New Jersey Devils Hockey

Preseason Recap

2007-09-29T21:14:00.000-04:00

After going 1-2 in their first three games, the Devils won the final three, making their final record 4-2. Jamie Langenbrunner, Cam Janssen, and Colin White are all out indefinitely. Langenbrunner is expected to return in late November/early December, while it's unknown when Janssen and White will be able to play. Rookies Rod Pelley, David Clarkson, and Nicklas Bergfors all seem to have made the team.

Preseason scores:

G1, L 3-2 vs. Flyers
3rd:
Zach Parise (PP) (Karel Rachunek, Andy Greene)
Andy Greene (PP) (Aaron Asham)
Full Box Score

G2, W 3-0 @ Boston
2nd:
Pelley (Barry Tallackson, Vitaly Vishnevski)
3rd:
Rachunek (Johnny Oduya, Travis Zajac)
Tallackson (Bergfors, Oduya)
Full Box Score

G3, L 3-4 @ NYR
2nd:
Dainius Zubrus (Olli Malmavaara)
Parise (Clarkson, Brian Gionta)
Gionta (Malmavaara)
Box Score

G4, W 3-1 @ Flyers
1st:
Bergfors (Rachunek, Greene)
3rd:
Pelley (Sergei Brylin, Oduya)
Bergfors (Gionta, Jari Viuhkola)
Box Score

G5, W 6-1 vs NYI
1st:
Gionta (unassisted)
John Madden (Arron Asham, Matt Corrente)
Zajac (Parise, Clarkson)
2nd:
Gionta PP (Rachunek, Parise)
3rd:
Gionta PP(Greene, Rachunek)
Madden PP(VIsnevski, Greene)
Box Score

G6, W 2-1 @ NYI
1st:
Zubrus PP (Gionta)
2nd:
Parise PP (Greene)
Box Score

White and Janssen Injured

2007-09-19T16:43:00.000-04:00

Colin White was hit above the eye durning 2 on 1 drills in practice today. He and the ice were covered in blood. When coach Brent Sutter went to find him in the locker room after practice was over, he was gone. No word on where exactly he got hit, and how bad it is yet.

Cam Janssen disloacted his shoulder during the preseason game on Monday during a fight. The jersey was pulled over his head and he got a beating. His shoulder popped out while he was trying to throw a punch. He got it back in, but he was involved in another fight minutes later where it popped out again and he missed the rest of the game.

New Captain for 07-08 Season?

2007-09-15T22:28:00.000-04:00

Head coach Brent Sutter has announced that there might be a new captain and assistants this season. There's a good chance Elias will wear the C again, but Sutter wants the players to work for it- nothing will be handed to them. Several players have been brought up as options for the new leaders, including

Patrik Elias- Wore the C last season, but didn't have a great season, despite leading the team in points and assists. He admitted the C effected his play in the beginning of the season, but he got more comfortable as the season went on.
John Madden- Usually wears an A, but could change that with hard work during camp and the preseason games. Many thought he would wear the C after Stevens.
Colin White- Same as Madden, but might not be the best on ice leader on the team.
Jamie Langenbrunner- Also an A, and showed a lot of leadership on a line with Travis Zajac and Zach Parise last season. A current groin injury might prevent him from impressing in camp and getiing it, though.
Jay Pandolfo- No letter unless one of the above is injured,although he shows leadership on the ice. Unfortunately, he doesn't seem like a top choice in this race.
Sergei Brylin- Pretty much the same situation as Pandolfo. Is a great leader, but he probably won't get it.
Zach Parise- An excellent player who many believe will be the captain in time, but he's a little young right now. He'll wear an A, if anything.
Martin Brodeur- Goalies can't be captain, but some think they should have three alternates, and make Marty the honorary captain of the team. I can't really see this happening, although if goalies could be captain, we wouldn't even be talking about this right now.
Cam Janssen- Why not? He brings energy to the team with his two minutes of ice time a game. And he'll lead the league in goals, assists, points, +/-, PIMs, and game winners, all with his 2 minutes on ice a game. Book it.

I think Elias, Madden and Langenbrunner are the three best choices of those listed, but Langs's groin problems might also cause a problem with him having a chance as captain.

Dowd to Flyers Camp

2007-09-11T16:55:00.000-04:00

Jim Dowd will be at the Flyers' trainging camp this season. Better them than us. He's 39, and was never the best. So thanks for the memories, but see ya Jimbo.

Erik Rasmussen was offered an invite to training camp by none ofther than Lou, which he turned down. I don't think anyone is too disappionted about that eiter.

The Devils currently have four open spots on the third and fourth lines, assuming the first two lines will be made up of Elias, Zubrus, Gionta, Parise, Zajac and Langenbrunner, with Madden and Pandolfo holding their spots on the third line. Asham, Janssen, Rupp, Clarkson, Pelley, Viuhkola, and Brylin will be the top candidates for those spots, but several prospects, such as Bergfors, Vrana, and Tallackson could make the cut, along with NHL vet Grant Marshall.

Just some news

2007-09-07T20:29:00.000-04:00

The Devils will not be doing anything special to show off their new jerseys. They will be seen for the first time during their first preseason game on September 17.

The Habs are retiring assistant coach Larry Robinson' number during a game against the Sens on November 19.

The Prudential Center is coming along nicely. Pictures are being updated frequently on their site.

Fromer Devils VP and GM Max McNab passed away at the age of 83 on Sunday.

Scott Neidermayer is still unsure if he'll play this season. Either way, he will miss most, if not all of training camp.

And finally, in case you haven't been keeping up with the Canada/Russia Under 20 series, coach Brent Sutter and the Canadien team are 6-0, with game seven tonight. Devils prospect Alexander Vasyunov has been one of the few bright spots on the Russian team. The game can be watched here.

Keep on voting

2007-09-05T17:21:00.000-04:00

Round three of the logo contest: Devils vs Habs

Also, remember to watch the Devils Fifteen to Remember tonight, from April 5, when Brodeur collected his 48th win, an NHL record in the final meeting of the Devils and Flyers last season.

Martin Finally Resigned

2007-08-16T16:48:00.001-04:00

Paul Martin has signed a 3 year deal worth 11.5 million (3 this season, 4 in 08 and 4.5 in 09).

Finally, a decent defenseman signed.

Vote Devils

2007-08-15T19:12:00.000-04:00

Vote for the Devils.

http://nhllogos.blogspot.com/2007/08/poll-devils-vs-maple-leafs.html

Asham Signed

2007-08-07T21:16:00.000-04:00

The Devils have signed ex-Islander Aaron Asham to a one-year, $700,000 deal. I think we have enough fourth liners now to play a different one every night.

Well, I'm sure Janssen's happy about this.

Parise Resigned

2007-08-01T17:10:00.000-04:00

Zach Parise has signed a four-year deal worth $4.5mil.

Assistant Coaches Announced

2007-07-26T00:24:00.000-04:00

Larry Robinson, John MacLean and Tommy Albelin will be backing up new head coach Brent Sutter this season.

This was a good loss.

2007-07-21T16:03:00.000-04:00

Who knew there even was such a thing? Lowell defensemen Alex Brooks and Jim Fahey have parted ways with the Devils. Brooks signed with the Blues and Fahey withe the 'Hawks. Trust me, I'm not crying.

To make up for their losses, which also includes Dan LaCouture who is now a duck, and Dan McGillis and Scott Lachance, who won't be resigned, they signed vet defense man Ian Moran and German defenseman Jean-Luc Grand-Pierre (try saying that ten times fast). I think it's safe to say these signings are for Lowell. If not, we just might set a record for most and lamest defensemen on a team during one season.

Marshall Resigned

2007-07-15T20:58:00.000-04:00

Why? That I do not know. He's signed for this season, and will be making 475,000. Hopefully he'll be back in Lowell. I have nothing against him, but there are a ton of younger, more/just as talented players waiting to get a shot with the big guys.

New Coach?

2007-07-12T12:28:00.001-04:00

UPDATE: According to TSN, the Devils will be announcing Sutter as their new coach today.

Now to get off topic. Souray signed with the Oilers for 5.5 mil. a season for 5 seasons, with a NMC for the first three years.

It's awesome," Devils winger Zach Parise said. "I'm pretty excited about it. He coached Team Canada in the world juniors. Travis (Zajac), who was trying out, said a lot of guys liked him. I think this is great for us."

Judging by that quote, I think it's safe to say Parise is/will resign(ed).

Rumors are flying around that Brent Sutter will be the Devils' new coach. He previously coached junior team the Red Deer, and was apparently a favorite of Lou's for the position for the past few coach hunts. This dude had her heart set on Pat Bruns, but Sutter is, supposedly, the same hard core type of coach, and is good from kids. Kids as in younger players. I'm not saying it's definite, and I won't until I see it from a reliable source, like TSN or the Devils site. After the Souray ordeal, I'm not believing anything until it's made official, again, by a reliable source (NHL Line doesn't count).

It's out

2007-07-11T14:38:00.000-04:00

The schedule for the 2007/08 season's out. I'd post it, but it's too long.

Word on the street is Lou's in Minnesota getting Martin and Parise to sign their contracts. Minard, McGillis and Lachance won't be kept. I have no problem with that, they're all a little old. If they haven't made it the NHL yet (or played well on that level), then they never will. Pihlman will be playing in Finland, but we still have his rights. Hopefully Lou will use that in a trade. Dowd wants to return for another season, but LL isn't sure if he will or not. I'm overusing Lou, but he'll most likely be talking to Rasmussen, too. I still smell a trade coming on. Eight defensemen, most of which are barely decent number 2's. It's good for injury, but we have Fraser and Malmivaara for that. Maybe two of them for a good number two? Who knows.

See ya, Sheldon.

2007-07-10T10:54:00.000-04:00

Update: He's signed for the next three seasons, and will get 1.4 Mil. this season and 2 per for the last 2. And Janssen's signed for three seasons. I love Cam as much as anyone else (maybe more, judging by the hate I've seen for him by some people), but I think Lou has officially lost his mind.

With Vitaly Vishnevski now on the team, I think it's safe to say we won't be signing Souray, unless Martin isn't resigned or Lou plans on having Oduya down in Lowell. Not enough cap space, and enough defensemen. But if Lou plans to trade for Souray, then we're looking at a whole other story. Well, I don't know how long we have him for, but he'll be making $1.4 mill this season.

Souray?

2007-07-06T22:55:00.000-04:00

All this Souray junk deserves it's own post. Long story short, NHL Line is the only site to have anything regarding all of this. I don't know how trustworthy this is, because I've only recently heard of it, the writing has a bunch of mistakes in it, and they reported that Briere had signed with the Canadians. I'm not totally buying it, mainly because they've been saying a signing will be announced shortly for the last three days, and it's been their main story since then. Not that there's anything wrong with that. You never see the Devils with a "big" story, but with Vanek signing that offer sheet from the Oilers, then Buffalo matching it, you would think that would be forgotten or something. I've heard some people suspect Lou's waiting for Parise and Martin to sign their contracts before announcing a Souray signing to prevent what happened with Vanek and the Sabres happening with them. I could see why. If we announce that we signed Souray or anyone else for that matter before Parise and Martin were signed, and that were to happen, a team would know how much to offer so that Lou couldn't match it. Well, we'll see what happens, but if you ask me, this site is as reliable as the National Enquirer.

Signings

2007-07-01T16:20:00.000-04:00

The exclamation mark is officially out. Clemmensen's out, and he's been replaced by kevin weekes. More Ranger trash. Now, If you've read nearly anything I've written about Lowell, you know how much I dislike Frank Doyle. I'd rather have him warming the bench for a lot less $$ than the 1.375 he'll be getting over two years. Needless to say, I won't be a Devils fan when he plays- unless we're playing the Rangers or Flyers.
Let's take a look at his stats from last season, shall we?
GP: 14 W: 4 L:6 OTL: 2 GAA: 3.39 SV%: .879
I'm sure you're all up to date with Clemmensen's 6 games, 1 win, 1 loss and 2 shoot out losses. He had a GAA of 3.15 and a SV% of .889. Being that it's almost gaurenteed that Clemmer would probably be willing to take the minimum, I'd take him any day.

Oh, and nothing else on the Souray rumors.

First off, happy Fourth. Now, down to business. The Rachunek rumors have been confirmed by both TSN and the Devils. There are rumors floating around about us signing Sheldon Souray, but it's yet to be confirmed by a reliable source. Weather this is true or not, our D's gonna be pretty hot next season. As hot as an ice cube..

Oh my. Lukowich to the Lightning for three years. So our defense is Oduya, White, Greene, Matvichuk and possibly
Rachunek (TSN has yet to confirm us signing him, so I'm not entirely sure).

Update: 20.4 million over the 6 seasons.
Finally, a big name! The Devils have signed Danuis Zubrus for 6 years, with financial terms not disclosed yet.

Well, Oduya signed the same deal as Greene, 2 years at 600,000 per, and I heard Janssen will be getting 550,000 for I don't konw how long. We also signed ex Ranger Karel Rachunek for one season for 1.5 mil. The Pens got Sykora for two seasons, so my hopes of getting him are gone. I'll keep updating as I find out more.

Here's one Deivls signing- Oduya has been resigned for I don't know how long or for how much.
Update: Nothing on the $$ or the length, but it's not on TSN's list of signings, so I don't have a clue as to what's going on.

Talk about bleeding red and black- Gomez signed a 7 year deal with the Rags for $7.35 mil. per season. Well, I hope they enjoy over paid players- then again, they must, going back to that Holik deal. How nice would it be to see Janssen pull one on him next season? Maybe Rupp, White, or Matvichuk or Clarkson. Anyone. If you ask me, it's be worth someone getting susended over. See ya, Gomer, and I hope you're as good as you were here there.

Brian Rafalski has signed a 5 year $30 mil. contract with the Red Wings. So as of right now, our defense consists of White, Greene and Matvichuk. That seems promising. No word on Gomez of the other UFA's, but I'll keep you posted.

Rupp Signed

2007-06-29T14:57:00.001-04:00

Mike Rupp has signed with the Devils for 2 seasons, at $500, 000 per. Lou's close to closing a deal with Rafalski, and Odyua will be a UFA come Sunday. Oh, and the cap will be $50.3 million this season.

Well, since it's Friday, and Rupp was signed, why not make him the star this week?

Height: 6' 5"
Wight: 230
Position: Right wing
Birthday: Jan 13, 1980
Shoots: Left
From: Cleveland, Ohio

2006/07 Season:
Team: Devils
Games played: 76
Goals: 6
Assists: 3
PIMs: 92
PPG: 0
SHG: 0
GWG: 1
+/-: -10

2006/07 Playoffs:
Team: Devils
Games played: 9
Goals: 0
Assists: 1
PIMs: 7
PPG: 0
SHG: 0
GWG: 0
+/-: +1

He's in the Hall

2007-06-28T17:49:00.000-04:00

Scott Stevens has entered the Hockey Hall of Fame. Make that he will officially enter on November 12. That's pretty awesome, for him and the Devils. His leadership and skills got him in, and, well, it was all with the Devils- I didn't see him win three Cups with any other team. Aww, congrats, Scotty.

Scott Stevens' 10 Greatest Hits

10/14/06: Lowell Picks up First win

2007-06-28T14:15:00.000-04:00

It took two games to do, but on October 14, the Lowell Devils took their first win ever over the Hartford Wolfpack. Kind of funny, how they were 5-2-1 against them, since like the Devils were the same against the Rangers. Anyway, I'll keep it short. They were tied 1-1 going into the second and 2-2 going into the third. Justin Papineau scored the game winner at 7:57 of the third.

Chris Mindard (could I have introduced that any better?)

Height: 6' 1"
Wight: 200
Position: Center
Birthday: November 18, 1981
Shoots: Left
From: Owen Sound, Ontario

2006/07 Season:
Team: Lowell
Games played: 65
Goals: 32
Assists: 17
PIMs: 30
PPG: 12
SHG: 0
GWG: 8
+/-: +5

Happy summer!!

2007-06-25T15:07:00.000-04:00

I know I'm late, but happy summer. But I guess it's not all that happy, since there's no hockey. I do have some happy news, though. Even without a first round pick in hte draft, the Devils made out pretty well. Here's some info on all their picks. As for that moment of the week, that's not happening- we both have too much going on this summer to be able to do it. On the plus side, FSN NY's 15 To Remember will be replaying some of the season's most memorable games Wednesdays at 8, Thursdays at 12:30 am and noon, and Saturday afternoons. The first game's been done, but there's still 14 more. The Devil of the week will still be done, as will the Lowell moment (we don't have to think of those) and rookie/Loweller of the week, both of which will be done by tomorrow afternoon.

