Winter Classic - Sabres vs. Penguins

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Diabolical
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Re: Winter Classic - Sabres vs. Penguins

Post by Diabolical »

The bigger bitch is that I didn't know the game was on regular ass NBC. I thought it was on NBS Sports, which I don't get anymore.
I did see 3OT though. Not the ending I wanted, so I was kinda glad I missed the first 5 periods.
Based only on 3OT, Boston deserved to win.
Fucking Chicago.
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Re: Winter Classic - Sabres vs. Penguins

Post by Ran »

I'm pulling for Chicago only because I can't stand Boston. You Red Wings fans will soon learn to hate them as well.

Did I ever mention I was at the Caps-Islanders playoff game in 1987 that went into 4 OTs? Our seats were about 30 rows up behind one of the goals. It was surprisingly easy to get tickets to Caps games. Even playoffs. I think we went to one or two other playoff games also (one was vs. NJ, and I think the other was against Pittsburgh). We left after the 2nd overtime, drove home, and watched the rest on TV. At the time, it was about the 6th longest game. It is now the 10th longest. The ticket stubs are in my closet somewhere.
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Re: Winter Classic - Sabres vs. Penguins

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I didn't watch game 1 and I'll be damned if I'm going to watch any of the games until the cup can be given out. I hate both Boston & Chicago with the passion of the Christ & wish there was some way both teams could lose.
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Re: Winter Classic - Sabres vs. Penguins

Post by Ran »

Buffalo traded Thomas Vanek to the Islanders for Matt Moulson, their 2014 1st round draft pick, and a 2015 2nd round pick. Probably a good move for the Sabres because they aren't winning anything this year and Vanek most likely wouldn't have re-signed anyway. During the press conference, the Sabres GM didn't rule out trading Moulson before the trade deadline. He also claimed he hadn't been talking to any of the other teams about Ryan Miller.

Naturally, none of the NHL experts saw it coming.
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Re: Winter Classic - Sabres vs. Penguins

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Miller's going, it's just a matter of "where" & "how soon".
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Re: Winter Classic - Sabres vs. Penguins

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jjreason wrote:Miller's going, it's just a matter of "where" & "how soon".
Yeah, it's going to be whoever gets desperate enough for a goalie going into the playoffs. Probably due to injury (or some other goalie shitting the bed).
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Re: Winter Classic - Sabres vs. Penguins

Post by Ran »

Sabres beat the Sharks last night. The Sabres unveiled a new defense which the Toronto Globe called "The Rolston Centipede".

No one has explained exactly why there were 3 guys on Thorton leaving two Sharks in front of the net yet.
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Re: Winter Classic - Sabres vs. Penguins

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I'm guessing they found out Joe is a half-decent playmaker shortly after that pic was snapped?

Here's a rundown of my day today.

0550 - up and at 'em.

0640 (6hrs & 20 min before game time) - on the road.

1000 (3hrs before game time) over the border into Port Huron Michigan - not quite an hour from Detroit in good weather, so call it 90 minutes from Ann Arbor.

1300 (0 hrs before game time) - arrive at Michigan Stadium in time to see fireworks going off & hear the teams introduced and national anthems.... on the radio. Still not parked yet.

1400 Into our seats. Missed a whole fucking period parking, walking to the stadium & waiting on the concourse to get down to our seats. Literally 30 minutes of this was in the lineup just to get into section 28 to get to our seats. Insane. Upon getting to our seats proper it was the end of the first, Wings had outshot the old Buds 17 or 18 to 5. No score. There was some concert thing happening which extended the first break significantly, thank Christ or we would have missed part of the 2nd as well.

The 2nd and third periods we enjoyed at our seats - standing and shuffling our feet the whole time as it was god damned cold the longer you stood outside. Those little hot packet thingies that wusses have with them to make the insides of their gloves warm when their mommies aren't around to hug them & give them hot chocolate? Yeah, I used those.

Daniel Alfredsson opened scoring which drove the Toronto fans fucking insane - it was glorious. JVR tied it up for the leafs after being given at least 3 hacks at the puck from point blank range - lesson to be learned here, Wings D, knock people down when they're doing that for fuck's sake. :frus: Tyler Bozak put the Leafs ahead on a seemingly harmless butterfly from Phaneuf at the point (that I'm sure hit a Wings player's stick on the way in, but they credited Bozak with the goal - it's possible they saw it better on the replay than I could live from row 69 I must admit) but Justin Alphabet showed some hustle and tied the score before the end of the third.

