Battle Of Hudson

Devils with a poor effort on the second of back-to-back nights, losing 4-0 at the WachOff Center. I’m not gonna knock Marty with the defense he has in front of him. What a piss-poor group this is. I never thought I’d be begging to get Colin White back. Martin and Rachunek awful. Vishnevski invisible. Mottau and Greene still green (pardon the pun) and Oduya is barely stabilizing his game at this point.

That said, what a game played by Martin Biron tonight. 38 saves from the Flyer goaltender, and terrific rebound control. The Devils rarely got a second chance shot, which brings up an odd point: The Devils AGAIN, dominated at periods of time. The Flyers couldn’t buy possesion on Park Place last night. It’s just one or two bad bounces, and away goes Sami Kapanen or another forward and the defense and Brodeur were just unable to handle it.

Let’s go around the league, check back at 1AM for a full recap, including attendance numbers at every rink because we know how much you love analyze those.

Marco Sturm and Mark Stuart each struck twice as the Bruins won their home opener over Tampa Bay, 5-1. The Bruins were the second to last team to open their building, the final one will happen in New Jersey’ largest city on October 27th. Unfortunately with the Red Sox still in action, the Bruins 4-2 mark has gone unnoticed in Beantown. But if Kevin Garnett doesn’t get it done with the Celtics, the spotlight will be on the black and gold once again.

Bill Guerin struck three times, his first three of the season, as the Islanders fought off a 3rd period comeback from Washington (That included Alex Ovechkin’s 4th) to win it 5-2. The Islanders are 4-2.

Check out our Ranger recap from Lenny for more on their 5-3 loss to Atlanta. Shanahan and Gomez struck late for NYR.

Nik Antropov scored with 28 seconds to go and the Leafs got off the schneid, defeating Florida 3-2. Jason Blake got his first of the year for Leaf Nation.

The Senators won a battle of two Canadian clubs, beating Montreal 4-3, and lookie here…Jason Spezza got the winner, his first goal of the season. In the “good for him” column, Nick Foligno got his first career goal. Dany Heatley (7th) and Wade Redden cashed in for Ottawa, as Guillame Latendresse, Michael Ryder and Alex Kovalev struck for Montreal.

Mike Cammalleri has goal #7 and the Kings have a 2-1 lead in Calgary. Kristian Huselius has the only Calgary goal, while Dustin Brown has the go-ahead for LA.

Edmonton and Phoenix just getting under way in the valley of the Sun.

Detroit and San Jose at 10:30.

Not a good game for the Rangers tonight. A few things from my point of view:

– I stand by the decision to sit Malik tonight. He needed a day off. The defense looked no better without him in it, but it was a necessary move. We’ll probably see him back in next game.

– Nigel Dawes is NHL ready. No questions asked.

– How in the world did Garnet Exelby get away with the charge on Prucha? And then he couldn’t man up and face someone? C’mon, if you’re going to play on the edge, expect to take some hits back. The hit was high, he left his skates and it was late. I don’t understand. The kneeing penatly was terrible as well. The officials let this game get out of hand.

– Lost in the whole game was Lundqvist’s play. The score was lopsided for most of the game, but he made some amazing saves.

– Give it up to Johan Hedberg. The Rangers are making mediocre goalies look amazing to start the year.

– Congrats to Girardi, first NHL goal. Congrats to Shanahan on his first, long overdue goal of the season. Good to see him stand up in a big way for Jagr. That is the kind of thing that will energize a team.

– There are 76 games left. We should not panic, but there should be a sense of urgency. The problem on defense needs to be addressed, and not with trading youth for Ed Jovanovski. Maybe a call up, Ivan Baranka or Liffiton looked good for Hartford, although I think Liffiton has to go through waivers. Jason Strudwick also didn’t look too bad when he was paired with Mara early in the year.

Let’s hope they rebound in a big way. And quickly. Saturday’s game will be blacked out for me most likely so I’ll check in at night. Goodnight.

I’d like to give a welcome to our newest member Ray.

Updating the locals, the Caps are on the board and trail the Isles 2-1 in the third.

NYI- Bergenheim, Guerin
Wsh- Ovechkin

The Rangers trail the Thrashers still 3-0 in the third. Make it 4-0. How’s that Malik scratch looking now? Think this team could actually show up? Paging Scott Gomez and Chris Drury. Paging Jagr who has no shots and has been invisible. Paging anyone?

NYR- None (1 even strength goal in last nine periods) guessing that’s not good
Atl- Dupuis, Kozlov, White, Little

The Devils trail the Flyers by the same margin with the third just ahead.

NJ- None despite 27 shots to 13 edge.
Phi- Richards, Kapanen, Dowd (yes really)

Other games:

Boston leads Tampa 2-1.

TB- Richards
Bos- Schaefer, Sturm

Florida and Toronto are tied 2-2.

Fla- Olesz, Booth
Tor- McCabe, Blake

Ottawa leads the Canadiens 3-2.

Mtl- Latendresse, Ryder
Ott- Redden, Foligno (1st of NHL career), Heatley (NHL leading 7th)

Kings-Flames just underway.

Oilers-Coyotes later.

