Golden Points: Boston vs New York

Bruins 2 - Islanders 3
Bruins 3 - Rangers 4



What am I going to do with this team?  Don't the Bruins know that my parents family grew up in New York?  Me and my siblings are the only Boston sports fans.  Do the Bruins know how much it sucks to get swept by the New York teams?!?!?!  Screw the points they left out on the ice, think about me!

To be honest, I thought the B's played two pretty good games (minus the first few minutes of the Rangers game).  The re-energized first line of Lucic, Krejci, and Seguin looked AWESOME again, with Seguin scoring a nice goal and Lucic grabbing a power play goal.  The only problem was, like Claude pointed out, they aren't getting that "secondary" scoring.  Who else is going to step up?  We can't just rely on the normal players to give us a goal.  A goal or two needs to come from someone else.  They had plenty of opportunities, but just couldn't get one past Nabokov.

It was also good to see Boychuk back out on the ice.  Sorry Mottau, you didn't get to face your old team.

A huge hold your breath moment during the game when you see Rask go down in pain like that.  We now know it's a groin injury and that he'll miss 4-6 weeks.  I initially thought it was a groin injury the whole time.  People were speculating knee or hand.  I'm probably the furthest thing from a doctor, but Rask flicks off his blocker and waves his hand indicating he needs the trainer to come on the ice immediately.  Then what's the normal human reaction when you have an injury...you hold it.  I don't know why, but when you get hurt you grab whatever is hurt.  Tuukka placed both hands on his lower ab/groin area...hence why I thought it was his groin.  If it was his knee wouldn't he be grabbing his knee?  I think this might be the first thing I got right all season long!!
The icing or non-icing call...  Was it bullshit?  Yes.  There was neither an icing signal or a non-icing signal, but who cares.  You are taught at a very young age to "play 'til the whistle".  Both Lucic and Seguin were right there and just stopped.  Just an unfortunate play that ended up leading to the game winning goal.  The B's can't use that as an excuse though, they had control of most of the game and had plenty of opportunities to finish them off.

Yeah yeah yeah, cousins, your lowly Isles beat the B's.  Enjoy hockey in April...oh wait...enjoy another lottery pick.

Onto the Rangers............

I don't hate the Rangers as much as other people do.  For one, they aren't in our division.  I know people like to play the New York versus Boston card.  It's a nice original 6 rivalry.   Don't get me wrong, I don't like the Rangers, but I don't hate them as much as I hate the Jets or Yankees.  For me, my hockey hatred is geared towards the Canadiens, Canucks, Flyers, Maple Leafs.

I give the Rangers front office credit.  Earlier in the decade they tried building a team around individual stats and sexy names.  It's like they were putting together a fantasy team with the likes of Jagr and Kovalev.  Those guys were great, but the chemistry just didn't seem to be there.  They've changed their approach and it all starts with their captain, Callahan.  I was talking with a coworker and I agree, I would love Callahan to be a Bruin.  He's the definition of a Bruin, hard working and tough.  And that's what this Rangers team is.

Anyways, you take out the first few minutes (and the Rangers first two goals) and the game is ours.  Why can't this team put together a full 60 minutes???  They aren't good enough right now to take even ONE shift off.  After a couple bouts, the B's finally started playing much better.  Big props to Lane MacDermaid who stood up for himself in his first NHL game.  Rupp isn't like fighting Sergei Samsonov either, he's a very tough dude.

Even though the first goal was all Chara's fault, I still thought Thomas should've made the save.  The second goal was a bit weak as well (yes I know it deflected off our own player), but I feel like last year Thomas figured out a way to keep the puck out of the net.  Maybe he's tired, maybe he's old, either way he's our goalie the rest of the way and NEEDS to step it up.  Just like last year, we go as far as Timmy will take us.

Claude finally got his secondary scoring from Jordan Caron and Pepe Le Pouliot.  These weren't pretty goals, just making the other team pay for their mistakes which is what both teams did all night.  Hopefully that third line can get rolling a little bit.

Although it's lame that Thomas used it as an excuse, I've always wondered why the "Greatest Arena on Earth" was called that and yet it has some of the WORST lighting on Earth.  It's painful watching all the shadows on the ice.  Come on!!  How hard is it to put some lights up in there??

Next Up: The B's need to snap their 2-game losing streak against the Maple Leafs tonight.  It'll be the Leafs first home game under their new coach, so you have to assume they'll come out flying.  Hopefully the B's can match it or I'm throwing my computer out the window...