Yawnfest in Atlanta turns into a must-win for me

I got to be honest with you. Sometimes it's great to have a relative who routes for the enemy.

I was ready to yawn throughout the entire Habs game when checked my phone machine and got this lovely gem:

"I'm watching the Sens beat the Bruins and I think Atlanta is going to be playing the Habs so hopefully they win too."

I was just about to curl up with a pillow and snooze away. But nooooo. That's smacktalk! I couldn't just doze off now. No! I had to yell at the Habs to make sure that they woke up enough to win! It didn't need to be a beautiful win. They just needed to do enough to get the two points. I can't go into the holidays (and I know there's still one day left before I can relax completely) knowing that my Habs lost to the Thrashers while those horrible Sens beat the Bruins. Nuhuh. No way. No way.

Things were looking baaaaad though. The Habs were looking like they had just shoveled their way out of Long Island. It seemed like only Jaro had loaded up on the caffeine before the game. And thank goodness he did. Jaro's solid play early on coupled with the Thrashers inability to shoot the puck in a decent manner saved the Habs from going down 5-0. They did end up 1-0 after one though on a goal by Ilya (oh Ilya, we're just not getting along very well these days, are we?).  The second period was nicer when Turtle-Pleky and Andrei had two nice goals, thereby making Hedberg's save percentage look like absolute crap.

Of course that nice warm fuzzy feeling I was feeling didn't last. Of course not. A group effort in epic fail ensued in the third period when the Habs botched up the faceoff and Jaro botched up control of the puck and bingo! we were tied. It got worse too. Antropov threatened to ruin my night when the Habs obstructed their own goalie and helped the Thrashers score the go-ahead goal. News wasn't all that great in Ottawa either. There was STILL no score. Oh and the Leafs finally appeared to be beating Miller. GUHHH.

Of course MAB had to save my night. Couldn't have been Markov....nope. MAB tied it up on a super late powerplay and then MAB scored the game winner on a very sweet pass from Turtle-Pleky. Of course they had go and review the goal after the teams were already on their way out. Goal turned out to be good and I breathed a sigh of relief.

Of course it wasn't going to be enough if the Habs won. As much as I hate the Booins, they really needed to smack those Sens around. If they Booins were going to get blanked by the Leafs the other night (can we just say thanks for absolutely nothing, Boston?), then the least they could do was kick the Sens. They did just that as Marshmallow shut them out. Yeah, I know... I'm not celebrating a Booins win. Just a Sens loss. Different thing. Just like I'm not celebrating the Sabres come from behind win over the Leafs. I'm celebrating another Leafs loss. Thanks Miller!

In other news (and no, it's not minor league news so dont' run off yet)

• Chubby Marty FINALLY got his shutout record. Against the Pens too. Whooo! The Habs thank the Pens for being the sacrifices in the latest Chubby Marty record this time around. 
• Oh Philly.... I guess it wasn't Bub who was the problem, eh? they just lost again. 4-1 to the Panthers this time. 
• It's not a great night for Dubnyk and the Oilers.... the poor rookie goalie just let in 7 goals on 26 shots... ouch.