Hockey All the Time

Such excitement! Under the new deal between Rogers and the NHL, Hockey Night in Canada now features more televised games on Saturday than at any other time in my history! Last night, we had the perennial CBC option, plus four others via various Sportsnet and CITY channels. For the first time in I-don’t-know-how-long, the Flyers were my first game of the Saturday night season.

And the buggers lost. Not only did they lose, they blew a 3-0 lead to do it. At home, no less. That takes talent. Montreal beat them 4-3 in a shootout, so they got a point, but no win. No matter how you spin it, that means they lost. For the third game in a row. Just like last year.

Is Craig Berube in trouble? Peter Laviolette lost his job after losing the first three games in 2013/14, but I suspect that Berube is okay for the nonce. Philly is notoriously slow out of the gate, but will pick up momentum as the season progresses. As hard as it is on Basher and me, the 82 game season is a blessing. If this was back the old days, we’d already be out of the playoffs.

Like Toronto, perchance?

And, boy, did Don Cherry go on a rant about the Leafs continually ignoring Canadian prospects and selecting Europeans in the draft. He was so bent out of shape that he got his mords wixed and called two of the Leafs’ picks “a Swinn and a Fede”—which is in no way the players’ fault; they just want to play in the big league. But so do the thousands of kids in the Ontario Hockey League (OHL), and according to Grapes, none of them will ever make it to Toronto. He’s a bit of a doofus in other matters, but the man is a patriot and he knows hockey. I must admit, I prefer the Canadian kids myself—they play a sturdier game and seem to be better team players than the flashier Europeans. I think that’s why Russia blew the Olympics. They were badly coached, yes, but all those NHL “stars” jostling for puck possession to be the hero … You really do have to leave your ego on the bench, ’cause the game is as much about opportunity as it is about skill, and if your third line winger is still on the ice but hovering off the radar, get him the frigging puck and settle for the assist. You’ll still get a point in the fantasy pool.

Is this enough ranting, Ru? Not quite …

Game Two of HNIC: the Vancouver home opener, where the visiting Oilers also blew a fast lead. It was a better game than MTL/PHI because the Canucks are trying to resurrect themselves after the Tortorella debacle and they came from behind a couple of times to win last night’s game in a shootout. I hate hate hate that their #17 isn’t Ryan Kesler anymore—they should have “retired” the number for a year to get me over the trade—but it was fun to see the Twedes working their cyclical magic again, and now that Roberto is Luongone, the net is in good solid hands with Ryan Miller. No goalkeeping controversy this year (one hopes).

Let’s save that one for Philadelphia.