jumped up on the glass, Ovie-style, and was mobbed by his teammates. Pretty freakin' sweet.
random crap

• Seriously, the dirtbaggage on the Flyers is plentiful. Asham, Betts, Hartnell, Pronger, Richards, Carcillo - they are all hated by their own mothers, even.
• Daniel Briere. I gotta say, he displayed a stick-to-it-iveness with his goal, splitting Wides & Hunwick. "Not Hunwick's best moment", noted Minnesota. Briere's what you get if you chop Bergeron's nuts off.
• Recchi vs. Pronger. Here's a great sub-plot to the whole series that I can't wait to develop. About 300 playoff games combined between the two veterans. The wee Recchi tried to cross-check the towering Pronger. Pronger was all, "what was that?" and Recchi got the extra 2. RECCHIN BALL. They are going to battling in front of the Flyer crease this whole series, this is going to be fun to watch.
• Crowd taunted Boucher with chants of "BOOO-SHAAAAY". I'd rather we chant "PROOONG-ERRRR", but I'll take it.
• Lots of whining by the callers on the post-game show about the fandom in the Loge texting during the game. Seriously, don't worry about the Loge/Club Seats and what they're doing/not doing. Just watch the game.
• Whiskey is for drinking, water is for fighting.
• Gotta find one of them "Hail Satan" t-shirts worn by a guy in the Loge, featured a yellow pentagram instead of a spoked-B.
• Wideman had 3 assists.
  

Adams Division Semifinal Game 6

Satan (above) scores another winning goal to further demonize his former team

B's win. The game started off pretty well relative to the others games - we didn't cough up a goal in the first 5 to 8 minutes. Once the forecheck was established, the B's carried themselves really well with a confidence, intensity, and efficiency that reminded me of last year when they were consistently destroying teams by 4 or 5 goals. Then we got on the power play and Krejci scored on a tip-in. In the 2nd period, Buffalo stepped up their play a little bit, but the B's stayed cool. Recchi slapped home another power play goal, B's up 2-0. Then Buffalo attempted their comeback, goal by Kaleta after a turnover by Wideman. The B's extended their lead to 2 goals with another Krejci goal off a nice feed from Lootch, but immediately after the celebration, ex-BC putz Nathan Gerbe fired a shot in after a turnover by Ryder. Just can't seem to hold those 2 goal leads. Anyhow, Satan scores the eventual game-winner on a nice pass from Wideman. Miller was caught out of position and Satan had an empty net to fire at. Vanek scored with a little over a minute left, after the (premature) "Na Na Hey Hey Goodbye" chant.
random crap

• Mike Milbury HATES Tim Connolly, so he must be enjoying some serious schadenfreude here.
• McQuaid/Ference. Now there's a pair that beats a full house. Every time their shift began, it was open season on Rask.
  
• Buffalo's power play went 0 for 19 in the series.
• Sobotka was 7 for 11 from the faceoff dot.
• Sometimes I think the warmup songs have something to do with a team's performance. Okay, maybe not, but they played "Unsung" by Helmet which is always a good thing.
  
• Of course, they're playing "In the Air Tonight" as well, probably a nod to the Celtics' recent championship run. Amusing to watch most of the crowd air-drum the famous drum fill.
• "Snowball 1, Hell 0" was what Jack Edwards said after the win. He also quoted Gordon Lightfoot, and that tool who replaced Tanguay ("Gresh"?) was whining about it. We all known Jack is loony and a total homer, but so what? I'll take the homer-ism over the high-pitched doom 'n gloom of Tony Mazz.
  
• I hope we play the Penguins. I'd like really like to send Cindy Crosby to the golf course, avenge the hits by Samuelsson on Neely, and avenge the losses we suffered in the Wales Conference Finals in the early 90's. Of course, there's also the whole Matt Cooke thing, with Savard coming back and stuff (he's been cleared for contact as of this morning). Minnesota thinks the Pens are very beatable, "Fleury's not that good; that team had trouble with Ottawa, a team that's been miserable since the Olympic break; they don't have Hal Gill & Rob Scuderi, their key shutdown pair from last season. Seriously, you think they're gonna win it all with Alex Goligoski or Mark Eaton? No way." Look forward to his full preview once our opponent has been determined. We're also reviewing his Bruins fan membership, as he actually spoke well of Hal Gill.
• Boob Salad. A listener on Toucher & Rich suggested that they be called "Apple Widemans" instead of "Apple Turnovers". If you're able to catch the drunken Bruins recap, check it out. Not a greater statement has been made in human history than "Top shelf, baby...where mom stores the peanut butter and I hide the pornos."
• Any thoughts on which number Seguin or Hall will wear on their jersey next season?
  