Jamie Langenbrunner

Height: 6' 1"
Wight: 200
Position: Right wing
Birthday: July 24, 1975
Shoots: Right
From: Cloquet, Minnesota

2006/07 Season:
Team: Devils
Games played: 82
Goals: 23
Assists: 37
PIMs: 64
PPG: 12
SHG: 0
GWG: 7
+/-: -10

2006/07 Playoffs:
Team: Devils
Games played: 11
Goals: 2
Assists: 6
PIMs: 7
PPG: 1
SHG: 0
GWG: 1
+/-: +3

Double Dose

2007-06-18T15:22:00.000-04:00

On January 14, the Lowell Devils hosted both Red Sox Day, and the Philadelphia Phantoms. With two goals from then-Devil Aaron Voros, one each from Dan McGillis, Petr Vrana, David Clarkson and Chris Minard and 25 saves from Jordan Parise, the Devils cruised to a 6-3 win in a penalty-filled game. The win was Parise's 7th win of the season, and the Devils' 19th.

Parise is a familiar name to many hockey fans- there's the Devils' young left wing Zach, who lead the team in goals in the regular season, came second on the team in scoring and lead the league in playoff goals through the first round. There's Jean-Paul, ex-left wing, who spent 17 seasons in the NHL, with the Bruins (2), Maple Leafs (1), North Stars (9), Islanders (4), and Barons (1). There's also the less-known Jordan Parise, who had an excellent rookie season with the Lowell Devils. An attitude problem postponed his hockey career a bit, but help from his brother got him into the UND for three seasons, and signed as a free agent with the Devils.

Height: 5' 11"
Weight: 190
Position: Goalie
Birthday: September 19, 1982
Catches: Right
From: Fairbault, Minnesota

2006/07 Season:
Team: Lowell Devils
Games played: 32
Wins: 17
Loses: 19
OT Loses: 3
Points: 1
Shutouts: 2
Goals Against Average: 2.68
Save Percentage: .915

Talk About Under the Radar

2007-06-16T13:27:00.000-04:00

How many people noticed that Sergei Brylin had 40 points last season? Not many. But you can't blame them. Sarge tends to be a quiet player, so it's not that strange that he was over shadowed by Marty and Parise.

Height: 5' 10"
Wight: 190
Position: Center
Birthday: January 13, 1974
Shoots: Left
From: Moscow, Russia

2006/07 Season:
Team: Devils
Games played: 82
Goals: 16
Assists: 24
PIMs: 35
PPG: 8
SHG: 0
GWG: 2
+/-: -5

2006/07 Playoffs:
Team: Devils
Games played: 11
Goals: 1
Assists: 2
PIMs: 6
PPG: 1
SHG: 0
GWG: 0
+/-: -8

I, personally, am glad we have him for another season. And by the way, I screwed up last week: Gionta had 25 goals, not 35.

Excuse me?

2007-06-14T21:05:00.000-04:00

I'll save my ranting and raging about Crosby winning the Hart for the other blog, so here are the award winners for now:

Frank J. Selke (best defensive forward): Rod Brind' Amour (420 pts.)
Runners up: Sami Pahlsson (405), Jay Pandolfo (311)
John Madden made it into the top ten in voting, Brindy gave props to Pando.

Calder Memorial (best rookie): Evgeni Malkin (1,357)
Runners up: Paul Stastny (956), Jordan Staal (565)
Travis Zajac came in tenth, with 13 points (I knew he'd get some votes)

Lady Byng (most gentlemanly player): Pavel Datsyuk (not sure how may points, but he did have a lot more than the first runner up)
Runners up: Martin St Louis (no comment), Joe Sakic
Pandolfo came in fourth in voting.

First team all-stars: Marty Brodeur, Nicklas Lidstrom, Scotty Niedermayer, Sidney Crosby, Dany Heatley, Alex Ovechkin

Second team all-stars: Roberto Luongo, Chris Pronger, Dan Boyle, Vinnie Lecavalier, Martin St. Louis, Thomas Vanek

Jack Adams (best coach): Alain Vigneault (Canucks, 134)
Runners up: Lindy Ruff (Sabres, 126), Michel Therrien (Penguins, 91)

James Norris (best D-man): Lidstrom (1,217)
Runners up: Niedermayer (1,024), Pronger (608)

Vezina (most awesomest goalie): Marty!! (122)
Runners up: Luongo (116), Miikka Kipursoff and Henrik Lundquist (7 each)

Hart (MVP): Crosby (1,225)
Runners up: Marty (763), Luongo (801)

Tomorrow, look for a nice rant about freaking Crosby winning Marty's freaking Hart trophy in the other blog.

Crikey!

2007-06-14T16:56:00.000-04:00

The NHL awards are tonight, and the Devils are hoping for a hat trick. Marty Brodeur and Jay Pandolfo have been nominated for the Hart, Vezina (both Brodeur) and Selke (Pando).

The Hart is for the MVP. Sidney Crosby and Roberto Luongo are also in the running. Maybe it's just because I worship him, but I think Marty deserves it. He lead the league in shutouts, was third in GAA and save percentage, and broke the 33 year old wins record. Sid the kid did lead the leauge in scoring, but he didn't play as big a part in the Pens' sucess as Marty did in the Devils. Luongo, well, I think he had a little more help from his D than Marty did, and Marty just played better.

The Vezina goes to the best goalie. Luongo, Henrik Lundqvist and Miikka Kipursoff are going against Marty. If you ask my, it's really between Marty and Luongo. Kipursoff was amazing in the playoffs, but he wasn't as good as the other two. I think breaking the wins record should have put it in the bag for Marty, but Loungo did tie it (although he tied it after Marty broke it, so he really didn't do anything too special). Not only did he actually break the record, but Marty also had him beat in GAA and SV%.

The other candidates for the Selke (best defensive forward) are Rod Brind'Amour and Sami Pahlsson. I'm not quite sure who I think should win this, but I don't think it will be Pandolfo. I didn't see either of the others play too much, but I've seen better defensive play from forwards other than Pando. Who knows. Maybe we will get that hat trick tonight.

I'll post the winners of each award after it's over. The awards start at 7:30 and will be aired on Versus and CBC.

Czech it

2007-06-11T15:29:00.000-04:00

Ha, I crack myself up. Ok, so moment number 8 (is it that many already?) happens to do with Rod Pelley, who's supposed to become the next John Madden, who happens to be the the Devils' checking center (for all you non-Devils fans). Pelley started the game with three goals, and ended with six. For all of you who aren't good at math, that's three goals in one game, which we in the hockey world call a hat trick (unless it's done by Patrik Elias, which is called a Pat-trick. Get it?). The Devils had a 3-0 lead after 23 minutes, courtesy of Pelley, Nicklas Bergfors and David Clarkson. Seven minutes into the third, the Wolf Pack had tied the game at three. No worries. Justin Papineu and Pelley scored, making it seem as if the Devils had it in the bag. But the last minute was more insane than I am. With an empty net behind them, the Wolves got with in one. As if their hopes of at least going into OT being squashed wasn't enough, Pelley netted an empty netter with three seconds left to record the first Lowell hat trick ever.

Now, where does the Czech come in? Right here. Petr Vrana may not have turned out to be what the Devils hoped, but you sure can't say he was bad.

Height: 5' 10"
Wight: 185
Position: Center
Birthday: March 29, 1985
Shoots: Left
From: Sternberk, Czech Republic

2006/07 Season:
Team: Lowell
Games played: 61
Goals: 13
Assists: 19
PIMs: 44
PPG: 3
SHG: 0
GWG: 1
+/-: -9

Kind of funny how his stats were so similar to Nicklas Bergfors' and neither had the type of season that was expected, right?

Just a little

2007-06-09T16:47:00.000-04:00

Late, that is. Speaking of little, Brian Gionta had a not-so-good season after his 48 goal performance last season. But you really can't blame him. Claude Julien was the coach for almost the whole season (nothing against him, but no players reached their full offensive potential this season, and I blame him for that) and he missed about a quarter of the season with groin injuries. The way I see it, had he not missed 20 something games, he could have easily lead the team in scoring yet again. Why am I rambling about him? Let's think. I said this was late, I never did the Devil of the week thing..I know, shut up and do your thing.

Height: 5' 7"
Wight: 175
Position: Right wing
Birthday: January 18, 1979
Shoots: Right
From: Rochester, New York

2006/07 Season:
Team: Devils
Games played: 62
Goals: 35
Assists: 20
PIMs: 36
PPG: 11
SHG: 0
GWG: 4
+/-: -3

2006/07 Playoffs:
Team: Devils
Games played: 11
Goals: 8
Assists: 1
PIMs: 4
PPG: 3
SHG: 0
GWG: 1
+/-: +5

I think I said enough about him. Let's hope he can have another season like last season this coming season *with Elias and Sykora*.

More Marty

2007-06-07T15:13:00.000-04:00

I completely forgot about the moment thing, until today. Sorry bout that. But it's not like I forgot for a week or six.

So, yeah, it's about Marty. Incase you've been living under a rock, or you just don't care, Marty broke that 33-year-old wins record, with a 3-2 win over the Flyers, who's old goalie, Bernie Parent, set it in the 73/74 season.

The game was almost like catch. The Flyers took and early 1-0 lead, that Jamie Langebrunner evened out with a power play goal over 15 minutes later. The Flyers took the lead again, about half way through the second, but Sergie Brylin provided another PPG, and tied it up again. Brylin was on the PK with Jimmy Dowd when Scott Gomez was in the box for hooking in the third, and Dowd scored short handed for the Devils' first lead of the game. Brodeur was his usually awesome self, and led the Devils to a 3-2 lead, setting a new wins record, and franchise record for wins. Brodeur had 34 saves, and Brylin had a goal and an assist.

New Stanley Cup Champs

2007-06-06T22:47:00.001-04:00

So the (Mighty) Ducks won the Cup (finally). They won the series 4-1, with a 6-2 win tonight. I'm happy for them. And for Scott Neidermayer for getting the Smythe, but it should totally be Parise with that trophy. And the Devils should be cheering and passing around the Cup. Ugh. It was so weird seeing a captain besides Scotty Stevens with the Cup. And it was even weirder to see Neids with it not as a Devil. Ah, congrats, Ducks. But the Devils will get it next season.

Alright.

2007-06-06T14:50:00.001-04:00

The Devils signed Andy Greene to a two-year $1.2 million contract (that's $600,000 a season). That's good. Andy rocks. Sad that he's almost as good as some of the older D-men, right?

No Way!

2007-06-04T19:01:00.000-04:00

Let's go back to my No Way! entry from my other blog, shall we? I'm starting to become amused by the reasons people want Souray back. The most common (maybe even only?) one I've seen is he's good offensively. Ok. Let's get someone who's not exactly decent on D, but is good offensively, to improve our less-than-amazing defense. Makes sense, right? I saw this video, and, after you watch it yourself, I think you'll see my point about him not being a Norris-worthy d-man.

Now, Souray is barely making $2.5 million, so, with the cap supposedly going up about $2 mil., and we need defense, what's the harm? Well, not only will be definitely want more than Rafalski, just look at his stats from this season, and focus on his +/-. It's not a joke, or a typo, he was really a -28. That's not the kind of guy I wanna see making Marty's job easier, which, as we all know, is the D's job.

So that's it, really. If you want a "No way to Souray" button, they'll only be $.75.

Bergforce!!

2007-06-04T15:37:00.000-04:00

That nickname didn't exactly fit this season, after a not-so-good season, compared to his rookie season, but, hey. Since this week's moment is kind of lame (just about the Devils purchasing the franchise in July), I'm going right into Bergfors. Not that it wasn't good or anything, but it didn't say much, and I'd be easier to just read it than to listen to my rambles.

Height: 5' 11"
Wight: 190
Position: Right wing
Birthday: March 7, 1987
Shoots: Right
From: Sodertalje, Sweden

2006/07 Season:
Team: Lowell
Games played: 60
Goals: 13
Assists: 19
PIMs: 8
PPG: 10
SHG: 0
GWG: 0
+/-: -1

On the plus side, he doesn't take too many penalties. Maybe he's one of those players who's better suited for the NHL. Who knows?

I see coaching potential

2007-06-02T13:59:00.000-04:00

In Jimmy Dowd. Not any time soon, though. Give him 5 or 6 years.

Incase you didn't hear, and you care, Sidney Crosby's the Penguins' new captain. I just won't comment on that right now.

And finally, me and my friend over there have started another blog for all of our rants, since there seem to be a lot of those. No rants yet, but I'd say soon, since there is a game tonight (Ducks @ Senators at 8 on Versus).

Marty-riffic

2007-06-01T16:07:00.000-04:00

Riffic sounded best. So, it's Marty time.

Height: 6' 2"
Weight: 215
Position: Goalie..Duh.
Birthday: May 6, 1972
Catches: Left
From: Montreal, Quebec, Canada

2006/07 Season:
Team: Devils
Games played: 78
Wins: 48
Loses: 23
OT Loses: 7
Points: 1
Shutouts: 12
Goals Against Average: 2.18
Save Percentage: .922

2006/07 Playoffs:
Team: Devils
Games Played: 11
Wins: 5
Loses: 6
OT Loses: 0
Points: 0
Shutouts: 1
GAA: 2.44
SV%: .916

Marty's the best. End of story.

Ahh..

2007-05-31T16:27:00.000-04:00

I changed my mind again. There's only gonna be 15 moments, because I really don't wanna do 2-3 a week. I'm finally gonna start that today. With my complaints about Clemmensen's lack of ice time and all that last night, I think his only win this season deserves something. That, and I'm really not in a thinking room.

After not playing with the Devils since a 40-save 5-3 loss to the Bruins in December, Clemmensen was sent down to Lowell for a game in February, and made 35 saves for a 3-0 victory. He played on the following Sunday, after the Devils suffered a 4-2 loss the day before, with Marty in the net and Janssen scoring his first NHL goal.

Zach Parise scored the first tying goal (Travis Zajac, Jamie Langenbrunner) early in the second, and the Devils took the first lead of the game less than two minutes into the third, with a tally from Zajac (Parise and Brian Rafalski). About nine minutes in, the Capitals tied it, only to see the tie broken yet again by Langenbrunner (Rafalski and Patrik Elias). Clemmensen ended with 23 saves, and his first win since the previous March. The Caps were 0/2 on the PP, while the Devils were 1/4 (Langenbrunner).

Bitter much?

2007-05-31T00:05:00.000-04:00

Does Ray emery ever smile? Pictures, during games, after games..I've never seen a smile cross that man's face. Maybe he knew he would be down 2-0 in the series against the Ducks? Yep, Jean Sebastien Giguere had an excellent game, and the Ducks won the game 1-0 and increased their lead in the series. Samuel Pahlsson scored the only goal.

I believe I had a point, other then pointing out emery's bitterness. Ah, yes. I've brought up the backups many times,
just like my desire to have Sykora and Neidermayer back, and, well, I feel it needs to be done again. I've said it before that I don't want Clemmensen to go. I think I've also made it pretty clear that if we can't find a decent UFA to do it, I'd pick Jordan Parise over Frank Doyle any day, even if I was in a coma. The only goalie aside from the two listed above that I like is Giguere, now that Holmqvist is with the Bolts. Unfortunately, he's too good to be a backup, and the Ducks will probably manage to keep him under their wings (get it? Ducks? Wings? I quack myself up..). Enough with the stupid jokes, I like Giguere. Maybe we can steal him and give them Gomez in exchange. It could happen.

As I've sid many times before, though, the lack of games Clemmensen played will effect both what he can get and who would want to sign with us. I feel bad for Clemmensen. He's just not as good as Marty. There's nothing wrong with making $450, 000 a season to sit on the bench and play a handful of games, but sitting there so long must be horrible for his confidence, which is why I'd be happier to see him go somewhere else and actually play.

Priceless.

2007-05-29T21:24:00.000-04:00

"I'm cheering for the other guys to beat the Ducks because I am a Red Wings fan. I predict Ottawa will win it in three.'' -A skateboarder in Newport Beach - and self-proclaimed hockey fan - predicting who will win the Stanley Cup.

Genious, that boy is. Speaking of smart guys, I told my buddy he could do the moment, if he brought up tfour other points. He brought up one, but forgot about the other three I'll let it slide this time. I have nothing better to be doing now anyway.

In case you didn't hear, the Ducks came back from deficites of 1-0 and 2-1 to win their game and take the lead in the series, 1-0. The recap's here.

My second point was the Devils have signed Finnish center Jari Viuhkola, who used to be Blackhawk's property. He's not very big, and doesn't have much of a scoring touch. Eh, maybe we can change that. I'm obviously not too excited about it, but, hey, maybe I'll change my mind. Although the only ones I want to see signing with us right now are Sykora, Rafalski, Clemmense, and Drury or Briere.

Finally, the Devils moment of the week thing has not been forgotten, we just didn't start it yet. Similar to the 25 moments featured on the Devils site all season, there will be 25 of them, meaning most weeks will have two moments, which will most be posted on Tuesdays and Thursdays. I'll start it this week, maybe tomorrow instead of a Tuesday. We'll see.

