Please, please, please make this happen

I love the Sox. I love Fenway. I think hockey in Fenway will be awesome.... that being said... the NHL could very well earn my love if this happens:

From the Globe and Mail.

The Montreal Canadiens’ regular-season game at Olympic Stadium is expected to be on the agenda when the 2009-10 NHL schedule is released tomorrow.

The final tinkering to the 92nd NHL regular season will be made in the next 24 hours, but a league source indicated yesterday that a Habs home game against the Washington Capitals and star sniper Alex Ovechkin “is still in the mix for late November.”

The indoor game at Olympic Stadium is expected to be contested on Nov. 28 or the previous Saturday to help commemorate the Canadiens’ centennial celebrations that will conclude on Dec. 5 with a match against the rival Boston Bruins at the Bell Centre.

The Olympic Stadium game was an idea brought forth, discussed and met with approval at the competition committee meeting three weeks ago – providing the NHL schedule makers could accommodate the request.

I WANT OVIE IN THE OLYMPIC STADIUM! AND I WANT TO BE THERE! Make it happen you twerps in charge of the NHL schedule! I WANT OVIE HERE! WHAAAAAAAAH! It would be SO awesome to have the league's most exciting player playing in the craziest city ever.

Clearly I don't need any caffeine this morning to keep me awake *G*

NHL doesn't want me to be bored

Just as I was about to make a comment about there being no hockey and how boring summer is right now.. I see this on the NHL website:

Yay! Burnt cookies for the NHL today for keeping me happy. Ovie's hattrick still makes me laugh hysterically.

Expect more random junk like this over the summer until I can force my brain to come up with something brilliant... which might be never.... err maybe hold out for something "better" than? =p

Uhoh... Habs sign Paul Mara

Umm.....this is the extent of my knowledge of Mara as a player:



Yes, that's Mara trying to stop Ovie... And this...



Okay fine. So technically that one is not entirely his fault.. but he was still on the ice!

Welcome to Smurf Village Mara! May you never have to be on the ice at the same time as Ovie =p

OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOVIIIIIIIIIEEEEEE

Forget caffeine to keep you awake. Watch Ovie. He. Is. Freaking.Awesome.

I've been running around like an idiot right now....=p

OOOOOOOOVIIIIIIIIIIIIIE = AMAZING

If saying that makes me anti-Canadian, then fine. I don't care. Ovie makes me smile every time he scores. Well.... minus that highlight reel goal against Pricey.... but almost every time!

Yes, I haven't been this excited over a game in.... a long time.... WHEEEEEEEEEEEEE!

So awesome that this calls for another lame limmerick!

We just can't get enough of Ovie
He just loves to score so much - sowwy
He came out to play
And made them all pay
What would we ever do without Ovie?

I'm too hyped to even think properly about the game. I can't even type in a coherent fashion....Can't you tell? THIS WAS AMAZING!!

Despite the LAME start to the game which saw yet another Puffy goal in the first period... the Caps came back with... an Ovie goal to tie it up in the third period. Simmy and Maf - Simmy in particular - were amazing again. The Ovie goal was followed by a Puffy goal later which brought us to 3-2 going into the third period. Dino (see "Dictionary of EPisms") tied it on some icky Pens playing. And then Ovie scored on the PP - which was amazing because the Caps hadn't done anything on the PP before and semi-sad because Eggplant decided to not show up to the playoffs- which had me in absolute fits. And then again he gets a mini breakaway and puts it away. HAAAAAAAAT TRIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIICK! That sound you heard was the Verizon Center roof coming off.

And then Jurcina decides to make a bid for my Hate-You-Right-Now list by taking a penalty with 2 minutes to go. Pens pull Maf and guess who the heck scores on the PP? OH YES. PUFFY PUTS IT OFF OF SIMMY'S HEAD AND INTO THE NET WITH 30 SECONDS LEFT TO GO! Like seriously.... Puffy topped off my Hate-You-Right-Now list because it wrecked an otherwise wonderful ending to the game.

And yes. Ovie AND Puffy had hattricks. Apparently it's the first time in 13 years that two players have had hattricks in the same game in the playoffs or something. I dunno. Bettman must be freaking now. Oh and yes, only Puffy showed up tonight. Maf got no help from the Pokemon or the Vegetables or the Vampires tonight. Poor Maffy. I felt bad for him.

Kinda. I wished he played somewhere else.... =(

but anyway....