WORSHIP SATAN

We've been saying it on the blog all along: WORSHIP SATAN.
The number of the beast is now 81 instead of 666.



Okay, where to start? The B's got behind again quickly on 2 goals from Buffalo. Honestly, the 1st 2 periods are a blur right now. But one of those goals was scored by league punching bag Steve Montador. Montador wears an "A" on his sweater. Lindy Ruff should be tried for war crimes for allowing him to be an alternate. That is an atrocity to the game of hockey to allow that putz to wear the "A", nevermind give him 20+ minutes of ice time. Then in the 3rd period, Krejci scores a goal, then Bergeron scores a goal. How clutch is Bergeron? DAMN. So we end up going to overtime, and it's non-stop play. Everyone was pulling their hair out because Buffalo had a lot of chances and Rask made some pretty incredible stops, as did Miller.




After watching this slo-mo, I can only be reminded of another diving play in the Stanley Cup Playoffs a few years ago:

Then, of course, we have the goal by Satan. Ryder, who has become an entirely different player in this playoff series, blows right thru the Buffalo defense and puts a tape-to-tape pass on Satan, who fakes out Miller and shoots on a virtually empty net. Scrub to 1:58 of the video below, as the it shows the entire power play.

• KNOW YOUR CHEEZ ROCK: The Garden entertainment crew lived up to their usual milquetoast, family-friendly BS and played "Don't Stop Believin'" and "Living on a Prayer" during the overtime intermission. They then played "Nut Rocker", temporarily cleansing the palate...then kicked into ah, Ferris Bueller "Twist 'n Shout" thing, to which Minnesota noted, "this is where [jumbotron entertainment] jumps the shark". Then an edited version of the classic speech by Al Pacino from Any Given Sunday.
• THERE WON'T BE BLOOD: Only 1 real fight in the game, Lootch took on Rivet. It didn't amount to much, just mostly grappling. Lootch got the helmet off, but couldn't seem to get an arm free so he could start whaling away. The game was physical (95 hits or so), but not a chippy affair from what I could see.
  
• POWERLESS: Buffalo's power play is 0 for 14.
• WOOF: Krejci was 6 for 19 from the faceoff dot.
• SLICE OF SOBOTKA: 8 hits tonight to lead the Bruins.
  

B's win

Nice win today by the Providence B's over the Hershey Bears, who were playing with their parent team's #1 line of Backstrom, Ovechkin, and Semin. Thomas let in a softie at first, but was pretty solid throughout, including 3 nice saves on Ovechkin. Goals by, ah....Ryder who picked a corner on a nice shot for a power play goal, and also scored another close-in, Sturm (a BOMB one-timer on a feed from Krejci) and in the shootout, Krejci got the first one and Satan undressed Varlamov for the 2nd one.

• First NHL point of his career for Zach Hamill, wearing #52. He assisted on Ryder's first goal of the game.
• Buncha players taking today off: Chara, Bergeron, Recchi, Sobotka
• Hunwick & Boychuk were tasked with Ovechkin duty, and didn't do too badly.
• Nice to see the team start the playoffs winning 3 straight. It was basically against teams who didn't care, but it allowed for extended, quality minutes from McQuaid & Bodnarchuk as they adjusted to the speed/skill of the NHL game.
  

Sabre Rattling

Last night, the B's won, 3-1. Really slow game to develop. Goals by Satan, Wideman (no, really), Chara. I'm not sure, but I'm pretty sure, that there are "Wideman Hater" t-shirts out there these days. WOW. Apparently Mike Milbury had something to say about the overall Wideman hateration during the intermissions, that the fans had to leave him alone.

