Ovechkin, I hate you right now

Why? Because you seem to have completely disappeared. Where were you when Philly completely ran over Washington? Okay, so apparently you did have three brilliant attempts at a goal but Mr. Niittymaki stopped you on all three. But really... only three brilliant shots, Alex? That's it from the guy who scores the most goals in the entire league last year? Obviously your team has goalie issues but that does not explain why you didn't score. Is it because Semin wasn't there to help get the offense going? I thought he was "the other Alex". Look, I may not like you when you're playing Montreal or Pittsburgh but other than that I like you. I don't like you not scoring a single goal against the Flyers. That is just icky. But then again, maybe it's not totally you're fault. The Flyers are just so capable of being good and they were obviously ticked off that we beat them. But still.... YOU SHOULD HAVE SCORED! 7-1 is bloody embarrassing. And yes, I'm only mad because it's the Flyers you lost to. But still.... Don't be like a certain other Russian out there who forgot how to score for 19 games in a row. Only do that when you play us and the Penguins.

Speaking of the Penguins and hating people....

What the heck is going on here, people? You're currently losing 5-1 against the Maple Losers? You know what? I was going to go into a whole rant over where Crosby, Malkin, Fleury and everyone else went... buuuut I have the answer: It's those horrid coloured jerseys that everyone seems to like for some reason that's killing you. No one in their right mind should be able to go and skate and score goals when they look like they look like cotton candy. Well, obviously they don't have cotton candy in Russia because Malkin scored a nifty goal while wearing that horrid jersey. But that's beside the point. The point is this: Why are you losing to a loser team? You are SO much better than that. What is going on here? You're making me really sad now.

Later: Well, now I really hate you all. 7-3??????! Guys.... this was so not cool. Please, dump those horrid jerseys and get back to black and back to beating all those loser teams.

And finally, some people I don't hate for once:

1) Real Madrid

You won. Didn't see the game but you did get your one and only goal against Valencia in the 6th minute of the game. Yay for you. Too bad Barca's still waaay ahead of everyone else. Pooh.

2) The Habbies! Habs 4 - Sabres 3 in OT!!!!

You won. I can't believe it actually. I love you guys! When I came home after spending the day making a Hab pillow thing, you were already playing. And by the looks of things, I thought you had died. You didn't seem to be playing with quite the same fire as when you played the Flyers and I was frankly worried. Hadn't we seen this before? The Habbies played really well against a good team and then died against a bad team? Well, the Sabres were playing like a team who was feeling really good after blanking the L.A. Kings. They seemed all over you guys. I was squashing the non-exisistant stuffing in my new pillow when the Sabres scored on you in the first period. Oh boy, here we go, I thought to myself.

The second period was not looking too much more promising as Sergei was the only guy to get a goal past Miller on... what was it? A five on three powerplay? Well, you realize that I would have had to scream until my whole street woke up if you hadn't scored on that lovely opportunity, right? Right. Anyway, I went back to crying like crazy when you guys let Buffalo score again. I'm trying to remember how they got that goal in but I'm coming up with a blank. I think that must have been the one where Halak was on one end of the net facing the puck when whoops, the puck sails past Halak and there just so happens to be a Sabre guy standing there who tips it in. I think that was it. Anyway, I was cursing you guys inbetween cursing my dinner which wasn't the best thing in the world I could have eaten. Your powerplay really wasn't so cool again tonight. Especially when the refs were being so nice and giving the Sabres so many penalties but I suppose getting that one goal was good.

As the third opened up, I was just moaning over how badly when you were all doing when whoops, you scored! It a nice goal off the faceoff by Tanguay which was setup nicely by Hamrlik. Well, the puck comes to the net, Miller can't control it and whoops. 2-2. Haha. Yes, I know you were doing better than I had given you credit for but really... can you blame me too much? Okay, go ahead. Blame me. I was cranky last night. Moving on... The nice feeling of course couldn't last for long. You guys got the powerplay, you guys lost the powerplay but not on the penalty that you should have taken. You guys then play well 4 on 4 and then what the heck was that? Buffalo gets the powerplay, some guy stands in front of Halak so he can't see and presto, puck goes flying past him and he didn't even see it. Hmm, I guess someone should have knocked him out of the way, yeah? So it was more screaming from me. All was not lost however. With five or something minutes to go Kovalev took a shot on Miller which he couldn't control and Sergei got it and it was into the back of the net.

Sot it was to overtime you guys went amid plenty of cheering. I mean, c'mon, there were moments when the crowd was wondering if you guys were going to go down like you had against a pile of other people. But you stuck it out and it paid off in overtime. Let's me honest though, things totally went your way during OT. The Sabres took two penalties to ensure that most of the action was gong to be at their end. It was just a matter of you guys just putting that puck behind Miller for good. It was tense though. Time wasn't on your side. But it happened. With 25 seconds left till we had to sweat it out in shootouts, Kovalev finished the game for good as he put a beautiful shot past Miller. Thank the hockey gods!!!!!

Somewhere in there Lang almost scored but the goal was disallowed because the net got knocked off by some idiot before the puck went past Miller. Booooo. Sorry, I can't remember when you almost got that goal. I think it was in OT but I can't remember. It would have been a nice goal though.

Let's be honest though. You got over worked in some parts of the game. There were moments when it looked like Buffalo was enjoying a power play when they weren't. There were times when you took bad penalties - yes, I'm looking at you Mr. Kovalev. And there were times when it looked like you would never get the puck into the other zone. Oh and the Sabres were really giving Halak quite the workout. Though I suppopse I should be hating Miller more for being good and stopping a lot of really good attempts. Speaking of Halak, you seemed to have some more trouble controlling that puck again. I don't blame you though and you came up with some really nice saves so you're forgiven. But the good news was you all didn't really die. Well, except for that little period after Buffalo got their first goal. You sort of didn't play so well immediately after that. But you did pick it up after and look: You won in OT because you tried. You didn't roll over and die. Yay! Okay, so maybe it wasnt as pretty as the win against the Flyers but still....You won!

The good: The real Kovalev may just be back for good now. You've now had three goals in the last three games plus you had some really nifty chances to get a goal throughout this game. And was that Price I saw as the backup guy? Oh and I really did appreciate you all not going off and dying. You stuck it out.

The bad: well, the powerplay sort of maybe could be better. But you did score twice on the power play, including two times when it was really important to get a goal in. And really, maybe I"m just being picky now because let's face it: four powerplay goals in two games is a lot more than you had in your previous games.

The annoying: the annoying announcer who was doing the announcing in the video on the NHL site where I watched the highlights.