Wings-Sharks later.

Say a hi, hello and welcome to Ray Calderon of IslesEnforcers.com, who agreed to come over here in place of Rob after he left. Ray will be an invaluable asset to our team, giving us Isles news and notes. If you enjoy sites like hockeyfights.com, you’ll enjoy IslesEnforcers.com

Good road period from the Devils.

Derek, the puck was not obscured it was clearly loose in the crease, and the THREE Pens defenders in the way of Fleury did more to hurt than Gionta did.

Gionta’s is not a cheap player, not compared to guys like Avery. The fact is Fleury fell on his own accord.

8:45 -Still 3-0 Thrashers. It seems like the Rangers always run into the hot goalie. Bottom line is the defense is full of holes. Tyutin and Girardi are a great combination but even they will falter sometimes. Roszival is playing a bad game, as is Pock. Pock we can chalk up to rust, Roszy has no excuse. They need to get on the same page and the offense needs to build some chemistry. Pronto.

8:23 – Apparently if you are skating backwards with the puck over the blueline, the linesman can rule it onsides. I had no idea of that rule. Learn something new everyday.

8:20 – 3-0 Atlanta. Todd White was extremely offsides, but the Rangers are playing sloppy, sloppy defense. I said in the beginning of the year if they were going to be successful, the defense needed to be better than last year. That is not the case so far this season, but especially not this game. The offense is playing well, we just haven’t buried any.

7:45 – End of period one. 2-0 Atlanta. Pascal Dupuis and Slava Kozlov scored for the Thrashers, who came out playing hard, and the Rangers were flat. Good news for the Rangers is they had a lot of opportunities. Bad news is so did Atlanta. They have to tighten up defensively and put some through on Hedberg the rest of the way out.

Update 7:35 – Kari Lethonen is out of goal and Johan Hedberg is in. Sam and Joe are saying it is a groin injury, which is good news for the Rangers. Thomas Pock has a lot of rust right now, and is a disaster waiting to happen.

The Rangers and Thrashers are squaring off right now on MSG and the hungry Thrashers are already off to a 2-0 lead.

Thomas Pock lost his stick on the first goal, failing to recover in time. The second goal was scored on a 5 on 3 power play, which was a very questionable call on Ryan Callahan, and a really weak interference call on Petr Prucha. The Thrashers have come out flying, and it has taken a little over 10 minutes for the Rangers to wake up.

Nigel Dawes looks great so far, and Tyutin and Girardi are the 1st pairing on defense. I’ll update again in a bit.

To come out flat against the only winless team in hockey who already axed their coach?

Two Atlanta goals. Undisciplined penalties and no defensive coverage.

Ranger fans have always wanted Marek Malik scratched. It should be an easy win, right?

Steve, Gionta is a cheap player. He intentionally went into Fleury and the goalie had no chance. How could you not see that? Why no reply on the other points to the view being obscured?

Let’s just say you’re wearing your team colors and leave it at that. Back to the game.

Lehtonen who looked razor sharp is out after robbing a couple of Blueshirts. He left with an injury. Hedberg who has played well in the past against the Rangers at Phillips Arena is in.

Still 2-0. Nearly three as they allowed Brian Little to break in untouched.

Will Ranger fans blame Malik? Stay tuned.

The Islanders face off with the Capitals in mere minutes and Aaron Johnson, whom the Islanders signed in the offseason to vie for one of the last defense positions, and has been a healthy scratch in every game this season, will play his first game tonight.

Johnson will not be playing defense but playing wing with Chris Simon and Richard Park. Johnson has played a handful of games on offense last season with Columbus. Mark Andre Bergeron who is apparently in Ted Nolans doghouse, will be a healthy scratch tonight as well as Darryl Bootland.

The best news the New York Rangers’ fans have heard in a long time was announced today. Marek Malik will be a healthy scratch tonight in favor of Thomas Pock. Pock will play alongside Roszival on top unit, although it can now be debated that Fedor Tyutin and Dan Girardi are the top defense pairing in New York. Malik needed a day off to compose himself, and Pock deserves a look. I don’t expect this move to be permanent though. Jaromir Jagr and Malik are friends, Tom Renney has a thing for sticking with the veterans, and Pock is in no way a top defenseman.

Also, as said yesterday, Nigel Dawes will be skating with Jagr and Scott Gomez tonight. What’s interesting is what will happen if Dawes clicks with them. Marcel Hossa is very expendable, so Dawes can have his spot if he is producing, although I am really not ready to give up on Hossa. The big problem arises when Sean Avery comes back. Avery is a different player than everyone else on the roster. Does Dawes sit when he comes back? Do we lose someone else? Or is someone stashed away on the 4th line, like Prucha or Callahan? These questions are a couple of weeks away from needing answers but it’s still not a bad idea to think about them now.

I’ll check in period by period during tonight’s game against the Thrashers.

Derek, if you watch the video, you’re absolutely incorrect. If you watch the video (http://youtube.com/watch?v=Yz-QhWFOdFg) you’ll see that Fleury either falls on his own accord or is tripped by his own defenseman. Gionta went looking for the puck in the crease and got pushed into Fleury.

It’s a good goal.