• Power play continues to be powerless, going 0 for 5.
• Hard to believe that Gaustad (78 PIM) wouldn't rumble with Thornton when Thornton wanted to.
• Sobotka tried to engage Ex-BC punk Nathan Gerbe in a fight, but the linesmen broke it up, giving each 2 mins for roughing .
• Let's say Satan gets 15 shifts a game. For 14 of those shifts, I hear Minnesota cursing under his breath because Satan is unable/unwilling to be physical or play defense. That 1 other shift, Satan usually scores. Normally, I figure you'd get rid of the guy, but seeing as how the B's have 1-20 goal scorer, I guess we can't be too choosy.
  
• Sobotka 6 for 11 from the faceoff dot.
• We had a pretty annoying Buffalo fan in Row 14 last night. A drunken "Let's go Buff-a-lo" chant every 30 seconds. I'm not exaggerating, either. He did start an almost entertaining chant of [clap clap clapclapclap] "DEN-NIS WIDE-MAN!" The section got into it for a few moments.
  
• Row 12 sat in Loge 5 last night. Our apologies to those well-heeled denizens of Loge 5. We let him out of his kennel last night and his unwashed self managed to escape and then wander into the Loge.
• Minnesota dislikes the Wisconsin Badgers ("they're rodents!") and I dislike the BC Eagles, so we're about to punch ourselves in the face over the Frozen Four matchup.
• Dave Goucher (radio play by play guy for the B's) looks like Steve Carell. Well, he did last night anyway while announcing the Bruins fans awards (Lester B. Pearson, Elizabeth Dufresne, John P. Bucyk - won by Recchi, Bergeron, Thornton).
• Last night ended Minnesota's boycott of home Bruins games. It was the first B's win he's seen in person since, yup, the Winter Classic.
  

B's get a win on the road.

Last night the B's beat Toronto, 2-1 in OT. Both goals by Satan. The first one was a garbage rebound goal off of a Krejci shot. The second was a snappy tip of a Chara shot off of the shaft of his stick. Ya know, I don't know if he meant to do it, but it's a pretty fine thing to tip a shot with the shaft of your stick and not have it go wide. Satan's been strange to watch this half-season. I'd say get rid of him, but we have no one else.

• I'm becoming a little obsessed with Sobotka's performance on faceoffs; last night he was 5 of 7 from the dot.
• Seidenberg suffered a gash on the wrist while attempting to take his own life after watching the B's power play.
  
• No production from Wheels/Ryder despite the line shuffle. The offense is simply Krejci & Bergeron. I hope opposing teams are not scouting us.
  
• Currently watching the 2-hour (!) pre-game to the Sox' season opener. Boston.com posted something about the rivalry being dead or old. Dude, the rivalry was done in '04 - the only folks who give a shit about it are those reporting or broadcasting the game. All I know is that the games are usually 5+ hours long when the Sox/Yanks play. It's that whole Boston.com/Boston Globe/Red Sox/NESN circle jerk that's been put into high gear now that the season's underway. Don't get me wrong - I love the Sox, love to plop down in front of the tv every night and waste time watching the games, but I - like the rest of "Red Sox Nation" - could probably do without the constant coverage. I DO like the addition of Peter Gammons. Anyhow, the only thing that makes Sox/Yanks interesting are the donnybrooks - so let's have some HBPs tonight...shake up the tired, old ballpark, eh?
  
• Wideman was on the ice for 27:34 last night. My goodness, I hope that never happens again.
• Gotta learn your cliches:

Bruins stop sucking long enough to win, 2-1

Seabass visits Section 311

The Rangers are a hockey team almost as offensively inept as the Bruins. Today, the Bruins picked up their play and beat them, 2-1. Goals by Satan (nice pass by Ference, backdoor) and Wideman (what?) from Sobotka. Wideman's was a backhand(!) from the right circle. He actually started the play with a good breakout pass to Lucic...It was probably Wideman's best shift in over a year. Oh, don't get me wrong - he still sucks.

• Avery was typical Avery all night. Also, Begin fought Prust early. Stuart was boarded by Prospal, leading to a scrum in the corner. Satan actually checked someone...but it led to an interference penalty.
• I renewed my season tickets - all of 311 is back for next year. I also had to buy concessions today, as the 12:30pm start threw off my eating schedule. Yup, that same eating schedule that makes me eat all of the time.
  
• Look, it's all a conspiracy - the Bruins are trying to do nothing more than take your money. Take today's pretzel (below). It is mega-salty. That thing's more kosher than Tevye. It's all a massive plot by the Jacobses to make you buy a $7.25 beer or a $4.00 bottled water.