To all you other James Vam Riemsdyk fans, there's more of a chance that Scott Stevens will come back. We have no first round pick, and that's when that boy's getting picked. Even Lou can't make that happen. Way to stay positive, right?

Six is good.

2007-05-29T15:44:00.000-04:00

It's Andy Greene's number, it's..I'm sure there are other good things about it. Moment number six was a good one, too.

On November 17, after the first 20 minutes, things didn't look good for the Devils. They were down 3-0 against their rivals, the Manchester Monarchs. Frank Doyle was pulled from goal and was replaced by Jordan Parise. They were solid in the second, getting goals from Grant Marshall (PP) and Dan LaCouture, and Parise not letting anything get past him. Nicklas Bergfors (PP) tied it up a little over five minutes into the third period. They ended up on the power play in overtime, and Dan McGillis blasted a shot that went right past the Monarchs' goalie for the Devils' second win in a row, in a week against the Monarchs. Parise stopped all 16 shots he faced, while Doyle had 10 saves on 13 shots.

As a side note, I was told to add that if the Devils are looking for a disciplinary coach, they should forget Stevens and Burns and go after our (as in we, the writers) vice principal, who "is there to discipline us, not to teach us."

Czech It Out.

2007-05-28T18:06:00.000-04:00

I knew I could think of something not lame. Again, happy Memorial day, if you missed my pervious post.

There's one UFA that few Devils fans seemed to not even notice is available, who, along with Patrik Elias, was part of the infamous A Line. Not Jason Arnott. He still has quite a bit of time on his contract with the Predators. Not Elias, since, well, he already is a Devil, and he and his $7.5 mil. a season aren't going anywhere for another six years. That leaves Pert Sykora, a clost friend of the Captain's, who hasn't played his best lately- lately meaning since he left the Devils. Now, after looking at his stats from recently and his salary ($2.9 mil.), there's no little chance that he'll be making more than $3 mil, unless there's a GM out there who's a little off the rocket.

Unfortunately, Lou can't force him to sign with us (if he had those powers, Neidermayer would still be here, and I wouldn't be complaining about, well, him not being here), but there's always the fact that he was on the 2000 Stanley Cup team, was on Anaheim when we beat them for the Cup in 2003, and hasn't played as well since leaving us.

His highest +/- while not on the Devils was a +5. With us, he reached +36 and was only a - for one season. He hasn't passed 59 points, while his all time high with the Devils was 81. His stats were better with us, and he and Elias have a lot of chemistry on the ice. A line of him, Elias, and Brian Gionta could easily become a line with more points then the EGG line, although the EGG line has a cooler name. They can be the B Line or something. Now I don't know what I'm doing.

Bottom line is I want Sykora back (what's with me desparately wanting old players back?). Maybe Elias would have a good season. And maybe that would win us cup number 4.

Happy Memorial Day!

2007-05-28T15:50:00.000-04:00

Before I start rambling about nothing, happy Memorial day to all of you.

So, Lowell hasn't posted a new moment yet, but that doesn't mind there's no Rookie/Lowell-er of the week yet. The potential next John Madden, only not as good, Rod Pelley, is the star. Or player. What ever you wanna call it.

Height: 6'
Wight: 200
Position: Center
Birthday: September 1, 1984
Shoots: Left
From: Kitimat, British Columbia, Canada

2006/07 Season:
Team: Lowell/Devils
Games played: 65/9
Goals: 17/0
Assists: 12/0
PIMs: 35/0
PPG: 4/0
SHG: 1/0
GWG: 2/0
+/-: -1/-3

No playoff games for Mr. Pelley, unfortunately.

A spot on the 4th line might be his next season. Or the next season. Or maybe he'll just play as a fill in until Madden retires. Who knows. He drew a little negative attention declairing in a game against the Bolts that there was no way Vincent Lecavalier was gonna score on him. He was right- even though we lost the game. I like him, regardless of his arrogantness. And I also like this picture. Make that, these pictures.

Now I've heard it all.

2007-05-25T19:02:00.000-04:00

I've seen people who want Souray over Lukowich. Ok, so they had one too many drinks. Understandable. Then there are people who would trade Gionta for Pyatt (did they remember to take their medication?). But the craziest I've seen is not Souray over Rafalski, but Oduya and Fraser over Raffy. Huh? Those two over our top scoring D man? Why not toss Elias or Langenbrunner to the curb for LaCouture or Ryznar? And we'll send Brodeur down to the AHL and make Parise our starting goalie, too. Nothing against those who would like Rafalski to leave, but it wouldn't work in our favor. Granted, not signing Raffs would leave room for Gomez, but the the chances of him staying, even if Lou does offer the most are very slim.

I think, the best line up would be (if we could get the players that are UFAs and what not):

Elias/Sykora or Briere/Gionta
Parise/Zajac/Clarkson
Pandolfo/Madden/Langenbrunner
Pelley/Dowd or Rupp, if Jimmy retires/Brylin
Rupp (if Dowd plays for another season) and Bergfors or Vrana (both if Dowd's gone)

Martin/White
Rafalski/Matvichuk
Greene/Lukowich
Fraser or Oduya. I'm not too fond of any UFA defense men, or any in Lowell.

Brodeur
Clemmensen or Parise

If the coach, whoever it may be, makes Parise play center and splits our little dynamic dou of him and Zajac up, the dude's got issues. Sykora had a..not good season, but maybe if we pair him with Captain Patrik, that will change. I think it's time for Dowd to retire. I like him, but he's the best, and he won't get better with age. With him gone, we could make room for some younger players (i.e.: Bergfors, Vrana and Pelley).

Ahoy, Captain!

2007-05-25T13:11:00.000-04:00

How lame can you get? Before I get completely off topic, the Devil of the week is Captain Patrik. Isn't that fun? This season wasn't too good for him, but hey. Life isn't always fair. As for the whole moment thing, that's gonna wait till I feel like doing it.

Height: 6' 1"
Wight: 195
Position: Center/Left Wing
Birthday: April 13, 1976
Shoots: Left
From: Trebic, Czech Rebublic

2006/07 Season:
Team: Devils
Games played: 75
Goals: 21
Assists: 48
PIMs: 38
PPG: 8
SHG: 0
GWG: 5
+/-: +1

2006/07 Playoffs:
Team: Devils
Games played: 10
Goals: 1
Assists: 9
PIMs: 4
PPG: 1
SHG: 0
GWG: 0
+/-: +3

Maybe next season things will go his way. With Petr Sykora becoming a UFA after this season, maybe Lou will go after him and try to create line similar to the A line (only not as A-mazing) with the two Czechs and Gionta. Hey, it could happen.

15 To Remember

2007-05-24T15:18:00.000-04:00

On Wednesdays, from June 20 to September 26, FSN NY will be airing "15 To Remember," a program reliving the Devils' Silver Season from 8-10 PM, and on Saturdays at noon. The program will feature rebroadcasts of several games. Details here.

The Worst Part of the Season

2007-05-22T17:41:00.000-04:00

Any true hockey fan would agree that the off season is the worst part of the game, especially when it starts as early as the Devils' did. We were lucky to get that far, unlike some teams, like the Thrashers and the Flyers, but it would have been nice to go until June. The season was pretty good, undoubtedly- to any casual fan, or a fan of any other team. But to us die hard fans, the season isn't very good, if it doesn't end in June and result with us getting the cup.

Now that the bad part started, Lou is faced with many decisions: six players (Gomez, Dowd, Rasmussen, Rafalski, Lukowich, and Clemmensen) will be UFAs, six more (Parise, Rupp, Janssen, Martin, Greene and Oduya) will be RFAs, and we desperately need a coach. Dowd and Rafalski will be on the roster next season, if they get any offers from Lou. I think it's safe to say all of the RFAs, with the exception of maybe Janssen and Oduya, will be here. It's gonna suck to see Gomez go. He's a talented play maker, but, not only will we most likely not have the cap space for him, is he really worth the $6 million he'll be asking for? Rasmussen is good for the checking line, but we have Clarkson and Pelley to do that, for less. Lukowich is reliable, so I hope Lou can get him to sign, but if not, it's not that big of a loss. Clemmensen will have a hard time signing somewhere, not really because of his performance, but because he doesn't play too much. The guy isn't too bad, but some teams probably don't know he even exists, and they probably think there's a reason he doesn't play too much.

Defense UFAs (for the Devils):
Quite honestly, Lukowich and Rafalski are the only two UFAs I would like to see on the Devils. I'm very against us getting Souray, regardless of how good he is on the PP. I'd rather our PP still be...not good than have a player who was -28 this season, because it shows that he screwed the Habs over more than he helped them this season.

Forward UFAs (again, for the Devils):
One day, I hear Drury's with the Sabres again. The next, he's with the Rangers. The next, he didn't sign. I'm sticking with the third option in hopes of signing him or Briere, if Gomez moves on. We need a center for the first line, and our other natural centers aren't first line material, except maybe Parise, but I'm not too sure it would be good moving him to a position he hasn't played since college, and splitting him and Zajac, who were fantastic together. Shanahan, no matter how bad he was with the Rangers, wouldn't be a bad chioce either.

Goalies:
If we can't keep Clemmensen, it's wouldn't be the end of the world. Instead of signing another backup, Jordan Parise would be a good idea (I'd pick him over Doyle too). He had a better season than Doyle, and he probably wouldn't play too many games, so no there's no harm.

Now, for the biggest piece of the puzzle: a coach. Ex coach Pat Burns and assistant coach John MacLean have both made it clear to the public that they would like the job. Scott Stevens has also been rumored to be a candiadate, but, if he coaches, it'll most likely be as assistant to whoever gets the job. Ron Wilson, the Sharks' coach from this season, 's job has been said to be hanging by a thread, but Burns or MacLean are the most talked about choices. Personally, I want Burns back, with Stevens by his side.

This all will, hopefully, be resolved by June, so we'll have to wait and see.

-Ty

{Edit} I must be spending too much time around my blogging buddy, because I meant to put my idea of a good line up for next season (without Gomez). Better late then never, right?

Elias - Briere - Gionta
Parise - Zajac - Clarkson or Langenbrunner
Pandolfo - Madden - Pelley or Langenbrunner
Brylin - Dowd - Pelley or Clarkson

- OR -

Langenbrunner - Elias - Gionta
Parise - Zajac - Clarkson
Pandolfo- Madden - Pelley
Rupp - Vrana or Dowd - Bergfors or Brylin

Rafalski or - Greene
White - Martin
Matvichuk - Lukowich or Hannan
Fraser

Brodeur
Parise or Clemmensen

Coach: Burns

Clearly, I'm not a fan of signing new players. With a different coach, I think we would be the ones waiting to see who wins the Ducks and Red Wings series, not the Senators.

Just as a side note, I'm praying that we draft James Van Riemsdyk this season. Aside from him, I really don't care for any of the draftees.

Here we go

2007-05-21T17:00:00.000-04:00

Monday is officially Memerable Moments Monday. Just, you know, by the way. So moment number five is up. Back in January, before the All Star break, the Devils went 1-3-1 in five games, and were last in the Atlantic Division. On the 26th, they can from behind (3-0) and won it, with goals from Ryan Murphy, Grant Marshall, Nicklas Bergfors, David Clarkson and Tuomas Pihlman. The next day, they blew and 2-0 lead, but won it with an OT goal from Barry Tallackson. Andy Greene and Chris Minard scored the regulation goals.

On a somewhat off topic note, I was thinking, for once. Why should Lowell get a memorable moments thingy, when the Devils had a very special season of their own? Their last season even in CAA, Marty breaking the wins record, the debuts of several great players, including Greene, Clarkson, and Travis Zajac, and all that jazz deserves some recognition. So I'm gonna pick awesome parts of their season (and some moments that were just plain awesome, like Stevens/Daneyko nights, the 3 Cups..) and they'll be posted on either Wednesdays or Fridays. Wheneven I feel like it. Some weeks might have 2. Who knows. So, good bye for now.

It's Monday!

2007-05-21T15:34:00.001-04:00

Since when is that a good thing, right? Eh, Lowell hasn't updated the moment thing yet, so that's gotta wait. Of course, there's always other stuff to..blog about. Several sources have indicated that the Devils have signed Sergei Brylin for another season. I won't say anything else, until I see it on the NHL site, or the Devils site. My dreams of signing the Lightning's goalie Johan Holmqvist are now gone, being that he signed a one-year deal with the Bolts. That rumor about Drury's "contract" and Briere being as good as gone have been followed up with rumors of Drury signing with the Rangers. Again, no comments till I see it with my own eyes from a trustworthy source. With that, I move to my Lowell-er/rookie of the week. This week's victim, er, player? David Clarkson (ironic that I just mentioned him on Friday, right?) and his great season with both the Devils and Lowell Devils.

Height: 6' 1"
Wight: 205
Position: Right Wing
Birthday: March 31, 1984
Shoots: Right
From: Toronto, Ontaria, Canada

2006/07 Season:
Team: Lowell/Devils
Games played: 67/7
Goals: 20/3
Assists: 18/1
PIMs: 150/6
PPG: 4/2
SHG: 0/0
GWG: 3/1
+/-: +1/-1

2006/07 Playoffs:
Team: Devils
Games played: 3
Goals: 0
Assists: 0
PIMs: 2
PPG: 0
SHG: 0
GWG: 0
+/-: -1

Seriously, if he doesn't make the roster full time next season, I'm sending Lou for therapy. He almost ended up with a Gordie Howe hat trick in his second game (and would have had it, had the refs let him get into it. Too bad, since that would have made that game seem a little better), he can hit, he got time on the PP, what more can you ask for? Dude can do it all.

We Neid him!

2007-05-20T18:36:00.001-04:00

That was pretty lame. But dude's not feeling too creative right now. Eh. I think you should have realized that this is about Mr. Gray Playoff Beard, aka Scott Neidermayer. Not that I have anything against gray playoff beards, unlike Stan Fischler, who is against playoff beards in general (do I agree with him on anything?). And I digress..

Three overtime winners so far, six assists and -1 (you can't have it all) in 14 playoff games this season. Nine points isn't exactly a lot, but hey. It's third with defensemen, and he lead defensemen in scoring in the regular season with 69 points. Ok, he has a lot of points. What's my point? That Lou should go to Anaheim and drag Neids back to Jersey by his rather unattractive beard. Get rid of Gomez and Rasmussen and Rupp if he has to. Even throw Janssen away, if necessary. And throw Martin in his jersey so they don't notice (he can tell 'em it was plastic surgery). Hey, you never know.

I blame his brother for all this. If it wasn't for him, Neidsy might have signed with us again, and we might have still been in the playoffs. Eh, what are you gonna do? No one ever said life was fair.. If it was, Stevens wouldn't have retired, and there wouldn't be a cap.

On a somewhat brighter note, apparently the Sabres (who were eliminated yesterday) are thinking about tossing Daniel Briere. Rumor has it that he and Chris Drury got into it in the locker room after yesterday's loss over a contract that Drury signed with the team, and it could be the end of Briere's career as a Sabre. Wouldn't it be exciting if Lou could get him to sign (if Gomez doesn't)? Let me have my moment, ok? It could happen. If Lou knocks him out and forges his signature on the contract..

Oh, the memories.

2007-05-18T17:25:00.000-04:00

Remember back in the beginning of the season, before half the team missed a million games due to injury? Remember how good Zajac was in his rookie year? Or how great Greene was in both his first regular season and playoff games? What about the debute of David Clarkson? And who could forget Marty breaking the wins record, in the arena of the team who's ex-goalie set it? And there's Parise, who lead the team in goals in the regular season and through the first round of the playoffs, and was second in scoring in the regular season, and third in the playoffs. Parise's stellar sophmore season is what earned him the spot as my second Devil of the week. Actually, it was the fact that I somehow skipped this week when I was setting up who I would do when (I get bored in detention) and just figured I'd use the player for next week. Either way, it's Parise's week this week.
*Side note: a friend of mine wanted to start a blog, and wanted me to help with it, so I just invited him to write here. He'll start writing soon. Possibly.*

Height: 5' 11"
Wight: 190
Position: Center/Left Wing
Birthday: July 27, 1984
Shoots: Left
From: Fairbault, Minnesota

2006/07 Season:
Team: Devils
Games played: 82
Goals: 31
Assists: 31
PIMs: 30
PPG: 9
SHG: 0
GWG: 7
+/-: -3

2006/07 Playoffs:
Team: Devils
Games played: 11
Goals: 7
Assists: 3
PIMs: 8
PPG: 2
SHG: 0
GWG: 1
+/-: +4

This kid is just plain awesome. He's gonna be like, the Scott Stevens or Marty Brodeur of offense. Ok, Maybe not that good, but hopefully, he'll keep getting better.

