Welcome to the playoffs Columbus.
The Jackets got a huge wake up call last night at the hands of the Detroit Red Wings.
The regular season this is certainly not.
The game looked good for about 30 minutes... the Jackets were skating and working hard... then in the matter of seconds the wheels fell off.... and that is all a team like Detroit needs to swing a game in their favor.
STOPLIGHT GAME REVIEW
GREEN
* The boys skated stride for stride with the Wings for those first 30 minutes...especially in that first period. I loved the way they came out and dictated the game early.
* It was great to see Umberger's goal come so quickly after the Wings had scored.. I thought alright, this team came to play and will not get rattled -- I spoke a little too soon.
* Jackets fans were representing.. some of them (ah-hem..me) a little too much.. was great to see the fan turnout.
* The Anchor Bar and it's owner were a class act yet again welcoming Jacket fans with open arms.
* The Jackets did a good job of containing Hossa/Datsyuk/Zetterberg... just 1 point between the 3 of them.
* Tom Reed of the Dispatch... a great guy and thanks for the plug!!
* Tony and his wife... classiest Red Wings fan I have ever met... it was a pleasure!! I wish there were 19k more of you.
* Jim Day with his pre-game musical chairs... I'm tellin ya, ole Jim was reved up for this one.
* We had great seats behind the Jackets bench entrance/exit..
* Osgood unfortunately.. was good. I think we needed to get to him early and often to try to rattle him but we weren't able too.
* To Kevin, Ryan, Dan and Steve... great time riding up/back with you fellas!!
YELLOW
* Ummm.. well Voracek got his first ever playoff point.
* Decent game out of Rusty... Tyutin and Russell were okay as well.
* The Jackets were winning a lot of races and were strong on the puck early... unfortunately they got away from that game as the game went on...end result a 4-1 loss.
* Mase was just average... again I hate to put some much pressure on this kid but we need him to be better than that to have a chance.
RED
* That powerplay..or lack thereof... really hurt us again. At times it was decent but if you don't score it doesn't matter... If the Jackets could have notched an early one who knows where this game could have gone from there. The Jackets have to find a way to take advantage of those opportunities..
* Not much out of any of the big guns.. Nash and Juice were held completely in check.
* Message to Manny Malhotra... (or as my buddy calls him Manny Malfunction) get out of the way and let Mase make the save! We cannot afford to give those kinds of goals up.
* Speaking of... the Jackets got very few bounces to go their way... but they need to make their own luck.
* Jan Hejda a -3... Commodore a -2.. ouch.
* What was it? 5 shots over the last two periods... unacceptable.
* The security at the Joe...where Wings fans can heckle you to death but you are not allowed to respond... oh and thanks for my own personal post game "tour" folks... and trust me when I say this, the basement in that place is a toilet!
* The Wings score about once every 4 PPs... the Jackets took 4 penalties and guess what? The Wings scored once.
* For what should be a strength the Jackets were horrible in the circle winning only 43% of their draws..
* The Jackets were outhit 37 to 26.. I know there is some home team bias baked into those numbers.. bottom line though is that the Jackets are supposed to be the more physical team yet they are the ones who got pushed around.
* The defeat marked 3 straight regulation losses which only happened twice during the regular season.
* A couple of Jacket fans get a red light for taking off with the my flag that I let em borrow for pre-game!!
3 BRIGHT LIGHTS ON THE NIGHT
1. Jacket fans representing at the armpit..er Joe.
2. Anchor Bar
3. First 30 were good.. but too bad the game is 60 minutes.
Okay... bright side time. I've been reading around and here are a couple of stats I wanted to share which I grabbed off of HF (thx Skraut!):
* Vs said last night that the winner of game 1 wins the series 75% of the time.
* The 7th Seed has a 50% winning percentage against the #2 seed since the early 90's. It's actually higher than any other seed 8-5th.
* Game 2 winners who lost Game 1 have gone 127-113 (52.9 percent).
The Jackets need to understand what went wrong, learn from it and put this loss behind them quickly. Some players either need to step up their games (Peca, Chimera, Boll) or take a seat in the press box. The Jackets may get out skilled but there is no excuse for getting outworked... Every player must do their jobs for this team to be successful.
The puck drops for game 2 tomorrow night at 6 EST. Let's see if these boys can recover and put in a full 60 minute effort. If the Jackets dream of an upset they need to come home with this series split. Its a must win game.
GO JACKETS!!
-LTL
Posts
5 comments:
The last few games, they've tried too hard to do Mason's job. There's been 5 or 6 redirects off CBJ players in the last 4 games. Mason has told the D to keep their sticks off the ice because if they cause a redirection, there's not much he can do to stop it. Leave him clear to make an unobstructed save rather than do him a favor...
I think Manny was simply reacting how anyone would have, but it's (of course) not the Hitch way to react. Boooooooooooooooooo!
But you get those two goals back and keep it tied through two periods, it could have been epic battle in the third. I've never seen a Hitchcock CBJ team play to the bitter end. No more hanging on for the tie and a point.
Overall, it was a good game. They came out hard and settled for damage control in the 3rd. There's plenty we can harp on, but the first ever playoff game is history. Jitters should be gone and there should be no question in any player's mind what level they need to play at. Time to regroup and press on.
Good post Wally. Actually a GREAT post!
-LTL
What a bunch of classless A-Holes! I take back any previous comments about their fans (overall) having class.
On another subject:
Someone PLEASE tell me, otherwise -is it me, or is Modin essentially pimping his way back into the lineup, even when he remains (having the skates of cement) 2 steps slow, an act of selfishness, or what?
A warrior is one thing, but, playing while still injured, especially during the playoffs, is not helping the team.
Keith Jones of Versus, possibly the only "pundit" who is predicting the Jackets to win this series, mentioned, earlier today, about how out of sync Freddie Mo is.
Freddie: Do us all a favor, and PLEASE let someone who can help the team play.
Carry the Flag!
Good point HR.
I'm about to re-watch the game in a less distracting environment.. I'm gonna watch Modin closer after reading your post... but to your point I'm just thinkin back to the game and now that you say it, I don't remember him doing much of anything..
I really like the guy when he's healthy. I also know players play injured all the time and I admire Modin's courage.. but there is a time when you have to weigh whether a player battling through injuries is actually helping or hurting you.
That's why Hitch gets paid the big bucks right?
-LTL
After re-watching the first period...a couple of things:
1. I should have given Klesla a huge GREEN light as he was a monster defensively against Holmstrom.
2. Zetterberg is a little bitch with his poking and wacks all over the ice.. then of course he skates away.
-LTL
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