A LOOK BACK……..
The only thing missing in this video was more of the underground talk on how this game was just plain slow. Fantasy wise it had to kill anyone who dared watch this game. How often does a winning goalie only give up two goals and have an .882 save percentage? That just does not occur a lot. The shots on goal were 19-17 New Jersey but the announcers trying to sell this game simply could not if they tried. Sure there were a few glorious chances in Overtime but that game fittingly had to be ended in the shootut where if not for David Clarkson, who knows how long it might have gone.
Alex Ovechkin had 0 points, 2 shots, and 11 hits on the night. Petr Sykora had 4 shots and 1 goal for New Jersey. This was not aesthetically pleasing to watch in the least. It was more painful than anything Tampa and Philadelphia could pull off. Washington went something like 20:51 without a shot on net. New Jersey only had 5 shots after the second period. Scoring chances were so far and few between. Yes the teams combined for 33 blocked shots but I could have blocked 3/4 of those. Yet there were no complaints or gasps over this one. Maybe because it was not nationally televised. Truly if you had fantasy players in this game, just run now.
Speaking of Tampa, they laid an egg in St. Louis last night losing 3-0 and similar to Washington had only two shots in the second period. The Blues only had 24 shots in the game to Tampa’s 19 and really the game saw few quality scoring chances. Eight different players had one point each for St. Louis with former Columbus Blue Jackets defenseman Kris Russell tallying the game winner in the first period. If you were looking for multi point efforts here, you would be denied but Brian Elliott did get kind of a cheapy 19 save shutout.
In Boston, sure everyone is talking about the Milan Lucic – Ryan Miller collision from last night but both Tyler Seguin and Brad Marchand had three points in the 6-2 rout of Buffalo. Seguin now has 11 goals on the season and honestly keeps making that Phil Kessel deal a non-issue despite Toronto’s best efforts to keep bringing it up and fans of Boston as well. Seguin’s speed and hands are A+ quality and usually by the time a goalie is prepared, it is almost too late to stop him. Buffalo has a bigger problem behind the pipes with Jhonas Enroth and Ryan Miller. It seems Miller could use a little time off to get mentally back in the game. Clearly, he was rattled well before last night’s incident and it is killing fantasy hockey owners.
Let’s move on to today’s schedule…….
SCHEDULE TIME:
Sunday, November 13, 2011 |
|||||
| Teams | Notes | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Philadelphia | at | Florida | 5:00 PM | Gameday | ||
| Edmonton | at | Chicago | 7:00 PM | Gameday | ||
| Minnesota | at | Anaheim | 8:00 PM | Gameday | ||
| NY Islanders | at | Vancouver | 9:00 PM | Gameday | ||
Sure it seems like a light night but four games is pretty robust for a Sunday Night in the early going. Philly and Florida may be the game of the night but the Canucks and Islanders offer some strange intrigue in the late game.
KEEP AN EYE ON…….
Kris Versteeg, F, Florida Panthers — For some reason I can see Versteeg torching the Flyers. He was not well liked in his brief stay in Philadelphia and honestly he is a player that is on a hot streak. Ilya Bryzgalov may get lost in the sunshine so chances of a point or two are good for the guy who has a good bit of talent but not always the consistency needed to stick with a team for more than a year or two it seems.
Cam Fowler, D, Anaheim Ducks — With the Lubomir Visnovksy injury, an already depleted Ducks’ defensive corps needs Fowler to break out of his sophomore slump and quickly. Fantasy owners are hoping the opportunity yields some production at long last. He had 10 goals last year in 76 games but 0 in 16 games this season. He does have 6 assists so you would think the law of averages would strike back some here. Perhaps with Visnovsky out a month or close to it, Fowler can get his goal scoring groove back some.
John Tavares, F, New York Islanders — The three headed goalie monster was just too much of a burden for us to bear here again on this post today. He had 10 points in his first 6 games (including back to back 4 point nights) but only three points in his last 7 games. Which Tavares and which Islander team we will see tonight is anyone’s guess but the Isles really need to play better defense which will lead to quality offense as they gave up 51 shots in a 4-3 loss to Colorado the other night. He may just have to lead this team offensively on his back.
We have the show tonight and as always live tweeting away tonight on the fantasy do’s and don’t of the hockey world. This should be fun and good luck.