Poor Sabres.

2007-05-14T22:13:00.000-04:00

Ryan Miller: 31/32 Saves
ray emery: 15/15 saves (not bolded for a good reason)

Do you see anything wrong with this? As in round 2, emery has about 15-20 saves, and comes out looking like a hockey God, while the other goalie, who has about twice as many saves looks like crap. I really don't think that's fair at all. Maybe the Sabres can play like they did in the regular season and win the next four. As fun as it would be to see the sens lose in the finals (I hold grudges. I'll probably still hate them in 5 seasons, even if we win every game against them until then), I think the Sabres deserve the Cup more. Scratch that. Miller deserves the cup. As with the Devils, it's the goalie (Marty) and a few forwards who really deserve it. With the sens, it's their defense that's really doing all the work. If they weren't there clearing the puck everytime it got within 10 feet of emery and he wasn't able to cover it, I doubt they would have been able to take even one game from the Devils, let alone the Sabres or Penguis. Basically, it sucks, and it's just not fair. Yeah, it looks better to be eliminated my the team that wins the cup than to have them eliminated, but come on. The senators deserved maybe two or three games that they won, four max.

Zajac, and moment number 4.

2007-05-14T15:20:00.000-04:00

It should really be "Moment Number 4 and Zajac," but do I care? No, I don't. Here we go.

Moment number Scott Stevens is the pre-season game on September 17, where that Devils beat the Bruins, 5-0, in Lowell (Tsongas Arena). Scott Gomez and Barry Tallackson scored in the first, Zach Parise in the second, and Jamie Lagenbrunner and Mike Rupp in the third. Parise's goal was the only even strength goal of the game, and the Devils were 4/11 on the power play. Scott Clemmensen and frank Doyle split the game, with Clemmensen getting 30:12 of game (and shutout) time, and Dolye getting the rest.

Aanndd, since he just celebrated his 22nd birthday yesterday, the rookie of the week is *drum roll*..TRAVIS ZAJAC!! Yeah, I know, that was pretty lame.

Height: 6' 2"
Wight: 200
Position: Center
Birthday: May 13, 1985
Shoots: Right
From: Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada

2006/07 Season:
Team: Devils
Games played: 80
Goals: 17
Assists: 25
PIMs: 16
PPG: 6
SHG: 0
GWG: 2
+/-: +1

2006/07 Playoffs:
Team: Devils
Games played: 11
Goals: 1
Assists: 4
PIMs: 4
PPG: 0
SHG: 0
GWG: 0
+/-: +4

If he improves as much as Parise did from his rookie season, I'll be one happy camper.

Brylin to play with Russia

2007-05-11T17:50:00.000-04:00

Sergei Brylin will be playing with Russia's national team, and could play in their semifinal game against Finland. Wouldn't it be kinda funny if team USA had won and he was playing against Parise? Hope he got all of his Hep. A shots too.

Anyway, about that coaching thing. According to several people/sites, John MacLean, Pat Burns and Scott Stevens are on the top of Lou's list. Johnny Mac and Burns have both made their desire to coach the team public, while Stevens is another story. I haven't read anything (yet) stating that he wants to do it (actually, I haven't heard anything about him really since he retired), but I have heard that Lou would like him to consider it. I'd settle for any of the above, but Stevens would be my top choice, followed by Burns, with MacLean in third. Sadly, as awesome as I am, I'm not nearly as amazing as Lou, nor will I ever be, so the decision is not up to me. Good luck to all of the "contestants," and may the best candidate win.

The Beloved Back-up

2007-05-11T16:11:00.000-04:00

Maybe not so beloved, since a lot of people want him gone next season, but I <3 him. Scott Clemmensen was lucky enough to be that first non-rookie/Lowell-er who's profile thing I posted. [Side note: I have a little update on the coaching thing, but that'll come a little later.]

Height: 6' 3"
Weight: 205
Position: Goalie
Birthday: July 23, 1977
Catches: Left

2006/07 Season:
Team: Lowell/Devils
Games played: 1/6
Wins: 1/1
Loses: 0/1
OT Loses: 0/2
Points: 0/0
Shutouts: 1/0
Goals Against Average: 0/3.15
Save Percentage: 1.000/.889

2006/07 Playoffs:
Team: Devils
Games Played: 0
Wins: 0
Loses: 0
OT Loses: 0
Points: 0
Shutouts: 0
GAA: 0
SV%: N/A

I may be in the minority, but I hope he resigns with us.

Parise to Play in Russia

2007-05-08T23:21:00.000-04:00

The Zach Attack will be playing with team USA for their quarterfinal against Finland. He also played with the team in 2005 and recorded two assists in three games. Good luck, Zach, and beware of Hepatitis A.

Momento Numero..Trois.

2007-05-07T15:00:00.000-04:00

I don't know any Spanish, so forgive me for putting "three" in French. Moving on, Lowell's third awesome moment was my favorite-est back up goalie ever, Scott Clemmensen, shutting out the Worcester Sharks back in February. Clemmy stopped 14 shots in the first period, 13 in the second and 8 in the 3rd, and Aaron Voros scored two goals and Ryan Murphy put in the empty netter for a 3-0 victory for Lowell. Clemmer then lead the big guys to a 3-2 win over the Washington Capitals several days after. He was first star in that (Lowell) game, because he's the best.

As for my Devil of the week thing, I decided I'll do two a week: a rookie or a Lowell-er on Mondays, to go with the Lowell moments, and a bug guy on Friday. This week, I'm giving Andy Greene the honors of being my first rookie. He was by far the Devils best D man in the play offs.

Height: 5' 11"
Wight: 195
Position: Defense (duh)
Birthday: October 30, 1982
Shoots: Left
From: Trenton, Michigan

2006/07 Season:
Team: Lowell/Devils
Games played: 52/23
Goals: 5/1
Assists: 16/5
PIMs: 28/6
PPG: 1/1
SHG: 0/0
GWG: 1/0
+/-: +6/-1

2006/07 Playoffs:
Team: Devils
Games played: 11
Goals: 2
Assists: 1
PIMs: 2
PPG: 0
SHG: 0
GWG: 1
+/-: +6

Andy's amazing. End of story.

So long, Continental.

2007-05-06T11:58:00.000-04:00

25 years and 7 months after it started, it's all over. Never again will the Devils play at Continental Airlines Arena. Oh my, I'm ready to cry. I'm not even gonna do the whole recap thing, just a box score type thing.

GOALS:
1st:
Scott Gomez, wrist shot from Patrik Elias and Paul Martin (6:59)
2nd:
No one cares.
3rd:
Gomez, wrist shot from John Madden and Zach Parise
Final: 2-3.

(My)THREE STARS:
#3-Parise
#2- Brodeur
#1- Gomez

So..yeah. Gomez made it pretty clear that he doesn't wanna stay with the Devils next season, and I doubt Clemmensen will stay, if he gets an offer anywhere else. I think Rafalski will stay. He seemed like he wanted to. I don't know about the rest of them, though.

After the post game last night, I hate that ranger worshipping stan fischler more than ever. For those of you that didn't see it, he flat out said Clemmensen sucks. And he wasn't exactly nice about some of the other players. He pretty much dissed Elias right to his face, too. Patrik really didn't have a bad series. Things just didn't go his way. It happened to everyone. As if jagr's a good captain anyway. Someone hits one of his teammates so instead of hitting them back, he goes and lectures their bench. What's wrong with him? If your teammate is incompetent and can't hit back himself, don't (basically) make your team shorthanded. Do what Rupp would do and beat the crap out of them (even though the Devils usually have the sense to hit back themselves).

I still can't believe it. We were one goal away from forcing it into OT. And with the exception of a few crap goals, Marty was amazing. It's sad how this came down to which goalie was better, but the better one didn't win. Nothing went our way. The entires series was decided by unlucky bounces garbage calls.

Since I can't bear to not write about hockey until october, I'll be posting recaps of other games and news and all that stuff. And I'll be doing a Devil of the week thing, where I'll post that stats from this season and profile of a Devil once a week (probably Mondays or whenever I post the Lowell moments thing). Till next October, my friends. Actually, until the Sabres/rangers game is over. Then till Monday. So I won't be gone too long.

Things to improve upon.

2007-05-05T11:20:00.000-04:00

Lou needs to read this. After paying close attention to the play of the Sabres, Ducks, Canucks, rangers, senators, and, of course, the Devils, I noticed exactly what's wrong with us. In short, we suck. But we wouldn't suck if the following would be improved:

The offense. Some of our offense (re: Parise, Zajac, Gionta and Clarkson) has been pretty good. If only they could score. Their shots aren't the best, and they're not getting on the rebounds quickly enough (I finally noticed them!). The problem isn't lack of rebounds, but the fact that we can't seem to get to them in time. By the time we get there, the D cleared it, or Emery covered.

The defense. With the exception of Matvichuk, Martin, and Greene, it sucks. Rafalski's mind hasn't been with him, White has anger issues and Lukowich hasn't been bad, but he hasn't been as good as usual. Matvichuk blocks anything he can, Martin's great at breaking up plays (namely odd man rushes), and Greene's been good all around. I think Oduya would be a better choice than White or Rafalski right now.

The lack of heart. Minus the seven that aren't really having offensive or defensive problems and Marty, no one has any heart. Elias, our captain, is playing with less heart than imaginable. I think you all know by now that I'm always the first one to defend him, unless he's just that bad. None of them seem to care if they make it to round three or not.

The lack of pressure. Boy, are they lacking a lot of things, but pressure has to be the most important. If they would pressure Emery, even a little, he would crack like an egg. They need to shoot what ever they can at him, and get a goal (preferably more) early in the game, just as a blow to his confidence. He's not like Marty. He's not as good, and he doesn't shrug off those goals like he does.

The lines. The line choices just suck. Not so much the lines themselves, just how much they're played. Was it just me, or was the Zajac line playing better against the Spezza line the the Madden line was? They had the puck in their zone, and they were creating some scoring chances. The Madden line was creating scoring chances too, just not for us. That line is being over played. Save them for if we make it to round three and have to play the Sabres. Let ZZPop get the job done and be done with it. Oh yeah, put Clarkson with Parise and Zajac, stick Langenbrunner on the first line with Gomez and Gionta, and put Elias where ever there's an opening. That would play out well.

Things that aren't that wretched:

The rookies. Clarkson, Greene, and Zajac have been some of the best players in this series, and they're only rookies. If I was Rafalski or Elias, I'd be a little embarrassed that rookies were out playing me.

Parise and Gionta. Scoring or not, they're still amazing. They both hit (and hard, which is pretty cool, since they're both kind of small), shoot, and do anything possible to score.

Marty. After the very first period of this series, he's been a God on skates. That's all I have to say about him.

So, the end. And someone try to get this to Lou.

Strange, isn't it?

2007-05-04T22:18:00.000-04:00

I was always one of those weird children, that preferred writing over playing with Barbies. Why am I telling you this? Because I felt like writing something, so you're gonna get an unbiased (that's my favorite word) recap of the Sabres/rangers Game 5.

As Maxim Afinogenov scored just 4:39 into overtime, the Buffalo Sabres took a 3-2 series lead over the new york rangers (unbiased or not, none of those words are getting capitalized).

At 16:41 of the third, martin straka broke a scoreless tied with an even strength goal from karel rachunek and Brendan Shanahan (he was a Devil, so his name can be capitalized), only to have Chris Drury of the Sabres tie it up with less than eight seconds left in regulation. Daniel Briere and Tim Connolly picked up the assists.

When blaire betts was called for hooking at 4:28, both teams were unsuccessful on the power play, with the Sabres going 0/5, and the rangers 0/7. Eleves seconds later, Afinogenov scored the only power play goal of the night, which stood as the game winner. Jason Pominville and Dmitri Kalinin assisted on this important goal for the Sabres. Neither team had been sucessfun on the road, with each now suffering an overtime loss, and the rangers losing games 1 and 2, and the Sabres game 4 in regulation.

The Sabres out shot the rangers 40-22 through out the whole game, with the rangers only registering more shots on goal in the first (8-7) and both team only having 3 shots in OT.

With a win on the road on Sunday, the Sabres can close out their series against the rangers in six games, and wait for the Devils/Senators series is over to find out who their next opponent will be.

I like being biased better. Oh well.

Dude, that's harsh.

2007-05-03T23:10:00.000-04:00

I know Elias has been (chose one: wretched, sucky, lame, horrible, a disgrace, just plain bad) in the playoffs, but some people are blowing this way out of proportion. Just because he hasn't been his best lately doesn't mean the guy needs to be chained up and put away, or worse, be stripped of Stevens' "C". Yeah, he hasn't been the best captain (so it seems), but who do we have to compare him to? The only guy I can really think of is Scott Stevens. We were lucky to have such an amazing player and captain for so long, we took it for granted, and now people are calling for Patrik's head. Give the guy a break. He missed half of last season, and about 8 games this season, due to illness and injury. I've seen all of these guys play better, and no one wants to see any of them gone (with the exception of Madden). Which brings me to another point. Madden's been (chose one of the above) too, but wanting the guy gone is a bit too extreme don't you think? Pelley does a good job of taking his place, but until Madden's retired, I don't see him being replaced by anyone.

I'm getting way off track here, but, don't get me wrong, I love Parise, but give him a few more years until he's an alternate, let alone captain.

Oh, and can someone please tell me when White started wearing the "A"? Wasn't it Langenbrunner all season? Now all of a sudden it's White? When did this happen? I'm not even joking, can someone please tell me when this happened?

Here's an idea.

2007-05-02T19:24:00.000-04:00

[10:13] Just a quick note to Lou: When a guy like Ken Daneyko says to play Janssen, do it. The guy played (professional) hockey for 21 years. I'd trust his word over Lou's crappy coaching any day.

[9:43] Season over. We sucked.

[9:26] Just BTW, Brodeur had the secondary assist on Gio's goal.
STOP PASSING AND SHOOT THE FREAKING PUCK!!

[9:20] Martin?! Didn't see that one coming. If the Devils can do that 2 more times, and Marty can not let anything in, I'll be good. I'll make the cookies, I'll do anything. Oh, that goal was from Pandolfo, with assists form Martin and Brylin.

[9:08] We lost. We lost the game, we lost the series, we lost the cup, we just plain lost. It's over. We're wretched tonight. Nice, Lukowich, or Marty whoever that was. Let's just take the L and be done with it. I don't care what anyone says. It's over.

[8:44] ..It's he said, she said/LET'S EVEN OUT THE SCORE. Got it guys? I'm gonna start singing if you don't tie it again, then win. Regroup during the intermission, and remind me why I love you guys.

[8:41] Another PP. I bet you anything it's gonna be useless.

[8:36] I refuse to count that goal until heatley learns how to spell "Danny." There's 2 N's, not one, sweetie. And Madden, next time Parise's standing right in front of the net, all alone, try to get it to him. That goes for all of them.

[8:26] First of all, nice trip on Zajac. Second, did they forget to freeze the puck? It's bouncing around a lot. Nice shot to the pads, too, Rass. We're not very good.

[8:12] Why do their fans even boo when they're short handed? We never score. And I just jinxed it. Not really. Gionta just tied it with a wrister from Elias. Oh, but nice hook Martin.

[8:10] I've given up hope on us. If they're gonna keep playing like this, we're gonna lose, no question. And we deserve it. Step it up, or just give it up. Pressure guys, pressure!!

[7:50] ( Our 3rd power play. Does that lack of goals surprise me? No. We haven't had a goal in forever, let alone a PPG. Tonight, I'm sending each player a copy of that picture. They could use it, that's for sure. They need to stop shooting to Emery's pads and the rest of the Senators, and maybe try aiming for the net. Unless you're like Fultonsp?) Reed from the Mighty Ducks (the movie, not the team), you can't make the puck go through someone. Get close to the net, and shoot at that, not the players. Stop passing, and shoot. Shoot your little hearts out. Remember last time, when I said pressure Emery, and they seemed to listen, and they not only scored, but won? If Marty can play like he did last game, and the offense plays like they did in the 2nd period of game 1, we can win it. K, Lou?

[7:40] This needed to come back. I think it worked last time.

[7:37] I take that back. Out PP isn't lame. It's as wretched as out offense. And chris simpson. She knows less than I do. And she doesn't do a good job of covering that up. I doubt she knows Clarkson's name either (the announcers called him something, but it wasn't David). Anyway, PP number 2. They play their PPs like it's full strength. That's not good.
All these goal posts are giving me a headache. Score, Devils, score!! Either that, or get your golf clubs ready.

STOP PLAYING THE FREAKING MADDEN LINE. They're not very good at all. Stick the EGG and PZL lines on and be done with it. And if he had to sit someone, why Rupp? He's the best. Not really. But he is pretty good.
Stupid goal post. Go die. That goal was as in as the Sens'. And the refs are continuing their non call thing. But here's a Power Play. Make it useful, please. It's been kind of lame lately. Like, really lame.

