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Post by MPLABBE on Nov 5, 2002 20:58:41 GMT -5
That says it all. The Blues were just all over the ice from the midway point of this game. Great transition game, plenty of speed, great defensively, deadly special teams, no scoring chances for us,etc Like Garbo said, it was combination of us being so bad on this night and them being so good. God imagine if they had Pronger/Tkachuk/Johnson out there
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Post by MPLABBE on Nov 5, 2002 22:15:10 GMT -5
BTW I hope this doesn't put all the fans in a state of panic again or bring the Theo bashers back in full force. We just got our butt kicked by the best team in the league so far. No biggie. Hell, this could have been a real blowout and not the close affair it was for about 50 minutes.
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Post by JohnnyVerdun on Nov 5, 2002 22:16:40 GMT -5
What I saw tonight was the effect of a bad goal given up against a team where you absolutely, positively must have excellent goaltending. Until Theo gave up the soft one to Rucinsky on the pp the Habs were playing with the Blues and were getting excellent chances. Rucinsky dribbles one at the net while Theo is doing his fish routine and the air just went out of the balloon. Period.
A better team would recover, no question, and had they potted one of those chances before the game was tied at two the game might also have been different, but this is not the first time he's given up a bad goal at a crucial time and it hurt them badly tonight. Right in the solar plexus....
Hackett gives them a better chance to win right now. That may be tough for some people to swallow but there it is. There it is.
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Post by GARB08 on Nov 5, 2002 22:18:10 GMT -5
We need a better system to stop these big forechecking teams thats it, Philly ones us because they can walk all over us. I think that all we need to do is get a better system and we're good.
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Post by larek on Nov 5, 2002 23:45:04 GMT -5
Theo was very very very ordinary tonight,Ruscinski goal was weak,He pushed the puck out to the Blues player who shot it into an open net and i thought the Weight goal was weak,was an angle shot from close in that Theo should have had.I dont see Hackett being traded in the near future unless someone gives an offer savard cannot refuse!
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Post by JohnnyVerdun on Nov 6, 2002 0:24:21 GMT -5
I think you're right, Larek. Savard's probably not getting good offers anyway and, as ugly as it might be to carry three goalies, the risks involved in moving Hackett at this point clearly outweigh the benefits. Theo is not the same goaltender he was last year and if he doesn't get things straightened away we're going to be forced to rely more and more heavily on Hackett. It's entirely arguable that we should have played Hackett tonight, and I don't mean in hindsight. He is unbeaten, after all. He's allowed perhaps one soft goal in 4 or 5 starts. He's stoned the opposition in almost every one of his games. And he's fundamentally sound. Plus, the team appears to be more confident with him in goal, no matter what they might say. The way they folded after the Rucinsky goal tonight was pretty telling. It was almost as though they were saying to themselves: "uh, oh, here we go again". That's hard to contend with.
Maybe Savard will shock us and move Garon, sign Hackett to an extension as the back-up, and give Theo every third or fourth start until he shows he's cured....But that's doubtful. The reason being that, if you move Garon, and Theo really does a Thibault and can't deal with the pressure and expectations, and doesn't bounce back, then you have to move Theo and all you're left with is Hackett (with one or two years left) and a couple of really big question marks in Tarasov and Michaud....That's why he won't move Garon. He hangs on to Garon in case the whole Theodore thing becomes a real fiasco and Theo has to be moved next year to kick-start his career and to get some value before playing in Montreal gives him an ulcer and ruins him for good.....
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Post by UberCranky on Nov 6, 2002 0:31:01 GMT -5
JV, Tarasov is not doing well at all according to my Russian sources. In fact he has slipped to a back-up status on his team.
If our entire future is Michaud then I am worried, nee, frightened.
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Post by larek on Nov 6, 2002 0:47:48 GMT -5
Ya our goaltending prospects dont look as strong as they did last year,what about our finnish goaltending prospect?His name escapes me but how has he been doing?Isnt his name purrala or something like that?
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Post by seventeen on Nov 6, 2002 1:31:23 GMT -5
He (Puurola) did not get off to a good start, but was improving. I still think he's our best prospect (I can see clearly now, the pain has gone)
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Post by montreal on Nov 6, 2002 2:18:07 GMT -5
JV, Tarasov is not doing well at all according to my Russian sources. In fact he has slipped to a back-up status on his team. If our entire future is Michaud then I am worried, nee, frightened. Well I don't know about that. Tarasov, may never come back over, but he has picked his game up somewhat, from the stats I have seen. Just the other day, he had a very good game (either it was russianprospects.com or russianinsider found at HF) where I read this. Also Tarasov was named to the Russian Senior National Team (could just be a backup, I have no ideal) so that can't be bad (along with fellow Hab prospect Alex Perezhogin, the tournament is sometime this month same as the U-20's). Michaud has been getting shelled this year, as his team was great last year, and now they suck. But he also has had a few good games lately ( I think he got defence player of the week in the Q, but my memory tricks me sometimes) Also, it might be a good thing, yes he won a lot of games last year, but was only facing 20 shots per game, and now he sees 30-35 so he's getting his pratice. But even though I have never seen him play, I have heard many good things about our Finnish goalie prospect Joni Puurula. I have spoken with some guys from Finland (or thats what they tell me, internet who knows?) and they seem to think he's one of the top young Finnish goalie prospects (he's only 20), but we'll have to wait and see.