Funniest moment of the night: The Sens relative calls. The mother picks it up. He started watching the game later so he's behind where I am (I've got it on live). He hears me screaming and thinks it's because Mr. Puffy scores (the Sens relative likes Puffy). I hear something about some chants about "Sidney" (glad he remembers my rabbit's name *g*). I'm too busy dancing around to point out that it was the "Hated-Ovie" that scored the goal to make it 3-2 and not the Puffy. I will have to remind the relative that the Wonderfully Amazing Ovie's hat trick won over the Puffy's hat trick when I see him next =)

Quote of the night:

Boudreau: If this were tennis, we've held serve.

Dude. This guy is brilliant. Yes. The Caps hold serve to take the first set! Hell yeah!

Oh wait! More quotes. Crosby apparently has a problem with other people getting a hattrick....

"People kept throwing hats. I was just asking if he could make an announcement to ask them to stop. I mean, the first wave came and then I think they were all pretty much picked up, and then more started coming. So for us, we just wanted to make sure we kept kind of moving and kept the game going, wanted to try to get back in it. So wasn't complaining about anything."

I'm thinking this is the cue to start throwing hats at the beginning of Game 5 - assuming there is a Game 5. Puffy is just jealous that he only got one hat.... Pfft....

And what does the Anointed one think of Simmy?

"I mean, yeah, he's made some timely saves. I still think we can do a better job of burying the puck and capitalizing on our chances. The difference is a few inches, but he battles and he competes, and there's times where he's out of position but he finds a way to get a piece of his body on it. So as a shooter you have to make sure that you bear down, and we have to really correct that quickly. I mean, there are times when he's kind of swimming in the crease and we've got some loose pucks and we've got to put them in."

Does this remind anyone of Jumbo Joe's comments about Jaro being "good" when he beat the Sharks? Uh how about "yeah, he was amazing"?

And finally, Mr. Puffy comments on Ovie's hattrick

"When it comes down to it they got a big goal there on the power play when it counted, and that's the difference. I don't see anything else but that. We had opportunities, I mean, the last two games we can honestly say we did some really good things but we made a few mistakes that have hurt us. That can be a good thing to look at as well, knowing that we're that close and these are things that we can easily and change quickly. But we have to do that."

Read: Hattrick? What hattrick? I got one too, remember? Hello? I GOT ONE TOO DAMNIT!

Ovie says:

Sick game. Sick goals by me and him.

We liked yours better Ovie.... really.... =p No, I have no shame whatsoever in saying that.....

GOOOOOOOOOO CAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAPS!

So not liking Crosby makes me anti-Canadian, eh?

JT at the H Does NOT Stand for Habs brought up in an interesting topic the other day about our (least) favorite player. Apparently someone said that if she didn't cheer for the Penguins over the Capitals, she would be anti-Canadian. You heard it. Cheering for the Capitals over the Penguins makes you anti-Canadian. I've actually had similar if not quite so blatant statements from people myself, which always, without fail, puzzle me.

Let's be honest here. This series is between the Capitals vs. the Penguins. This is not a series between Russian and Canada. It's not even just about Crosby vs. Ovechkin, despite what the media tells you. It's the Washington Capitals vs the Pittsburgh Penguins. Two very talented teams in the National Hockey League who are based in the United States.

With most teams in the NHL comprising of players from many different nationalities, I find it hard to understand why people would associate a team like say, the Penguins as being Canadian? Sure they have a lot of Canadian players, but the team itself is based in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. The Capitals are considered "Russian" and yet they have more Canadians than Russians on their team. But I suppose because the Caps have a few high profile Russians, the entire team must be Russian and that's somehow a bad thing....Both teams however, are technically American.

Personally, I don't see why even defining the team as "American" or "Canadian" is needed in most cases anyway. The thing is, a player should be playing for the logo on the jersey (however ugly it is). They play for the team. In the NHL, that means they are not playing for their country and I'm not sure that most guys play for the city either. They play for the logo on the jersey. Nationality should have zero to do with it.

When I watch hockey, I watch it to see what the guys on the ice do. I want to see guys play with a lot of passion. I want to see guys who care. And I like exciting plays on most nights as a bonus. I dont' care what the guys do with their lives off the ice as long as it's legal. I don't pick my favorite players based solely on where they were born. That's ridiculous.

If I limited myself to only Canadian players, then I'd be stuck with people like Sidney Crosby, Danny Heatley, Jason Spezza, Eric Staal, Sean Avery and Martin Brodeur. Thanks but no thanks. I'm not saying that these guys aren't talented. I believe everyone I just named is capable of being talented at something (I wouldn't say that Avery is an extremely talented player. He's a talented pain though). But I can think that they're talented and still detest them.

Ovechkin meets my criteria for what I want to see in a player. He works hard, he cares and he's pretty exciting on most nights. I like him because of that. I don't like him solely because he's Russian. I don't care if he was from India or Australia. I don't like him because I don't like Crosby. All I care about is what he does on the ice. All I care about is what he brings to the game. And on most nights, I like what I see.