..Who..?

2007-05-01T22:13:00.000-04:00

Just out of curiosity, who is Paul White? I was cutting out the articles on the Devils from Sunday's Bergen Record, and something caught my eye. It said, and I quote:
"This time, defensemen Paul White and Richard Matvichuk failed to level Heatley.." (It's not my fault that's the sentence it was in.)
Had I not seen Matvichuk there, I would have assumed there's a Paul White on the Senators. Could it have been a typo? Yes, since the two previous sentences were about Colin White. But even I proof read my writing (though it is hard to tell sometimes), and my writing isn't even published (surprising, right?). Normally, I would have let it slide, but the girl who wrote the article made another error by stating that Langenbrunner's goal was unassisted. Big deal. A lot of breakaways are unassisted, right? Right. But I've noticed, in reading several other articles, that she makes mistakes like that all the time. If the girl wasn't clearly a Devils fan, I would probably written a letter complaining about it instead of wasting your time writing this. I've said it before, no one's perfect, but at least proof read, especially if you know your writing's gonna be read by thousands of people. And if that tying goal "sucked the life out of the arena," we were watching a different game. I wasn't there, but the fans never seemed to lose their enthusiasm at any point of that game.

I bet you anything there are a ton of typos in here that are gonna make me look like a huge hypocrite, but hey. At least I'll admit it. Till tomorrow, my friends.

Do they get peanuts in the penalty box?

2007-04-30T20:16:00.000-04:00

[9:33] So Gionta gets tripped and they score. Not us, them. I really really really really hate Emery. He's a crappy goalie and he doesn't know how to play hockey. He doesn't deserve that freaking win. He's not good at all. I don't care what anyone says. If you can't make a normal save, then go play golf. He's a freaking cocky..ugh. He doesn't deserve half the credit he gets. Either do the refs. Are they all blind or something? Langenbrunner fell, so he gets called for tripping. Elias and Gionta were both tripped and nothing. I'm starting to hate emery more than I hate avery. Freaking tard made me break my computer. I hope he pulls his grion covering the puck next time.

[9:22]So Jamie falls, and gets sent to the box. Screw Montreal next summer. I'm going to Ottawa tomorrow. Those refs and emery need a reality check, and the refs need glasses. I'll send them mine. They obviously need them more than I do.

[9:17] What's worse: the crap calls or the constant covers by emery, for which I might just have to hit him with the puck right in the..? Seriously. They missed at least 2 calls on the Sens in the last 3 minutes (interfearence and tripping), but as soon as we do (or even don't do half the time) something, they're blowing the whislte. The penalty on them right now is working, but when you were shorted 3 power plays in one period, there's a problem. This game sucks. No, wait. We suck. Gahh.

[9:07]Hey Marty, guess what? You SUCK. I don't care how many freaking saves you have, how could you let that one in? Seriously. Stop checking out the ref, and keep your head in the game. Stupid. And these announcers are really making me sick. I'm gonna vomit all over my keyboard. I hate to say it, but the checking line sucks too. They're not doing their job very well.

[8:45] Is this reminding anyone else of the game on April 3rd, where it was scoreless until about half way through the third, then Madden scored, then the Sens tied it, then we won in the shootout? Ugh. How bout the Devils score and get the 1-0 lead, the Sens pull Emery, and it backfires this time and we get the eampty netter? That works for me.

What's with the Planters wall paper thing in the Sens' penalty box? Do they give away free peanuts? They must. Why else would Matvichuk be making so many trips there? I want peanuts.

So the Devils are kind of sucking right now. Like, seriously. I bet they all want free peanuts. Then they'll be happy. Wouldn't you be happy if you got free peanuts? Enough peanut talk. Someone needs to tell emery to stop covering every freaking puck that comes near him, or I'm gonna have to go and do that. And trust me, he doesn't want that to happen. Eh. I'm not liking the short handed-ness and the lack of shots and puck controll. We suck. End of story. But I'm finding this all very amusing. Oh, another cover. I need a ride up to Ottawa. This is crazy. When you've only faced about 10 shots half way through the game, it's safe to say you can give up a rebound or two. And if they score, oh well. That's hockey. I ramble a lot. Good bye, until something *good* happens.

STEP IT UIP, GUYS!!

New links

2007-04-30T15:20:00.000-04:00

So I found a couple blogs I happened to find interseting, so I figured I'd link to them. If you have a site or blog you want me to link to, just send me an email or drop a comment. That's all.

LET'S GO DEVILS!!

Moment Number Two

2007-04-30T13:23:00.000-04:00

Remember about a week ago, I posted that thing about Lowell's "Inaugral Season Moments?" If you don't, I don't blame you. I posted a lot of crap after that, so it's not your fault. Anyway, this week's moment is David Clarkson's awesomeness back in January. In two consecutive games (both against the Philadelphia Phantoms), he had 5 goals and 3 assists (that's 8 points, to those of you who are also math-challenged). The first game, he gave the Devils the 2-0 lead, and broke the 2-all tie in the 3rd. He got the primary assist on Ryan Murphy's (game winning) goal, and scored the empty netter, to collect the 2nd hat-trick of the season (for Lowell) and the first on home ice. The next night, he had a goal and 2 assists on 2 goals form Aaron Voros. So, that's really all it said, but here's the link, if you wanna read the actual article thing.

LET'S GO DEVILS!!

The impossible has happened.

2007-04-29T20:46:00.000-04:00

Final Ducks/canucks update: Ducks 3, canucks 2. GWG- (PPG) Perry at 7:51 (3rd) from Chris Progner and Andy McDonald. The end.

Update (already?!): The canucks tied it at 19:12. Just in case you care.

The rangers won. Over the Sabres. I'm just as shocked as you. But they copied us. Seriously. They were leading until (kind of) late in the 3rd, and they won it in 2OT. Copy cats. But, on the bright side, it needs to happen 3 more times for them to win the series, so that's good.

And the Ducks are up 1-0 on vancouver late in the 1st, with a wrist shot goal from Dustin Penner (Corey Perry). I'll keep you posted.

As usual, I had to put something off topic in here. So I found this, and the first thing I thought was "Captain Crunch."

Game 2: Devils vs Senators

2007-04-28T20:21:00.000-04:00

[11:46]Jamie Langenbrunner got his 2nd of the playoffs, that was the OT winner at 1:55 into the 2nd OT. Yahoo says Travis Zajac got the only assist, but I could have sworn they said it was Zach. Whatever. We won, that's good.

3 STARS:
#1- Marty (43 saves)
#2- Travis (because I said so)
#1- Jamie (game winner)

That was exciting. Well, good night.

[11:28]Oh joy, double OT. There goes my heart. Yeah, I know, I sound like an old lady. Whatever. I get more nervous than the players when it comes to OTs. So, let's have Gomer be the OT hero again so my heart rate can go down. I really don't care who scores the winner, as long as he's on the Devils. Like I said, pressure emery, and start beating him every time he covers the freaking puck. Seriously. Within 5 minutes, there must have been at least 15 face offsin front of him, because he covered everything. They should set a limit to how many times you can cover a period, and if you go over it, you get a penalty or something. Some of these guys are ridiculous. It's necessary sometimes, but when you're covering the puck just to save yourself from some rebounds, that's just lame. Catching the puck and all that is fine. But covering just gets obnoxious.
But what if they have to cover? Like, if they have no other choice? Simple. The refs can tell if it's necessary or not. I should totally work for the NHL. I'll rewrite the rules and everything. It'll be awesome.

[10:39]MARTY! What was that? Letting them tie it, are you kidding me? Me and your glove are over. UGH. Overtime now. I'm gonna have heart failure. I bet heatley is a child killer. And he threatened to kill Marty's kids if he didn't let them tie it. Yeah. If we don't win, I'm gonna burn Marty's glove. But if we had the EGG or ZZPop line out there, we would have gotten the empty netter. I bet you anything that would have happened. Or they wouldn't score. Either one would have worked. Now, I <3 style="font-style: italic;">cry. He should have gotten a prize for that!! I would have given him a prize. Yeah..our PK was pretty awesome. A SHG would have been nice, but, I'll take a good PK over that any day. Unless we're losing. Then I want the SHG. Eh. Marty was..what's the word? Oh yeah. Freaking awesome. But the ZZPop line was kind of..not bad, but not as awesome as usual. Oh yeah. White was in the box for boarding. Again, that was a nice hit. I would have given him a prize too. But we killed it off. Although I'd rather have White out on the ice hitting stuff, then have everyone else hitting stuff. Not really. I just wanted to say something with the phrase "White out" in it. Let me have my moment.

[9:15]Hey alfredson, guess what? You SUCK. Scoring on Marty is not legal. Next time that happens, you'll be hearing from me. And it won't be a friendly "hello." But I can't blame Jimmy Dowd. If he wasn't from New Jersey, then I could. I probably wouldn't, but I still could. Nice hit, Whitey. Almost as nice as that one Zubrus had on avery last night. That made me happy. And he was first star for that in my books. And jagr yelling at the Sabres' bench while he was on the ice was hysterical. He's a great captain, that's for sure. Every time I look while he's playing, he's making some dumb move. Captain of the year right there. And Marty's save right now just made up for that nasty goal. That's my boy.
And I want some biased announcers for us!! Doc, Chico, and Steve just don't cut it. Everyone else has biased announcers, why can't we?

[9:12]What was funnier: Marty taking his helmet off and yawning, or Zach still controlling the puck while on his knees? Ew, but Jimmy Dowd's in the box for slashing, so uh, they're on the PP.

[8:49]Aaaannnnnddd they score!! Sergei Brylin!! With .2 seconds left in the 1st, Sergei Brylin doubled the lead with an unassisted goal, and Patrik's accent seems to be less heavy or something. He sounds weird. Not weird, but different. Uhh, I had something else to say. Seriously. I'm not trying to waste your time..Oh yeah.Why is Emery covering the puck every freaking time it comes near him? He covered our last 6 shots. I'm not even kidding. Like I said, of course you're gonna be good if all 6' and 200 lbs. of you is covering that little puck. But, really, that doesn't make you good. It makes you seem good to people who only look at the stats, but to the people who watch, it makes you look bad, because it looks like you know you're so horrible that if you put it back out they're gonna score on you.

[8:44]Way to almost take Jamie's eye out, Shafer. Real nice. Are you gonna take Zach's arm off next? Eh, whatever. A double minor to him and with [roughly] 1 1/2 minutes, we'll most likely start the 2nd on the PP. Oh, and now a 5 on 3 to end this one, and start the next one. Let's go, guys!

[8:34]This is, by far, the craziest hockey game all season. I'm not even at CAA and I'm having heart failure over here! The rushes, the shots, the saves, the PK..man..We're "a very well oiled machine," to quote Chico.
So..Gionta should have been called for tripping about a minute before the last commercial. Rass is playing well. I told ya, he's more of a checking/fourth liner. Chico, Matvichuk is not like Scott Stevens. He's a hitting machine, but he's no Scott. I'm rambling now. Looking for anything to say..I can't believe this is still the first period. Yeah, maybe I should just go. No, just kidding. This is true, and not just something to say so I can sit here (my computer chair is much more comfortable than the couch): How many freaking times have we been off sides? I swear, every five seconds, it's like "We get a whistle on the play, and the Devils are off sides." And it's always when the EGG line's on. Eh, I'm gonna go.

[8:22]Barely 7 minutes in, and we've had:
A power play goal from Brian Gionta (Wrist shot from Patrik Elias and Scott Gomez).
A little action after Gomer was called for tripping (roughing and tripping for Gomer and roughing for some other kid).
Rafalski making a new friend.
Marty playing like..well, Marty.
Travis Zajac just missing the net thanks to that nasty post.
Some awesome scoring chances.
And some awesome Devils hockey.

Talk about prepared.

2007-04-28T11:10:00.000-04:00

The following Lowell-ers have been called up, and have been practicing with the team for God knows why:
Jordan Parise
Frank Doyle
Grant Marshall (so that wasn't a rumor)
Tuomas Pihlman
Rod Pelley
Barry Tallackson
Mark Fraser
Alex Brooks
Mike Mottau

So..yeah. Clarkson, Oduya, Janssen, Rupp, Elias and all of the above have been practicing with the team. Elias will be playing tonight, and the D should (hopefully) show tonight. And maybe Lou won't let Oduya in the goal like in the first period Thursday.

I'm honestly surprised (or is it disappointed) that Brooks, Mottau and Fraser got the call instead of McGillis. There are a couple others, too, that I would have expected to get called up, that didn't. Whatever. That's it till (post?) game time.

Tsk, tsk, tsk.

2007-04-26T23:29:00.000-04:00

Call me immature of you must, but since this is my 69th post, I have to laugh. *LOLs* OK, back to business. It just occurred to me that my picture in the "Elias is out" post, the X-ed out players made an "L" as if it was warning my as to what was coming. *Note to self- Next time, make it a "W"* And I also need to be reminded to never wear my Brodeur shirt. I had it on in the first, then I changed into my Parise jersey, and Marty's game improved. And Zach's was still awesome, so it worked out. Aside from the 1 goal we couldn't get..

With that said, here's a little something for Lou:
THINGS TO IMPROVE UPON FOR GAME 2:

1- Marty. He sucked tonight. End of story. I love him, but he was just plain bad. Not the Marty I'm used to and enjoy seeing.

2- The Defense. Brian Rafalski, that means you. Again, I love Raffy, but he sucked. He was responsible for about 1/2 of our many turnovers. Which brings me to my next point.

3- The turnovers. Is it just me, or were there more turnovers just in the 1st then there were in the entire regular season? That's gotta stop.

4- The penalties. So four penalties isn't that bad. Unless they're stupid ones, and you let the Sens score on two of them. Not acceptable. Now, you can't blame the Devils, because who knows how this game would have turned out had the refs not missed several calls against Ottawa, but the PK needs improvement.

5- The PP. I'm not expecting them to score 10 PPGs on 3 PPs, but one would have been nice. Almost as nice as setting up an attack would have been. I swear, they, like the Bolts, were nearly setting up an attack on our power play! That was almost as bad as that SHG we gave up.

6- The lines. What were they thinking, putting Rass on the first line? Why not just stick Janssen on there? Or better yet, Clemmensen. Put my fish, a hobo, anyone but Rass! Sarge plays much better with them then Rass does. Next time Elias or Gio isn't there (which, hopefully, is like, uhm, NEVER), put Rass in Sarge's place on the checking line. And leave him there! Putting Sergei on the 4th line would not only create a 4th line that would get more ice time and (possibly) produce more scoring, but give the checking line more..checking! Brylin isn't much of a hitter. Personally, I would be much more (afraid? nervous?) if Rass was coming after me, rather than Sarge.

7- The 2nd line. They need more ice time. They can handle it, and they could do something with it.

8- Patrik. Dead or alive, sick or healthy, we need our captain. One thing I noticed about our games without him is that we don't play as well. So to those of you who don't think he deserves that "C," think again.

Surprisingly, there were some bright sides. Like:

1- The 2nd line. 2 goals and 4 assists for 6 points. The team only had 12 points. That speaks to me. It better speak to Lou too. That line has serious chemistry. How often do you see Zach score without Jamie or Travis getting an assist? And the same goes for Travis. Him and Zach are like connected or something. Jamie plays well with anybody, but he seems to up Zach and Travis's game. Off topic, but isn't it odd, how when ever Zach or Travis scores, not only does the other usually get an assist, you can always find a picture of them together, celebrating, but you rarely see one of Travis and Jamie? It's not too hard to find one of Jamie and Zach, but Jamie and Travis is a whole other story. Of course, you can find a picture of Zach celebrating with anyone. But it's weird that they never seem to take any of T&J.

2- Gomer and Gio. Regardless of how much better they (and the rest of the team) plays with him, they were pretty awesome, with 1 goal and 2 assists.

3- Greene. That kid is too good to be true. He not only can score, but he can hit and block shots. And he has a very fast shot. He can shoot over 95 MPH. I guess that's why all of his goals always come from (around) center ice. He's like Fulton Reed from the Mighty Ducks. They see his shot coming, and they run. Although Andy's yet to break the net. Or somebody.

4-The heart everyone played with after the first. Well, most of them. The 2nd line, as usual, seemed to have most of it, but they didn't quit when it looked like they had no way to win. They didn't win, but they played amazingly. With a few exceptions.

5- The comeback. How they managed to be down 4-0 and make it a one-goal game is just..great (I can't think of another word for awesome, and I've been informed that I over use that. But when you're awesome, you're awesome..). If our offense can keep that up (minus the 10 missed scoring chances) and the D and Marty can do what they did in games 5 and 6 of Round 1, we'd be unbeatable. Maybe not unbeatable. But close to it.

