Pens 5, Lightning 1

They finally got back to their game! I just had a feeling that this would be a great game for Fleury...now for the key points:

1. Apparently the fans at Consol had a Fleury chant going before the national anthem. That's class right there. Meloche told him not to rely on the pokecheck...thank you for voicing the opinion of every Pens fan.
2. The defense looked much better, especially Michalek. Now he looks like how I expected him to. You couldn't really blame him much for the last couple of games since he was just coming back off an injury,
3. If I had to hear Steiggy and Errey say "1-3-1" one more time, I would have had to mute my television.
4. The Conner/Test Tube/Kennedy line looked pretty good. Keep Conner and trade Comrie. (I'm sorry to say it, since I had really high hopes for Comrie in the preseason, but he's just been terrible.)
5. The turnover problem wasn't glaring in this game, but it's still something they need to work on. When Martin almost turned the puck over to Stamkos, I nearly had a heart attack.
6. At some point, Steiggy and Errey were talking about how great the lighting is at the arena. From firsthand experience, I can tell you, it's like watching a game played on the sun. I've never seen that bright of lighting in an arena.
7. The Pens finally look like they might have some chemistry going. With so many new additions this year, the lack of chemistry at the beginning of the season comes as no surprise.
8. Max, Dupuis, and Adams all looked fantastic this game.
9. Goligoski seems to be back on his game after looking like shit for the past few outings. I hope he can keep it up.
10. Fleury was just a beast. I had a good feeling about him for this game, and even though it wasn't a shutout, it was close. He made the key saves at key times, and it helped that he had defensive support. Congrats on your 150th career win!
11. There were a lot of bad penalties taken in this game, but the penalty kill came up big. It could have been WAY worse considering how well the Lightning's power play has been this season.
12. The way he was playing all game, you knew Max was going to score.
13. Can Dupuis really be considered a secondary scorer anymore?
14. Congrats Engelland on your 1st NHL goal, which surprised the hell out of everyone watching this game.

What a huge win for the guys last night! Hopefully this will be a confidence booster, especially for Fleury. Now let's just hope that the consistency issue doesn't rear its ugly head.

In Avs news, they won 5-1 against the Jackets last night, and surprisingly no one got injured. Yay!

Bad news: I'm sick as hell.
Good news: I called off work, so now I get to see the game live tonight. Hooray for raking up a ridiculous amount of sick time!

Go Pens! Go Avs!

And I continue to suck at life...

No recap for the last Pens game, since I was lazy. But I did wear this yesterday:



So let's not think about how awful the game was (with the exception of the underrated Craig Adams of course), and focus instead on kicking Flyer arse.



I miss Stan. Anyway, I would LOVE to see Asham kick Carcillo's ass tonight, but seeing as how he's just coming back from an injury, I don't think it will happen. Maybe later this year. Now I'm going to go try to finish watching the Avs/Flames game I started watching last night. Have a good one kids, and GO PENS!

Avs 3, Canucks 4

This was a pretty entertaining one, as I figured it would be.

1. Bad news: Anderson injured his knee during warm-ups. Only someone from the Avs would get injured warming up. Hopefully he won't be out for too long.

2. Congrats John-Michael Liles! He now has the NHL record for consecutive games from the start of the season with an assist!

3. The Canucks were sporting some nice throwback jerseys last night:


No nameplates, keeping with tradition.

4. Mike and Peter (the Avs broadcasters) are normally pretty good, but they get all starry-eyed around the twins for some reason. Yeah, they're good, we get it.

5 Both goalies were very strong for the most part. Budaj did make one bad play, playing the puck instead of letting it be icing, which resulted in a Canucks goal.

6. Winnik continues to be an amazing addition to this team. He does it all, I swear. The Avs need all the defensive help they can get, and he's a very defensive forward, but has still managed to score 3 goals so far.

7. The Avs totally dominated the second and third periods of this game. They outshot the Canucks 16-8 in the second, and 15-5 in the third. They deserved the win, but sometimes that's just how the puck bounces.

8. Liles and Stastny both about gave me a heart attack in this game. Liles got smashed into the boards, and looked like he was favoring his shoulder. Thankfully he was O.K. and finished the game. Stastny took one hell of an elbow to the face, but he's fine too. The toughness of hockey players will never cease to amaze me, regardless of how long I've been watching the sport.

9. Nice bit of robbery by Budaj late in the third:




And that's all I've got. Pens face Tampa Bay tonight. Fleury is expected to start. Hopefully he can redeem himself with a nice save on Stamkos or something. I cringe every time Stamkos takes the ice against the Pens. He's a dangerous player, and they need to make sure he's covered. Asham will be back in the lineup tonight. No more Tangradi. :-( Oh well, Arron, show us what you can do! Go Pens!