Crosby's seemingly lack of emotion in general, makes me snore. He doesn't make me interested in watching hockey. When I initially watched the Pens, I watched Malkin (until he disappeared). I watched Fleury. I didn't watch Crosby. Look, I feel bad for him. I think he's been manufactured and handled by various people beyond belief and that's resulted in this cardboard cut-out guy. I'm not going to say that he isn't talented or that he doesn't try hard. I think he's talented and he tries. But he doesn't interest me at all. I find him annoying now. I don't like his constant yapping and whining. I don't really like his new hobby of getting into cheap fights. I just do not like him.

I don't see how that makes me anti-Canadian if I don't like Crosby and would rather cheer for a team that interests me. If I said "I prefer Lidstrom to Avery" do you think many people would complain? I doubt it because we're talking multiple Norris winner vs major pain who got suspended for dissing his ex-girlfriend. But Lidstrom is from Sweden and Avery is indeed Canadian. If I said "I wouldn't cheer for the Leafs if they were the last Canadian team in the playoffs" would anybody care? No. They know I'm a diehard Habs fan and I would never cheer for the Leafs, even though the Leafs are a Canadian team.

So. If it's okay to prefer Lidstrom to Avery and if it's okay to not cheer for the Leafs under any circumstances, why the heck isn't it okay to cheer for the Ovechkin over Crosby? In case everyone missed it, the Cold War sort of ended a while ago.

Again, this isn't about Russia vs. Canada. This is about the Washington Capitals vs the Pittsburgh Penguins. This is about which team I prefer to watch. Nationality of the players notwithstanding.

Go Caps Go!

Alexander the Great strikes again

Ahem... video of Ovie's goal against the Rags. I know people want to kick him, but I personally could watch this one all day (for the records, I have watched some of his goals all day *g*). Maybe now people will stop pointing out that goal Ovie got against Pricey...? Maybe not... Whatever. This is the goal that matters right now.

Habs vs Sabres pre-game rant

Fine, so this is actually a big excuse to post my new stick figure drawing... I couldn't help myself. It's like making fun of Crosby.... It's so easy. I'm bad, I know.... Here's another picture of the Crosby voodoo by the way. He now lives in a tissue box. I should probably make it look like an igloo or something....


Anyway.....

Miller's back and I'm thinking I should have made a Miller voodoo doll instead of a Crosby one. Then again, doesn't seem to matter what goalie is in nets though because we all know that the Habs can lose to anyone at any given time. They can also beat anyone at any given time.

So. Which team shows up?

I really hope it's not the one that came to the Bolts game. If the Bolts had been just a tiny bit more... well, I can't say talented, but organized? then we would have seen a different result. The Habs need to play with a tad bit more intensity (okay, fine, a lot more) for 60 minutes. Not 20. Not 40. Definitely not 50. 60! They also need to not freak out if the Sabres take a lead no matter how the goal goes in. And they need to not let the Sabres get a pile of odd man rushes or breakaways. And not getting kicked around by the Sabres would be nice. Thank you. Forechecking is always appreciated, as is hitting anyone in a Sabres jersey. Shooting at the net is a good idea as supposed to going very wide. Staying out of the penalty box is a must. And not having a sucky powerplay would be nice. And not obstructing your own goalie is an absolute must (Komisaurus I'm looking at you!). And of course, a win in any capacity would make this sick fan happy.

What else needs to happen tonight to make me happy

• Pens lose... then again, a Habs victory and a Rags loss in regulation could get the Habs out of 8th because they've played less games...Hmm....Fine. Habs victory and a Rags loss in regulation
  
• Can't decide between a Bruins loss and a Leafs loss.... maybe they could both lose?
• Hurricanes and Devils.... Couldn't care less. Both goalies must be stopped.
• It'd be cool if the Isles beat the Flyers after blanking the Wings...The Flyers had their chance to be the cool people by beating the Panthers and they blew it
• I'd love it if Kovalchuk and co beat the Sens because well.... I just do....
  
• And Dallas MUST beat the Panthers but I'm not really seeing that happen....
  

You didn't think I'd leave the Ovie thing alone, did you?

Remind me what decade we're living in here because judging by a lot of comments directed towards Ovechkin and his celebrating his 50th goal, you'd think we're stuck in the '20s or '30s.