With that being said, someone make sure Louie Lams reads this. In Lou we trust, but sometimes, his decisions are questionable. Not saying I miss Julien, but I can't help but wonder how different some of this would be had he not been fired. Would we have won in 5, or maybe 7, instead of 6? Would we have not even won that series? What about our regular season games without him? Would we have won them? Would Marty have played the last game? Who knows. All I know is
GO DEVILS!

I hate the Senators.

2007-04-26T21:35:00.000-04:00

A lot. Notice I said Senators, not Ottawa. Nothing against the place, just the team. Although, I did like seeing them have a 4-0 lead, only to win it 5-4. That was kind of funny. Yeah, prepare for a very biased, angry recap. Don't worry, when the Devils win, it won't be (as) biased or angry.

After Marty gave up 4 first period goals, Travis Zajac got us on the board, with his first ever playoff goal at 17:38, about a minute after Marty gave up goal numero four..0. Jamie Langenbrunner and Zach Parise got the assists. The next two goals were Devils goals as well, from Brian Gionta (2:20, 2nd, from Scott Gomez and Paul Martin) and Andy Greene (4:47, Langenbrunner and Parise). Then the Senators made it 5-3. That sucked. Parise made the game look less embarrassing at 19:30 of the 3rd, when he made it 4-5, with a goal from Gomez and Brian Rafalski. Although I'm not happy at all that we lost, I have to admit, I was kind of laughing at the score. Have the Devils even ever been leading 4-0, and then ended up winning 5-4? Oh, and BTW, I don't like emery, and I take back everything I ever said about him having skill.

3 (Devils) Stars:
#3- Zajac (1st playoff goal)
#2- Langenbrunner (2 assists)
#1- Parise (1g, 2a)

Elias didn't play, as I said about 50 million times before, and, while there was a lot of line switching, Rasmussen took his place, and Clarkson played on the 4th line (for the most part). It seemed like we were on the PK a lot more then 4 times, and it didn't seem like we had 3 PPs either. Whatever. Great game, yeah yeah.

Marty sucked, our defense sucked, and our offense, eh, it wasn't that bad. Hopefully they'll use this as a learing experience and strike on Saturday. I'm not in the mood to rant and rage and complain and bash Ottawa (although there were at least 3 missed calls against them). We sucked, the end. Just pray that not only do we not suck Saturday, but that Patty's back. Peace, and go feed your fish.

Elias Out Tonight

2007-04-26T12:17:00.000-04:00

Update: Marshall (apparently) did not get called up, so the lines are (supposedly):
Rass/Clarkson-Gomer-Gio
Parise-Zajac-Langenbrunner (who I've officially renamed the "hot line")
Pando-Mad Dog-Sarge
Clarkson/Rass-Dowd-Rupp
Yep, Janssen will miss yet another game. Useless or not, I miss the man.
And on D we'll (most likely) have (if White plays):
Whitey-Raffy
Martin-Matty
Greene-Lukowich
In short,

It's true. Captain Patty will miss the game tonight due to (they say) the flu. So there's a very good chance either Grant Marshall (who doesn't have to pass through waiver, apparently, since Lowell's season is over) or David Clarkson will fill in for him. So bad news, good news..now, it's more bad news. Erik Rasmussen was practicing with Gomer and Gio (yesterday?), so that line will most likely be together tonight. Unfortunately, I can't think of anymore good news, aside from the fact that White is most likely playing, and Oduya looks like the odd man out. I still liked Sarge on the first line and Rass on the third line better, but I'm not Lou, so it's not my choice. I wish I was Lou, though. He's awesome. Huh. I guess that's it. Till tonight, my friends.

Rant on

2007-04-25T23:52:00.000-04:00

I think I set a new record. 4 posts in 1 day. Huh. Anyway, my current (anger? problem?): covering the puck. Now, it's very necessary at times, like when you have 4 players from the opposing team waiting for the rebound, but not all the time, like when there are no players within 50 feet of you. I noticed few goalies that actually keep the puck in play as often as possible (Brodeur, Lundqvist (I'm in shock too), Miller, and even Clemmensen, to name a few). The way I see it in my very twisted mind, constantly covering the puck as pretty much a way to win a game is just as bad as dirty play. If you can't win playing normal (clean) hockey, just don't play. At first, I just saw younger, rookie goalies or ones that don't play much doing it, but then I realized that Holmqvist, a kid who was playing in his first playoff series (and now that that's over, I can say he played really, really well), didn't do it half as much as some of the older, more experienced ones. And Clemmer doesn't do it too often eiter, and he only played in 6 games this season.

Why did I suddenly start this? Well, this isn't something new that bothers me. In that game we were shut out by the Pens (I'm still trying to forget about that), Thaibult (sp?) seemed to go out of his way to cover the puck, which prevented us from scoring. That's good for the other team and all, but did he see Marty doing that? No, he didn't. Marty can win without covering the puck unless it's really necessary, so I don't see why all these other goalies can't take the hint from him. *Rant off*

Just another thought: Marty doesn't have the greatest save percentage, or the lowest goals against average. Yes, I know. Thank you, Captain Obvious. Not my point. How bad can our offense be if Marty's SP is 11th out of 19 (in the playoffs) and his GAA is 10th (again, in the playoffs)? We did step it up a little in the 1st round (and hopefully that will be carried over into the 2nd round), but if we can beat a high-scoring team like Tampa, how bad can it be? If you look at the number of goals the Devils, the 2nd lowest scoring team in the regular season, had (19) and compare it to the 14 from the Lightning, who generally don't play a low scoring game, it says something. If you don't look at the shot percentage we have, it really does speak about how much of a difference was made since Lou came in. Yeah, we still play defensive hockey, but our offense is getting pretty hot. If they can keep that up, and Marty doesn't lose his Martyness, as he did in games 2, 3 and (the regulation part of) 4, we can totally win this series, and the cup.

Marshall called up.

2007-04-25T22:50:00.000-04:00

It's true. Grant Marshall got the call, and is now on waivers. They're one series behind though..Should have called him up against Tampa. Oh, well. So, since Elias apparently has the flu (and with the Devils, who knows what that really could mean), we might be seeing him or Clarkson tomorrow. As much as I want Clarkson to play, I hope Patty feels good enough to play tomorrow. Uhh..I think I had something else to say too..Huh. Whatever.

Update numero two..o: The Mighty Ducks have increased their lead to 3 goals, thanks to a goal from Ryan Getzlaf at 9:05 (assists: Dustin Penner and Perrey). So..that's it.
Just KIDDING!! Goal numero 3 for Andy McDonald. Yep, a hat trick for him. I bet he's excited. So 5-1 Ducks. I think it's safe to say they won it. As they clean the hats and such off the ice, I'm waiting to hear who got the assists..And they are Kent Huskins and Getzlaf. How ironic would it be if the Canucks scored again? That'd be madd crazy. But with 5 seconds left, that's probably not happening. So, peace till tomorrow. After, or maybe even during the Devils/Senators game. Who knows. I don't.

Side note: Neidermayer is still pretty awesome, and the Ducks' back up's playoff beard is pretty awesome. And the announcers just basically called a certain Mr. Parise awesome. I know, I say awesome too much.

Ducks vs canucks update: No scoring in the 2nd, but quite a few penalties. There was almost a goal. Actually, there were almost a lot of goals. But one goal was reviewed, and ruled as no goal. The assists on McDonald's first goal were changed from Progner and Perrey to Kunitz and Progner.

It just occurred to me how off topic this is. Whatever. I have to vent, so expect a rant to be coming soon.

Ducks are leading the Canucks 3-1 after the first. The Canucks got on the board first, with an unassisted goal at 7:07 from Jeff Cowan, due to a..lack of clearing from ex-Devil Scott Neidermayer. No worries. 2:17 later, Andy McDonald tied it up with a PPG from Chris Progner and Corey Perry. The Ducks then went on to take the lead at 14:56, when Teemu Selanne took the puck from McDonald, who got it from Chris Kunitz (it was bad, but I found a way to reword it). McDonald struck again 4:15 later, this time from Selanne and Kunitz. So now it's 3-1 going into the 2nd. I'll finish this when I feel like it, so it could be a while.

Sabres vs rangers: Game 1

2007-04-25T20:42:00.000-04:00

Final Score: 5-2, Sabres. Since the 3rd began, marcel hossa got the rags on the board and made it 3-1. 3:03 later, the Sabres regained their 3 goal lead when Jason Pominville got his 3rd goal of the playoffs from Jochen Hecht and Daniel Briere. Ex-Devil brendan shanahan gave them hope again at 19:12, and they pulled ol' lundo, for some reason thinking that they could score twice on the Sabres in :48. Drew Stafford showed them how wrong they were 32 seconds later, with the empty netter. Dainius Zubrus and Toni Lydman picked up the assists.

I don't care if you called this biased or not, but what was jagr thinking, trying to defend against Stafford after he shot that puck at the empty net, about 3 feet away from it? Common sense would have said to block the shot, instead of going after the guy when the damage was already done.

[Previous Coverage]
As the second period comes to an end , the Sabres are leading 3-0, thanks to Thomas Vanek's PPG from Dmitri Kalinin and Derek Roy at 14:19, and Ales Kotalik's full strenght goal from Adam Mair 2 minutes later. Vanek netted the third goal also, at 18:24 from Henrik Tallinder and Teppo Numminen. Yeah, I'm working on new ways to word that, because it's even starting to bore me. Anyway (yep, that's over used too), more to come. After the game.

^I told you this wouldn't be biased. I didn't write about how much I hate the rags or how much they suck. And this is a side note, so it doesn't count as part of the recap. That is, let me pretend it doesn't.

Oh, and there was a reason I didn't just do this all at the end. I felt the need to comment on the fact that ever since (I believe it was) Dan McGillis got called for "closing his hand on the puck," I've been seeing people get called for that so often, it's driving me crazy. Maybe it's because I really didn't pay too much attention to what every penalty was for up until recently, but I don't recall ever seeing anyone called for that until that one time. Now, like I said, I'm seeing players getting called for it more than not. It's almost as crazy as I am.

I can't believe it.

2007-04-25T18:32:00.000-04:00

Are my eyes decieving me, or is this article from a Canadian website actually (somewhat) pro Devils? I never thought I'd see the day. Not saying that all Canadians hate the Devils, but this is one site I would have never expected to see credit the Devils. And they flat out said the Devils are better then the Penguins. I don't know weather I'm more excited about that, or seeing the Sabres beat the rags at 7. And since I have nothing better to do, I'll be doing an (unbiased) recap of that game. Since I don't like either team (although I'm sure you all know which team I dislike more), it won't be (very) biased. But there will be a ton of avery-bashing and unnecessary comments about most of the other players *rags* too, just FYI. But if someone gives avery that nice whooping that he so deserves, they will be praised. A lot. Now, to anger everyone else and make then root against the rags (which I don't think would be too hard to do anyway), he's a quote from the NY Post, by avery:

"I'm going to hurt them, I'm going to hit them, I'm going to be in their face as much as I can."

Yes, that was on the NHL site, and in the paper. Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't threatening someone, oh, I don't know, illegal? Here's the rest of the article, if you care.

I never thought I'd hear (see) myself say this, but go Sabres. If anyone of them goes after avery, they'll get cookies.

Lowell's Inaugural Season Moments

2007-04-24T22:41:00.000-04:00

So now that Lowell's season is over, they're doing an "inaugural season moments" thing. Not sure how often they're gonna be adding new ones, but I'll keep you posted. The current moment is Andy Greene being in the Planet USA game, as the only player from Lowell. He came in second in the hardest shot competition (now I know why his goals always seem to come from 60 feet away from the net), and a bunch of other stuff. I really don't feel like summarizing it all, so read it yourself.

http://www.lowelldevilshockey.com/theteam/Inaugural/IMGreene0423.php

Rant off

2007-04-24T18:57:00.000-04:00

Now that I'm cooled down from last night (their win celebration made me sick), I have bad news. Nicklas Bergfors (Lowell) might play in Sweenen next season. Not that bad, since we still like, own him, but I love him. He's awesome. Anyway, luongo, I apologize for that last post (he does read this, you know), but Marty is still better. Yes, I should look into anger management classes. Or yoga. Which ever's cheaper.

No, I didn't delete that one because of an excessive amount of hate mail, but it was being a moron, so yeah.

ROUND 2 SCHEDULE:
Thursday, April 26 7:00 p.m. Ottawa at New Jersey
Saturday, April 28 8:00 p.m. Ottawa at New Jersey (on Versus)
Monday, April 30 7:00 p.m. New Jersey at Ottawa (on Versus)
Wednesday, May 2 7:00 p.m. New Jersey at Ottawa (on Versus)
* Saturday, May 5 8:00 p.m. Ottawa at New Jersey (on Versus)
* Monday, May 7 7:00 p.m. New Jersey at Ottawa (on Versus)
* Wednesday, May 9 7:00 p.m. Ottawa at New Jersey

* means if necessary, to those of you who are math challenged like me. And only games 3 and 4 are exclusively on Versus, thankfully.

Matchups:
Eastern Confrence:
Devils vs Senators (to those of you who live under a rock) (I say Devils in 7)
Sabres vs rags (Sabres in 5)

Western Confrence:
Ducks vs Canucks (haha that rhymes!!) (Ducks in 6)
Red Wings vs Sharks (Sharks in 6)

If any of those are right, I want a prize. If you have any predictions you wanna share, email me or leave them as a comment. I'll post them. If you want me to.

You decide.

2007-04-23T14:31:00.000-04:00

It was pointed out that at (about) 13:44 of the 3rd period yesterday, Zach scored right before we went on the PP and the refs somehow missed it. It's not too clear in the video, but you can see he did score.

http://vids.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=vids.individual&videoid=2024399550

http://vids.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=vids.individual&videoid=2024407670

And, in other news, the forwards, again, had 13 blocked shots along with Marty's 32 saves. Nothing from the post this time, though.

Aaaaannnnnndddddd the dates for the first two games of round 2 have been decided:
Thursday (home), Start time: 7 or 7:30, Channel(s): TBA
Saturday (home), Start time: 8, Channel(s): TBA
And the rest is TBA as well. And you know the deal. Games 1,2,5*, and 7* are at home, and games 3,4, and 6* are at Ottawa..So yeah..That's it..Till Thursday.

Ottawa, here we come.

2007-04-22T16:05:00.000-04:00

Thanks to 2 goals from Gio, 1 from Rafalski, and 32 saves from Marty, the Devils took a 3-2 win in Tampa and are moving on to play the Senators in round 2.

Brian Gionta opened the scoring 14:29 in the 1st with a power play goal from Patrik Elias and Brian Rafalski. There were 9 penalties called in that period, 5 of which were on us, with 1 4 on 4 and a 4 on 3 for us and the bolts.

Rafalski got his 2nd point of the game with a PPG of his own 1:21 into the 2nd. Elias and Gomer picked up the assists. 3:49 later, the lightning struck with a PPG of their own, with Gomez in the box, serving a too many men on the ice penalty. We regained the 2 goal lead :39 later, when Gionta netted his 2nd goal, with Elias getting his 3rd assist, and Gomez his 2nd. So yeah, it was all the EGG line and Rafalski, pretty much. Almost 5 minutes later, though, the lead was again cut in half, when Zach was sent to the box for tripping a player that was no where near him. And I'm not gonna even mention lecavalier taking out Rafalski and Lukowich at exactly the same time Zach was called. What ever. And while I'm on the topic of dumb penalties, what about that 4 on 4 that came when Travis Zajac and a bolt were sent to the box, Travis for diving, and the bolt for tripping Travis. First of all, Travis was on a break away. Why would he dive and screw that up? And if he was getting called for diving, why was the bolt called for tripping him? Again, what ever.

Marty had a classic Marty performance, with 32 saves on 34 shots. So..yeah, that's it. But I have to wonder, how, when tampa's net was empty, and we had 3 players around it, we didn't score. Who cares, though? We won, and we're going on to round 2. All is right with the world.

3 STARS:
#3- Marty
#2- Patrik
#1- Gio

Well..Janssen, Clarkson and White were all at the arena, but none of them played. Stupid lecavalier took out Matvichuk in the 1st, and thankfully got sent to the box, but so did Johnny Madden and st louis for unsportsman-like conduct. I have to say, it was nice seeing tampa's top penalty killers in the box at the same time. So, I guess that's it, until after game 1 of round 2..

Wowzers.

2007-04-21T00:42:00.000-04:00

On top of tampa's 31 shots that Marty stopped, the forwards (not just the D) had abotu 20 blocked shots. And let's not forget the goal posts' amazing performance.

And, BTW, Marty was listed as 1st star of the night on the nhl site, and there's something about the win in the news thing. And it's bigger then the 50% off ground shipping. So it must be pretty darn big. But the goal post wasn't mentioned at all. Except for the recap on the Devils site.