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Post by montreal on Nov 6, 2002 2:23:22 GMT -5
What I saw tonight was the effect of a bad goal given up against a team where you absolutely, positively must have excellent goaltending. Until Theo gave up the soft one to Rucinsky on the pp the Habs were playing with the Blues and were getting excellent chances. Rucinsky dribbles one at the net while Theo is doing his fish routine and the air just went out of the balloon. Period. A better team would recover, no question, and had they potted one of those chances before the game was tied at two the game might also have been different, but this is not the first time he's given up a bad goal at a crucial time and it hurt them badly tonight. Right in the solar plexus.... Hackett gives them a better chance to win right now. That may be tough for some people to swallow but there it is. There it is. Yea, I agree. The game was going fine, until Markov does the slip and slide and Theo gives up a softe. I think the refs didnt have their best game either, but Brisebois made a few mistakes, along with Markov, and when your top defencemen mess up, it usually spells trouble. I might be alone in this, but I thought Theo made some of his best saves of the year. I mean the 2nd on he was just getting shelled, and for the most part (aside from the softie) he was ok. The team has to learn, when your 30th in the league in PK, playing one of the top PP's, stay out of the box, don't play "lets see how long it takes them to score" or "well our PK needs practice anyway", cause you will get burnt even if God is in nets. Did I say God, I meant Roy.
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Post by MPLABBE on Nov 6, 2002 8:20:37 GMT -5
Montreal, what is that ''slipe and slide'' from Markov? before the Rucinsky goal? If Markov was only an inch or two longer he could have poked that puck away... I agree with you Theodore, he made some tough saves out there last night...
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Post by larek on Nov 6, 2002 11:13:01 GMT -5
Its great to make the tough saves but it kind of defeats the purpose when you let in soft goals!
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Post by JohnnyVerdun on Nov 6, 2002 11:24:54 GMT -5
Any decent NHL goalie -- any one -- will make about 25 to 30 saves a night. Of the thirty shots on goal, maybe 5 amount to really good scoring chances. It's what happens with those five shots that separates the excellent from the merely very good. The excellent (like Theo last year) will routinely stop three of those great opportunities. The good will only stop two of them. But in both cases you're presupposing that none of the other 25 -- none of the more or less routine shots -- are getting by you. Because if you let in a soft goal, one of the 25 that 99% of NHL goalies will stop on a given night, it often doesn't matter whether you later stop three or only two of the great chances. And the reason it doesn't matter is that a soft goal at a crucial time can just deflate you team. If the Habs give the Blues 6 or 7 glorious chances, with guys walking in alone with time or on odd-man breaks, and Theo allows 4 goals, I blame the team. But if until the mid-way point in the second the team is going toe to toe with the best in the league and is leading 2-1 despite too many powerplays, and Theo lets in a shuffleboard shot from Rucinsky following which the air goes out of the tires, I blame Theo at least as much as the rest of them. More, actually.
So you can talk all you like about the tough saves he made when it was 3-2 or 4-2, but to me he'd already played a major role in the loss after Rucinsky slid one towards the net and his stick wasn't where it was supposed to be: on the g*ddamned ice...
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Post by The Habitual Fan on Nov 6, 2002 14:35:16 GMT -5
Theo should have stopped at least two of the goals last night. No real excuse for the Rucinsky goal just lack of concentration and the 5th was a very stoppable 5 hole. Having said that he did also make some great saves so I wouldn't be too concerned about how our Finnish goaltending prospect is doing this week or if Michaud is NHL ready.
The biggest concern is that the team was out played, hit and skated the entire night. I kept counting to see if they had 5 men on the ice, and at one point there was six and that didn't help. St. Louis may have won 9 in a row, but watching them outshoot the Habs 36-15 it must have been one of the easier ones.
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Post by montreal on Nov 6, 2002 15:44:02 GMT -5
Montreal, what is that ''slipe and slide'' from Markov? before the Rucinsky goal? If Markov was only an inch or two longer he could have poked that puck away... I agree with you Theodore, he made some tough saves out there last night... Markov mad a bad decision, IMO, to try and block a shot that close in. Once you leave your feet, its block it, or the play can get real ugly fast. To me it was a poor decision, but he's young and should be pulled aside after the game, and shown the tape. Green should tell him, you see this, don't do it. I'm all for blocking shots, but that one was poorly timed, and not a good place to go for a slide.
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Post by MPLABBE on Nov 6, 2002 16:48:31 GMT -5
Yeah his lack of experience on a PK showed on that sequence...
Did that Weight goal go through the 5 hole? I thought it went top corner?(I have crappy eyes and I can have trouble seeing the puck in in tight situations)
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