I saw Ovie's celebration. I went deliberately looking for it when I heard that he had scored. I admit I was a little surprised by his reaction. I was expecting something a little more spontaneous, but I was in no way angry with his celebration. I thought it was funny and I'm pretty sure that Ovechkin wouldn't have done it if he had not thought that at least some people would find it amusing. I don't necessarily think that he was doing it to rub it in people's faces. There's many other ways that he could have celebrated if he had wanted to be a showoff or if he had wanted to rub it in people's faces. Even if he was being a bit of a brat as some people have said, so what? I think he's allowed to have a moment or two of lapses in judgment. And it's not like he said "Crosby can't score 50 goals. HAHAHA". That would be way out of line and even I wouldn't appreciate it if he had done that. But he didn't. He didn't go skating around in circles screaming at the top of his lungs. He didn't go signing his stick on the spot and throwing into the crowd. He didn't point to the goalie and the three of four Bolts players who were on the ice at the time and say "you can't stop me. Hahaha". He simply did a little celebration after he scored. And in the grand scheme of celebrations, it's pretty minor.

All that being said... The one thing that did sort of... disappoint me about Ovie's celebration was that it was pre-planned. I like the spontaneousness (is that a word?) of Ovie's reactions when he scores or when a teammate scores. That this was pre-planned to me sort of takes away from the celebration a little bit for me. I much prefer him when he's being natural - to me, that's what he's all about and that's what makes him so darn cool to watch and this only adds fuel to the wildly out of control Ovie bashing that's been going around. But I didn't feel that he was out of line to do that celebration and I've got the feeling that he doesn't really care what people think or say about him anwyay. After scoring fifty goals, he has every right to celebrate. So I'll just sit back, laugh at the theatrics - pre-meditated or not - and laugh more at all the people who are bugged by this.

Imagine what he'd do if he ever won the Stanley Cup... Wow......

Saturday morning ramble

First sign that the world has turned upside down. It's Saturday and that usually means hockey. Today, I'm quite hyped about the game today. No, not the Stinky Sens vs. the Listless Habbies. I'm talking about Vancouver vs the Maple Losers. I know, I know.... I'm horrid.... but...but...but... if the Canucks behave nicely then they'll decimate the Leafs and there's nothing I like more than watching the Leafs lose. Except to see the Habs win but umm, I have a feeling that I'm going to get embarrassed beyond belief today. Anyway... Hey Sundin, I may for about two second, actually like you. For two seconds only. Maybe.

Second sign that the world has turned upside down. Anyone else see/hear the Hammies beating in the Marlies aka the baby Leafnuts last night? Hammies almost own the Marlies this season... Whoopie for the Hammies! Sergei, unfortunately failed to score.....C'mon Sergei.... show everyone that you're not the off-ice-partying nutcase that everyone thinks you are.

Third sign that the...etc.... Flyers vs Pens. Love you Pens (hate you Crosby) but for the sake of all Habs fans out there, please lose Pens. Yes, I said, please win Flyers. Wow....sowwy Pens.....

Fourth sign etc, etc...Avs smacked Ovechkin and the Caps upside the head and win 4-1 last night. Ovie didn't score and didn't even get a point. And this is coming from the guy who just scored what many are saying is the goal of the century? C'mon, Ovie.... you gotta back that goal up with something at least half as impressive.... sheesh....

Did you know....That of the four teams that went off to Europe last year, three have fired their coaches? If you remember that far back the Sens, Pens, Lightning and Rangers all went to play in front of a bunch of people who had no clue who they were. As you know, Barry Melrose, Hartsburg and Therrien are now jobless. Well, actually, Melrose isn't jobless technically, but since when does talking about hockey for ESPN count as a job? Anyway, Renney could be next if the Rangers continue on this path of horrendousness. Isn't that fun?

Fiftieth sign that the Habs are imploding...Kovalev appears to have been sick with something for a while now. He didn't tell anyone up until.....now? Bad Kovy. FREAKING TELL SOMEONE IF YOU'VE GOT A PHYSICAL PROBLEM! Bad Kovy..... very bad Kovy.....Who do you think you are? Roger Federer?! And look what happened to him last year.... Sheesh.....

Fifty-first sign that the Habs are imploding: Andrei and Hamrlik didn't get to talk to the hordes of media peeps that invaded the practice center. That's not cool. They should have been able to say something, yes? Even if it was a "I'd rather not comment" type of thing. Hiding 'em won't save them from the media....

Fifty-second sign that the Habs are imploding: My relative (Section 311) says that the Habs are looking like the Sens last year. What's next, someone will accuse the Habs of turning into the Leafnuts? The shame and horror of it all....!

And finally......

My dream day: Flyers edge out Pens. Habs decimate Sens. Canucks decimate Leafs. How hard is it for that to happen?!

What will probably happen: Flyers decimate Pens. Sens decimate Habs. Leafs edge out Canucks...... *sighs*