Gobble Gobble

HAPPY THANKSGIVING to one and all!



-m

Oi Vey!

Islanders 4 - Canes 2
(and it wasn't even that close)

Well, that was not what we needed.

If the Cane's were "lazy" Tuesday night against the Rangers, they were down right PATHETIC on Wednesday against the Islanders. If this were a character test, everyone - with the notable exception of John Grahame - failed miserably.

One would have hoped for a bounce back effort; for a bit more energy, a bit more grit, a bit more fire than was on display at Madison Sqaure Garden on Tuesday night. But on this night, the mausoleum on Long Island (otherwise known as the Nassau County Coliseum) was the perfect setting as the Hurricanes played as if they were on their way to a funeral all night. I'm not sure what I can say. It was frustrating to watch. The Canes were so sluggish and sloppy with the puck that they seemed to play in their own zone all night. It was as if they were down a man on the power play all night. Turnovers. Getting beat time after time to the puck in the neutral zone. Sloppy passes. And seemingly losing every battle along the boards for most of the night. I had thought that it could not get much worse than the Ranger's game. I WAS WRONG.

According to the TSN Game Re-Cap Carolina coach Peter Laviolette took an extra long time to emerge from his office to meet with the press after the game. Needless to say, he was none too happy:

''John Grahame was great. He kept us in the game. I don't think anybody (else) played well. This is unacceptable. This was a terrible game. After last night, I thought we would show more fight.''

You and me both Peter.

John Grahame was indeed stellar. 44 saves on 47 shots (the official shot tally for NY was 48, but their last goal was an empty netter from the blue line). Many of those saves were from point blank range, from Islanders left wide open and unchecked in the front of the net. Without Grahame single handedly keeping them in the game for more than two periods, the score could have easily been 10-2, or worse. The Canes were outshot 20 to 1 in the first period. That 1 was a slapshot from Kevin Adams from 30 feet away with under 2 minutes to play. Carolina managed 15 shots for the entire game.
Scott Walker and Trevor Letowski notched essentially meaningless goals in the final minutes.

Laviolette became visibly more and more incensed with his team's lackluster play as the game wore on. He seemed especially miffed at the efforts of his "star" players as Eric Cole, Ray Whitney and Eric Staal saw their minutes diminish signifcantly in the third period.

Less than a week ago, the Canes seemed to have hit their stride, playing their best hockey of the year. Over the last 48 hours they have played without a doubt their worst hockey of the year, and if they don't right the ship soon this could get real ugly.

Not much time to recover or mope around. The Canes have an off day tomorrow in Boston and then a 12noon puck drop on Friday against the Bruins. I'm not sure if even Peter Laviolette would cancel an off day on Thanksgiving for one of those brutal soul-crushing-attitude-adjustment practice sessions. But from what I've seen the last two nights, I sure wouldn't blame him.

- Atlanta notched a win tonight 4-2 over the Capitals, ending the Thrashers 4 game losing skid, and sending them back to the top of the Southeast division. The game turned into a slugfest near the end, with over 162 penalty minutes being assessed in the last 62 seconds of the third. Look for some suspensions to come out of this fracas.

- David Tanabe and Andrew Hutchinson were healthy scratches for tonights game.

-m

Dud

I'm baaaack....

Long time between posts. Work has been crazy of late. Life in general has been busy. Severely cutting into blogging time. Will have to get back into the habit.

The Canes went on quite a little run there, climbing all the way back into a first place tie with the Thrashers. Got to check out 3 games in person at the RBC Center, all wins. Our seats this year are indeed "up in the rafters", but it's all good. For the Pittsburgh game a couple of weeks ago, I shelled out the big bucks ($85) for the primo seat - center ice, section 119, downstairs...best seats I've ever had...I was literally straddling the center-ice line...and well worth it...a great game, a Canes win.

Back to the present...last night's game against the Rangers was a big fat DUD. Painful to watch. The Canes were flat, got out skated, out hit, out shot and out hustled. Everything that had went right over the past few weeks and a 6-1-1 streak, definitely went wrong in Madison Square Garden. Doh! If it were not for some spectacular goaltending, and Jagr inexplicably blowing a 2-on-none breakaway, the final score could have, and probably should have been a lot worse than 4-0 Rangers. Laviolette described it after the game as a "lazy" effort. And I think that is putting it mildly.

Well, it's back to the ice in about 30minutes on the Island. Perhaps the quick turnaround will work in our favor. No time to stew over a dismal performance. Will be interesting to see how the Canes respond. I think the biggest challenge the Canes will face all year is maintaining their intensity and fightring off complacency. They came out a bit complacent at the beginning of the year and dug themselves a whole. After fighting and clawing to dig themselves out of that hole, regaining the top of the Southeast division and second place in the Eastern Conference, they came out flat and complacent again against the Rangers. Wake up call? One can only hope. This 3 games in 4 days stretch in NY and Boston is a real test of their mettle.

Let's see how they respond tonight on Long Island.

Go Canes.

-m