It was nice to see the Devils being our shot, and holmqvist being out saved. By a lot.

4/20: Game 5

2007-04-20T20:05:00.000-04:00

[8:07] Game time!! Well, I'm a little late, but get over it. About 5 minutes gone in the 2nd, and it's 1-0 Devils with Andy Greene's first playoff goal (congrats, Andy!!) at 12:46 from Mike Rupp and Scott Gomez. Let's see..there's the million awesome saves by Brodeur, a nice block from Richard Matvichuk that would have resulted in a goal had he not been there. A nice hit by Rasmussen right now, and 2 usuless PPs for the Devils. Not to mention that short handed breakaway by Johnny Madden that almost resulted in a goal. A little higher and he could have had it. Oh well. We still killed it off. But this has been a rather exciting game so far. 14 saves from Marty to homqvist's 5. I'm liking this game so far, except for the lack of ice time Zach's getting. And all those playoff beard are just plain awesome. I'll be back when something *good* happens.

[8:17] After Jamie needs to get a new stick during a faceoff and ticks the refs off, just a little, tampa gets a shot in which Marty covers, and Travis starts some crap with a bolt. I love hockey. But I don't like the lack of the Zach attack.
Aaannndddd a deflection off holmquist and THEY SCORE!! Brian Gionta!! From Gomez and Rafakski at 9:59 of the 2nd!! 2-0 Devils. Zach next?

[8:32] Nice crap call on Martin, refs. Now, is it just me, or do their PPs seem to last longer? At least our PK isn't bad. And thank you, refs, for evening it up, and missing that call on Matty. 4 on 4 for 26 seconds, then a PP for 1:34. Let's go guys!! And I can't say this enough: I WANT ZACH!! Come on, Lou.

[9:41] Whoo!! 31 save shutout for Brodeur. Or more like 25 if you count all those saves the goal post had. Either way, good game. Gomer sealed the win at 18:13 with an empty netter from Captain Elias.

9 penalties were called from 18:27 till the end, so I don't know how that played out. We were on the PP for like a minute at the end, though. We killed off 3 penalties, and couldn't score on any of our 4 PPs. So yeah..White missed the game, and Clarkson was called up, but didn't play. Hopefully both will play on Sunday. BTW, the game's on NBC at 1 on Sunday, incase you didn't hear.

3 STARS (from yahoo):
#3- Gio
#2- Greene
#1- Marty

I would have said:
#3- Andy/Gomer (they would both be a good choice, right?)
#2- Marty
#1- The goal post, who I shall nick name the awesome one.

With that, I'll be back Sunday. Unless something big happens, like someone, like, I don't know.

Scratch that.

2007-04-19T13:52:00.000-04:00

I lied about my 3 stars. And that occurred to me when I looked on yahoo and the 3 stars were listed as follows:
#3- holmqvist
#2- st loius
#1- Gomer

Yeah, Gomer had the game winner. Yeah, homo, er, homer, had 33 saves or whatever, but come on. Marty deserves something for his improved game. And what about Zach and Travis? Not only did the Zach attack have 2 goals in that games, and now leads the NHL in playoff goals (so far), but Travis had the assists on both of them, and, combined, they had 6 points in the last 2 games. If you ask me, that's better then 1 goal, or a goal and an assist. And since when does losing a game make you star worthy? I can see Gomer getting the #2 or #3 star, but Zach definitely deserved to be #1, and I don't see why Travis wasn't #3. And people wonder why I hate the NHL.

Here we go.

2007-04-18T19:09:00.000-04:00

K, so I'm bored. So I'm gonna be here through the whooole game. Except for if I have to pee. Or if when I make my brownines.

Blah blah blah game four just a few moments away blah blah blah. Take it away, Doc-ie boy.

[edit] I rarely start with a rant, but why did they use the Madden line as the starting line? That was kind of dumb. No offense, Madden. And nice hit on lecavs, Matty. And on the lame Marty. Matty, will you marry me? He's like amazing right now *knocks on wood.*

[edit]Thank you Raffy!! A power play. Let's have that work in our favor this time, mmk? And I don't care who has the puck blah blah. I wanna here 'He scores!! !! 1-0 Devils!!' Don't you?

[edit]GIO!! I LOVE you!! If my sister didn't call him, I'd totally say he could be one of my many future husbands. 1-0, Devils, Brian Gionta from Johnny Oduya and Brian Rafalski. Not a PPG, cuz it was over, but the guy still wasn't in the play blah blah..I don't care what it was, as long as we're winning.

[edit] erik perrin, I hope you die. And your obnoxious fans shoudl go die too. BEcause honestly, they're worse then rags and pens fan combined. But on the bright side, the Devils are still awesomer and Matty's like awesome. And what's with Zach right now? Aim, sweetie, aim!!

[edit] Thank you, Zach!! I think he heard me. They must be reading this on the bench. Totally. Anyway, Zach's 5th playoff goal, from Paul Martin and TRAVIS ZAJAC. So that's Travis's 2nd assist/point. That's exciting. And Marty's kind of awesome. Just incase you doubted that.

[edit] 3-1 GO ZACH!! 2nd goal of the game for Mr. Parise, from Andy Greene and Travis Zajac. And I love Marty and whoever just hit lecavs with the puck. I really like this game.

[edit] EWWW. 3-2. At least we're winning. Although I'd like to be winning by more. Either way, I hate tampa.

[edit] 3-3 in the 3rd. Too many 3's for my liking. So let's score Devils *Zach* and I'll be happy. And Jamie's like asleep on the bench.
I WANNA WIN!!

[edit] Here guys:

Can you do that?

[edit] :43 into OT, and Martin's in the box for delay of game. Uh oh. Kill it off guys!!

[edit] NIce PK, guys. Now, uhm, how bout a nice goal to go alone with that?

[edit] I take back everything I ever said about Gomer. 4-3 OT win for us, and we come back home tied 2-2. WHOO! Yeah, that goal was unassisted.

Aannnddd the 3 stars:
#3- Brodeur
#2- Gionta
#1- ZACH PARISE!!

I liked this game.

This one's for the team.

2007-04-18T13:20:00.000-04:00

Here's the deal: Either the guys step it up tonight, or we're screwed.

That doesn't just go for Marty, and Gomer, and Oduya. That goes for the whole team. Through the whole series so far, Zach and Andy seem to be the only ones actually playing. Except for the first game, everyone else has been lame. The EGG line played great in game 1. I'd like to see that again. Our defense, with the exception of Greene, is slacking. I don't expect them to score (although it would be nice), but at least get the puck out of the zone or to someone who can do something with it *cough*Zach*cough.* And I'm sure no one's happy with Marty's performance. Yeah, the D could be helping him out a little more, but when a team that really only has 3 good players and a goalie who's playing in his 1st playoff series can beat you, you know soemthing's up.

Now, back to the offense. Our checking line needs to, I don't know, CHECK some more? Seriously guys! Ok, they can shut down lecavs and the lame marty, but that's not gonna do too much when they can't get the puck out of our zone, or really score. There's no way we can shut them down completely, so give them a little less ice time and put the 1st and 2nd lines on more. Regardless of who's on the ice from tampa, they can keep the puck out of their zone and score with it. I'd rather have them win like 6-5 or something then lose 3-2. I don't know what they're thinking, but being able to keep tampa down to 3 goals a game isn't too good when we can only score 3 because of the lack of ice time our offensive offense is getting.

With that, I'm off to make brownies. And hopefully next time I post, I won't be whining about a loss or ranting about how horribly we're playing.

WONDERFUL.

2007-04-16T23:01:00.000-04:00

So we lost, 3-2, again. And BTW, this is gonna be really short, since I'm not even supposed to be on my computer right now.

1-0 bolts till John Madden scored from Sergei Brylin and Brad Lukowich at 17:27. The bolts took the lead again at 1:09 of the 3rd, but Zach Parise 3:37 later, with his 4th playoff goal of the season from Travis Zajac and Jamie Langenbrunner. Then tampa took the lead again, and we lost, despite out shooting them 32-24. I can't say too much on their playing, since I only watched about a total of 5 minutes of the game because my parents suck. So yeah..The bolts are leading the series 2-1. But I said Devils in 6 anyway, and after these last 2 games, they better start to step it up.
So yeah. See ya Wednesday.

Thanks a lot, doyle.

2007-04-15T18:30:00.000-04:00

As if pretty much being the main reason the Devils didn't make the playoffs wasn't enough, frank doyle caused the Devils to lose their final game this season.

Doyle surrendered 2 PPGs :45 apart in the 2nd, but David Clarkson (20th from Rod Pelley and Ryan Murphy) and Rod Pelley (17th from Olli Malmivaara and Clarkson) forced the game into OT. Then they lost. Yeah, doyle had 39 saves and everything, but seriously. And the refs were makign crap calls too. Mark Fraser got pulled down in the 3rd and there wasn't even a whistle on the play, and Pelley was knocked down right before the sharks scored the game winner. So it was all Doyle's fault. So no more Lowell till October. That makes me really sad. I think I'm gonna go cry now.

3 STARS (just mine again cuz I don't like the ones they picked):
#3- Ryan Murphy
#2- David Clarkson
#1- Rod Pelley

Like I said, no more Lowell Devils till October. So to end their season, a big SCREW YOU goes to frank doyle. I dont' care how well he played last season, he sucked this season.

Not a good hockey night.

2007-04-14T22:57:00.000-04:00

Before I start ranting about the Devils game, let me complain about Lowell's wretched game. First of all, what made them think that JP could play like he did last night 2 nights in a row? Yeah, he's amazing, but he played so hard yesterday, common sense would have told them to give the guy a break. Of course, 29 saves is a lot, but come on. Anyone could have told them that this would have been the one time Doyle should have played. But, they're out of the playoffs, and that sucks for them. As mad as I am, I have to say they deserved it. They made some horrible mistakes (mainly the coaches and who they played and scratched) in the past few games and that costed them a couple wins they could have used. Anyway, Chris Minard scored his 32nd of the season from Ryan Murphy and Tuomas Pihlman, and Rod Pelley got his 16th from David Clarkson and Mike Pandolfo. 5-2 Pirates. In Jordan's defense, their 5th goal was an empty netter.

Now for the big guys. Tonights game was probably some of the worst hockey they've played recently. Yeah, 36 shots is a lot, but if you can only score 2 goals on that, it means nothing. All of their shots were crappy, as were their passes. None of them seemed to have their heart in the game tonight, with the exception of the PZL line. Actually, no. I hate to say it, but Travis wasn't playing his best tonight either. It was all Zach, Jamie, and about 1/2 of the defense. Even the EGG line was lame. They were just plain horrible. And Marty was pretty bad too. What makes him go behind the net to play the puck when there are 2 or 3 bolts, lurking to get the puck and score on him? Seriously. I don't know what happened, but I didn't like this game at all.

GOALS:
Zach Parise (PPG) from Rafalski and Langenbrunner
Jamie Langenbrunner (PPG) from Brian Gionta and Patrik Elias

3 STARS (Just mine, because the "actual" ones were the crappiest chioces ever):
#3-Gionta
#2- Parise
#1- Langenbrunner

If they keep this crappy playing up, they might as well not even bother. So they should either call up Clarkson or play Janssen and all will be right with the world.

Lowell keeps playoff hopes alive

2007-04-13T21:23:00.000-04:00

So Lowell won their game tonight 2-0, and guess who was in the net? Yes, it was the rather attractive, and rather awesome Jordan Parise, getting his 2nd shutout of his rookie season. He's amazing. I know.

So the game was scoreless until 10:12 (which happens to be my birthday), when Chris Minard scored his team-leading 31st goal of the season from Grant Marshall and Toumas Pihlman. Aside from that goal and 10 saves from JP, the 2nd period wasn't a very good one. They were short handed for a total of 6 minutes. Not really much, unless you take into account that about 4 minutes of that was 5-3. And except for when David Clarkson was in the box in the 1st, we weren't short handed besides that.

2:12 into the 3rd, Clarkson scored his 19th of the season Petr Vrana and Olli Malmivaara. So..that's really it I guess. The Devils had 37 shots to Partland's 21. So the Pirates' goalie played well too, but JP's better. Neither team had any PPGs, with the Devils going 0/6 and the Pirates 0/4. Now, this has nothing to do with anything, but Stephen Gionta got smashed into the boards with 4:50 remaining, and had a little trouble getting off the ice. But hopefully he's ok.

3 STARS:
#3- Clarkson
#2- Minard
#1- Parise

Till tomorrow, my friends.

The impossible has happened.

2007-04-12T22:21:00.000-04:00

The Devils, the ones from New Jersey, the most awesomest hockey team ever has done what has seldom been done by them before- they scored more than 3 goals in a game. I kid you not. Not OT, no SO (which couldn't have happened anyway..), just a 5-3 win over the high-scoring Tampa Bay Lighening.

Zach Parise, who I officially declared a hockey God, along with Marty Brodeur (more on that in a bit) opened the scoring at 7:43. Patrik Elias followed suit with a power play goal at 12:31. 3:24 later, St Louis scored a PPG, with Travis Zajac and Johnny Oduya in the box (that was trip #2 to the sin bin for Johnny). The Devils held the Lightning to just 6 shots in the 1st, to their 10.

The Devils struck again in the 2nd, with another PPG from Brian Rafalski at 3:36. That goal was kind of confusing, with Rafalski first given credit, only to have it changed to Elias, to change it back to Elias. Vinnie Lecavalier scored 8:10 later, but the Bolts failed to tie it up in that period. Each team had 7 shots that period.

2:51 into the final period, Lecav tied it up, but Parise gave the Devils the lead yet again 1:03 later. Brian Gionta also scored in that period, making the final score 5-3, Devils.

The Devils were 2/3 on the PP, while Tampa was 1/6. The bolts held the edge on shots, with 26 to the Devils' 24. Brodeur had 24 saves on the night, most of which were, like, amazing. He could have easily let 3 or 4 more goals in than he did, at least, but Marty's Marty, so that didn't happen.

ASSISTS:
Parise (#1)- Unassisted
Elias- Scott gomez, Rafalski
Rafalski- gomez, Jamie Langenbrunner
Parise (#2)- Langenbrunner
Gionta- gomez, Elias

3 STARS (the "real" ones):
#3- Rafalski
#2- Lecav
#1- Parise

See, I would have had it more like:
#3- Langs
#2- Marty
#1- Zach the Hockey God

Until Saturday, my friends. Unless of course Lowell wins tomorrow, or loses as horribly as they did last night.

LMAO@THEBOLT!! Ok, maybe not LMAO, but at least LOL.

I lied again.

2007-04-11T22:28:00.000-04:00

Well, I said I would only do a recap of the Lowell game if they won, and they didn't, but it was just such a horrible game, I couldn't help myself.

Where to begin..That wretched attempt at goaltending by Doyle, of the lack of offense that seems to be contagious with the Devils..I think I'll start with the lack of scoring, just so you can stop reading once I start bashing Doyle.

So, the little Devils had 2 amazing scoring chances in the 1st, but only scored one goal, Chris Minard's team-leading 30th goal of the season, from Mark Fraser and Alexz Brooks at 9:28. Grant Marshall and David Clarkson missed on golden opportunities, and the 1st ended 1-0. Lowell. And then it went down hill. The Sharks scored twice in about a minute and a half (1:14, 2:53) and again at 11:35. They scored 3 more times in the 3rd, and after the 1st, I shut it off. But they scored 3 times in a ten minute span to expand the lead to 6-1. But at least they had the sense to not pull Doyle, of that would have ended worse then the St Patty's day game.

Now you can stop reading (especially if you're a fan of Doyle). I just need to rant.
I really can't stand him. He's not very good, especially compared to JP. Yeah, even if JP was worse, I would probably still like him better, because he's Zach's brother, but still. Go compare Jordan's stats to Doyle's, and look to see which teams who played against. Parise's played18 less games, and most of the teams he's played were better then most of the ones Doyle's played, and he only has 4 less wins. Yeah, his GAA isn't as good, but that's it. He won a higher percentage of games then Doyle, and, like I said, had played better teams, and he's a rookie. And keep in mind that their save % is nearly the same, due to Doyle's wonderful performance tonight (6 goals against on 27 shots). If they really want to get into the playoffs so badly, I strongly suggest they start JP in at least 2 of their last 3 games. That's all.

Playoff schedule

2007-04-09T15:11:00.000-04:00

For those of you who didn't see it yet..

Thursday, April 12 7:30 p.m. Tampa Bay at New Jersey RDS
Saturday, April 14 7:00 p.m. Tampa Bay at New Jersey CBC, RDS
Monday, April 16 7:00 p.m. New Jersey at Tampa Bay CBC, RDS
Wednesday, April 18 7:00 p.m. New Jersey at Tampa Bay CBC, RDS
* Friday, April 20 7:00 p.m. Tampa Bay at New Jersey CBC, RDS
* Sunday, April 22 TBD New Jersey at Tampa Bay CBC, RDS
* Tuesday, April 24 TBD Tampa Bay at New Jersey CBC, RDS
and to those of you who can't do math like me, * means if necessary.