Overtime solved nothing. Of interest, due to wind conditions, they were stopping play at exactly the halfway mark of each period so the goalies could switch ends. I'm absolutely sure this was discussed over and over, and it was decided that the chances of them interrupting play with these stoppages at critical junctures was small enough to risk manage. Well of course, right at 2:30 of OT when the horn went, a Wings forward was just splitting the Leafs D pairing and was heading in for at least a partial breakaway - but the chance was negated by the horn. Even in lowly soccer, play is never stopped when one team has the advantage. I was livid.

The 2nd half of the OT slowed right down with the snow continuing to accumulate on the ice surface faster and faster. Of course the game went to a shootout - what else would happen when your balls are frozen together and you really want to go back to the warm car & head for home? Needless to say, Toronto won the shootout even though Datsyuk's goal showed more style than we had seen from anyone all day. How he did that in the snow I will never understand. I could hear the clink of the puck hitting the iron clearly from my seat. Awesome. Jimmy Howard looked completely baffled on Leafs chances 2 & 3, I don't think he's back to full health - either that or he wanted to get the fuck out of there like I did.

After a long & tiring drive home on snowy roads, I'm finally back & able to type this out. I was nearly 18hrs door to door, but I will always be able to say I was in attendance which is something special. Thanks to my brother for the tickets!
Last edited by jjreason on Thu Jan 02, 2014 10:46 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Winter Classic - Sabres vs. Penguins

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It is cool that you got to go. I forgot it was on and missed most of it. The Sabres have been so bad this year it kind of hurt my interest in hockey. NHL Network managed to find some Lanny Leaf fan to interview. I wanted to slap him.
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Re: Winter Classic - Sabres vs. Penguins

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Yep it was. The negative parts were real & significant, don't get me wrong, but it was worth the effort. I'm a big Michigan football fan, and this was my first trip to that stadium in all these years. Because of the issues just getting to our seats, I'm in no real hurry to make an effort to back for football - that really pissed me off. Most impressive once you get in there & get to your spot though, as I always thought it would be.

EDITED: Ran you should have knocked up the wife 9 months & 1 day ago: http://instagram.com/p/iowGe8gXp7/#
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Re: Winter Classic - Sabres vs. Penguins

Post by Ran »

They would have never made it out to Vegas. Sabres post a lot of pictures on Twitter of their players/front office staff visiting people in hospitals.

I guess traffic is a side effect of big events like that. Do you know how much I hate people and traffic? I took off work on Tuesday because I didn't want to have to through the New Years Eve traffic near the Las Vegas Strip. They started road closures around 5 PM.
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Re: Winter Classic - Sabres vs. Penguins

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The people part was absolutely nuts - I don't really like crowds all that much either honestly - but I was REALLY surprised that we didn't get into much worse traffic snags leaving the stadium. I went with a hunch & went against the flow to start & found the expressway from a different access point then worked my way back - I think it saved me the hassle of waiting at the on ramp from the main 2 streets & might have gotten me out ahead of the main crowd.
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Re: Winter Classic - Sabres vs. Penguins

Post by Ran »

I got home in time today to catch part of TSN's coverage of the trade deadline on the NHL Network. They had quotes from twitter popping up at the bottom of the screen. Many of the tweets were from fans saying welcome or goodbye to traded players. There were several from Devils fans happy that Brodeur didn't get traded. Then there were tweets from Leaf fans. Is it possible to be a fan of Toronto and not be delusional? Some were mad that they didn't trade for everybody despite the fact that they have not cap space or many assets to move. Others were saying the Leafs didn't need to make any moves because the team will win the cup as-is. Maybe Bushkorn abandoned youtube for twitter. Would he be considered a Lanny?
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Re: Winter Classic - Sabres vs. Penguins

Post by Ran »

I'm not sure who here participated in it, but somehow I won the Tie Domi Fan Club fantasy hockey league championship.
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Re: Winter Classic - Sabres vs. Penguins

Post by Diabolical »

Ran wrote:I'm not sure who here participated in it, but somehow I won the Tie Domi Fan Club fantasy hockey league championship.
Fuck you.

I butt fucked everyone all season long and end with a 38 point lead heading into the playoffs and wind up with 4th fucking place.

Thanks Obama.
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