With that, I'm leaving you till after the 1st playoff game Thursday. Unless I hear something I think you might need/want to know, or if Lowell wins on Wednesday. Yes, I only do recaps if they win.

yeah, I know, it sucks. It looks better bigger, but this thing doesn't like me and I have very limited computer skills.

I'm sorry.

2007-04-08T18:49:00.000-04:00

I didn't mean to leave you all. But I got distracted. Anyway, the cracklanders (yes, they went from crap to crack) scored again in the 3rd, but Johnny Madden scored 15:47 into the 3rd, then tied it 19:59. So to the shootout..Zach Parise scored and tied it at 1 after the first go around. Brian Gionta couldn't put it in, and after the 2nd, it was 2-1, not in our favor. Clemmy made a save on the last shot, but Louie Lams put Brylin in, instead of a better choice, and he couldn't put it in either. Clemmer finished with 24 shots, 25 if you count the one SO save he had. If you ask me, he played well. Even Steve said he had no shot on stopping the 1st goal.

ASSISTS:
Pandolfo, Brylin (Madden #1)
Langenbrunner, Elias (Madden #2)

3 STARS:
3- the cracker's goalie
2- the cracker who got their 2 goals
1- the Mad Dog

That's LAME. It should have gone:
3- Parise
2- Clemmer
1- Madden

So the Devils 1st playoff game will be on Thursday..I don't know the start time yet, but I'll tell you when I find out.

baseball sucks.

2007-04-08T16:23:00.000-04:00

Just thought I'd share that with you. As for the Devils, it's 1-0 crappers, end of the 1st. Don't blame it on Clemmy. And don't give the crappers credit. Any idiot can score if they're right in front of the net and they have like 50 shots. But the Devils did have an awesome period. I mean, 3 whole shots, can't beat that. If they don't win, I'm sorry, but they don't deserve the cup. Any team that can't beat the crappers just sucks. End of story. And yes, I'll be doing my coverage during the game.

[edit] Come on guys, listen to Chico. Pick up the pace. We need to win. Why? Because I said so, mmk? Stop making that crap goalie look good. Big freaking whoop, he beat the phailures, who, by the way, somehow managed to beat the 1st place sabres. Go figure. Anyway, COME ON GUYS!! If the phailures can beat the sabres, why can you guys not beat the crappers? They're horrible!! If not for me, do it for Clemmy, and the rest of the team. And ofr Continental. You guys can't lose your last regular season game there. It's illegal.

[edit] Wow, 5 whole shots in the game for the Devils. Make that 6. COME ON ZACH!! Where's that fire?? Make your daddy (and my proud). Trust me, you don't want to lose this one. 'Cause that'll make me hunt you down, and you do NOT want that to happen.

[edit] So someone hits Gionta and knocks him into the goalie, and what happens? Gio ends up in the box. Nice, guys. I bet you anything the refs are Canadien. This game sucks. I think they have something against playing on holidays. We can't forget the 'Saint Patty's Day Massacre,' unfortunately.

[edit] How many freaking PPs are we gonna give those terds?? Seriously guys. You need to step it up. I know, you're getting sick of hearing, er, reading that, but seriously. And Clemmensen is awesome, just incase you doubted that. He's been amazing today. And I would really like to see a goal or 6 from the Devils. PPG, SHG, or even a freaking full strength goal, JUST SCORE!!

[edit] At least our PK is strong..Too bad I can't really say the same about out offense. Come on. I'm not looking forward to a loss on one of my least favorite holidays. Alas, Matvichuk is playing rather well, as is Clemmy.

Matvichuk back..vichuk?

2007-04-08T13:28:00.000-04:00

So D Richard Matvichuk was activated for the game today, but it did cost the Devils 2 of my personal favorites. Cam Janssen and Andy Greene were both sent down to Lowell to make room for the big guy. On the bright side, chances are both will be back for the play offs. And I have no clue if Gionta is playing or not. I heard that he is, but you can never be too sure.

Janssen in the playoffs?

2007-04-08T09:40:00.000-04:00

Let me answer that for you with a quick YES. How could anyone even think of playing without Janssen? Yes, if he's a scratch David Clarkson would get his spot, but come on. How many people were so upset when Janssen was hurt or suspended, because we didn't have him? Yes, he's not a big scorer, and yes we're not playing the rags so we don't need him to kick avery's large, ugly rear end, but we still need him to intimidate the Lightening and what not. And as much as I love Vinnie Lecavalier, I think it would be kinda funny to see CamJan beat the crap out of him (it could happen). And even if Clarkson is called up, where would he go? He's too good to be stuck on the 3rd or 4th line, but there's no way they're gonna put someone from the 1st or 2nd line on the 3rd or 4th line to make room for him. Plus, Janssen does have some playoff experience. Yes, the 3 or 4 minutes of ice time a game and the million PIMs he racked up last season don't exactly qualify as "experience," but it's more then Clarkson has, and he knows what happens. Maybe next season Clarkson will be in the playoffs with us, and, just as likely, on the roster, but for this season, I think we're sticking with Janssen.

It's official.

2007-04-07T22:12:00.000-04:00

Since Tampa lost in a shoot out to the Thrashers, who I never thought I would find myself cheering for, we are definitly playing the Bolts in the playoffs. But, on the down side, the Habs couldn't beat the laughs, and now there is a chance the craplanders will be in the playoffs. It's a very slim chance, since they're playing the Devils tomorrow, but there is a very small chance that it may happen. And then I'll find sidney crosby attractive.

And I have more good news! Lowell won their game 4-3 in OT, to keep them just 3 points out of 4th, with 4 games remaining. Rod Pelley scored his 15th of the season at 14:13 from Ryan Murphy and Mark Fraser, as you would already know if you read my previous post. The bruins tied it up at 4:07 of the 2nd, but we took the lead again at 12:02 with an unassisted goal form Stephen Gionta, his 7th of the season. 1:40 later, the bruins tied it up yet again, and the second ended with a score of 2-2. Barry Tallackson scored his 10th of the year at 13:47 of the 3rd from mike mottau and Tomas Harrant, but the bruins answered back :13 later, and that was that- until OT. Dan McGillis scored his 3rd game winner in OT (10th of the season, 10th PPG) from mottau and Chris Minard on the only shot in OT. I think the bruins' goalie was a little stronger then Doyle, with 38 saves on 42 shots, while doyle had 29 saves on 32 shots. Either way, I'm glad they won.

3 STARS:
3- rosa (prov)
2- McGillis
1- Pelley

Normally, I woudl have said mottau as #3 instead of rosa, but I can't stant mottau, and I actually think 1g, 1a is better then 2a.

So..the end. Till tomorrow.

I need to rant.

2007-04-07T19:10:00.000-04:00

Feel free to skip over this, but I need to rant, and I can't find either one of my cats, and my fish and the rest of my family don't care.

I'm so sick of Lowell's choices when it comes to who they play. I know a lot of you will disagree with most of this, but I'm entitled to my own opinion, as are you. Players like Nicklas Bergfors, Rod Pelley and even Chris Minard are completely underrated, while players like Barry Tallackson and Tuomas Pihlman are kind of overrated. And as I'm typing this, Pelley won a faceoff, and they Devils are on a 5 on 3. Anyway, it's kind of like Janssen. Maybe they would put up better numbers if they played a little more.

And then there's the increadibly overrated Mike Mottau on defense. Granted, I do hate him because of some nasty comments he made about Janssen, but he's still so overrated. Dan McGillis, yeah, he does get some credit, but I don't think he gets as much as he deserves. And the fact that they keep signing all these rookies and never play them gets to me too. Look at Zach Tarkir. They signed him, what, a month ago, and he's only played in 2 games. Don't sign them if they're not gonna play.

Now for my biggest rant. I'm so freaking sick of them acting like Frank Doyle is God. Yeah, sure, he does have more wins and a lower GAA than Jordan Parise, but maybe that wouldn't be the case if Jordan didn't play most of the 1st place teams, while Doyle was playing the last place teams. How is the rookie supposed to beat the better teams in the league, while doyle can barely win when he plays them? If you look at the stats, Jordan wins a higher percent of his games then Doyle, too. I hate to say it, but I'd rather have some of these players on other teams where at least their talent would be appreciated. And trust me, there are more players that I feel are over/underrated, but really don't feel like listing them all.

Now I hate to say this too, but I think I'd rather have the Devils lose tonight and fall farther out of the playoffs then have them prasing Doyle liek he's God.

And congrats to Rod Pelley who just scored his 15th of the season from 2 other rather underrated players, Ryan Murphy and Mark Fraser, and gave the Devils a 1-0 lead. And way to go, Clarkson, for not scoring on that break away. But it's ok, I still love you.

Playoff Thoughts

2007-04-06T23:36:00.000-04:00

Well, as the playoffs draw nearer, I've been thinking (surprise!) about who I would most like to see the Devils play in the first round (if you're one of the people who's already heard this a million times, bare with me). The Canadiens would definitly have been my first choice, but thanks to a nasty loss to the rags last night, that's not happening. So no big deal. The rags would be my second choice. I always enjoy a good laugh after seeing their unusually large, ugly rear ends handed to them by the Devils after a nice whooping. Now the only other possibility would be the Lightening, if they lose their next game (which happens to be their last), or if the rags, by some miracle, beat the pens tomorrow. That was totally my last choice. But then, the unthinkable happened. I actually thought about it, and realized that both of the games we lost to them in regualtion, John Madden missed. Actually, in one of the games he got wacked in the face with the puck, but he still didn't have as much ice time as usual, and his face was just gross. And he didn't exactly play his best, but who could, with a big gash under their eye and cotton stuffed up their nose. And the other loss we had to them came in a shoot out. So the way I see it, if Madden can not injure himself now till the end of the playoffs, the chances of us winning the cup are like, increadibly high. Of course, I'm not saying we can only depend on Madden, but he plays a big part in the games, no matter how little he scores. As long as we have him, Gionta, and Janssen (someone needs to rough the other teams up a little bit) in the line up through most/all of the playoffs, they might as well just start preparing the cup for us now, because it's as good as ours.

This picture is yummy.

Ahh, a win.

2007-04-05T22:07:00.000-04:00

Before I get all..whatever. Congrats to Marty on win nomero 48. He definitly deserved that win. 34 saves, most of which were absolutely amazing.

So the Phailures took the lead 1:05 into the 1st. That wasn't exactly what I had expected to happen. Fortunately, the Devils had Jamie Langenbrunner who was on a 15 game scoring drought fighting to break that, and he scored his 23rd of the season (12th PPG) and tied it up at 16:58. The Devils were on the PP 3 times that period, and were only short handed once.

Now, the 2nd and 3rd periods quite possibly showed some of the dirtiest hockey I've ever seen. One thing I really didn't like was that elbow on Travis Zajac, which should have been a minor, if not a double minor, since it was not only illegal, but he was hurt because of it. Then less then a minute later, Zach Parise barely touched a guy, and was sent to the box. Fortunately, the phailures didn't score on that, or I think I would have..I won't say, but trust me, you wouldn't have wanted to be near me.

In the 2nd, the phailures took the lead again at 9:27. Sergei Brylin tyed it up with another PPG (16g, 7PPG), and again, that was the end of the scoring. Devils were 1/3 on the PP again, while the phailures were 0/2. There was a 4 on 4 after Mike Rupp beat the crap out of some guy.

The 3rd wasn't as dirty, but it wasn't exactly clean. Devils were 0/1 on the PP, but Jimmy Dowd scored a SHG, his 1st SHG, and 4th g this season. That was the game winner. So..yeah.

ASSISTS:
Patrik Elias, Brian Rafalski (Langenbrunner)
Andy Greene, Zach Parise (Brylin)
Brylin (Dowd)

3 STARS:
3- Jamie Langenbrunner
2- upshall (philly)
1- Marty Brodeur

Again, screw upshall, Brylin deserved the 2nd star. If you ask me, 1g, 1a is better then 1a.

NOTES:
Brian Gionta and Cam Janssen both missed the game, but they both should be playing on Sunday, along with Rickard Matvichuk. All three made the trip to philly, but none played. Brodeur now holds the record for most wins in a regular season, which is obviously a career high for him. Brian Rafalski now has an 8 game point streak. I think that's it..

Now for those pics I promised yesterday..

Hold it.

2007-04-05T21:57:00.000-04:00

I lied. Again. You're not getting the recap till the Fighting Sioux game is over. Sorry.

But
MARTY BROKE THE PARENT RECORD!!

Devils win, and Brodeur ties record

2007-04-04T15:12:00.000-04:00

So, I lied. I said 3 today, and here it is, 3:15, and I'm just sitting down to write this. But oh well. You should just be glad I actually do this ('cause there totally aren't 5 million other sites that do recaps of Devils games and all that). But first, I heard something really funny today. Some kid thinks that craplanders will beat the Devils on Sunday. I actually started laughing..anyway..

So the game was scoreless until 10:15 when John Madden scored his 10th of the season, a tip in from Brian Rafalski. :21 later, before the crowd calmed down, the Senators tied it up, costing Brodeur a shutout and the Devils a regualtion win. So now I guess I don't need to say that it went to OT. But it did. And nothing happened in OT, so, of course, it lead to the dreaded shootout. That was a bit of a nail biter, since Brian Gionta was smacked in the foot with the puck in the 3rd. He got of the ice himself, but was taken out of the arena in a wheel chair. The x-rays on his foot came back negative, thank God. Hopefully the little man will be back tomorrow. And hopefully Janssen will join him.

Now, the shootout. One of my least favorite points of hockey. Zach Parise (sniff), Travis Zajac (sniff), and Patrik Elias (sniff, but no surprise) weren't sucessful, but, luckily, either were any of the Senators. The Sens scored on their next two shots, but fortunately, Jamie Langenbrunner (yayy) and Sergei Brylin (didn't see that coming). Brodeur stopped the next shot, and it was all up to Madden. If he didn't score, the Devils would most likely lose. So as I stood there, legs shaking, expecting the worst, the Mad Dog scored, and the Devils won, giving them a 3 point lead over the Penguimps, and giving Marty his 47th win of the season, which tied the all time wins record. And there's a 99.9999999999999999999999% chance he'll break that record in Philthadelphia tomorrow. That's exciting. (Marty had 22 saves in the game).

3 STARS:
3- emery (sens)
2- Brodeur
1- Madden
See, for number 3, I would have put Rafalski, for continuing his point streak, which is now up to 7 games. And with that, I give to you some notes..

Let's see..There's Rafalski's streak, Gio's injury..Parise's 6 game point streak was snapped. Cam Janssen and gomez both missed the game..Matvichuk didn't play, which leads me to think he'll play on Sunday..I think that's it..

Peace till tomorrow, when you'll get a recap (on time!!) and 2 awesome pics (one for last night and one for tomorrow).

New Jersey Devils Hockey

Preseason Recap

White and Janssen Injured

New Captain for 07-08 Season?

Dowd to Flyers Camp

Just some news

Keep on voting

Martin Finally Resigned

Vote Devils

Asham Signed

Parise Resigned

Assistant Coaches Announced

This was a good loss.

Marshall Resigned

New Coach?

It's out

See ya, Sheldon.

Souray?

Signings

Rupp Signed

He's in the Hall

10/14/06: Lowell Picks up First win

Happy summer!!

Double Dose

Talk About Under the Radar

*Excuse* me?

Crikey!

Czech it

Just a little

More Marty

New Stanley Cup Champs

Alright.

No Way!

Bergforce!!

I see coaching potential

Marty-riffic

Ahh..

Bitter much?

Priceless.

Six is good.

Czech It Out.

Happy Memorial Day!

Now I've heard it all.

Ahoy, Captain!

15 To Remember

The Worst Part of the Season

Here we go

It's Monday!

We Neid him!

Oh, the memories.

Poor Sabres.

Zajac, and moment number 4.

Brylin to play *with* Russia

The Beloved Back-up

Parise to Play in Russia

Momento Numero..Trois.

So long, Continental.

Things to improve upon.

Strange, isn't it?

Dude, that's harsh.

Here's an idea.

..Who..?

Do they get peanuts in the penalty box?

New links

Moment Number Two

The impossible has happened.

Game 2: Devils vs Senators

Talk about prepared.

Tsk, tsk, tsk.

I hate the Senators.

Elias Out Tonight

*Rant on*

Marshall called up.

Sabres vs rangers: Game 1

I can't believe it.

Lowell's Inaugural Season Moments

*Rant off*

You decide.

Ottawa, here we come.

Wowzers.

Excuse me?

Brylin to play with Russia

Rant on

Rant off